Privacy Policy

TLDR: we never sell your personal information, and we never rent it out. We do share it in two narrow ways, both named below: with the analytics and advertising platforms that measure the site, and with the provider that sends our newsletter. If you are on the newsletter, we also use your address to help advertising platforms find people who like rocket engines like you do.

You are a rare breed. People excited about realistic rocket simulations are expensive to find, and finding more of them is what keeps Meco Rocket Simulator viable. That is the honest reason this policy is not shorter.

Who We Are

Meco Rocket Simulator (its representatives, consultants, employees, officers, and directors – collectively, “Meco,” “we,” or “us”) provides software that helps people learn operational, engineering, and scientific aspects of space exploration. Meco Rocket Simulator is a trading name of Loren Aerospace LTD – a company registered in England and Wales with company number 14563299.

How This Policy Applies

This Policy describes the information we collect from you, how we use that information, and our legal basis for doing so. It also covers whether and how that information may be shared and your rights and choices regarding the information you provide to us.

Information We Collect

We collect information in multiple ways, including:

• When you provide information directly to us (when signing up for our mailing list);
• Information about the ways people visit and interact with our Site, through Google Analytics, Google Maps and the Meta Pixel. These are not anonymous. They record your IP address, your browser and device, the pages you open and any advertising identifiers your browser carries, and Meta and Google can connect that record to an account you hold with them. In the United Kingdom and the European Union these tools load only after you accept them in the cookie banner, and you can decline. Meta acts as a joint controller with us for the events the Pixel sends, which means Meta also uses that data for its own purposes, including improving its advertising systems.
• Details of any requests or transactions you make through us. We partner with other companies (such as Stripe) for payment processing. The payment information you submit is collected and used by them following their privacy policies (read Stripe’s privacy policy). We don’t store any of your payment information apart from the country.

How We Use Your Information

• To measure the site. We analyse how people move through the Site so we can tell which pages and which explanations work. We report and act on this in aggregate; the underlying records are not anonymous, as described above.

• To find people who like rocket engines like you do. If you are on our newsletter, we help Meta build a "lookalike" audience: a group of people whose behaviour online suggests they share the interest, whom we can then advertise to.

  We do not send Meta your email address. We run it through a one-way scrambler first, which always turns the same address into the same jumble of letters and numbers, and which cannot be run backwards to recover the address. Meta scrambles the addresses it already holds in the same way and looks for jumbles that match. So Meta can tell that someone it already knows is on our list. It does not learn your address from us, and it cannot work out the address of anyone it does not already have.

  This is called hashing. It is a real protection and not a complete one: because the match works, the scrambled address still counts as information about you under data protection law, which is why it is described here rather than treated as anonymous.

  We exclude our subscribers from seeing those adverts. You are the model, not the target.

• To send the newsletter. Your address, your name if you gave one, and the record of your sign-up are held by Sequenzy, the platform that sends our email on our behalf.

• To keep bots off the sign-up form. The form loads Google reCAPTCHA when you start typing, to tell a person from a bot. It loads nowhere else on the Site and we do not use it to track you. We treat it as strictly necessary to run the form, so the banner does not gate it; if you would rather not use it, email us and we will add you by hand.

• We do not sell your personal information. Nobody pays us for it and we do not rent, trade or hand it to anyone beyond the named providers above.

• We do share it in one narrow sense, and California's law has a specific word for it. Telling Meta that you visited this site, so that Meta can show you an advert somewhere else, is "sharing for cross-context behavioural advertising" as the CPRA defines it — even though no money changes hands. That is the Meta pixel, it is the only thing we do that meets the definition, and Your Privacy Choices at the foot of every page switches it off.

Choices You Have

• Cookies and the Pixel: decline them in the banner, or turn them off at any time through Your Privacy Choices at the foot of every page. Declining does not affect anything else on the Site.
• The lookalike audiences: email us and we will remove your address from the seed list we give Meta. You can stay on the newsletter and still opt out of this. You can also object on the grounds of our legitimate interest, and we will stop.
• The newsletter: every email carries an unsubscribe link, and one click is enough.

How Long We Keep It

We keep newsletter records, including the record of your consent, while you are subscribed and for twenty-four months afterwards, so we can show that you asked to hear from us. Analytics records follow the retention set on each platform. Sign-up records are deleted on request, except where we must keep them by law.

Our Legal Basis

We rely on your consent for the newsletter, and for the cookies and the Pixel where you are in the United Kingdom or the European Union. We rely on our legitimate interest in finding new players for the lookalike audiences described above, which is why you can object to that use specifically without leaving the newsletter.

