About Showgone's automated requests
This page explains the automated requests Showgone sends to other websites, and how to reach us about them.
VIN lookups (ShowgoneVINLookup)
When someone uses Showgone's VIN lookup, Showgone sends that VIN to vPIC, the public vehicle database of NHTSA (the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration), to get the vehicle's year, make, model, trim and engine details. These requests identify themselves as ShowgoneVINLookup/1.0 (+https://www.showgone.io/bot; oscowboyc@gmail.com). Showgone sends only the VIN. It doesn't send your name, email or account details, and the request comes from Showgone's servers, not your device. Showgone keeps each result in memory for up to 24 hours to avoid repeat requests. The lookup itself doesn't save the VIN to Showgone's database. If you save a vehicle to your garage, see our Privacy page for what we keep.
CARB documents (ShowgoneEOFetcher)
Showgone's app doesn't send requests to CARB's website. Showgone's document fetcher does, and each run is described here before it happens. In its next run, the fetcher will download public executive order (EO) listing pages and EO PDFs from CARB's website, arb.ca.gov (including ww2.arb.ca.gov and ww3.arb.ca.gov), to list aftermarket parts and the vehicles each EO lists. It sends one request at a time, at least 5 seconds apart. It reads CARB's robots.txt first and follows it, and it doesn't request search pages or any URL with a query string. These requests identify themselves as ShowgoneEOFetcher/1.0 (+https://showgone.io/bot; oscowboyc@gmail.com). Showgone stores the downloaded PDFs privately so it can index them, and never serves them on its website. Showgone also downloaded public EO documents from CARB's website once before, in October 2026. To ask us to stop or slow down, use the address under "Contact" below.
Contact
To ask us to stop or slow down, email oscowboyc@gmail.com.