Effective 28 September 2026. Expat China is operated by 岛主（海南）投资有限公司 (Daozhu (Hainan) Investment Co., Ltd.). For privacy questions or requests, write to Privacy@expat.org.cn.
When you read the site
The site delivers pages and records ordinary technical request information needed for security and operation. Cloudflare Web Analytics measures page performance through a browser beacon; this measurement does not use analytics cookies or browser storage. The chat window separately uses browser session storage for its session identifier and recent on-screen conversation, which normally ends when the tab session ends.
When you use web chat
We process the question you type, generated replies and session details such as page address, referring page, campaign information when present, language, browser information, country-level location signal and session identifier. We use these to answer, maintain context, protect the service and let our internal reception team follow up. Do not enter passport numbers, payment credentials, medical records or other sensitive details. Children under 14 should not use the chat.
Services that process a conversation
The conversation is stored in a Cloudflare D1 database. Relevant chat context is sent to DeepSeek to generate an answer; Alibaba Cloud Qwen may be used if that route fails. A question needing current information may be sent to AnySearch, Qwen or Google Gemini for search. Contact-like strings are removed from search queries where detected, but the original question and returned search result can be logged with the conversation. Chat messages are also relayed over HTTPS to our reception system in Sydney, Australia, and may appear as notifications in our internal WeCom support app. Cloudflare, the AI and search providers, and the support platform process information under their own arrangements. Chat data may therefore be processed outside mainland China.
How long we keep it
We automatically remove Expat China chat sessions, messages, related search logs and any associated lead row from our chat database after 90 days without activity. The same 90-day inactivity limit applies to the conversation summary in our Sydney reception database. Notifications already delivered to the WeCom support app and copies held by external service providers are outside these two deletion jobs and may follow those providers' own retention rules. We will help direct a deletion request for those copies where available. Information that must be retained by law may be handled separately and restricted to that purpose.
Your choices and requests
You can read the site without opening web chat. Before sending a chat message, review this policy and the separate consent in the chat window for processing outside mainland China. To request access, a copy, correction or deletion of information we control, or to withdraw consent for future chat processing, email Privacy@expat.org.cn. We may need to confirm that the record belongs to you before acting. Withdrawing consent does not undo processing already completed.