Cookies, and What the Banner Controls

TLDR: three tools, Google Analytics, Google Ads and the Meta pixel. In the UK, the EU, the EEA and Switzerland we ask first and load nothing at all until you say yes. Everywhere else they load when you arrive and you switch them off in one click. Either way, Your Privacy Choices at the foot of every page is the off switch, and if your browser sends a Do Not Sell or Share signal we honour it before you touch anything. Saying no also stops the one thing we send from our own server, which is a scrambled note to Meta when you join the newsletter.

The short version, for anyone who would rather not read a policy: a cookie here is a note your browser keeps for a website. The tools we use leave one so they can tell that two visits came from the same person. Where the law says to ask before that happens we ask, and if you say no we never load them at all, so there is nothing to leave a note. Where the law instead gives you a switch, they start on and the switch is in the footer of every page. Either way, saying no costs you nothing. Every page works exactly the same.

Whether we ask you first

Where you are decides which way round this works, because the law really is different in different places.

In the UK, the EU, the EEA and Switzerland, nothing loads until you accept. Decline and this site makes no request to Google or Meta at all. Not a blocked one. Not a cookieless one. Nothing.

Everywhere else, the tools load when you arrive, and you turn them off whenever you like through Your Privacy Choices at the foot of every page. That is how California and the other American states with privacy laws have written it: an opt-out you control, rather than a question standing in front of the page.

We work out which of those you are in from your browser's own time-zone setting, and nothing else. We do not look your address up with a geolocation service, because asking a third party where you live before you have agreed to anything is precisely the thing this policy says we do not do. The trade is that we get it wrong for travellers and for anyone on a VPN, so the mistake is pointed in the safer direction: unless your browser tells us plainly that you are outside those countries, you get the banner.

If your browser already said no

Some browsers and extensions send a Global Privacy Control signal, which is a standing instruction not to sell or share your data on any site. If yours sends one, we honour it everywhere in the world, not only where the law compels us to. Nothing loads, and we do not put a banner in front of you to ask again.

You can still override it for this site by opening Your Privacy Choices and accepting. A decision you made here is more specific than one your browser makes everywhere.

If you accept

Three things load, from this site's own code rather than through a tag manager.

Google Analytics tells us which pages people read, which ones they leave, and where a reader gives up halfway through an explanation. It sets cookies named _ga and _ga_XXXXXXXXXX that last up to two years, and it records your IP address, your browser and device, and the pages you open.

The Meta pixel tells Meta that someone visited this site, so we can show Meco to people who are likely to want it. It sets a cookie named _fbp, which lasts about three months, and it reads _fbc if an advert brought you here. Meta connects that record to your Meta account if you have one, and uses it for its own purposes as well as ours. We switch off its automatic matching, which would otherwise read what you type into a form and send it to Meta; nothing you type reaches Meta from your browser.

Google Ads records that a visit, and a newsletter sign-up, came from this site, so we can tell whether an advert worked and can show Meco to people who read it. It is the same company as Google Analytics and the same page view tells both.

Analytics traffic reaches Google through /g/collect on this site rather than through a direct call to Google. That address is part of this site's own code. It forwards what it receives to Google Analytics, adding your IP address and browser so that Google can still tell which country and which device a visit came from. It moves the same events described here; it does not collect more of them, and it does not send Google any cookie this site sets.

When you join the newsletter, we also tell Meta from our server. The browser pixel already reports a sign-up. Our server reports the same one, and gives Meta a scrambled form of your address with it, so that Meta can tell whether the person who signed up is someone it already knows. Both reports carry the same reference number and Meta counts them once.

The scrambling is the same one-way method described further up: the address goes through a scrambler that cannot be run backwards, and Meta only ever receives the jumble. Your address itself never leaves our server, and it never enters this page at all.

This happens on exactly the same terms as everything else on this page, which means it depends on where you are. Where we ask first — the UK, the EU, the EEA and Switzerland — we send it only if you accepted. Everywhere else measurement is on unless you turn it off, so joining the newsletter does send it, and declining stops it. Either way, declining stops this too: if you have said no here, or your browser sends a Do Not Sell or Share signal, we send Meta nothing about your sign-up.

Neither of these is anonymous. The sections above say the same thing in more detail, including what Meta is allowed to do with it.

If you decline

Nothing loads. No script is fetched, no cookie is set, and no request leaves your browser for Google or Meta.

Your answer is remembered in your browser's own storage, under one key named meco.consent.v1. That is not a cookie and it is never sent to us or to anyone else. It only stops the banner asking you the same question on every page. Clear your browser storage for this site and the banner comes back.

Changing your mind

There is a Your Privacy Choices link at the foot of every page. It reopens the banner, and your new answer replaces the old one straight away — including where you were never asked in the first place.

