Privacy

Introduction

This Privacy Statement applies to Homewarrantysecured.com (“HWS.COM,” “HWS,” “HWS GUIDE”), our partners, affiliates, and our data associates. This Privacy Statement describes how homewarrantysecured.com collects and uses the personal information you provide and other information that is collected from your use of the Websites. It also describes your choices regarding our use of your personal information and how you can access and update this information.

Homewarrantysecured.com is committed to protecting the privacy of the users of the Websites. We will use and disclose your personal information as stated in this Privacy Statement.

Website Privacy Statement

Security

The Websites have security measures in place that are intended to help protect against the loss, misuse, unauthorized access or alteration of the information under our control. These measures may include encryption of data using the Secure Socket Layer (SSL) system. Despite these measures, the confidentiality of any communication or material transmitted to or from us via the Websites by the Internet cannot be guaranteed. At your discretion, you may contact us at the mailing address listed in the “Questions, complaints, and contacts” section at the end of this Privacy Statement.

Revisions to the Privacy Statement

We may revise this Privacy Statement from time to time as we add new features or modify the way in which we manage information or as laws change, that may affect our services. If we make material changes to our Privacy Statement, we will post notice of this on our Websites prior to the changes becoming effective. Any revised Privacy Statement will apply both to information we already have about you at the time of the change, and any personal information created or received after the change takes effect. We include a version number on this Privacy Statement consisting of the date (year, month, and day) it was last revised. We encourage you to periodically reread this Privacy Statement to see if there have been any changes to our policies that may affect you.

Website visitor data

HWS routinely gathers data on the website and mobile application activity, such as how many people visit the sites, the web pages they visit, where they come from, how long they stay, etc. The data is collected on an aggregate, anonymous basis, which means that no personally identifiable information is associated with the data. This data helps us improve our content and overall usage. The information is not shared with other organizations for their independent use.

The Websites do not honor a browser’s signal or header request not to track the user’s activity.

Collecting and using personal information

Our use and disclosure of an individual’s personal information is limited as required by state and federal law. We do not sell or rent personal information about visitors to the Websites.

Except as disclosed in this Privacy Statement, we do not collect any personally identifiable information about visitors to the Websites. The policies, sources, and uses of information are outlined in Sections 1 through 15 that follow:

How Do We Collect Your Information?

We collect your personal information in three ways:

Directly from you when you access or use our Sites or Services, conduct business dealings with us in the B2B context or when you communicate with us in any manner, including but not limited to:

Personal information you provide by filling out forms in person or electronically through our Sites, including information provided at the time of registering for any Service or event, posting material, or requesting further services or information;
Personal information you provide when you access or use our Services;
Personal information you provide when you conduct B2B dealings with us;
Personal information you provide when you enter a sweepstakes, contest or promotion sponsored or offered by us;
Personal information you provide when you report a problem with our Sites;
Records and copies of your correspondence (e.g., email address) if you contact us;
Your responses to surveys that we might ask you to complete;
Details of transactions you carry out through our Sites, and the fulfillment of your orders; and
Your search queries on the Sites.

Automatically when you access or use our Sites, Services, conduct business dealings or when you communicate with us, including but not limited to:

Details of your visits to the Sites, including traffic data, location data, logs and other communication data;
Information about your computer and mobile device, and internet connection, including your IP address, operating system, and browser type; and
Interactivity with an e-mail, including opening, navigating, and click-through information.

From Third Parties, including but not limited to:

Data analytics providers for the purpose of receiving statistical data about your activity on our Sites;
Social media networks for the purpose of collecting certain of your social media profile information and activity, including your screen names, profile picture, contact information, contact list, and the profile pictures of your contacts, through the social media platform;
Service providers, including but not limited to internet service providers, fraud prevention services, and related partners; and
Public sources, including local, state, and federal government agencies and departments, to facilitate your use of the Sites, and to provide you with our Services.

How Do We Use Your Information?

We use the personal information for a variety of business and commercial purposes, including but not limited to:

Provide the Sites to you;
Provide the Services you have requested;
Conduct business dealings with you;
Fulfill a transaction you requested or service your policy;
Handle a claim;
Create and manage your account;
Operate the Sites, including access management, payment processing, Site administration, internal operations, troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, research, and for statistical purposes;
Respond to your requests, feedback, or inquiries;
Comply with laws, regulations, and other legal requirements;
Comply with relevant industry standards and our policies;
Protect and enforce your rights and the rights of other users against unlawful activity, including identity theft and fraud;
Protect and enforce our collective rights arising under any agreements entered between us and you or any other Third Party;
Protect the integrity and maintain security of our Sites and Services;
Operate, evaluate, and improve our business;
Provide you with information and advertisements about products, services, and promotions, from us or affiliates, that may interest you;
Deliver content tailored to your interests and the way you use the Sites;
Present content in a manner that is optimized for your device; and
Measure and analyze the effectiveness of the Sites and Services we provide to you.

