Legal

Privacy Policy

Note: This is a working draft intended as a starting point. It is not legal advice. Before publishing this as your final policy, have it reviewed by a qualified lawyer familiar with UAE data protection law and, if you expect visitors from the EU/UK, with GDPR requirements — your obligations may differ depending on what tools (analytics, email providers, forms) you ultimately use on the site.

1. Who We Are

This website, tomorrowbecameacountry.com, is operated in connection with the book Tomorrow Became a Country: How the UAE Engineered the Future as One System by Syed Raheel Shahzad. For any questions about this policy, contact us at info@tomorrowbecameacountry.com.

2. What Information We Collect

We collect information you provide directly to us, specifically:

  • Email address — if you subscribe to receive book updates, research notes, or press announcements.
  • Name, email, and message content — if you submit the contact form for press, speaking, or reader correspondence.
  • Basic technical data — such as browser type and pages visited, automatically collected through standard web server logs and any analytics tools we may use.

We do not knowingly collect sensitive personal data, financial information, or government identification numbers through this website.

3. How We Use Your Information

We use the information collected to:

  • Send you the updates you have specifically subscribed to receive
  • Respond to enquiries submitted through the contact form
  • Understand how visitors use the site, in order to improve it
  • Maintain the security and proper functioning of the website

We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal information to third parties for marketing purposes.

4. Cookies

This site may use cookies — small text files stored on your device — to support basic functionality and, where applicable, anonymised analytics. You can disable cookies through your browser settings; doing so may affect some site functionality.

5. Third-Party Services

This site is built on WordPress and may use third-party plugins or services (for example, email delivery or form-handling tools) to operate features such as the newsletter signup or contact form. Where such services are used, your data may be processed by that provider in accordance with their own privacy policy. We aim to use only reputable providers and to share the minimum data necessary for the feature to work.

6. Data Retention

We retain personal information only as long as necessary for the purpose it was collected — for example, your email remains on our list until you unsubscribe, and contact form submissions are kept only as long as needed to address your enquiry.

7. Your Rights

You may request access to, correction of, or deletion of the personal information we hold about you at any time by contacting us at info@tomorrowbecameacountry.com. If you have subscribed to updates, every email includes an unsubscribe link you can use at any time.

8. Children’s Privacy

This website is not directed at children, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

9. Changes to This Policy

We may update this policy from time to time. The date of the most recent update will always appear at the bottom of this page.

10. Contact Us

For any questions about this Privacy Policy or how your data is handled, please reach out to us directly:

Last updated: 2026