Stack Overflow Privacy Policy

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11## Stack Exchange, Inc. Privacy Policy
22
3Last updated: June 18, 2025
3Last updated: December 10, 2025
44
55ABOUT STACK OVERFLOW
66
77The Stack Overflow Network (also referred to herein as "Stack Overflow" or "Network") is a set of related Internet sites and other applications for asynchronous collaboration and sharing knowledge, owned and operated by Stack Exchange, Inc. ("Stack Overflow", "we" or "us"), a Delaware corporation. As of 6/18/25, this policy also applies to all use of [stackoverflow.ai](https://stackoverflow.ai/) and its related sites and services ("Services"). For the purpose of applying this policy to the Services, "Network" means "Services" as defined in the [Stackoverflow.ai Terms of Use](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/services/stackoverflow-ai-terms-of-use/).
88
99Stack Overflow welcomes you to the Network, the largest community of developers and technologists in the world, and invites you to participate in the community by sharing knowledge with your peers and colleagues.
3232Personal data is any information about you by which you can be identified or be identifiable (either on its own or when combined with other information). This can include information such as: your name, email address and username; information about your device (e.g., IP address); and information relating to how you use and interact with our sites, apps and services.
3333
3434We have set out below an overview of how our privacy notices work. Depending on how you interact with us, we will collect and process your personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy and any applicable other privacy notice(s).
3535
3636- This Privacy Policy applies where you interact with us through the Network, or use any of our products and services.
3737- If you interact with us through our Collectives on Stack Overflow, please read the [Privacy Notice for Collectives](https://stackoverflow.com/legal/privacy-policy/collectives).
38- If you interact with us through your organization's Private Network on Stack Overflow for Teams and/or through one of our Stack Overflow for Teams Integrations, we will only process certain information as described in our [Stack Overflow for Teams Privacy Notice](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/teams/privacy-notice) and our [Stack Overflow for Teams Integrations Privacy Notice](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/teams/integrations-privacy-notice), respectively.
38- If you interact with us through your organization's Private Network on Stack Overflow Internal and/or through one of our Stack Overflow Internal Integrations, we will only process certain information as described in our [Stack Overflow Internal Privacy Notice](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/internal/privacy-notice) and our [Stack Overflow Internal Integrations Privacy Notice](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/internal/integrations-privacy-notice), respectively.
3939- If you're a job applicant for a position at Stack, our [Applicant and Candidate Privacy Notice](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/company/candidate-privacy-policy) will be applicable.
4040- If you're an employee, our Employee Privacy Notice will be applicable.
4141
4242GENERAL PRIVACY NOTICE FOR STACK EXCHANGE, INC.
4343
44This Privacy Notice is applicable to you, including when you participate in our Public Community Platform for Questions and Answers by interacting with us through Stack Overflow's Public Network ("Public Network"), or when you otherwise interact with us, e.g., when you purchase or use our Advertising or Teams or Collectives or other products ("Products") or when you contact our Customer Service, Sales or other teams for assistance or inquiries ("Services").
44This Privacy Notice is applicable to you, including when you participate in our Public Community Platform for Questions and Answers by interacting with us through Stack Overflow's Public Network ("Public Network"), or when you otherwise interact with us, e.g., when you purchase or use Stack Overflow Business or other products ("Products") or when you contact our Customer Service, Sales or other teams for assistance or inquiries ("Services").
4545
4646The Public Network allows individual users to engage in a community to share their knowledge and expertise, and to acquire knowledge and expertise. It is community-moderated, and the content in the Public Network is public and therefore visible for anyone to see and is subject to our Public Network Terms of Use.
4747
4848Below you will find details about the personal information we collect about you when you use the Public Network or our Products and Services and interact with us; how and why we collect it, how we use it, and how we keep it secure.
4949
5050This Privacy Notice also tells you about your rights, how you can exercise those rights, and how the law protects you.
5151
5252Stack Exchange, Inc. is the Controller responsible for your personal data collected on the Public Network or directly by us for Stack's operational purposes. In connection with certain Products and Services, Stack is the Processor for the organizations who provide your data to us or use our Products and Services.
5353
5454If you interact with Stack Overflow through your organization, please refer to the specific privacy notices applicable to those Products.
5555
56If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice or the way in which we use your personal data, please contact us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#d5a5a7bca3b4b6ac95a6a1b4b6bebaa3b0a7b3b9baa2fbb6bab8)
56If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice or the way in which we use your personal data, please contact us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#f8888a918e999b81b88b8c999b93978e9d8a9e94978fd69b9795)
5757
5858WHAT INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?
