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Privacy Policy
Last Updated: 05/30/2014
Care2.com ("Care2") takes seriously the issue of safeguarding your privacy online.
This privacy policy applies to www.care2.com and thepetitionsite.com owned and operated
by Care2.com. This privacy policy describes how Care2.com collects and uses the personal
information you provide on our web site: www.care2.com and www.thepetitionsite.com.
Please read the following to understand our views and practices regarding this matter,
and how they pertain to you as you use our many offerings.
The TRUSTe Trustmark
Care2.com has been awarded TRUSTe's Privacy Seal signifying that this privacy policy and
practices have been reviewed by TRUSTe for compliance with
TRUSTe's program requirements
including transparency, accountability and choice regarding the collection and use of your
personal information. The TRUSTe program does not cover information that may be collected through software downloaded from the site.
The TRUSTe program covers only information that is collected through this Web site,
www.care2.com and does not cover information that may be collected behind the log in on our website.
When visiting a website displaying the TRUSTe Trustmark, you will
be notified of what personally identifiable information of yours is
collected:
- The organization collecting the information;
- How the information is used;
- With whom the information may be shared;
- What choices are available to you regarding collection, use and distribution of the information;
- The kind of security procedures that are in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of information under the company's control;
- And how you can correct any inaccuracies in the information.
Questions regarding this privacy statement should be submitted to Care2
Customer Support using the Help Form.
If Care2 has not responded to your inquiry or your inquiry has not been satisfactorily addressed, please contact
TRUSTe.
https://feedback-form.truste.com/watchdog/request
Privacy Questions
Answers
Does Care2 ask for personal information?
Yes. Care2 asks for your name and other personal information when you
sign up for our services.
How Does Care2 use my personal information?
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Personal and Demographic Information:
Care2 asks for personal
information, such as your name, email address, date of birth, street address and zip code. Your
personal information is used to set up your Care2 account and to
allow you to use many Care2 member services. Members may also supply
additional information for special site services such as My Care2 and Biorhythms.
Care2 may also ask for demographic information,
such as your education level, occupation and industry. Care2 does not knowingly
collect information from children under 13 and if Care2 later learns that a
child under 13 is registered, steps will be taken to remove the child's
information from the data base.
We also reserve the right to collect publicly available data about you, either obtained directly by us or through a 3rd party.
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Advertising:
Care2's goal in collecting personal and demographic
information is to provide our members with the most personalized
web experience possible and our advertisers with an efficient means to
reach the right audience. By knowing about you, Care2 can deliver
more relevant content and advertisements (e.g. banner ads), and
hence better service, to you.
In delivering targeted online advertisements, Care2 plays the middleman.
Advertisers give us an ad and tell us the type of audience they
want to reach (e.g. females over 35). Care2 or one of our ad
server partners takes and displays the ad to users meeting those
criteria. In this process, only Care2 -- not the advertiser can access
individuals' account information.
We use third-party advertising companies to serve some of the ads
when you visit our web site. These companies may use information
(not including your name, address, email or telephone number)
about your visits to this and other web sites in order to provide
advertisements
on this site and other sites about goods and services of interest
to you. In the course of serving advertisements on Care2.com, our
third-party advertisers may place or recognize a unique
"cookie"
on your browser. If you would like more information about this
practice
and to know your choices about not having this information use by
these companies,
click here. Advertisers may also use "clear gifs" to track advertising page views, but
this information is not connected to personal information collected by Care2.
If you wish to not have this information used for the purpose of serving you targeted ads, you may opt-out by clicking Here. Please note this does not opt you out of being served advertising. You will continue to receive generic ads.
Advertising revenues help keep Care2 services free, and provide
revenues for donations for wildlife conservation and other charities.
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Biorhythm Generator:
The biorhythm generator is a Care2 feature that plots graph results of an
individual's intellectual, physical and emotional biorhythm cycles based on the
individual's birth date. To use the feature, users enter their birth date and
the date for which they wish to view results. This information is only used for
the Biorhythm feature. The graph results are intended to inform and entertain.
