Privacy

Status: describes the code as built. Anything marked (unverified) has not been checked.

TL;DR

• The website is static files. It has no API and sets no cookies, analytics or third-party scripts. Some pages contact a public service straight from your browser: the home page's river reading (USGS), the home page's "Get it now" (the free provider you picked), and the card checker (the address you give it). Never irlpls.
• The reference library runs on your machine. It sends place names to OpenStreetMap Nominatim to find coordinates, unless you give coordinates yourself or turn geocoding off.
• There is no hosted irlpls service. Your agent calls each provider directly.
• Orders go from your agent straight to the provider, using your own account with that provider. irlpls is not in the middle and never sees them.
• Quotes from a protocol provider (a card with a protocol block; none is listed yet) carry coarse coordinates (about 1 km), no address, no "why" and no identity; your exact place goes only to the provider you choose, when you order. Quotes and reads through an adapter (all 61 today) send the place at full precision to that provider.
• The provider you order from learns who you are (your account), your IP address, the exact place and what you asked for.

The model

One provider sees only its own requests. A central router would see every request from everyone, so irlpls runs on the requester's side: the matcher (match.js, irlpls/match.py) and the broker run on your machine or inside your agent, and you talk to each provider directly. The project publishes cards and a standard, not a service in the middle.

The website

Pages are plain files from irlpls.com. They set no cookies and load no analytics, third-party scripts or third-party fonts. Matching on the site (match.js) runs in your browser.

These pages contact someone else from your browser. Each request goes from your browser straight to that service, never through irlpls, and each service sees your IP address and user agent, as with any site:

• Home page, first screen: fetches the latest flow for USGS site 08167000 (Guadalupe River at Comfort, TX) from api.waterdata.usgs.gov. The river photos are saved copies served from irlpls.com.
• Home page, "Get it now" (live.js): when you tap it on a free match, your browser asks that one provider for a reading. It sends the map point of the place your ask was matched to (rounded to about 100 m, or a box around it), or a station id; the text you typed is not sent. Matching the ask to a place runs in your browser, from a built-in list of cities. The providers:

• Card checker: fetches the domain you type, or the card you paste, and, under "Check a sample pack", the sample-pack links that card lists (an evidence_url ending in irlpls-sample.json) and the files each pack names. Other evidence links are listed, not fetched.

The static host's own access logs (IP, user agent, URL, time) depend on the host, which is not chosen yet (unverified).

The reference library

Everything runs in your process. Outbound calls use irlpls/http.py (user agent irlpls/0.1 (+https://irlpls.com)), and each host contacted sees your IP address. Nothing goes to irlpls.com except fetching its static files.

Geocoding. When a request names a place and has no coordinates, irlpls/geo.py sends the place text to Nominatim over HTTPS (nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search). If you write a home address, Nominatim (a third party) receives it. Results are cached in memory for the session. Nominatim's logging follows the OSMF policy (unverified here). To avoid it:

• give coordinates: irlpls.request(need, lat=..., lon=...) or irlpls.find(..., lat=..., lon=...), or
• turn it off: geocode=False (irlpls find --no-geo on the command line).

Saved jobs. The broker writes each job (need, why, plan, quotes, order ids) to ~/.irlpls/jobs/ on your machine, or to $IRLPLS_HOME. It is not sent anywhere.

Providers with an adapter (no protocol). Each adapter talks only to the provider named in its file, and sends the place at full precision:

Orders are placed only after a policy check (auto_submit, max_order_usd); a provider's second, paid step (Capella's cost estimate, GLOBHE's quotes) only after your explicit approval of that order, never under auto_submit. Searching and quoting place no order but still send your search area. This table is a summary, not a field-by-field audit (unverified); the exact payloads are in irlpls/adapters/<name>.py.

Providers that speak the protocol

For a provider whose card has a protocol block (STANDARD Section 14), the library calls the provider's own endpoint, using the credentials you configured for it (broker.PROTOCOL["auth"]). Those credentials never leave your process except to that provider.

Quotes (irlpls/broker.py, _wire_request) send:

• the need text as you wrote it, plus timing, quantity, mode, terms and the country code;
• coordinates rounded to 0.01° (about 1 km), and no place field;
• a targets_person flag when the request is about a person.

They do not send your Policy, your why, or who you are. Before your first order with that provider, it also does not know your account, unless its quote endpoint requires your credentials (per provider, unverified).

The exact place (full coordinates and the place text) goes only to the provider you chose: in its own re-quote and in the order. Live readings use the coarse form.

Orders go from your agent directly to <the card's protocol endpoint>/orders, under your own provider account. They carry the quote or request, a spending ceiling, a random nonce, a random job id as client_reference, and whether a person approved or a standing mandate covered it.

Free text is not cleaned. If need names a street or a person, the provider gets that text even in a coarse quote. To keep quotes coarse, keep the address out of need and give it as place or coordinates.

The MCP server

irlpls-mcp runs the same library inside your agent's MCP host, so everything above applies.

• Full mode (default): can plan, quote and order. It geocodes place names with Nominatim, and orders with this process's provider credentials. Run it locally (stdio, or HTTP on 127.0.0.1). Binding another address needs --allow-remote, and then anyone who can reach the port can use the ordering tools, since the HTTP transport has no authentication.
• Read-only mode (--read-only): plans only. irlpls_submit and the six protocol tools are not registered, so it makes no provider calls and cannot quote or order.

Running a read-only server yourself

There is no hosted irlpls service. If you run the read-only MCP server for others, deploy/serve.py is the only supported way. It:

• refuses to start without --read-only;
• turns geocoding off, so it calls no one (place words and coverage text still match; agents can pass lat/lon);
• turns the access log off and sets server logs to WARNING, so no IP, path, request body or tool argument is logged;
• caps request size (64 KB) and live sessions (500).

Plans are held in memory and are lost on restart. A job id is the only key to a plan, so anyone holding the id can read it. The container user has no writable home, so the library's job files (~/.irlpls/jobs/) are not written (not tested in the built image). The hosting platform's own request logs are set by that platform.

What each party learns

Keep it local

1. Give coordinates or pass geocode=False, so no place string goes to a geocoder.
2. Keep addresses and names out of need.
3. Load only the adapters and provider credentials you need.
4. Self-host the static files if you don't want to fetch cards.json and match.js from irlpls.com.

Questions

Security reports: SECURITY.md. What the project will not do: GOVERNANCE.md. The normative privacy rules are in docs/STANDARD.md Sections 12 and 14.12. Contact: [email protected].