Privacy policy

What erkstats collects - both the public IRC data we aggregate and the limited information we collect from visitors - and how advertising on this site works.

The IRC data on this site

erkstats records public, network-level statistics for IRC networks: user, channel and server counts over time, sampled regularly and stored as history. For channels we keep the name, topic and user count and nothing else - no message content, ever. The one exception is opt-in channel statistics, and even there we only keep aggregate daily counts plus one short sample line per top nick; we never store full message logs.

These numbers are gathered by connecting to each network as a single, well-behaved read-only client that runs the standard LIST and LUSERS commands and disconnects. During a network sweep we never join a channel or read what anyone says, and we identify ourselves on IRC (answering a VERSION request with who we are and a link here).

All of this is publicly-available network metadata. erkstats does not host, produce, control or endorse the content of any IRC channel or network. Channel and network names, topics and similar text are created by third parties and shown as recorded. If something in the data is wrong or should be taken down, an operator or affected party can contact us and we will correct or remove it.

Information we collect from you

• Server logs. Like most websites, our servers record standard technical information - IP address, browser type, the pages requested and timestamps - used only to run the service securely and diagnose problems.
• A timezone cookie (erk_tz) so times are shown in your local zone. It holds no personal data.
• A session cookie - only if you create an account and sign in - to keep you logged in.

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not run third-party analytics or tracking beyond what is described here.

Advertising and cookies

To help cover its running costs, erkstats may display advertising served by Google AdSense. In connection with that:

• Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on your prior visits to this website and other websites.
• Google's use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads to you based on your visit to this and/or other sites on the internet.
• You may opt out of personalised advertising by visiting Google Ads Settings, or opt out of a third-party vendor's use of cookies for personalised advertising at aboutads.info/choices.
• More detail on how Google uses information from sites that use its services is at policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites.

Advertising is only shown on our general, content pages - never on individual channel pages.

Links to other sites

Pages here link out to IRC networks' own websites and web-chat clients. We are not responsible for the content or the privacy practices of those third-party sites.

Requests and changes

To ask about the data we hold, correct an error, or request that a network or channel be removed, get in touch. We may update this policy from time to time; the date below reflects the current version.

Last updated: 6 September 2026.