Care2 does not share or disclose the birth date or graph information with any
other party and is used only for immediate display for the person entering
his/her information.
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PetitionSite:
Care2 owns and maintains the nonpartisan PetitionSite.com. Petition and Public
Comment signers are required to provide certain personal information such as
name, email address and often street address. This information is required to
validate the petition / public comment. Care2 uses cookies and a signature
database to provide data integrity and ease of use.
For petitions and surveys you've signed or completed, we treat your name, city,
state, country and comments as public information - for example, we may provide
compilations of petitions, with your comments, to the President and
legislators, other targets, or to the press. Unless you have requested to be
shown as 'anonymous,' this information will also be visible on the website. We
will not make your street address publicly available, but we may transmit it to
members of Congress, to other public officials, or to other targets as part of
a petition to validate your signature. We may also make your comments, along
with your first name, city, state and country, available to the press and
public online.
Care2 hosts two kinds of petitions: free petitions sponsored by individuals
and paid petitions sponsored by third parties, typically nonprofits or charities.
For the free petitions, only the public information listed above is made
available to the petition sponsors or targets.
For many of the petitions sponsored by nonprofits,
we provide an advocacy service allowing individuals to send individual e-mails
to public officials, legislators, and other targets as well as public comments
to government agencies, through our website. These messages are sent in your
name, with your e-mail address as the return address and your full name and
contact information is provided as part of the submission. These messages will
only be sent out under your name as you approve them on an individual basis by
signing an action. You are solely responsible for the specific message(s) you
send using our email tool. Optional comments will be included in the body of
the email message delivered to the petition target.
During the signing process, you may opt to receive certain newsletters and memberships,
in which case Care2 will send your contact information to those 3rd party providers.
However, unless you specifically opt to receive such offers or send your contact
information to 3rd parties during the signing process, Care2 will keep your email
address information confidential. Note that for many campaigns the default settings assume that you want to receive communications from the petition sponsor. If you do not wish to receive such communications, please uncheck the box next to the signup offer. Please note that when you join a 3rd party we may use your petition activity to personalize the actions you see on the site and that we send to you by email.
This Privacy Policy is compliant with: (i) the Safe Harbor Privacy Principles of the US - EU Safe Harbor Framework, and (ii) the Safe Harbor Privacy Principles of the US-Swiss Safe Harbor Framework.
We self-certify compliance with:
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Care2 Cafe Discussions:
To post messages to the Care2 Cafe discussion boards, users must be Care2
members and must log in. When posting a message, a member's Care2 name and/or user name will
appear hyperlinked as the "author" of each message. Login is required to
ensure that every user who posts a message has a unique user id. The name
is hyperlinked to allow other Care2 users to e-mail you; our system is designed
to allow members to contact you via e-mail without revealing your e-mail
address. When posting a message, there is an e-mail notification check off box
that is automatically checked off so that you will be notified via e-mail when
another user responds to your posted message. If you do not want to receive
these e-mail notifications, simply uncheck the e-mail notification box before
posting your message. After posting a message, a link to your member profile
will appear (if you have submitted a member profile). Because, your discussion
postings and member profile will be publicly available, Do NOT include
personal information.
To request removal of your personal information from our discussion boards, contact us using our Help Form. In some cases, we may not be able to remove your personal information, in which case we will let you know if we are unable to do so and why.
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E-Cards:
When sending e-cards, Care2 requires your email address and the name and email address of the intended e-card
recipient.
We will only use this information for this purpose alone. Care2 does not store this information and will only use it for the sole purpose of completing this order.
Care2 has a no-SPAM policy and thus will not share or sell the e-mail addresses entered by card senders.
