C4ADS Privacy Policy
Last Updated: February 19, 2020
The Center for Advanced Defense Studies (“C4ADS,” “we,” or “us”) wants you to be familiar with how we collect, use, and disclose information. This Privacy Policy describes our practices in connection with information that we collect through:
- The website we operate, www.c4ads.org, and any other C4ADS-affiliated website from which you are accessing this Privacy Policy (the “Websites”).
- Our social media pages that we control (collectively, our “Social Media Pages”), from which you are accessing this Privacy Policy.
- HTML-formatted email messages that we send to you that link to this Privacy Policy or other communications with you.
- C4ADS-conducted research.
Collectively, we refer to the Websites, Social Media Pages, emails, and C4ADS-conducted research as the “Services.”
Personal Information
“Personal Information” is information that identifies you as an individual or relates to an identifiable individual. The Services may collect Personal Information, including:
- Name
- Postal address (including shipping addresses)
- Telephone number
- Email address
- IP address (we may also derive your approximate location from your IP address)
- Bank account information or financial account information (e.g., when you make a donation via check or other, non-payment card methods)
How C4ADS Collects Personal Information
We and our service providers collect Personal Information in a variety of ways, including:
Through the Services. We collect Personal Information through the Services. We do this, for example, when you:
- sign up to receive emails from C4ADS;
- register an account to access the Services;
- RSVP for or attend one of our events;
- make an inquiry over the phone;
- contact Communications;
- make a donation; or
- participate in a research project or activity.
From Other Sources. We may receive your Personal Information from other sources, for example:
- research partners, event co-sponsors, and other organizations we collaborate with to implement our work;
- publicly available databases; and
- joint marketing partners, when they share the information with us.
We need to collect Personal Information in order to provide the requested Services to you. If you do not provide the information requested, we may not be able to provide the Services. If you disclose any Personal Information relating to other people to us or to our service providers in connection with the Services, you represent that you have the authority to do so and to permit us to use the information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
How C4ADS Uses Personal Information
We and our service providers use Personal Information for many reasons, including the following purposes:
Providing the Functionality of the Services And Fulfilling Your Requests
- To provide the Services’ functionality to you, such as arranging access to your registered account and providing you with related service and support.
- To respond to your inquiries and fulfill your requests, when you contact us online or otherwise, for example, when you send us questions, suggestions, compliments or complaints, or when you request other information about our Services.
- To execute research projects, such as by collecting a name in order to verify an account or an event relevant to a research project.
- To complete your donation transactions, verify your information, and provide you with related service and support.
- To send administrative information to you, such as changes to our terms, conditions, and policies.
- To allow you to send messages to another person through the Services if you choose to do so.
Providing You With Our Newsletters And/Or Other Marketing Materials And Facilitating Social Sharing
- To send you emails with information about our services, new stories or events, and other news about C4ADS.
- To facilitate social sharing functionality that you choose to use.
- To send you C4ADS research products.
- To inquire about your interest in C4ADS research, services, events, and activities or in financially supporting C4ADS.
Analyzing Personal Information for Center Reporting and Providing Personalized Services
- To analyze or predict our users’ preferences in order to prepare aggregated trend reports on how our digital content is used, so we can improve our Services.
- To better understand your interests and preferences, so that we can personalize our interactions with you and provide you with information tailored to your interests.
- To better understand your preferences so that we can deliver content via our Services that we believe will be relevant and interesting to you.
Aggregating And/Or Anonymizing Personal Information
We may aggregate and/or anonymize Personal Information so that it will no longer be considered Personal Information. We do so to generate other data for our use, which we may use and disclose for any purpose, as it no longer identifies you or any other individual.
Accomplishing Our General Institutional Purposes
- For data analysis, for example, to improve the efficiency of our Services;
- For audits, to verify that our internal processes function as intended and to address legal, regulatory, or contractual requirements;
- For fraud and security monitoring purposes, for example, to detect and prevent cyberattacks or attempts to commit identity theft;
- For developing new programs and services;
- For enhancing, improving, repairing, maintaining, or modifying our current programs and services, as well as undertaking quality and safety assurance measures;
- For identifying usage trends, for example, understanding which parts of our Services are of most interest to users;
- For determining the effectiveness of our promotional campaigns, so that we can adapt our campaigns to the needs and interests of our users; and
- For operating and expanding our institutional activities, for example, understanding which parts of our Services are of most interest to our users so we can focus our energies on meeting our users’ interests.