5959
6060This section sets out the categories and details of personal information that we collect across our Products and Services.
6161
6262We collect and process your personal information in order to offer the Network, and to offer you our Products and Services.
8080**Billing information**
8181
8282For Products and Services requiring payment, we collect a billing name, phone number, and email address. We also collect a billing and shipping address for invoicing purposes. If you elect to pay by credit card, Stack Overflow may engage a third party to securely process your payment. All payment processing is done through a PCI DSS compliant third party. If customers are paying by a credit card, their card details are vaulted through a third-party payment gateway. Stack Overflow will store an encrypted token along with the last four digits of the credit card and the expiration month and year of the card and will not store or retain any other billing information about you.
8383
8484**Profile information**
8585
86When completing a public "profile", whether it is for use with the Network or our Products and Services, we may require you to share certain personally identifying information in required and optional profile fields. The name associated with your account, which you may review and change in your account settings, as well as reputation points are publicly displayed and connected to your activity on the Stack Overflow Network and via certain Products and Services, such as our Talent and Teams platforms. Moderators, who have elevated access privileges, may access non-public user profile data, as well as content in posts and other public data. For more information about moderators and their role in the Stack Exchange Network, please visit [our help center](https://stackoverflow.com/help/site-moderators).
86When completing a public "profile", whether it is for use with the Network or our Products and Services, we may require you to share certain personally identifying information in required and optional profile fields. The name associated with your account, which you may review and change in your account settings, as well as reputation points are publicly displayed and connected to your activity on the Stack Overflow Network and via certain Products and Services, such as our Stack Ads and Stack Internal platforms. Moderators, who have elevated access privileges, may access non-public user profile data, as well as content in posts and other public data. For more information about moderators and their role in the Stack Exchange Network, please visit [our help center](https://stackoverflow.com/help/site-moderators).
8787
8888Other profile information may also be publicly displayed if you choose to complete certain elective components of the Account Registration options, including e.g., your Developer Story, display picture, affiliated role and company, your location, and your preferred technologies (javascript, swift, sql-server, etc.), and some information is publicly displayed and required, such as how long you have been a member.
8989
9090Similarly, you may elect to share additional information that is not required, but this will be displayed publicly if you so choose to share it.
9191
92If you are using the private Network (e.g., Stack Overflow for Teams), your account settings, including name, affiliated role and company, and other information may be shared with your private Network Team members designated as authorized users of your private Network account. While some of the public and private Network profile information is required, much of it is within your control as we describe herein and can be modified, updated, and restricted by you in your settings.
92If you are using the private Network (e.g., Stack Overflow Internal), your account settings, including name, affiliated role and company, and other information may be shared with your private Network team members designated as authorized users of your private Network account. While some of the public and private Network profile information is required, much of it is within your control as we describe herein and can be modified, updated, and restricted by you in your settings.
9393
9494**Information we use to identify and authenticate you**
9595
9696We need this information to be able to recognize you, for example, when you access your accounts. It also helps us to protect your details and keep them secure. We may also use this information for fraud detection and prevention.
9797
9898**Analytics information**
197197**Developer Survey**
198198
199199As the world's largest developer community, Stack Overflow publishes an annual Developer Survey to provide key insights into the developer community, as well as other surveys from time to time, some of which include demographic (e.g., gender, race, age, etc.) and certain personal information. Your participation in the Developer Survey as well as any other Stack Overflow survey is entirely voluntary. In order to provide meaningful insights into the developer community, Stack Overflow may collect sensitive data about you, including, but not limited to your gender, race, sexual orientation, immigration status, and your location. We consider this data to be among our most sensitive and have taken elevated measures to protect such data as well as to de-identify your name and other personal information from such data. We restrict such data within Stack Overflow on a privileged basis to only those that need to see it and while we may share your personal information with our third party providers for our research, we do so only after imposing contractual obligations of confidentiality on such third parties and only where necessary for limited research purposes.
200200
201201When we publish our surveys, they are published as a compilation of anonymized data. We may ask for your consent to contact you following completion of the surveys.
202202
203If you have any questions concerning the Developer Survey or other survey and our security measures to protect your sensitive personal data, please contact us at: [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#700002190611130930030411131b1f061502161c1f075e131f1d).
203If you have any questions concerning the Developer Survey or other survey and our security measures to protect your sensitive personal data, please contact us at: [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#b4c4c6ddc2d5d7cdf4c7c0d5d7dfdbc2d1c6d2d8dbc39ad7dbd9).