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E-Mail:
To provide Care2 members email service, Care2 sends its email service provider, MailCentro, Inc., your first and last name, user
name, Care2 email address, and an encrypted password that serves as a
proxy for your actual password (Care2 does not relinquish your actual
password, except on rare occasion as required to provide customer support to an
individual). MailCentro does not use the user's information for any other
purpose than to set up and maintain the email account.
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Newsletters
Care2 offers a variety of Care2 and 3rd party newsletters. If you opt to
receive one or more newsletters via a check box, submit button or by clicking on a specially
marked subscribe link, Care2 will send any required contact information to
those 3rd party providers.
If you no longer wish to receive our newsletter and promotional communications, you may opt-out of receiving them by following the instructions included in each newsletter or by going to your My Account page and change your preferences to unsubscribe from the newsletter.
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Care2 Connect:
Care2 Connect (C2C) is an optional part of Care2 that facilitates new connections between members. C2C is accessible only among Care2 members who have personal profiles. Your personal contact information such as your email address and street address will be kept hidden from the public, and made visible only to you and individuals you have indicated are your friends. The C2C directory helps members locate their friends, and potential friends, by displaying first name, last name, city and other information on search results - but it does not include contact information per the aforementioned limitations. Contact can be initiated for "non-friends" by using an anonymous messaging system that will not reveal either party's address.
If you wish to request removal of your information from our directory, you can contact us using our Help Form.
When submitting a profile, you have the option of including information such as: your name, city, state, and country of residence, birthdate, gender, hobbies, interests, expertises, occupation, business, homepage url, email address, marital status, marital status, personal quote, photos, etc. Remember: Because, much of this information will be publicly available, do NOT include confidential information. Your personal friends network will be populated based on known relationships you have with other C2C members, as established through use of communications services on the Care2 system and as you specifically indicate while using C2C. Your friends network will be visible to other C2C users, and the privacy of each person is protected as described herein.
Tell-a-Friend service: Care2 Connect members can elect to invite friends to join using an invitation template provided by Care2. Through the template, one e-mail invitation containing a unique url link is sent to each person whose email is
entered by the sender. Care2 has a no-SPAM policy and thus will not collect or
sell the e-mail addresses entered by Care2 members.
We will automatically send your friend a one-time email inviting him or her to visit the site. Care2 stores this information for the sole purpose of sending this one-time email and tracking the success of our referral program. Your friend may contact us using our Help Form to request that we remove this information from our database.
Members can remove themselves from the C2C system at any time by adjusting their account settings via their My Account Page. Some changes may take up to 24 hours to appear on the site.
Race for the Rain Forest
,
Race for the Big Cats
,
Race for the Primates
,
Race for the Pets in Need
,
Race for the Oceans
and
End Breast Cancer
: Members and visitors may participate in the click-to-donate Races without entering personal
information. However, to track visits and see how one compares to other Race
participants, members must be logged in while visiting the Race. Care2 members are automatically
registered for each race the first time they click on the free donation button while logged-in. New visitors can become Race participants after
registering for a Care2 account.
When Race participants login to a Race, Care2 tracks the participant's site
visits. Race participants can elect to invite friends to join the Races using an invitation template provided by Care2. Through the template, one e-mail invitation containing a unique url link to the Race is sent to each person whose email is
entered by the sender. Care2 has a no-SPAM policy and thus will not collect or
sell the e-mail addresses entered by Race participants. All Race participants
will also receive periodic Race updates via e-mail. These updates can be
disabled using the "account settings" page on the Race web site.
If a friend joins a Race using an invitation url, Care2 records the friend relationship and gives credit to the friend's "upline" for each click. Sending the url in personal e-mails or posting it in text or image-link format is entirely the member's option, although Care2
specifically asks members to avoid sending the unique url to anyone they do not
know. Players' participation data is aggregated daily and the participation
statistics of the top 100 Racers are posted more frequently on each race.