With Whom Does C4ADS Share Personal Information
We disclose Personal Information:
To Our Research Partners
These can include think tanks, non-profit organizations, and government entities. This information is shared pursuant to research partnerships, or co-sponsored publications and events or similar activities.
To Our Third-Party Service Providers, To Facilitate Services They Provide To Us
These can include providers of services such as website hosting, data analysis, donation processing, information technology and related infrastructure provision, email delivery, auditing, and other services.
By Using the Services, You May Elect to Disclose Personal Information
On message boards, chat, profile pages, blogs, and other services to which you are able to post information and content (including, without limitation, our Social Media Pages). Please note that any information you post or disclose through these services will become public and may be available to other users and the general public.
Other Uses and Disclosures
We may also use and disclose Personal Information as we believe to be necessary or appropriate: (a) to comply with applicable law, to respond to requests from public and government authorities, to cooperate with law enforcement, or for other legal reasons; (b) to enforce our terms and conditions; and (c) to protect our rights, privacy, safety or property, and/or that of our affiliates, you, or others. We may use, disclose or transfer your information to a third party in the event of any reorganization, merger, sale, joint venture, assignment, transfer or other disposition of all or any portion of our assets (including in connection with any bankruptcy or similar proceedings).
Other Information
“Other Information” is any information that does not reveal your specific identity or does not directly relate to an identifiable individual. The Services collect Other Information such as:
- Browser and device information.
- Information collected through cookies, pixel tags and other technologies.
- Demographic information and other information provided by you that does not reveal your specific identity (e.g., the organization with which you are affiliated, whether you are a member of the media, your job or occupation, your policy interests, and how you learned about a C4ADS event, initiative, product, or website).
- Information that has been aggregated in a manner such that it no longer reveals your specific identity.
Other Information C4ADS Collects
We and our service providers may collect Other Information in a variety of ways, including:
Your Browser or Device
Certain information is collected by most browsers or automatically through your device, such as your Media Access Control (MAC) address, computer type (Windows or Mac), screen resolution, operating system name and version, device manufacturer and model, language, Internet browser type and version and the name and version of the Services (such as the App) you are using. We use this information to ensure that the Services function properly.
Cookies
Cookies are pieces of information stored directly on the computer that you are using. Cookies allow us to collect information such as browser type, time spent on the Services, pages visited, language preferences, and other traffic data. We and our service providers use the information for security purposes, to facilitate navigation, to display information more effectively, and to personalize your experience. We also gather statistical information about use of the Services in order to continually improve their design and functionality, understand how they are used, and assist us with resolving questions regarding them. Cookies further allow us to select which of our advertisements or offers are most likely to appeal to you and display them while you are on the Services. We may also use cookies or other technologies in online advertising to track responses to our ads.We do not currently respond to browser do-not-track signals. If you do not want information collected through the use of cookies, most browsers allow you to automatically decline cookies or be given the choice of declining or accepting a particular cookie (or cookies) from a particular website. You may also wish to refer to http://www.allaboutcookies.org/manage-cookies/index.html. If, however, you do not accept cookies, you may experience some inconvenience in your use of the Services.
Pixel Tags and Other Similar Technologies
Pixel Tags
Pixel tags (also known as web beacons and clear GIFs) may be used to, among other things, track the actions of users of the Services (including email recipients), measure the success of our marketing campaigns, and compile statistics about usage of the Services and response rates.
Analytics
We use Google Analytics, which uses cookies and similar technologies to collect and analyze information about use of the Services and report on activities and trends. This service may also collect information regarding the use of other websites, apps and online resources. You can learn about Google’s practices by going to www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/, and exercise the opt-out provided by Google by downloading the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on, available at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.
Uses and Disclosures Of Other Information
We may use and disclose Other Information for any purpose, except where we are required to do otherwise under applicable law. If we are required to treat Other Information as Personal Information under applicable law, we may use and disclose it for the purposes for which we use and disclose Personal Information as detailed in this Policy. In some instances, we may combine Other Information with Personal Information. If we do, we will treat the combined information as Personal Information as long as it is combined.
Security
We seek to use reasonable organizational, technical and administrative measures to protect Personal Information within our organization. Unfortunately, no data transmission or storage system can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. If you have reason to believe that your interaction with us is no longer secure, please immediately notify us in accordance with the “Contacting Us” section below.
