Analytics: PostHog
Every page loads PostHog's web analytics script from us-assets.i.posthog.com and sends events to PostHog's US cloud at us.i.posthog.com.
- What is sent: each page view and page leave, and, through PostHog's autocapture, clicks on links and buttons and form submissions together with the text of what was clicked. Events carry the page address and the details any analytics script sees, such as the page you came from and your browser and screen size. Like any request, they reach PostHog with your IP address.
- What is stored in your browser: PostHog keeps a randomly generated visitor ID in a first-party cookie and in local storage (names starting with
ph_), so that repeat visits count as one visitor. - What is not: the site never tells PostHog who you are, and PostHog is set to create person profiles only for identified visitors, so none is created. Session recording and surveys are switched off. The site has no text fields, accounts or sign-in.
To opt out, block posthog.com with a content blocker or turn JavaScript off. The pages work without JavaScript, and without it nothing is sent to PostHog.
The download and install counts
Downloads started
The ISO is served by www.shadowfetch.com, which keeps a running total of full ISO downloads it has started, one number per file. When /download or /install is served, this site reads those totals and writes the sum into the page. Viewing a page records nothing about you here.
“It installed”
The button on /install sends a form with one field, the ISO version. The check-in sets no cookie.
- Kept: a count per day and version. The pages show the sum.
- To count each network once a day, the server stores a keyed hash (HMAC-SHA-256 with a server-side secret) of your IP address and the date. The raw IP address, your browser's user agent and any cookie are not stored. A hash is needed only for its own UTC day: every check-in first deletes all hashes from earlier days, so a hash outlasts its day only until the next check-in.
- Before anything is stored, Cloudflare's rate limiter counts presses per IP address and turns away more than five a minute.
Hosting: Cloudflare
This site runs on a Cloudflare Worker. Cloudflare receives every request, including your IP address, in order to deliver the page, and the Worker has Cloudflare's Workers Logs switched on for all requests, so each request it handles is logged at Cloudflare and kept under Cloudflare's own retention.
The site's Content-Security-Policy lets pages load scripts and send data only to this site and PostHog. Fonts and images are served from this site. When you follow a link to another site, your browser sends it at most this site's address, not the page you were on.
Video: YouTube, only on play
The Shadowfetch Linux 4 walkthrough on /preview is a still image until you press play. Only then does the page load YouTube's player, from www.youtube-nocookie.com; from that point YouTube's privacy policy applies.
The operating system
Shadowfetch Linux has no telemetry: there is no Shadowfetch account to create and nothing in the system phones home. Updating contacts the Shadowfetch APT repository on www.shadowfetch.com and Debian's mirrors, like any Debian system. Optional agents, vendor apps and the AI services you connect use their providers' own accounts and network services under their own policies; the security model lists them.
Other sites
Links to GitHub, X, YouTube, Buy Me a Coffee, shadowfetch.com and other sites lead to services with their own privacy policies; nothing on these pages contacts them until you follow a link.
Questions
Email linux@shadowfetchlinux.org.