Distributed Services: Care2 provides 3rd party affiliates access via service modules to certain content and services on the Care2 site. These modules may include discussion boards, user submitted content and other services. The modules may be embedded to appear as if they are part of the 3rd party websites, though the modules themselves are hosted on Care2 servers. All feeds and service modules are subject to our Affiliate Terms of Service. The goal for these distribution services is to expand Care2's network reach to engage more like-minded individuals.
RSS Feeds: Care2 makes some content on our site available as RSS feeds. Content available for syndication is usually denoted with an XML or RSS button. All content syndicated is subject to our Terms of Service. No modifications may be made to any of the materials syndicated. No individual, organization or company may license, sell or otherwise assign use of Care2 RSS content. RSS distribution services help Care2 and its members reach and engage more like-minded individuals.
Facebook Connect: You can log in to our site using sign-in services such as Facebook Connect or an Open ID provider. These services will authenticate your identity and provide you the option to share certain personal information with us such as your name and email address to pre-populate our sign up form. Services like Facebook Connect give you the option to post information about your activities on this Web site to your profile page to share with others within your network.
Links to 3rd Party Sites: Our Site includes links to other Web sites whose privacy practices may differ from those of Care2.com. If you submit personal information to any of those sites, your information is governed by their privacy policies. We encourage you to carefully read the privacy policy of any Web site you visit.
Should I post personal information in group forums?
Users should always be aware that any personally identifiable information submitted to Care2.com can be read, collected, and used by other users of the Care2 site, and could be used to send unsolicited messages to the submitter. Care2 is not responsible for personally identifiable information which users choose to submit. Care2 specifically advises users not to provide information which they regard as sensitive, such as email addresses, phone numbers, mailing addresses, or financial information.
Will Care2 disclose any of my personal information?
Care2 will share your personal information with third parties only in the ways that are described in this privacy policy. Care2 will only disclose your personal information when we believe in good faith that disclosure is necessary to protect our rights, protect your safety or the safety of others, investigate fraud, or respond to a government request, such as to comply with a subpoena, or similar legal process, or to protect the rights or property of Care2, or as necessary to provide personalized Care2 member services. If Care2 is involved in a merger, acquisition, or sale of all or a portion of its assets, you will be notified via email and/or a prominent notice on our Web site of any change in ownership or uses of your personal information, as well as any choices you may have regarding your personal information. Care2 may also disclose your personal information, including name and contact information in some limited circumstances such as when you specifically opt to receive a 3rd party newsletter. We may also provide information to trusted partners who work on behalf of or with Care2 under confidentiality agreements. These companies may use your personal information to communicate with you about offers from Care2 and our marketing partners. However, these companies do not have any independent right to share this information. If you do not want us to share your personal information with these companies, contact us through our Help Form. Under confidentiality agreements, Care2 may also match user information with third-party data. Also, Care2 does disclose aggregated user statistics (for example, X% of our users are female) in order to describe our services to prospective partners, advertisers, and other third parties, and for other lawful purposes.
How do I change or delete my personal information?
To make changes to your name, password, address, subscriptions and other account information, simply log in to your account and click on the "My Account" link. Select the appropriate function(s) to make your desired change(s). For other changes or request deletion of your information to your account, please send an email, using our Help Form detailing the changes you wish to make to your account.
We will retain your information for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you services. We will retain and use your information as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.
What is "Heightened Security"?
For your convenience, we provide a way for you to recover a lost password or user name via a webpage. The "
heightened security" option is an account management tool that disables that recovery feature. If you enable heightened security, no one (including yourself) can search for your login information and view it online.
Will Care2 use my information for direct e-mailings?
Care2 offers a variety of direct e-mail subscriptions describing our
site progress, new features, healthy living tips, activist alerts,
news and announcements including commercial and non-commercial offers.
