We may update this page from time to time.

Privacy policy

Last updated: October 9, 2026

The privacy of your data—and it is your data, not ours!—is a big deal to us. In this policy, we lay out: what data we collect and why; how your data is handled; and your rights with respect to your data. We promise we never sell your data: never have, never will.

This policy applies to LegitOwl, built and maintained by Low Clouds LLC (“Low Clouds”, “we”, “us”). It covers our handling of information about site visitors and customers. We refer collectively to these categories of individuals as “you” throughout this policy.

What we collect and why

Our guiding principle is to collect only what we need. Here’s what that means in practice:

Searches

When you search, we use what you typed to run the search and to improve results. Searches are not tied to your name.

Identity and access

When you buy a report or sign up for Heads-Up, we ask for your email address. That’s so we can deliver your report, send Heads-Up emails, and send you other essential information about your purchase.

We’ll never sell your personal information to third parties, and we won’t use your name in marketing statements without your permission either.

Billing information

If you buy a report or Heads-Up, you will be asked to provide your payment information. Credit card information is submitted directly to our payment processor and doesn’t hit Low Clouds servers. We store a record of the payment transaction, including the last 4 digits of the credit card number, for purposes of purchase history, receipts, and billing support. We may store your billing address so we can calculate any sales tax due, send you receipts, and detect fraudulent credit card transactions.

Product interactions

We store the reports you buy and the contractors on your Heads-Up list. This is so you can use LegitOwl as intended. We keep this as long as your Heads-Up is active, or as long as needed to let you re-open a report you bought. If you cancel Heads-Up, we’ll delete your list within 60 days.

General Geolocation data

We log IP addresses for security and fraud prevention purposes.

Website interactions

We collect basic information about browsing activity to keep the site secure and working. This includes, for example, your browser and operating system versions, your IP address, which web pages you visited and how long they took to load, and which website referred you to us.

Cookies

LegitOwl does not use advertising cookies or advertising trackers. We may use first-party cookies to complete a purchase or remember a preference.

A cookie is a piece of text stored by your browser. It may help remember site preferences. You can adjust cookie retention settings and accept or block individual cookies in your browser settings, although parts of the site may not function properly if you turn cookies off.

Voluntary correspondence

When you email us with a question or to ask for help, we keep that correspondence, including your email address, so that we have a history of past correspondence to reference if you reach out in the future.

About the records in our reports

Reports contain information from official public records about licensed businesses. We do not show the names of people on a license, home addresses, or personal histories. If a record names you and you believe it is wrong, contact us and we’ll check it against the agency’s record.

When we access or disclose your information

To provide products or services you’ve requested. We use some third-party processors to help run LegitOwl and provide the Services to you, such as hosting, email delivery, and payment processing.

No Low Clouds human looks at your information except for limited purposes, for example, if an error occurs that stops an automated process from working and requires manual intervention to fix. These are rare cases, and when they happen, we look for root cause solutions as much as possible to avoid them recurring. We may also access your data if required in order to respond to legal process (see “When required under applicable law” below).

To help you troubleshoot or squash a software bug, with your permission. If at any point we need to access your information to help you with a support case, we will ask for your consent before proceeding.

To investigate, prevent, or take action regarding restricted uses. If we discover you are using LegitOwl for a restricted purpose, we will take action as necessary, including notifying appropriate authorities where warranted.

Aggregated and de-identified data. We may aggregate and/or de-identify information collected through the services. We may use de-identified or aggregated data for any purpose, including marketing or analytics.

When required under applicable law. Low Clouds is a U.S. company and all data infrastructure is located in the U.S.

• Requests for user data. Our policy is to not respond to government requests for user data unless we are compelled by legal process or in limited circumstances in the event of an emergency request. However, if U.S. law enforcement authorities have the necessary warrant, criminal subpoena, or court order requiring us to disclose data, we must comply. It is our policy to notify affected users before we disclose data unless we are legally prohibited from doing so, and except in some emergency cases.

• If we are audited by a tax authority, we may be required to disclose billing-related information. If that happens, we will disclose only the minimum needed, such as billing addresses and tax exemption information.

Finally, if Low Clouds or LegitOwl is acquired by or merges with another company — we don’t plan on that, but if it happens — we’ll notify you well before any of your personal information is transferred or becomes subject to a different privacy policy.

Your rights with respect to your information

We strive to apply the same data rights to all customers, regardless of their location. California residents have these rights under state privacy law, and we extend them to everyone. Some of these rights include:

• Right to Know. You have the right to know what personal information is collected, used, shared or sold. We outline both the categories and specific bits of data we collect, as well as how they are used, in this privacy policy.
• Right of Access. This includes your right to access the personal information we gather about you, and your right to obtain information about the sharing, storage, security and processing of that information.
• Right to Correction. You have the right to request correction of your personal information.
• Right to Erasure / “To Be Forgotten”. This is your right to request, subject to certain limitations under applicable law, that your personal information be erased from our possession and, by extension, from all of our service providers.
• Right to Complain. You have the right to make a complaint regarding our handling of your personal information with the appropriate supervisory authority.
• Right to Restrict Processing. This is your right to request restriction of how and why your personal information is used or processed, including opting out of sale of your personal information. (Again: we never have and never will sell your personal data.)
• Right to Object. You have the right, in certain situations, to object to how or why your personal information is processed.
• Right to Portability. You have the right to receive the personal information we have about you and the right to transmit it to another party.
• Right to not Be Subject to Automated Decision-Making. You have the right to object to and prevent any decision that could have a legal or similarly significant effect on you from being made solely based on automated processes. This right is limited if the decision is necessary for performance of any contract between you and us, is allowed by applicable law, or is based on your explicit consent.
• Right to Non-Discrimination. We do not and will not charge you a different amount to use our products, offer you different discounts, or give you a lower level of customer service because you have exercised your data privacy rights. However, the exercise of certain rights may, by virtue of your exercising those rights, prevent you from using our Services.

Please note that certain information may be exempt from such requests under applicable law. For example, we need to retain certain information in order to provide our services to you.

In some cases, we also need to take reasonable steps to verify your identity before responding to a request, which may include verifying your email address. If we are unable to verify you, we may be unable to respond to your requests. If you have questions about exercising these rights or need assistance, please contact us at hello@legitowl.com. If an authorized agent is corresponding on your behalf, we will need written consent from you before proceeding.

Depending on applicable law, you may have the right to appeal our decision to deny your request, if applicable. We will provide information about how to exercise that right in our response denying the request.

How we secure your data

All data is encrypted via SSL/TLS when transmitted from our servers to your browser. The database backups are also encrypted.

Data retention

We keep your information for the time necessary for the purposes for which it is processed. The length of time for which we retain information depends on the purposes for which we collected and use it and your choices, after which time we may delete and/or aggregate it. We may also retain and use this information as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements. Through this policy, we have provided specific retention periods for certain types of information.

Location of site and data

LegitOwl is operated in the United States. If you are located outside of the United States, please be aware that any information you provide to us will be transferred to and stored in the United States. By using our website or Services and/or providing us with your personal information, you consent to this transfer.

Changes and questions

We may update this policy as needed to comply with relevant regulations and reflect any new practices. Whenever we make a significant change to our policies, we will refresh the date at the top of this page and take any other appropriate steps to notify users.

Have any questions, comments, or concerns about this privacy policy, your data, or your rights with respect to your information? Please get in touch by emailing us at hello@legitowl.com and we’ll be happy to try to answer them!

Adapted from Basecamp's open-source policies,CC BY 4.0. We changed the company and product names, removed clauses about features LegitOwl does not have, and added clauses specific to LegitOwl.