204204
205205**Advertising on our Network**
206206
207207We work with third party advertisers to deliver ads on our Network. This involves tracking, targeting and measuring, using your personal data. We will get consent through our online consent management portal, or via other consent mechanisms before we can use your personal data in this way.
208208
209209**Targeting:**
230230**Microsoft Advertising**
231231
232232We use Microsoft services (e.g., Bing) for personalized advertising purposes, including Match lists, user event tracking (UET) and retargeting. When we do this, Microsoft collects or receives Personal Data from us to provide Microsoft advertising. Your data can only be used by Stack Overflow and will not be shared with other parties. Where applicable, (for example, if you reside in the EEA or where EEA law applies), we will get your consent before we can share your personal data with Microsoft. You can find out more by visiting [Microsoft Privacy Statements](https://privacy.microsoft.com/en-gb/privacystatement).
233233
234234You can also control the use of your data for interest-based advertising from Microsoft by visiting their [opt-out page](https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/).
235235
236**Employer Branding**
236**Stack Ads**
237237
238238Stack Overflow provides services that enable organizations to provide branded content on our website. We maintain a dedicated page on the public Stack Overflow page that enables our customers to set up a page and create branded content.
239239
240240The Customer has an admin key to the page, controls the content and can invite others to be admins. Most content is static and just resides on the page.
241241
242242Dynamic content (posting updates, giving advice, etc.) lives externally to the page and can be accessed by users through links provided by our customer. Public users can "follow" the page through getting a weekly email digest and they can unfollow or opt out of receiving emails from the Customer.
251251
252252- Companies within the Stack Exchange network.
253253- Third parties who provide professional services, including but not limited to accountants; banking, insurance and insurance broking services for us.
254254- Third parties we use to help deliver our products and services to you, e.g., payment service providers, payment processors, warehouses and delivery companies; cloud service providers, e.g., Microsoft Azure, service providers that help us carry out certain tasks, including order fulfilment, customer service providers, maintaining technology and related infrastructure, serving and targeting ads, measuring performance, managing and analysing research, email distribution, managing marketing e.g., Marketo and promotions and surveys.
255255- Additionally, to improve user experience, we offer single sign-on solutions for account login and these third parties (including Facebook and Google) may receive information from these services when you elect to use them.
256256- When Stack Overflow shares your personal information and other collected information with third party service providers, we require that they use your information only for the purpose of providing services to us and consistent with this privacy policy.
257- Third parties that we partner with to deliver products and services, including certain marketing and features to you, such as [Employer Branding](); and Collectives on Stack Overflow (please read the [Collectives Privacy Notice](https://stackoverflow.com/legal/privacy-policy/collectives)).
257- Third parties that we partner with to deliver products and services, including certain marketing and features to you, such as [Stack Ads](); and Collectives on Stack Overflow (please read the [Collectives Privacy Notice](https://stackoverflow.com/legal/privacy-policy/collectives)).
258258- Advertising partners - When you visit or interact with our websites, e.g., when you use the Public Network, we and authorized third parties will, with your permission, place certain cookies on your device and your account activity as described in more detail within our [cookie policy](https://policies.stackoverflow.co/stack-overflow/cookie-policy). We use this information to serve you certain advertising content. We also partner with other third parties, such as Google Ads and Microsoft Bing, to serve advertising content and manage advertising campaigns. When we use Google Ads or Microsoft Bing Customer Match for advertising campaigns, your personal data will be protected using hashed codes.
259259 Google users can control the ads that they see on Google services, including Customer Match ads, in their Google Ads Settings.
260260 More information on how to control your account settings or to opt out of direct marketing campaigns can be found under [Your Choices]() section. You can also opt out in your [Profile Settings](https://stackoverflow.com/users/email/settings/current).
261261- Event sponsors and partners - we may share your personal data with sponsors of Stack Overflow events and partners whom we hold events with for marketing purposes when you have given your permission for us to do so.
262262- Other third parties approved by you, e.g., third parties that run our Developer Survey, social media sites you choose to link your account to or third party payment providers.
263263- We may make available APIs to enable users to download publicly available information from our websites.
290290
291291- You can control the use of your data for interest-based advertising from Microsoft by visiting their [opt-out page.](https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/)
292292- You can opt out of advertising from Google or find out more by visiting [Google's help center.](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2676774)
293293
294294More information and resources on how you can control your ad choices and how to opt out of interest based advertising can be found on [NAI Consumer Opt Out](https://optout.networkadvertising.org/) and [YourAdChoices.com](https://youradchoices.com/).