If you do not want to receive any of our optional mailings, simply opt
out of them when registering to become a member or during other
subscription opportunities. If you sign a petition on our
PetitionSite.com, you will automatically receive updates on the
petition and other important causes. If you elect to receive a
newsletter but later change your mind, go to your My Account page and
change your Subscription preferences to unsubscribe from the
newsletter. Each emailing will also contain unsubscription information
in the email footer. Regardless of the above, Care2 may send
occasional important updates regarding a member's account, critical
service announcements, and other correspondence to all registered
members. To stop all such announcements, you must delete your account.
You may do so by following
this link
to verify your identity.
Care2 also offers optional mailings from our partner nonprofit
organizations and from commercial entities. If you elect to receive
any of these newsletters, some personal information including your
name and contact information will be sent to the respective nonprofit
or commercial entity delivering the newsletter. The user should beware
that by opting-in to either the nonprofit or commercial newsletter
offerings, Care2 will no longer be able to track and control the user
information sent out.
Does Care2 use cookies?
Yes,
cookies are used on Care2 in sevaral ways.
(1) We use cookies to be reminded of whom you are and to access your account information
(stored on our computers) to deliver a better and more personalized service to you.
(2) The use of cookies by our partners, affiliates, tracking utility company, service providers
and advertising networks serving ads onto Care2 may also use cookies. Care2 has no control over
information collected by advertising networks nor can we access this information.
(3) We use local shared objects, also known as Flash cookies, to store your preferences such as
volume control or high game score, or display content based upon what you view on our site to
personalize your visit. Third Parties, with whom we partner to provide certain features on our
site or to display advertising based upon your Web browsing activity, use Flash cookies to
collect and store information. Flash cookies are different from browser cookies because of
the amount of, type of, and how data is stored. Cookie management tools provided by your
browser will not remove Flash cookies. To learn how to manage privacy and storage settings
for Flash cookies click here:
http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager.html#117118
If you elect to disable cookies on web browser, you may be unable to use certain Care2 site features
that require membership, such as accessing your email account, viewing member profiles, and changing your user preferences.
(4) We, or a data provider we have engaged, may place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser to enable
you to receive customized ads, content or services. No personally identifiable information is placed into
these cookies. The cookies may reflect de-identified demographic or other data linked to data you voluntarily
have submitted to us, e.g., your email address, in hashed, non-human readable form. To opt-out of these cookies
or learn more please go to
http://aboutads.info/choices or
http://www.networkadvertising.org/managing/opt_out.asp.
Additionally, emails we send may contain a bit of code known as a "web beacon." This code allows us to understand the time and date of when a user has opened an email and when he/she has utilized a link within the email to visit a website. Our web beacons do not collect personally identifiable information. Users wishing to disable our web beacons should do so by turning images "off" in their email client (e.g., Outlook, Outlook Express). Please see your email client for more information.
What tracking technologies does Care2 use?
In addition to cookies (see above), Care2 and our third party advertising partners track information via database records and "clear gifs". These allow us to know if a web page has been viewed as well as what content has been effective. Clear gifs are tiny graphics with a unique identifier, similar in function to cookies, and are used to track the online movements of Web users. In contrast to cookies, which are stored on a user's computer hard drive, clear gifs are embedded invisibly on Web pages and are about the size of the period at the end of this sentence.
If you elect to disable cookies on your hard drive, this will also disable
database tracking of personalized statistics such as click-to-donate race
clicks, and you may be unable to use certain Care2 site features that require
your user name, such as accessing your email account, viewing member profiles,
and changing your user preferences.
Does Care2 sell e-mail addresses to advertisers?
Not without your direct permission. We respect your privacy and despise
SPAM.
As mentioned above, in some cases you may opt to receive nonprofit partner
newsletters or other commercial offers. When you opt to receive such an offer via Care2, we
will send your email address and other necessary contact information to the
newsletter publisher. Depending on the newsletter, this may result in a fee
paid to Care2 in exchange for a new customer. Care2 will never offer
newsletter subscriptions from, or reveal your address information to,
organizations known to be spammers, casinos, or adult-content providers.
