Privacy & Source Protection

Effective date: September 2026

Undercover Jagoff is an investigative-entertainment publication. We take reader privacy, source protection, responsible sourcing, corrections, and careful handling of sensitive information seriously. This policy describes what this site itself collects and how we handle story sources, tips, editorial requests, maps, automated research, and reader interactions. Hosting providers and services added later may have separate practices.

1. Source and Story Accuracy Disclosure

Undercover Jagoff does not independently verify every story, claim, document, statement, photograph, video, tip, or other item referenced, quoted, linked, summarized, or supplied by third-party sources. We rely in part on those sources to provide accurate information. Although we may review, compare, contextualize, investigate, seek corroboration, or identify contradictions, Undercover Jagoff cannot and does not guarantee that any source, story, allegation, document, or underlying information is complete, current, authentic, or accurate. Publication, linking, mapping, discussion, or inclusion on this site is not an endorsement, certification, or guarantee that a claim is true.

Publication is not certification of truth. Signal labels such as VERIFIED, CORROBORATED, MIXED, UNVERIFIED, or DISPUTED describe an editorial assessment of the available record; they are not warranties.

2. Source Records and Editorial Data

We may preserve source URLs, source names, filing dates, public records, excerpts, screenshots, notes, evidence summaries, people/entity records, verification labels, and editorial update history when reasonably necessary to research, support, correct, explain, or defend published work. A source being public does not automatically mean every personal detail is editorially necessary.

Where practical, the site exposes a public receipt ledger so readers can inspect the source trail themselves. Sources can conflict or later change. A linked source remaining online is outside our control.

3. Tips and Source Confidentiality

Tips submitted through the site are stored privately in WordPress and are not published automatically. Name, alias, email address, reference URL, message, and attachments are collected only when you choose to provide them. The theme does not permanently store a tip submitter’s IP address. A short-lived one-way hash may be used for abuse prevention. Hosting, firewall, CDN, email, or server infrastructure may independently create logs containing IP addresses or request metadata.

We will make reasonable efforts to protect confidential sources, but we do not promise absolute anonymity or confidentiality. This website is not an encrypted whistleblower platform, attorney-client channel, emergency service, or guarantee of reporter-source privilege.

Do not submit passwords, stolen credentials, unlawfully obtained material, private medical/financial records, or information you do not have the right to provide.

4. Correction and Right of Reply Requests

The site provides a Correction & Right of Reply form. It may collect your name, email, organization/role, the story involved, your requested correction or response, and a supporting public URL. Requests are stored privately for editorial review and may be retained when needed for editorial integrity, dispute handling, legal obligations, security, or the correction record.

Submitting a request does not guarantee removal, correction, publication, or any particular outcome. Material corrections, clarifications, updates, and published rights of reply may be preserved in the public Case File history instead of silently rewriting the historical record.

5. Personal Information in Stories

We try to minimize unnecessary personal data. We generally avoid publishing private addresses, personal contact information, identifying details about minors, sensitive medical/financial information, and information that is not materially relevant to a legitimate story. For allegations involving living people, we aim to distinguish accusation, charge, conviction, witness status, public-figure status, and other materially different statuses.

6. Verified Story Locations and Maps

A story appears on the public Story Map only when an editor or the automated research workflow has explicitly marked the location itself as sufficiently supported and geographic coordinates are available. A verified map location does not mean every allegation or fact in that story has been independently verified.

The Story Map uses OpenStreetMap tiles. Loading the map sends ordinary browser request information, including your IP address, to the map provider. We do not request your device location.

7. Comments, Cookies, Reader Voting and Accounts

If comments are enabled, WordPress may collect information entered in comment forms and technical data used for spam/security handling. Reader theory voting uses a limited cookie to discourage repeat voting. Reader votes and comments are opinion/participation signals, not evidence.

8. Newsletter and Distribution Services

If you join The Confidential Informant, we collect the email address you provide, an optional name, consent and confirmation timestamps, subscription status, and technical sync status needed to operate the publication. The site uses a confirmation step before activating a subscription.

If MailerLite is connected by the site owner, confirmed subscriber information is sent to the configured MailerLite account/group so MailerLite can provide mailing-list and campaign services. MailerLite then processes that information under its own terms and privacy practices. If native WordPress email delivery is selected instead, the site uses the configured WordPress/hosting mail system.

When a Case File is distributed to a connected Facebook Page or outbound automation webhook, the theme sends public story information such as title, summary/hook, public URL, status, signal label, location when public, and featured-image URL. Private tips, private correction requests, private subscriber information, and unpublished source notes are not included in the social distribution payload.

9. Analytics, Advertising and Other Third Parties

This theme does not activate third-party analytics, ad tracking, behavioral profiling, or advertising pixels by default. If analytics, advertising, affiliate systems, social embeds, video platforms, newsletters, payments, or other services are added, this policy should be reviewed and updated.

10. Data Retention

Tip and editorial-request contact information is retained only as long as reasonably useful for follow-up, verification, dispute handling, corrections, legal obligations, security, or investigation integrity. Source material, editorial notes, correction history, tip text, and request text may be retained longer when needed to preserve the editorial record or support published work.

11. Access and Erasure

Where applicable, requests to access or erase personal information may be handled through WordPress’s built-in personal-data tools. The theme integrates Tip Desk and Correction/Right of Reply contact information with those tools. Some submitted text or editorial records may be retained for editorial integrity, legal obligations, security, dispute resolution, or another lawful reason.

12. Security

No website, email system, upload form, or database is perfectly secure. Do not assume ordinary WordPress forms provide anonymity or end-to-end encryption. High-risk sources should use a purpose-built secure channel if one is later provided.

13. AI-Assisted Research, Writing and Images

Undercover Jagoff may use AI tools to assist with source discovery, research organization, drafting, summarization, metadata, internal linking, source comparison, and editorial imagery. AI systems can make mistakes. AI assistance does not remove the source limitations above and does not convert third-party claims into independently verified facts.

Automated Case Files are instructed to use source-grounded research and preserve uncertainty. AI-generated featured images are editorial illustrations, not documentary photographs or evidence.

14. Children

The site is not designed to collect personal information from children. Editors should apply heightened care before publishing identifying information about minors.

15. Changes to This Policy

This policy may change as services, editorial practices, or legal requirements change. Material changes should be reflected by an updated effective date.

Interactive maps

Map tiles are served by the OpenStreetMap Foundation using OpenStreetMap data. Loading a map sends your IP address and ordinary browser request information to the map provider. We do not request your device location. Story pins use the location information published in the Case Files.

Key-free daily publishing

The current daily publisher uses prepared editorial articles and public institutional RSS feeds. This workflow does not send article-generation requests to OpenAI or require an OpenAI API key.