Ethics & Transparency

ETTG is proudly developed with AI assistance. We believe transparency about our development process is essential to maintaining trust with our community.

• AI Tools Used: ChatGPT, GitHub Copilot, Claude, Kiro, and other AI coding assistants help accelerate development while maintaining code quality
• Human Oversight: All AI-generated code is reviewed, tested, and validated by a human developer
• Quality Assurance: AI assistance enhances our capabilities but never replaces human judgment on editorial or ethical decisions
• Still Human: Despite our best efforts in database management and content curation, mistakes can happen. We appreciate your understanding and welcome your feedback here.

Our mission is to provide unbiased, factual local news coverage across communities nationwide.

• No Political Bias: We aggregate news from multiple sources without editorial commentary or political slant
• Source Diversity: We pull from a wide range of local news outlets to provide comprehensive coverage
• Community Focus: Our commitment is to serve local communities with relevant, actionable news

We fund ETTG through advertising, but we refuse to compromise your privacy to do it.

• No Third-Party Ad Networks: We run our own in-house advertising system - no Google Ads, no programmatic exchanges, no real-time bidding
• Contextual, Not Behavioral: Ads are shown based on the page content (location, topic), never based on tracking you across the web
• No Tracking Cookies: We don't use advertising cookies or build profiles of your browsing behavior
• Human Review: Every advertisement is manually reviewed and approved before it appears on our site
• Clear Labeling: All ads are clearly marked as sponsored content

We implement privacy protection at the architectural level of our platform.

• Minimal Data Collection: We collect only essential information needed to provide our service
• Anonymized Analytics: Search queries and user interactions are anonymized using cryptographic hashing
• Do Not Track Compliance: We respect browser Do Not Track preferences
• Secure Infrastructure: Enterprise-grade security measures protect all data
• No Personal Profiling: We don't build individual user profiles or sell personal data

We take security seriously and implement industry-standard practices to protect user data and maintain service reliability.

• Data Protection: All connections are encrypted and user data is handled with strict security protocols
• Regular Monitoring: We continuously monitor for security vulnerabilities and apply updates promptly
• Incident Response: We maintain procedures to respond quickly to any security concerns
• Best Practices: Our development follows established security guidelines and industry standards

We are accountable to the communities we serve and maintain open channels for feedback and improvement.

• Open Feedback: Community members can report issues, suggest improvements, or raise concerns
• Responsive Support: We respond to community feedback promptly and transparently
• Continuous Improvement: We regularly evaluate and improve our processes based on community input