Why then do some people receive spam at an account they have only used on Care2? Either the spammer did "random combinations" of letters/numbers to guess the address, the member sent someone an email message that somehow got distributed, or perhaps someone entered their address by mistake somewhere else. Bottom line, if it came from a known spammer, we had nothing to do with it - spam is bad, we hate it, and we would never associate ourselves with spammers.
With regards to e-mail communication with us, we read every message
sent to us and do our best to respond quickly. We do save messages
that
might be needed if the sender contacts us again, but we absolutely do
not sell or rent e-mail addresses to other companies, unless you have
specifically opted to receive such communications.
How does Care2 secure its data storage?
Care2's servers are located at a world-class co-location facility in California, USA. The facility has some of the most powerful physical security systems in the business, from advanced smoke detection and fire suppression systems to 24/7 secured access with motion sensors, video camera surveillance, and security breach alarms. Only certain Care2 employees are given access to the building. Access to the database is protected by a firewall and secure data lines and available only to certain Care2 employees on an as-necessary basis. No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure, however. Therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.
Data Retention Policy
Our data retention policy varies depending on the business and system needs, but remains in harmony with the other policies stated here.
Our business systems and databases are securely stored and archived for disaster recovery purposes. Petition signatures are only retained
in our databases for a 90 day period. Personal Messages in a members "SAVE" folder are are retained indefinitely at the members request, while the remaining personal
messages that have been read but not saved are purged after 2 years. Photos uploaded for sharing are resized for web display only and original larger images removed.
What are the privacy standards for Care2's marketplace partners and affiliates?
Care2 has entered into affiliate relationships with leading companies in retail and services. You will find these companies listed on the Care2 Shopping pages. Care2 visitors who visit these partners from the Care2 web site generate donations from their purchases that in turn support worthy causes. Care2 does not share your personal information with affiliate programs; your purchases with them are alone sufficient to generate donations.
Care2's Privacy Policy does not extend to transactions you may enter into with affiliates or partners. Care2 partners and third-party Internet sites and services accessible through Care2 have separate, independent privacy and data collection practices. Care2 has no responsibility or liability for these independent policies or actions.
What else should I know about my privacy?
Please keep in mind that whenever you voluntarily disclose personal information online - for example on message boards, through e-mail, Care2 Groups, or in chat areas - that information can be collected and used by others. In short, by posting personal information online that is publicly
accessible, you may receive unsolicited messages from other parties in return. Furthermore, while we strive to protect your personal information, Care2 cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us over the Internet, and you do so at your own risk. In addition, Care2 partners and third-party Internet sites and services accessible through Care2 have separate, independent privacy and data collection practices. Care2 has no responsibility or liability for these independent policies or
actions. The point? You are solely responsible for maintaining the secrecy of
your passwords and/or any account information. Please be careful and
responsible whenever you're online.
Also, Care2 uses reputable third parties to serve some of the advertisements
that you see on the pages of Care2. These companies may use
information about
your visits to this and other web sites in order to provide
advertisements
on this site and other sites about goods and services of interest to
you. If you would like more information about this practice and to
know
your choices about not having this information used by these
companies,
please
click
here.
Our Web site includes Social Media Features, such as the Facebook Like button and Widgets,
such as the Share this button or interactive mini-programs that run on our site.
These Features may collect your IP address, which page you are visiting on our site,
and may set a cookie to enable the Feature to function properly. Social Media Features and
Widgets are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on our Site.
Your interactions with these Features are governed by the privacy policy of the company providing it.
What happens if changes are made to the privacy policy?
Care2 reserves the right to change the privacy policy but will notify users of such
changes through email and/or by posting a notice on the site. In the event of any
material change, this notification will be prior to that change becoming effective.
If the change involves the use of a user's personally identifiable information then
the notice to users will contain directions on how users can opt-out of the change.
For more information...
Care2.com, Inc.
275 Shoreline Drive, Suite 300
Redwood City, CA 94065
Phone: 650-622-0860
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