– How Do We Disclose Your Personal Information?

We may disclose personal information with others for a variety of business and commercial purposes, including:

- With your consent. We may disclose your personal information with your consent. We may obtain your consent in writing; online, through “click-through” agreements; when you accept the terms of use on our Sites; orally, either in person or on the phone; or by other means.
- In a business transfer. We may disclose your personal information as part of a corporate business transaction, such as a merger or acquisition, joint venture, corporate reorganization, financing, or sale of company assets, or in the unlikely event of insolvency, bankruptcy, or receivership, in which such information could be transferred to Third Parties as a business asset in the transaction.
- To non-affiliated third parties, such as service providers and contractors. We may disclose your personal information with other parties, such as service providers and contractors, to facilitate your access and use of our Sites and Services, including but not limited to internet service providers, advertising networks, data analytics providers, governmental entities, operating systems and platforms, social medial networks, and service providers who provide us a service (e.g., credit / debit card processing, billing, shipping, repair, customer service, auditing, marketing, debugging to identify and repair errors that impair existing intended functionality on our Sites or Services, and/or protecting against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity).
- To subsidiaries and affiliates. We may disclose your personal information with our subsidiaries and affiliates to further facilitate your use of our Sites and Services, and to ensure the smooth and consistent operations of SSDI-US by identifying and repairing errors that impede intended functionality and to protect against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity.
- For legal process and protection. We may disclose your personal information to satisfy any law, regulation, legal process, governmental request, or where we have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to:
  - Enforce or apply agreements, or initiate, render, bill, and collect for Services;
  - Protect our rights or interests, property or safety or that of others;
  - In connection with claims, disputes, or litigation – in court or elsewhere;
  - Protect users of our Sites and Services and other carriers or providers from fraudulent, abusive, or unlawful use of, or subscription to, such services; and
  - Facilitate or verify the appropriate calculation of taxes, fees, or other obligations due to a local, state, or federal government.

2. Web Logs

We maintain standard Web logs that record data about all visitors and customers who use the Websites and we store this information. These logs may contain the Internet domain from which you access the site (such as aol.com, abc.org, etc.); the IP address which is automatically assigned to your computer when you get on the Internet (a static IP address may be identifiable as being connected to you, while a dynamic address is usually not identifiable); the type of browser and operating system you use; the date and time you visited; the pages; and the address of the website you linked from, if any. All Web logs are stored securely, and may only be accessed by HWS employees or designees on a need-to-know basis for a specific purpose. Home Security Insights uses Web log information to help us design our Websites, to identify popular features, to resolve user, hardware, and software problems, and to make the Websites more useful to visitors.

3. Internet cookies

We may place Internet “cookies” on the computer hard drives of visitors to the Websites. Information we obtain from cookies helps us to tailor our sites to be more helpful and efficient for our visitors. The cookie consists of a unique identifier that does not contain information about you or your health history. We use two types of cookies, “session” cookies and “persistent” cookies.

A session cookie is temporary, and expires after you end a session and close your web or app browser. We use session cookies to help customize your experience on our site, maintain your signed-on status as you navigate through our features, and to track your “click path” through our Web pages.

Persistent cookies remain on your hard drive after you’ve exited from our website, and we use them for several reasons. For instance, if you’ve given us permission to email you with information, we may place a persistent cookie on your hard drive that will let us know when you come back to visit our site. We sometimes use this type of persistent cookie with a “Web beacon” (see below). Persistent cookies will not contain any personal information about you. You may have software on your computer that will allow you to decline or deactivate Internet cookies, but if you do so, some features of the Websites may not work properly for you. For instructions on how to remove cookies from your hard drive, go to your browser’s website for detailed instructions. In addition, further information regarding cookies may be available on other websites or from your Internet service provider. Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer and iOS browsers are commonly used browsers.

4. Web beacons

We may also occasionally use “Web beacons” (also known as “clear gifs,” “Web bugs,” “1-pixel gifs,” etc.) that allow us to collect non-personal information about your response to our email communications, and for other purposes. Web beacons are tiny images, placed on a Web page or email, that can tell us if you’ve gone to a particular area on our website. For example, if you’ve given us permission to send you emails, we may send you an email urging you to use a certain feature on our website. If you do respond to that email and use that feature, the Web beacon will tell us that our email communication with you has been successful. We do not collect any personal information with a Web beacon.

