Our Philosophy
Own your compliance data. Always.
The Difference
Who Controls Your Compliance Data?
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The Question
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Cloud SAAS
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Self-Hosted
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Where your consent records live
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The vendor's server
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Your own WordPress database
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Acces if the vendor closes down
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Frozen - you lose your records
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Unaffected - records stay on your site
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Who controls the data
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The vendor's terms of service
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You do
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Third-party in your privacy chain
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Yes
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No
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Monthly cost tied to your visitors
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Usually
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Never
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Portability if you switch tools
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Export required, formats vary
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Already yours - nothing to migrate
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The First Question
Who owns your consent data?
When a visitor accepts your cookie banner, they’re trusting you with a record of that consent — not the platform you happen to be using this month.
Cloud consent platforms sit between you and your visitors. Every accept, every reject, every preference change flows through a third party’s servers before landing in someone else’s database. If a regulator ever asks for records, you’re dependent on that vendor to hand them over. If the vendor changes its terms, so does your access to your own data.
You do. Always.
Vendor Risk
What happens when you don't control the platform?
Software companies get acquired. Products get sunset. Pricing changes overnight. Free tiers disappear. Terms of service get rewritten with 30 days’ notice.
When your consent system depends on a third-party service, every one of those events is now your problem — even though you had no say in it.
The failure modes look like:
- The vendor gets acquired and the pricing model changes
- The service goes offline for a day — your banner stops working with it
- A regulator asks for consent records the vendor has already deleted
- You want to switch tools but the export format is incompatible
- The product gets sunset and you're given 90 days to migrate everything
With Trust Armory, none of this is your problem.
The Implementation
Why Trust Armory runs entirely inside WordPress.
Trust Armory is a plain WordPress plugin. Not a WordPress plugin that phones home. Not a WordPress plugin that syncs to a dashboard. Just a plugin.
That means:
- The consent banner is rendered from your own server
- The consent audit log lives in your own database tables
- Site scans run locally on your install
- Plugin backups are written to your own uploads directory
- Policy documents are pages inside your WordPress — you own them like any other content
Nothing leaves your site because there’s nothing to leave. There’s no backend to talk to. There’s no cloud database to sync with. There’s no analytics endpoint counting your visitors. The plugin is the product, and the product runs where you run it.
Common Questions
Answers about self-hosted trade-offs.
Isn't cloud hosting more convenient?
For the vendor, yes. For you, the trade-off is real: convenience comes at the cost of ownership. Trust Armory is designed so you get the convenience of a plugin (install, configure, done) without ever handing over your data.
What if I switch WordPress hosts?
Your consent records move with your site. Because everything lives inside your WordPress database and uploads directory, a standard site migration takes Trust Armory’s data with it — no separate export, no re-linking, no vendor to notify.
Isn't storing data on my server less secure?
Your server has one owner. A cloud vendor’s server has thousands of tenants and a much larger attack surface. Whichever tool you use, the security fundamentals are the same: keep WordPress updated, use strong passwords, and back up regularly — Trust Armory helps with the last one.
What if I need to give someone temporary access to my data?
You do it the same way you’d share anything else in WordPress: create a user, give them the right role, and remove them when the work is done. There’s no separate vendor console with its own permission model.
Does self-hosted mean slower?
The consent banner is a small JavaScript file served from your own site — usually faster than pulling one from a third-party CDN, because your visitors’ browsers are already talking to your server. The plugin doesn’t add analytics calls or external requests.
Can I export my data if I want to leave Trust Armory?
You never need to — it’s already yours. Consent records are rows in your own database. Policies are pages in your own site. Backups are files in your own uploads folder. If you uninstall the plugin tomorrow, everything you’ve collected stays intact.