Privacy policy

Sift runs entirely inside your browser. It does not collect, transmit or sell any information about you, and it has no server to send anything to. Sift sends nothing to the developer or to anyone else.

The short version

There is no account, no analytics, no crash reporting and no third-party code. Sift’s only network requests are search alerts: for each search you choose to watch, Sift loads that search page from facebook.com or kijiji.ca in the background, at most every 30 minutes for Facebook (every 15, 30 or 60 minutes for Kijiji, as you choose), with your browser’s own cookies for that site, exactly as if you opened it in a tab. With no watched searches it makes no requests.
Your settings and your listing history are stored by Chrome on your own device, in storage that only Sift can read.
You can clear everything from the Data page in Sift’s settings, and uninstalling the extension removes it all.

What Sift stores, and where

Data	What it contains	Where it lives
Settings	The filters you set: blocked and required words, allowed and blocked places, price limits, the distance radius, feed options, Focus rules, presets, and your home location (a label and coordinates you chose).	`chrome.storage.sync`. If Chrome sync is turned on in your browser, Chrome copies this between your signed-in devices under Google’s own privacy policy. If it is off, it stays on this device.
Listing history	For listings Sift has seen on Facebook Marketplace or Kijiji: the listing id, the prices seen and when, when it was first seen, whether you opened it, whether you hid it, the posting time when the page provided one, and the listing title (up to 80 characters) and its link, so price drops and reposted listings can be listed. No photos, seller names or messages are stored.	`chrome.storage.local`, on this device only. Capped at 12,000 listings per site; the oldest are pruned automatically.
Repost index	For listings with a specific enough title: the normalized title with the city (or, on Kijiji, the start of the description), and the id, date and price of the first listing seen with it, so Sift can tell when the same item is posted again under a new id.	`chrome.storage.local`, on this device only. Pruned together with the listing history.
Watched searches	For each search you choose to watch (up to 10): the search page’s address, its label, whether it is on, and when you added it. Your alert settings (on or off, and how often to check) are kept with your other settings.	`chrome.storage.sync`, like your other settings.
Alert state	For each watched search: when it was last checked, the last error if any, how many new listings are waiting, and the ids of up to 400 recently seen listings, so only listings posted since the last check count as new.	`chrome.storage.local`, on this device only. Removed when you remove the watch.

Nothing in either store identifies you. Sift never reads your name, your Facebook or Kijiji account, your messages, or anything outside the listing cards on the page.

Your location

The distance limit needs a starting point. You can type a city, which Sift matches against a list built into the extension, or press “Use my current location”, which asks the browser for your position once through the standard permission prompt. Either way the result is a latitude and longitude saved in your settings, used only to compute distances on your own computer. Sift never sends your location anywhere and never asks for it in the background.

Permissions, and why Sift asks for them

Storage, to keep your settings and listing history as described above.
Access to facebook.com and kijiji.ca, so the extension can read the listing cards on those pages and hide or annotate them, and load the searches you choose to watch. Sift does nothing on any other website.
Alarms, to wake Sift every 5 minutes to see whether a watched search is due; the alarm exists only while you have an enabled watch.
Notifications (optional, asked for only when you create your first watch or press Allow notifications), to show one notification per watched search when new listings appear.
On facebook.com, a small script inside the page reads the listing data that Facebook’s page already downloads for itself, to learn posting times for the age badge. That script does not change those responses and does not make requests of its own.

What Sift never does

Send data to the developer or to anyone else.
Load remote code, fonts, images or scripts.
Track which listings you view across sites, or build a profile of you.
Post, message, save, like or buy anything on your behalf.
Change its behaviour based on who you are.

Deleting your data

Open Sift’s settings, go to Data, and choose “Clear history” to remove the listing history. Settings can be exported to a file, imported again, or changed back by hand on the same page. Removing the extension from Chrome deletes both stores. If Chrome sync is on, Chrome also removes the synced settings from your account when the extension is uninstalled.

Children

Sift is not directed at children and collects no personal information from anyone.

Changes to this policy

If a future version ever needs to store or send something new, this page will say so plainly, the date at the top will change, and the Chrome Web Store listing will note the change. Version 1.1 added search alerts (watched searches, their alert state, and the background loading of those searches), listing titles and links, and the repost index, all described above. The current version of Sift needs nothing beyond what is described here.

Contact

Questions and reports go to [email protected], or through the Support tab on Sift’s Chrome Web Store listing.