Privacy Policy

Last updated September 4, 2026

Early-access notice: SearchTester is not yet accepting paid subscriptions. This policy is an operational draft pending qualified legal review before paid launch.

SearchTester is a Practico Media service that helps businesses evaluate and improve how their public web presence appears in search and AI-assisted discovery. This policy explains the information SearchTester processes and the choices available to account holders and people who submit customer requests.

Information and sources

We collect information you provide, including your name, business name, email address, website address, password in one-way hashed form, approved business facts, account settings, support messages, and records of your acceptance of our policies. We receive publicly available website content when you request an analysis and store the resulting report. We also receive basic device, request, and delivery information needed for security, fraud prevention, email delivery, and service operation.

Sessions and cookies

SearchTester uses essential, secure session cookies to keep customers and administrators signed in. We do not currently use the service to sell personal information or for cross-context behavioral advertising.

Customer action requests

When you use a SearchTester-hosted form to contact a participating business, we collect the information entered in that form, which may include your name, email address, phone number, postal code, requested service, contact preference, and request details. We provide that information to the business you chose to contact and retain a service copy for no more than 90 days so the business can manage and respond to the request. The business can delete a submission sooner. We also process a one-way representation of network information to limit spam and abuse.

The participating business decides how it responds and is responsible for its own communications, privacy practices, and any copy it keeps after receiving the request. SearchTester does not sell the request, independently market to the requester, confirm an appointment, or make a commitment for the business.

Connected Google accounts

If you choose to connect Google Search Console, SearchTester requests the webmasters.readonly scope plus basic account identity. It can list properties and display query, page, impression, click, click-through-rate, and average-position information for the property you select. It cannot change Search Console data and never receives your Google password. Authorization tokens are stored in encrypted form.

SearchTester uses Google data only to provide the connected, customer-facing features you request. We do not sell it, use it for advertising, use it to train general-purpose AI models, or allow routine human access. Transfers are limited to service operation with providers acting for us, security, legal compliance, or a business transaction with required notice or consent.

SearchTester’s use and transfer of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements. The in-account disconnect control asks Google to revoke the authorization and, after Google confirms, permanently deletes SearchTester’s token copies.

How we use information

We use information to provide requested analyses and account features, authenticate users, publish customer-approved business resources, deliver customer requests, monitor configured websites, provide support, prevent abuse, maintain security, comply with law, and improve service reliability. We do not use connected Google data or customer-action submissions to train general-purpose AI models.

Service providers and disclosures

We use infrastructure, database, email-delivery, monitoring, Google integration, and payment providers to operate SearchTester. These providers process only the information needed for their function and are governed by their own terms and our arrangements with them. We may also disclose information when required by law, to protect the service or its users, or in connection with a merger, acquisition, financing, or sale, subject to applicable notice and consent requirements.

Stripe will process payment details if paid subscriptions are activated. SearchTester should not receive or store full card numbers. Google receives information as part of an OAuth connection under Google’s policies.

Retention schedule

Account, profile, scan, publishing, monitoring, and workspace records remain while the account is open. Hosted customer-action submissions and email-delivery metadata are deleted after 90 days. Expired password-reset, email-verification, and Google authorization-state records are removed within 7 days. Customers may delete individual hosted action submissions sooner.

Confirmed account deletion immediately removes the live customer account, hosted pages, scans, action submissions, workspace records, and local provider-token copies. Encrypted disaster-recovery snapshots age out on a rolling schedule, with monthly snapshots retained for up to 12 months. Backup data is not used for ordinary operations. A minimal deletion record containing internal identifiers, a one-way email hash, completion time, and provider-cancellation outcomes is retained for 3 years so deletions can be reapplied after a disaster restore and completion can be documented. Payment processors may retain invoices and legally required financial records under their own policies and applicable law.

Security and choices

We use reasonable technical and organizational safeguards. Signed-in customers can download a portable account export, delete hosted request records, revoke a Google connection, cancel subscription renewal, or permanently delete the SearchTester account from Data & privacy. Connected business profiles remain under your platform accounts; SearchTester does not take ownership of those relationships. Privacy requests may also be sent to us, and a person who submitted a customer action may contact the participating business or SearchTester.

Your privacy requests

Depending on where you live and which laws apply, you may have rights to request access, correction, deletion, or a portable copy of personal information and to appeal a denied request. SearchTester will verify a request before acting and will not discriminate against a person for exercising an applicable privacy right. We do not currently sell personal information or share it for cross-context behavioral advertising.

Children

SearchTester is a business service and is not directed to children under 13. Do not submit a child’s personal information through a hosted customer-request form.

Changes

We may update this policy as the service, providers, or legal requirements change. If a change materially expands how connected Google data or other personal information is used, we will provide appropriate notice and request new consent where required.

Contact

Questions or privacy requests may be sent to [email protected].

Qualified counsel must approve this policy and the corresponding product disclosures before SearchTester accepts paying customers.