One honest limit: a browser cannot unload a script that is already running. If you accept and then decline on the same page, three things happen at once. This site stops sending events of its own, which is what stops anything further reaching Google or Meta, including the sign-up report our server would otherwise send. Google's tags are told to stop through Google's consent signals. Meta's pixel is told separately, through its own, because Google's signals do not reach it. The code stays in the page until you load the next one, and every page after that loads nothing at all.

What the banner does not cover

The sign-up form. When you start typing in a newsletter form, the page loads Google reCAPTCHA to tell a person from a bot. It loads nowhere else, we do not use it to follow you around, and we treat it as strictly necessary to run the form, so the banner does not gate it. If you would rather not use it, email us and we will add you by hand.

The forum. forum.mecorocketsimulator.com runs different software on a different machine. It sets its own cookies so it can keep you signed in, and it asks you separately.

Videos. The trailer and the short loops on this site are files we serve ourselves. There is no YouTube or Vimeo embed anywhere on the site, so watching one tells nobody but us.

If You Are in California

Plain version: you can tell us to stop sharing your data with Meta for advertising, we have to obey, and we cannot treat you worse for asking.

What we collect and why. Everything is listed under Information We Collect and How We Use Your Information above; this section does not describe anything different. In the categories the CPRA uses, that is identifiers (your email address, your IP address), internet activity (the pages you open on this site), and inferences drawn from it (that you are someone who likes rocket engines). We collect it to run the site, to send the newsletter you asked for, to measure which pages help, and to advertise Meco.

We do not sell your personal information. Nobody pays us for it.

We do share it, in the specific sense the CPRA means. Two things qualify. The Meta pixel tells Meta you were here so Meta can advertise to you elsewhere. And if you are on the newsletter, we give Meta a scrambled version of your address as the seed for a lookalike audience. Both are "sharing for cross-context behavioural advertising" whether or not money changes hands, so we name them rather than hide behind the word "sell".

How to opt out. Both kinds, and how each one stops:

• The pixel — Your Privacy Choices, at the foot of every page. Open it and press Decline. That takes two clicks rather than one, and it stops the pixel on this browser straight away and on every page after it.
• The pixel — a Global Privacy Control signal from your browser or an extension does the same thing on its own, worldwide, before you have clicked anything at all.
• The seed list — email admin@mecorocketsimulator.com. This one needs an email and we would rather explain why than leave you guessing. The seed list is keyed to your email address, and a browser switch tells us only that a browser wants out; it carries nothing that says which subscriber you are. So we cannot act on it without you telling us the address. One email is enough, we do not ask for anything else, and you can stay on the newsletter.

Neither of the first two requires your name. The third requires only the address you want removed.

Your other rights. You can ask us what we hold about you, ask for a copy, ask us to correct it, and ask us to delete it. Email admin@mecorocketsimulator.com. We may ask you to confirm you control the email address in question, which is the only identity check we do, and we may keep what the law requires us to keep.

We will not treat you worse for asking. No different price, no reduced site, nothing withheld. There is nothing to withhold: every page works identically whether the pixel is on or off.

Children. We do not knowingly collect, sell or share the personal information of anyone under 16. Meco is sold on Steam to adults, and the newsletter is not aimed at children.

Your Rights

Users in certain jurisdictions, such as the EU and California, are afforded certain rights regarding their personal information. Except where an exception or exemption applies, these rights include the ability to access, correct, and request the deletion of your personal information.

While these rights are not applicable globally, You can request a  copy of your data from us. You may also request that we delete your account. We may retain certain information as required by law or as necessary for our legitimate business purposes.

Emails

We want to communicate with you only if you want to hear from us. We try to keep emails to a minimum, and you can manage any marketing emails we send.

We will send you an email relating to your transactions with us. You may also elect to receive certain marketing email communications, from which you may opt out at any time by clicking unsubscribe, found at the bottom of our emails.

Security

The security of your information is important to us. We look to industry best practices to protect the data we collect and maintain, including using Transport Layer Security (TLS) to encrypt information as it travels over the internet.

Who to Contact

Privacy questions, the requests in the California section above, and anything else in this policy go to admin@mecorocketsimulator.com.

Loren Aerospace is one person, so that address reaches the person who builds Meco, runs this site and sends the newsletter. There is no department for it to be routed through and no ticket number to quote.

You can contact us in writing at: Loren Aerospace Ltd 71–75 Shelton Street, Covent Garden London, WC2H 9JQ, United Kingdom Company No. 14563299, registered in England and Wales Telephone: +44 20 8133 2085

Updated: September 2026