295295
296If you want to access or control personal data processed by Stack Overflow that is not available via the tools, please refer to [Your Rights]() or contact us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#6c1c1e051a0d0f152c1f180d0f07031a091e0a00031b420f0301).
296If you want to access or control personal data processed by Stack Overflow that is not available via the tools, please refer to [Your Rights]() or contact us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#39494b504f585a40794a4d585a52564f5c4b5f55564e175a5654).
297297
298298YOUR RIGHTS
299299
300300You have a number of rights in relation to your personal data, and you can contact us if you want to exercise any of these.
301301
302302Your rights include:
326326
327327If applicable, we will only transfer or share your personal data outside the UK/EEA:
328328
329329- to a country, territory or organization that has been assessed as providing an adequate level of protection for personal data 'adequacy decision' by the UK or the EU Commission;
330330- By using legally-approved UK or EU Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCS) or Model Clauses, in addition to implementing appropriate supplementary measures to ensure the protection of the personal data.
331331
332If you are located in the UK or the EU, you may contact us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#6c00090b0d002c1f180d0f07031a091e0a00031b420f0301) to request a copy of the Standard Contractual Clauses.
332If you are located in the UK or the EU, you may contact us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#711d1416101d31020510121a1e071403171d1e065f121e1c) to request a copy of the Standard Contractual Clauses.
333333
334334By accessing the Stack Overflow Network and engaging with our Products and Services, you acknowledge that your personal data may be collected and transferred from your local jurisdiction (including those in the European Economic Area (EEA) and the UK) to the United States or other jurisdictions.
335335
336336**Our ongoing commitment to data security**
337337
338338Security is important to us and we know it is important to you. Stack Overflow follows generally accepted standards to protect your personal information when processing, transferring, and storing your personal information including Transport Layer Security ("TLS").
372372- Inferences we make based on other collected data, for purposes such as recommending content, advertising, and analytics.
373373
374374You can find more information about (a) what we collect and sources of that information, (b) the business and commercial purposes for collecting that information, and (c) the categories of third parties with whom we share that information in the sections of our privacy statement above.
375375
376376California consumers have additional rights under the CCPA (subject to certain limitations), including the right to request access to or deletion of your personal information, and information about our data practices, as well as the right not to be discriminated against for exercising your privacy rights.
377377
378These rights can be exercised by contacting us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#fc8c8e958a9d9f85bc8f889d9f97938a998e9a90938bd29f9391).
378These rights can be exercised by contacting us at [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#a1d1d3c8d7c0c2d8e1d2d5c0c2caced7c4d3c7cdced68fc2cecc).
379379
380380We will verify your request using the information associated with your account, including email address. Government identification may be required. Consumers can also designate an authorized agent to exercise these rights on their behalf.
381381
382382**Children**
383383
384384The Stack Overflow platform is not intended for children. We do not knowingly offer this or any other Product or Service to anyone under the age of 16.
388388We may amend or update this policy from time to time and will notify you of any material changes to this policy. Previous versions of this privacy policy are available upon request.
389389
390390CONTACT US
391391
392392Privacy Officer
393393
394- Privacy Officer, 14 Wall Street, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10005, [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#2454564d5245475d64575045474f4b52415642484b530a474b49), phone: 212-232-8280
394- Privacy Officer, 14 Wall Street, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10005, [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#7404061d0215170d34070015171f1b02110612181b035a171b19), phone: 212-232-8280
395395
396396UK Representative
397397
398- Privacy Officer, Bentima House, 168-172 Old Street, London EC1V 9BP, [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#4a3a38233c2b29330a393e2b2921253c2f382c26253d64292527), phone: +44 (0) 20 3349 1000
398- Privacy Officer, Bentima House, 168-172 Old Street, London EC1V 9BP, [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#afdfddc6d9ceccd6efdcdbceccc4c0d9caddc9c3c0d881ccc0c2), phone: +44 (0) 20 3349 1000
399399
400400EU Representative
401401
402402- The MD Stack Overflow GMBH HRB 234500
403403 3 Frieslandstraat, Amsterdam,
404 [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#5222203b2433312b1221263331393d243720343e3d257c313d3f), phone: +44 (0) 20 3349 1000
404 [\[email protected\]](https://stackoverflow.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#4d3d3f243b2c2e340d3e392c2e26223b283f2b21223a632e2220), phone: +44 (0) 20 3349 1000