Privacy Policy

What we collect, why, and what you can do about it. Last updated October 12, 2026.

HistoricTrails.org is a free resource for hikers. We collect as little as we can get away with, we do not sell anything about you, and we do not run advertising. This page describes what the site stores and who can see it.

Browsing without an account

You can read published hikes and use the site's hiking tools without signing up. We do not ask who you are to do any of that.

If you take part while signed out, for example by voting, rating, sending a suggestion or reporting something, we record it against a pseudonymous identifier for your browser, not your identity. To spot abuse we also keep one-way hashes of your IP address and browser details, computed with a secret key we never publish. We do not store the raw values alongside what you submitted, and the hashes are deleted within a year.

If you create an account

We store:

• Your name, username, email address, and anything else you add to your profile.
• Your password, only as a cryptographic hash. Nobody here can read it, and the password itself never leaves the site.
• Basic account activity, such as when you last signed in, which helps keep hikes maintained.
• Anything you choose to publish or send: hikes, photos, ratings, reviews and suggestions.
• The walks you log and what you attach to them.
• If you choose to share your location with us while submitting photos, feedback or other content, such as where a historic marker you found stands, we keep it with what you submitted.
• Usernames you used before, so nobody else can register one and pretend to be you.

One-time sign-in codes we email you are deleted automatically after a short time.

Who can see what

• Published hikes, and the ratings and reviews people leave on them, are public.
• Photos you upload are shown publicly as part of a published hike, on a walk you have logged, and on other parts of the site, including your profile.
• A suggestion you send about a hike goes to that hike's maintainer and to site administrators, so we can act on harassment and keep content accurate. It is not public.
• Reports you file go to administrators only.
• Hikes that are not published are visible to their maintainer and to administrators.
• Your public profile shows your name, username, bio, and what you have published and earned on the site. You choose in your settings whether it also shows your hiking activity; when it does, strangers see approximate dates, never exact ones. You and site administrators always see your full record.

Cookies and browser storage

We use cookies and your browser's storage to keep you signed in, to protect forms, to remember your preferences, and to keep your place in something you are partway through. We do not use advertising cookies. Analytics cookies are set only if you allow them.

Measuring visits

If you allow it, we use Google Analytics to learn how the site is used: which pages people visit, how they found us, and what site features you use. Analytics cookies are set only after you choose Allow. Until then, or if you decline, your browser may still send Google basic signals without cookies, which Google uses only to estimate overall visits. We never send Google your name or email address. You can change your choice at any time with the Analytics choices link at the bottom of every page.

We count visits to each hike in total, without recording who visited.

Other services your browser contacts

Pages load map imagery and fonts from outside providers. Those providers necessarily see your IP address in order to serve the request, as any server does. Links to outside sites, such as a store selling a hike's souvenir, are covered by that site's own policy once you follow them.

Contacting us

The contact form sends us your name, email address, subject and message so we can reply. We keep the correspondence only as long as we need it to answer you.

Children

Our hikes are written with youth groups in mind, but this site is intended to be used by the adults who organize and lead them. It is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. We never ask any visitor for their age or date of birth. If you believe a child has given us personal information, contact us and we will remove it.

Deleting your content and your account

You can delete your account from your settings at any time. You can no longer sign in, and your profile and your personal activity disappear from the site. We keep the account and its content rather than erasing them, so it can be restored later. To have it permanently erased instead, use our contact form.

Hikes you wrote are not deleted. A hike is a contribution to the community, so it stays published and becomes available for someone else to maintain, with you still credited as its original creator. Moderation records and suggestions also remain, with your name removed from them, so that reports of harassment cannot be erased by deleting an account.

You can delete a photo you uploaded, and closing your account takes your photos down. The one exception is a photo on a hike that someone else now maintains: it stays with that hike, the same as the rest of its content. Photo files are retained unless you ask us to erase them; anyone can use our contact form to request that a photo come down.

Security

Passwords are hashed, cookies are encrypted and signed, and access to anything that is not public is enforced on the server rather than merely hidden in the interface. No system is perfect, and we will tell affected users promptly if something goes wrong.

California residents

We do not sell or share personal information, and we do not use it for cross-context behavioral advertising. You may ask what we hold about you, ask for it to be corrected, or ask us to delete it, and we will not treat you differently for asking.

Changes

If this policy changes in a way that affects what we collect or who sees it, we will update the date at the top of this page.

Questions

Ask us through our contact page.