Last Modified: July, 2017
ActiveCouncil and our contractors ("ActiveCouncil", "we", "us", or "our") take the private nature of your personal information very seriously. This policy regarding our privacy practices (the "Privacy Policy") describes how we treat the information we collect when you visit and use the website available at activecouncil.net (the "Site") and ActiveCouncil's other domains, products, services, mobile applications, and content (collectively with the Site, the "Services").
When you use the Services, you are consenting to the collection, transfer, manipulation, storage, disclosure and other uses of your information as described in this Privacy Policy.
You should read our Terms of Use (https://activecouncil.net/legal/terms) together with this Privacy Policy. By accessing our Services, you are acknowledging that this Policy and our Terms of Use apply to your use of the Services and that you agree to be bound by this Policy and our Terms of Use.
Please read and understand these documents carefully before using our Services.
This Privacy Policy covers our treatment of information gathered when you are using or accessing the Services. This Privacy Policy also covers our treatment of information that our partners share with us or that we share with our partners.
This Privacy Policy does not apply to the practices of third parties that we do not own or control, including but not limited to any third party websites, services and applications ("Third Party Services") that you elect to access through the Service or to individuals that we don't manage or employ. While we try to facilitate access only to those Third Party Services that share our respect for your privacy, we don't take responsibility for the content or privacy policies of those Third Party Services. We encourage you to carefully review the privacy policies of all Third Party Services you access.
This Privacy Policy does not govern the licensing of content created by, uploaded to or in some other way provided to the Services. Please review the ActiveCouncil Terms of Use to learn more about licensing of content.
ActiveCouncil collects, receives, and uses information about users in several ways:
a) Information you provide to us directly. When you use our services, you will provide certain information directly to ActiveCouncil. This information can include:
Account Information: When you create an account on a ActiveCouncil Service (an "Account"), you will provide information such as your display name,, password, email address, preferred geolocation, name of preferred geolocation, phone number,digital images, time zone, and preferred language. This information may personally identify you. For example, if you use your full name as your display name or you provide a photograph of yourself, you will be disclosing your identity to the public. We do not expose your e-mail address to the public or third parties, except in the limited circumstances set forth in this Privacy Policy.
Information from you about Your Accounts on Third Party Services: You can link your Account to certain Third Party Services such as social media networks or other services. In order to do so, you will provide us with your display name or other user ID on each of those Third Party Services. To use these Third Party Services, you may also be required to engage in an authorization process with each of those Third Party Services, where we receive a token or account identifier that allows us to access those accounts. This enables ActiveCouncil to post your ActiveCouncil content or links to your ActiveCouncil content to those services when you choose to do so. We do not receive or store your passwords for your Third Party Service accounts.
b) Information we collect and receive when you use our Services. We collect and receive information about you when you use ActiveCouncil Services and related Third Party Services.
User-Provided Content: Most of the features of the ActiveCouncil services are based directly upon content that users provide when using ActiveCouncil Services. This content consists of the various pieces of information associated with the individual issue reports submitted through ActiveCouncil Services. This information can include your display name , the title of the issue, a textual description of the issue, the physical location of the issue, and a user-provided photograph and/or video showing the issue. In many cases, the default physical location of the issue is generated from obtaining GPS or other geolocation information directly from the user's computer or mobile device.
By default, all user-provided content is shared publically and is accessible to everyone as a result of normal use of ActiveCouncil Services. User-provided content is accessible by Internet search engines and may be copied and shared by the general public and users of the Internet. Once user-provided content is publically available, it may be impractical or impossible to remove or delete that information. Copies of user-provided content may exist indefinitely in accessible form, including in our systems.
In certain circumstances, we allow registered users to report issues anonymously. This means only that the registered user can provide issue-reporting information without a display name. The issue content is still associated with the user's account, but the user's display name and email are hidden from both public view. This does not mean ActiveCouncil assures a user's anonymity when using ActiveCouncil Services. Identifying information such as the unregistered user's IP address and other information may be collected and shared about unregistered users using ActiveCouncil Services.
It is also possible that user-provided content may contain identifying information about other people and the user including unregistered users. For example, a user might include a name or identifying information about a person or property in the textual description of an issue report. Or a user might include an image, a video, or voice recording of another person as part of an issue report.
Information About User-Provided Content: In some cases, we may collect metadata about you, which is information that describes the content you provide to the Services. For example, we may collect information describing your camera and camera settings when it's included with your images. This information allows us to improve the Services and provide additional features and functionality.
Financial Information: If you decide to purchase a paid Service, you will provide financial information related to your payment method including credit card number, credit card type, card expiration date, or other financial information. We do not, however, store that financial information. That information is provided to and stored by our third party payment processor (the "Payment Processor"). The Payment Processor's applicable Terms of Service and Privacy Statement govern use and storage of that information. The Payment Processor may also have other terms, and you are responsible for locating and familiarizing yourself with those terms, as applicable. Additionally, we receive certain information from our Payment Processor including: (1) a unique token that we connect with your Account to enable you to make further purchases using the information stored by our Payment Processor; and, (2) in certain cases, the last four digits of the credit card number associated with that token, so that we can prevent fraudulent transactions and identity theft. Under certain circumstances, we may have access to your name, address, email address, card payment history, card expiration date through the Payment Processor.
