In today’s digital landscape, privacy and data protection are of paramount importance. Edgee is deeply committed to upholding the highest standards of user privacy and data security. This document outlines our privacy practices, focusing on how we anonymize data before sending it to analytics destinations, ensuring compliance with global data protection regulations.

Anonymizing Data: How We Protect User Privacy

At Edgee, we employ data anonymization techniques to ensure that personal information cannot be linked back to any individual. Our approach centers on two key aspects: IP address handling and Cookie ID management.

IP Address Anonymization

The fundamental problem hindering client-side analytics data collection is that of direct contact, via an HTTPS connection, between the person’s terminal and data processing servers.

The resulting requests generally enable these servers to obtain the Internet user’s IP address, as well as a wide range of information about his or her terminal. Realistically, this information can be used to re-identify the user and, consequently, to access his or her browsing habits on all sites using the same audience measurement tool.

Edgee, operating at the edge as a proxy, breaks the contact between the terminal and the analytics solution.

  • Proxy Handling: Edgee operates as a proxy, meaning that all requests to analytics services are made through Edgee’s servers. To ensure privacy, Edgee anonymizes the client’s IP address by truncating the last byte before any data is transmitted to third parties. This method effectively obscures the full IP address, ensuring that the original, complete IP address is never directly exposed to external entities. This precaution helps maintain the privacy and anonymity of users, preventing third parties from potentially identifying individuals based on their IP addresses.

Edgee utilizes a first-party encrypted cookie to manage user sessions and verify user authenticity. This cookie serves a dual purpose:

  1. Verifying that the user is a genuine person (not a bot)

  2. Enabling session to understand user recurrence over time

Each cookie contains:

  1. An encrypted string, decipherable only by Edgee, ensuring that the contents remain confidential and secure from client-side access.

  2. An anonymous user ID and session information, which are used internally to distinguish between users and understand user behavior over time without compromising privacy.

  • Privacy-focused ID Use: The use of this encrypted cookie is strictly confined within Edgee’s edge processing environment. Although the anonymous user ID is transmitted to third-party analytics providers, it remains encrypted and inaccessible to client-side libraries. This ensures that no entity outside of Edgee can use this ID to identify individual users.

  • Dynamic Cookie Encryption: To enhance security and privacy, the encrypted cookie is regenerated with each request. This dynamic approach ensures that the cookie’s information cannot be reused or intercepted for tracking, further safeguarding user privacy.

  • Edge-generated IDs for Analytics: In addition to the encrypted cookie, Edgee can generate new, distinct user IDs at the edge for each analytics component. These IDs maintain session continuity and user distinction across different analytics tools without revealing or transmitting any personally identifiable information. The robust encryption and regeneration strategy of the cookie ensures that these IDs can be securely passed to analytics platforms, supporting comprehensive data analysis while preserving user anonymity.

Ensuring Compliance and Upholding Trust

  • Data Minimization: Edgee practices data minimization, collecting only what is necessary to deliver valuable insights and analytics. This principle is key to respecting user privacy and adhering to legal frameworks.

  • Compliance with Global Regulations: Our data processing and anonymization practices are designed to comply with major data protection laws such as the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) in Europe, the CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) in the United States, and other relevant privacy regulations worldwide.

  • Transparent Practices: Edgee believes in transparency and user empowerment. We provide clear information about our data handling practices, giving users and customers confidence in how their data is managed.

Technical and Organizational Measures

  • Encryption: All data transmitted to and from Edgee is encrypted using industry-standard protocols, ensuring that data in transit remains secure.

  • Regular Audits: Edgee undergoes regular security and privacy audits to ensure our practices remain robust and in line with the latest standards and regulations.

  • Continuous Improvement: Our commitment to privacy and data protection is ongoing. We continuously evaluate and update our practices to address emerging privacy concerns and technological advancements.

Conclusion

Edgee’s dedication to privacy is foundational to our mission. By anonymizing data and employing rigorous privacy measures, we strive to empower businesses with powerful analytics insights while steadfastly protecting user privacy. Our approach ensures that businesses can leverage the benefits of edge computing and analytics without compromising on their users’ trust and confidence.