Choices and Access
Your Choices Regarding Our Use And Disclosure Of Your Personal Information
We give you choices regarding our use and disclosure of your Personal Information for marketing purposes. You may opt out from receiving newsletters and other promotional emails from us. If you no longer want to receive newsletters and promotional emails from us on a going-forward basis, you may opt out by following the unsubscribe link provided in all marketing emails. You may choose to unsubscribe from messages related to specific topics, or from all marketing emails. We will try to comply with your request(s) as soon as reasonably practicable. Please note that if you opt out of receiving certain newsletters or promotional emails from us, we may still send you important administrative messages, from which you cannot opt out.
How You Can Access, Change, Or Delete Your Personal Information
If you would like to request to access, correct, update, suppress, restrict, or delete Personal Information, object to or opt out of the processing of Personal Information, or if you would like to request to receive a copy of your Personal Information for purposes of transmitting it to another company (to the extent these rights are provided to you by applicable law), you may contact us in accordance with the “Contacting Us” section below. We will respond to your request consistent with applicable law.
In your request, please make clear what Personal Information you would like to have changed or whether you would like to have your Personal Information suppressed from our database. For your protection, we may only implement requests with respect to the Personal Information associated with the particular email address that you use to send us your request, and we may need to verify your identity before implementing your request. We will try to comply with your request as soon as reasonably practicable.
Please note that we may need to retain certain information for recordkeeping purposes, to complete any transactions that you began prior to requesting a change or deletion (e.g., when you make a donation, you may not be able to change or delete the Personal Information provided until after the completion of such donation), and/or as otherwise required or permitted by applicable law.
Third Party Services
This Privacy Policy does not address, and we are not responsible for, the privacy, information, or other practices of any third parties, including any third party operating any website or service to which the Services link. The inclusion of a link on the Services does not imply endorsement of the linked site or service by us or by our affiliates.
In addition, we are not responsible for the information collection, use, disclosure, or security policies or practices of other organizations, such as Facebook, Apple, Google, Microsoft, RIM, or any other app developer, app provider, social media platform provider, operating system provider, wireless service provider, or device manufacturer, including with respect to any Personal Information you disclose to other organizations through or in connection with the Apps or our Social Media Pages.
Third Party Advertising
On some of our Services, we may use third-party advertising companies to serve advertisements regarding services that may be of interest to you when you access and use the Services and other websites or online services.
You may receive advertisements based on information relating to your access to and use of the Services and other websites or online services on any of your devices, as well as on information received from third parties. These companies place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser (including through the use of pixel tags). They also use these technologies, along with information they collect about your online use, to recognize you across the devices you use, such as a mobile phone and a laptop. If you would like more information about this practice, and to learn how to opt out of it in desktop and mobile browsers on the particular device on which you are accessing this Privacy Policy, please visit http://optout.aboutads.info/#/ and http://optout.networkadvertising.org/#/.
Use of Services by Minors
The Services are not directed to individuals under the age of thirteen (13), and we do not knowingly collect Personal Information from individuals under 13.
Jurisdiction and Cross-Border Transfer
Your Personal Information may be stored and processed in any country where we have facilities or in which we engage service providers, and by using the Services you understand that your information will be transferred to countries outside of your country of residence, including the United States, which may have data protection rules that are different from those of your country. In certain circumstances, courts, law enforcement agencies, regulatory agencies or security authorities in those other countries may be entitled to access your Personal Information.
Sensitive Information
Unless we request it, we ask that you not send us, and you not disclose, any sensitive Personal Information (e.g., social security numbers, information related to racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religion or other beliefs, health, biometrics or genetic characteristics, or criminal background) on or through the Services or otherwise to us.
Third Party Donation Service
We may use a third-party payment service to process donations made through the Services. If you wish to make a donation through the Services, your Personal Information will be collected by such third party and not by us, and will be subject to the third party’s privacy policy, rather than this Privacy Policy. We have no control over, and are not responsible for, this third party’s collection, use, and disclosure of your Personal Information.
Updates to this Privacy Policy
The “Last Updated” legend at the top of this Privacy Policy indicates when this Privacy Policy was last revised. Any changes will become effective when we post the revised Privacy Policy on the Services.
Contacting Us
The Center for Advanced Defense Studies, located at 1201 I Street NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20005, is the entity responsible for collection, use, and disclosure of your Personal Information under this Privacy Policy.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at [email protected], or:
1201 I Street NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20005
Because email communications are not always secure, please do not include credit card or other sensitive information in your emails to us.
Additional Information Regarding California
If you are a resident of California, under 18, and a registered user of the Services, you may ask us to remove content or information that you have posted to the Services by writing to [email protected]. Please note that your request does not ensure complete or comprehensive removal of the content or information, as, for example, some of your content may have been reposted by another user.
