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PRIVACY STATEMENT
COMMITMENT TO YOUR PRIVACY
This site is owned and operated by Search Engine Regulatory Commission. Your
privacy on the Internet is of the utmost importance to us. At Search Engine
Regulatory Commission, we want to make your experience online satisfying and
safe.
Because we gather certain types of information about our users, we feel you
should fully understand the terms and conditions surrounding the capture and use
of that information. This privacy statement discloses what information we gather
and how we use it.
Definition of the Information Search Engine Regulatory Commission gathers and
keeps track of.
Search Engine Regulatory Commission gathers two types of information about
users:
- Information that users provide through optional, voluntary submissions.
These are voluntary submissions to receive our electronic newsletters, to
participate in our message boards or forums, to email a friend, and from
participation in polls and surveys:
- Information Search Engine Regulatory Commission gathers through aggregated
tracking information derived mainly by tallying page views throughout our
sites. This information allows us to better tailor our content to readers'
needs and to help our advertisers and sponsors better understand the
demographics of our audience. Because Search Engine Regulatory Commission
derives its revenue mainly from sponsorships and advertising, providing such
aggregated demographic data is essential to keeping our service free to users.
Under no circumstances does Search Engine Regulatory Commission divulge any
information about an individual user to a third party.
Search Engine Regulatory Commission Gathers User Information In The Following
Processes:
Optional Voluntary Information
We offer the following free services, which require some type of voluntary
submission of personal information by users:
- Electronic newsletters (Dispatches)
We will offer a free electronic newsletter to users. Search Engine Regulatory
Commission gathers the email addresses of users who voluntarily subscribe.
Users may remove themselves from this mailing list by following the link
provided in every newsletter that points users to the subscription management
page. Users can also subscribe to the newsletters at the time of registration.
- Message boards/forums
Users of the site's Message Boards and Forums must register separately for
these services (both are free of charge) in order to post messages, although
they needn't register to visit the site. During registration the user is
required to supply a username, password, and email address.
- "E-mail this to a friend" Service
Our site users can choose to electronically forward a link, page, or documents
to someone else by clicking "e-mail this to a friend". The user must provide
their email address, as well as that of the recipient. This information is
used only in the case of transmission errors and, of course, to let the
recipient know who sent the email. The information is not used for any other
purpose.
- Polling
We may offer interactive polls to users so they can easily share their
opinions with other users and see what our audience thinks about important
issues. Opinions or other responses to polls are aggregated and are not
identifiable to any particular user. Search Engine Regulatory Commission may
use a system to "tag" users after they have voted, so they can vote only once
on a particular question. This tag is not correlated with information about
individual users.
- Surveys
Search Engine Regulatory Commission may occasionally conduct user surveys to
better target our content to our audience. We sometimes share the aggregated
demographic information in these surveys with our sponsors, advertisers and
partners. We never share any of this information about specific individuals
with any third party.
CHILDREN
Consistent with the Federal Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA),
we will never knowingly request personally identifiable information from anyone
under the age of 13 without requesting parental consent.
USAGE TRACKING
Search Engine Regulatory Commission tracks user traffic patterns throughout all
of our sites. However, we do not correlate this information with data about
individual users. Search Engine Regulatory Commission does break down overall
usage statistics according to a user's domain name, browser type, and MIME type
by reading this information from the browser string (information contained in
every user's browser).
Search Engine Regulatory Commission sometimes tracks and catalogs the search
terms that users enter in our Search function, but this tracking is never
associated with individual users. We use tracking information to determine which
areas of our sites users like and don't like based on traffic to those areas. We
do not track what individual users read, but rather how well each page performs
overall. This helps us continue to build a better service for you.
COOKIES
We may place a text file called a "cookie" in the browser files of your
computer. The cookie itself does not contain Personal Information although it
will enable us to relate your use of this site to information that you have
specifically and knowingly provided. But the only personal information a cookie
can contain is information you supply yourself. A cookie can't read data off
your hard disk or read cookie files created by other sites. Search Engine
Regulatory Commission uses cookies to track user traffic patterns (as described
above). Our advertising system delivers a one-time cookie to better track ad
impressions and click rates.
You can refuse cookies by turning them off in your browser. If you've set
your browser to warn you before accepting cookies, you will receive the warning
message with each cookie. You do not need to have cookies turned on to use this
site. However, you do need cookies to participate actively in message boards,
forums, polling and surveys.
USE OF INFORMATION
Search Engine Regulatory Commission uses any information voluntarily given by
our users to enhance their experience in our network of sites, whether to
provide interactive or personalized elements on the sites or to better prepare
future content based on the interests of our users.
As stated above, we use information that users voluntarily provide in order
to send out electronic newsletters and to enable users to participate in polls,
surveys, message boards, and forums. We send out newsletters to subscribers on a
regular schedule (depending on the newsletter), and occasionally send out
special editions when we think subscribers might be particularly interested in
something we are doing. Search Engine Regulatory Commission never shares
newsletter mailing lists with any third parties, including advertisers, sponsors
or partners.
When we use tracking information to determine which areas of our sites users
like and don't like based on traffic to those areas. We do not track what
individual users read, but rather how well each page performs overall. This
helps us continue to build a better service for you. We track search terms
entered in Search function as one of many measures of what interests our users.
But we don't track which terms a particular user enters.
Search Engine Regulatory Commission creates aggregate reports on user
demographics and traffic patterns for advertisers, sponsors and partners. This
allows our advertisers to advertise more effectively, and allows our users to
receive advertisements that are pertinent to their needs. Because we don't track
the usage patterns of individual users, an advertiser or sponsor will never know
that a specific user clicked their ad. We will not disclose any information
about any individual user except to comply with applicable law or valid legal
process or to protect the personal safety of our users or the public.
SHARING OF THE INFORMATION
Search Engine Regulatory Commission uses the above-described information to
tailor our content to suit your needs and help our advertisers better understand
our audience's demographics. This is essential to keeping our service free. We
will not share information about individual users with any third party, except
to comply with applicable law or valid legal process or to protect the personal
safety of our users or the public.
SECURITY
Search Engine Regulatory Commission operates secure data networks protected by
industry standard firewall and password protection systems. Our security and
privacy policies are periodically reviewed and enhanced as necessary and only
authorized individuals have access to the information provided by our customers.
OPT-OUT POLICY
We give users options wherever necessary and practical. Such choices include:
- Opting not to register to receive our electronic newsletters.
- Opting not to participate in certain interactive areas, which completely
alleviates the need to gather any personally identifiable information from our
users
YOUR CONSENT
By using this site, you consent to the collection and use of this information by
Search Engine Regulatory Commission. If we decide to change our privacy policy,
we will post those changes on this page so that you are always aware of what
information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances we disclose
it.
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