AP News: World & Local

"We work with Freestar to manage and optimize the digital advertising that appears on our Site and App... Freestar contracts with a network of third-party demand partners and ad-serving platforms (together, "Ad Partners"). These Ad Partners may include advertising exchanges, supply-side platforms, demand-side platforms, and measurement or brand-safety vendors."

AP shares user data with an extraordinarily large ecosystem of third parties including Meta, Google, Freestar, Connatix, JW Player, Taboola, Nativo, PubMatic, OpenX, Sovrn, InMobi, Magnite, Index Exchange, and many more identity resolution and adtech partners.

"We work directly with certain Business Partners and Analytics Providers who help us recognize and reengage users across sessions, devices, and platforms using identifiers. They may connect information you provide on our Services with information you have shared elsewhere, in accordance with their privacy policies and your settings."

AP uses identity resolution partners (BlueConic, Wunderkind, Freestar's Identity Partners) to track and recognize users across different websites, devices, and sessions, linking activity together using hashed emails and pseudonymous identifiers.

"Your device location may be transmitted to us whenever our Service's app is running (even if you are not actively using the app or it is running in the background on your device). Your device may continue to transmit its location to us until you change your device settings."

AP collects device location data continuously whenever their app is running, including in the background when the user is not actively using it, which constitutes passive background location tracking.

"We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes to our privacy practices, and when we do, we will update the "Last Updated" date at the top of the Privacy Policy. If we make material changes, we may provide notice where feasible... Your continued use of our Services after the "Last Updated" date constitutes your acceptance of the changes."

AP can change the privacy policy at any time, with no guaranteed notice even for material changes (only "where feasible"), and treats continued use as automatic acceptance of new terms.

"We retain your Personal Information for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which it was collected, including to provide our Services, comply with legal obligations, resolve disputes, enforce our agreements, and protect our legal rights... If your account is closed or becomes inactive... we will retain your Personal Information only for as long as we have a legitimate business, legal, or regulatory reason to do so."

AP provides no specific deletion timelines, retaining data indefinitely as long as they claim a "legitimate business" reason, and even after account closure data is kept for unspecified periods.

"SDKs are code packages embedded in our mobile apps by third parties (such as ad networks or Analytics Providers). They help us: Collect device and usage data, Monitor app performance, Service personalized content or ads... We use JavaScript and similar scripting languages to collect data about how you interact with our Services, such as mouse clicks, scrolling behavior, and page visits."

AP embeds third-party SDKs that collect device data, and uses JavaScript to track granular behavioral patterns including mouse clicks and scrolling, along with device identifiers, operating system info, wireless connections, and browsing history.

"Submit a request through our web form available here. We may verify your identity before fulfilling the request. Once you have verified your identity, we will comply with your request unless a legal exemption applies."

There is no self-service account or data deletion option — users must submit a form and go through an identity verification process, and AP reserves the right to deny requests based on broad legal exemptions.