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The Questions Your DPO Will Ask, Answered
The short answer
Answer Engineering is built so a data protection officer can approve it. Outward work uses published content. Any answer system on your site runs in the jurisdiction you choose, removes common identifiers before storing anything, sends nothing to an AI provider by default, and keeps records for a retention period you set.
Data Flows at a Glance
| Data | Where it is held | How long | Sent to an AI provider |
|---|---|---|---|
| Your published content | On your own website | Unchanged; it remains yours | No |
| Audit working copies | Where agreed in writing before work starts | Deleted as agreed in writing | No |
| Visitor questions to an answer system | The jurisdiction you choose | 90 days by default, adjustable | Not by default; only if you connect a provider |
| Identifiers in messages: email, phone, National Insurance and NHS numbers, date of birth | Removed before anything is stored | Not stored | No |
| Visitor session identifier | The browser tab's session storage | Cleared when the tab closes | No |
Personal data
What personal data does Answer Engineering involve?
Outward work, making your organization the cited source, uses your published content and involves little or no personal data. Inward work, an answer system on your own site, handles the questions visitors type, which can contain personal data. That is where the safeguards below apply.
What personal data does an answer system store?
Conversation records, with common identifiers removed first. Email addresses, phone numbers, UK National Insurance numbers, NHS numbers, and dates of birth are stripped from every message before anything is written to disk.
Does it profile visitors or use cookies?
It does not profile visitors or build records of individuals across visits. It holds a session identifier in the browser tab's session storage rather than a cookie, and that identifier clears when the tab is closed.
Where data goes
Where is the data stored?
In the jurisdiction you choose: on your own infrastructure, on UK servers through ecocpanel.co.uk, or in a country you select through ecocpanel.com.
Is any data sent to an AI provider?
Not by default. The answer system runs in retrieval-only mode and sends nothing to any third party. Connecting an AI provider is optional and your decision, and if you do, the provider's own data handling applies to what is sent.
Do you copy our content to analyze it?
Analysis runs on local tooling and nothing is sent to an external service. Where a working copy is needed, where it is held and when it is deleted are agreed in writing first.
Retention and rights
How long are conversation records kept?
Ninety days by default. You can change the retention period, export records, or purge them early.
Can we respond to a subject access or erasure request?
Records can be exported and erased. Conversations are looked up by session rather than by name or email address, which is worth building into your subject access process.
Roles and assurance
Who is the data controller?
You remain the controller of your content and of the data your visitors provide. Where we host or operate a system on your behalf, we act as your processor under a written agreement.
Will you support our data protection impact assessment?
Yes. We provide a written description of data flows, storage locations, retention, and safeguards for your assessment.
Do you hold certifications for this work?
We do not claim certifications for the answer technology itself. Whether a deployment meets a given standard depends on its configuration and hosting, which we document for your review.
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Start with a Confidential Chat
A no-obligation conversation with H D Fraser about how answer engines represent your organization today, and what a privacy-first approach would involve. NDA on request.