Since Web beacons are used in conjunction with persistent cookies (described above), if you set your browser to decline or deactivate cookies, Web beacons cannot function.

5. Re-Targeting

We partner with a third party ad network to manage our advertising on other sites. Our ad network partner uses cookies and Web beacons to collect non-personally identifiable information about your activities on the Websites and to then provide you with HWS advertising on other websites. We may also place a persistent third-party cookie (provided by Google) on your hard drive if you sign on to HWS. This cookie will prevent ssdi-us.com members from seeing advertising that is targeted towards people who are not members of Home Warranty Secured when searching on Google.

If you wish to not have this information used for the purpose of serving you targeted ads, you may opt-out by utilizing the Google opt-out tool.

Please note this does not opt you out of being served advertising. You may continue to receive generic non-targeted ads.

6. Emails and SMS text messaging

HWS uses a third-party vendor to help us manage some of our email and text messaging communications with you. While we do supply these vendors with email addresses or mobile telephone numbers of those we wish them to contact, your email address or mobile telephone number is never used for any purpose other than to communicate with you on our behalf. When you click on a link in an email, you may temporarily be redirected through one of the vendor’s servers (although this process will be invisible to you), which will register that you’ve clicked on that link, and have visited our Websites. HWS never shares any information, other than your email address or telephone number, with our third-party vendors, which may only share this information with its authorized subcontractors.

Even if you have given us permission to send emails or text messages to you, you may revoke that permission at any time by following the “unsubscribe” information at the bottom of the email or by replying “Stop” to any text message you receive from us.

7. Evaluation and quality improvement

We may periodically ask users to complete voluntary surveys asking about their experiences with features of the Websites. Our surveys ask visitors for demographic information such as age, gender, and education, but will not request that users provide specific information about any medical condition. We use survey information for evaluation and quality improvement purposes, including helping Home Warranty Secured to improve information and services offered through the Websites. In addition, with your permission, users giving feedback may be individually contacted for follow-up due to concerns raised during the course of such evaluation. Demographic information and Web log data may be stored for future evaluation and quality improvement activities.

8. Messages you send us

Comments or questions sent to us by email will be shared with Home Warranty Secured staff who are most able to address your concerns. We will archive your messages once we have made our best effort to provide you with a complete and satisfactory response.

9. Data integrity and correction

If your personal information changes, or to update or request deletion of information collected on our Websites, please use the contact information in the “Questions, complaints, and contacts” section below. We will respond to all such requests within 30 days.

10. Children

We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from children under the age of 13. If HWS is made aware of collecting information from a child under 13 we will delete this information.

11. Disclosures

We may disclose personal information to any person performing audit, legal, operational, or other services for us. We will use information which does not identify the individual for these activities whenever reasonably possible. Information disclosed to vendors or contractors for operational purposes may not be re-disclosed to others by such a vendor or contractor, except as permitted by HWS and applicable law.

We may also disclose your personal information:

as required by law, such as to comply with a subpoena, or similar legal process
when we believe in good faith that disclosure is necessary to protect our rights, protect you or others from threats of imminent harm, investigate fraud or other activity in violation of the law, or respond to a government request
to protect the security and reliability of the Websites
if HWS 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 Websites of any change in ownership or uses of your personal information, as well as any choices you may have regarding your personal information
to any other third party with your prior consent to do so

12. Opt out

If a user makes a request to receive information (for example, requesting a subscription to one of our online publications) in an ongoing manner through the Websites by providing an email address or mobile phone number, the user may request to discontinue future mailings or messages. Similarly, if you receive information about a HWS service through email or text message, you may make a request to discontinue receiving similar messages in the future. All such materials sent to you by email or text message will contain information about how to opt out.

13. Data Retention

We will retain your information for as long 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.

14. Social Media

Our Websites include Social Media Features, such as the Facebook button. 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 are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on our Site. Your interactions with these Features are governed by the privacy statement of the company providing them.

15. Links to Third Party Websites

Our Websites may include links to other websites whose privacy practices may differ from those of HWS If you submit personal information to any of those sites, your information is governed by their privacy statements. We encourage you to carefully read the privacy statement of any website you visit. Our Websites may include links to other websites whose privacy practices may differ from those of SSDI-US. If you submit personal information to any of those sites, your information is governed by their privacy statements. We encourage you to carefully read the privacy statement of any website you visit.

Questions, complaints, and contacts

If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement, our policies and practices concerning the Websites or the App, your rights under this statement, and your dealings with the Home Security Insights Websites, you can contact Home Warranty Secured sending us a message at info@homewarrantysecured.com.