Information Obtained from Third Party Services: In some cases, when you connect your Account with your accounts on Third Party Services, we may obtain information about you from those Third Party Services. The information we receive about you varies depending upon the information you disclose to the Third Party Services. Such information could include, for example, your gender, if you have disclosed that information to that third party and made it available for ActiveCouncil to access. To the extent we obtain such information, we may use the information about you that we receive from Third Party Services to improve and personalize the Services.
As a general practice, we strongly urge you to make careful judgments about any personal information you disclose to Internet services, including ActiveCouncil and any linked Third Party Services, regardless of whether you choose to link your accounts together.
Information Related to Use of the Services: We collect information about how people use the Services, including those without an Account. This information includes general usage information and may include information such as the number and frequency of our visitors, which pages or features of the Services they have visited, which links on the Services they have clicked on, and the length of those visits. We may also use third party applications and services, , as well as in house systems to collect and analyze this information. Some of this information may be associated with the IP Address (as defined below) used to access the Services, and some may be associated with your Account, such as the topics you search for and the help pages that you visit. We may also use some of this information in aggregate form, that is, as a statistical measure related to all of our users that would not identify you personally. This information enables us and third parties authorized by us to improve and enhance your experience using the Services.
Information Related to Your Web Browser: We automatically receive and record information from your web browser when you interact with the Services, such as your browser type and version, what type of device you are using, your operating system and version, your language preference, the website or service that referred you to the Services, the date and time of each web request you make, your screen display information, and information from any cookies we have placed on your web browser (as described below). We also sometimes detect whether you are using certain web browser extensions and store that information in a manner associated with your Account. Web browser related information is used to enhance your experience using the Services (for example, by personalization) and to allow us to improve the Services; it is not, however, used in a manner that would uniquely identify you.
IP Address Information: Under certain circumstances, such as when you log into the Services, load a web page from the Services, or submit an issue anonymously, we may collect and store your Internet Protocol Address ("IP Address"). We use your IP Address information to combat spam, malware, and identity theft; and to personalize the Services for you. We also analyze IP Address information to generate aggregated, non-identifying information about use of the Services.
Location Information: In some cases we collect and store information about where you are located. This may be accomplished by converting your IP Address into a rough geolocation, or by requesting location information from the device you are using to access the Services. We may use location information associated with content you create or interact with to improve and personalize the Services for you. Location services on your device or computer may be configured to control the disclosure of your location to our services.
Information Related to Your Mobile Device: We may collect and store information related to your mobile device, such as your phone number. You will have a choice as to whether we collect and store this information. We may use this information to improve the Services, such as by allowing you to verify your account by text message.
Derived Information: We analyze your actions on the Services in order to derive or infer characteristics that may be descriptive of you. For example, this analysis might help us determine the types of issues you care about or the geographical areas you are interested in. These characteristics are used to improve and personalize the Services
Through the normal course of operations of the Services, your information and your user-provided content may be shared in various ways.
Information Shared with the Public Through the Services: As noted above, content submitted through the Services is shared with the public by default. Such information includes, but is not limited to anything you choose to comment on or issue you choose to submit. Because your user-provided content can be seen by anyone and may be indexed by search engines (like Google Search), you should be careful in what you choose to disclose publicly and make sure it is information you want to share with everyone.
Information Shared With Clients: We may share user information and user-provided content with our clients as part of the normal operation of the Services. This information may include, but is not limited to: your responses to questions, your email address, your name, the location of the reported issue, or other identifying information about you. Some clients may be required by public records laws, other regulation, or policy to handle the information in a way that is different than this Privacy Policy or the Terms of Use.
Information Shared Between the Services: We may aggregate information about your use of multiple Services and use that consolidated information to improve how the Services operate and inform the development of new Services.
Information You Share with Third Party Services: You may have access to Third Party Services through the ActiveCouncil Services by clicking on externally pointing Internet links. You may choose to share information that you provide to us with those Third Party Services, which can include blog posts or postings to social media networks. This Privacy Policy only governs information we collect. You are responsible for reading and understanding those Third Party Services' privacy policies.
Information Shared with Our Agents in Order to Operate and Improve the Services: In some cases, we share user information with third parties, such as our service providers, consultants and other agents ("Agents") for the purposes of operating and improving the Services. For example, we may share user information such as IP Addresses with our service providers in order to fight spam. Additionally our consultants may be given access to user information for the purposes of improving our processes and technology. Agents with whom we share such information for these reasons are generally bound by confidentiality obligations and our Agents generally do not have any right to use your information or other information we share with them beyond the scope and duration of what is necessary to assist us. You hereby consent to our sharing of your information and your provided content with our Agents.
Information Shared with Third Parties: We may share or disclose non-private information, Aggregate Information, or other non-Personal Information with people and entities that we do business with.
Information Disclosed Pursuant to Business Transactions: In some cases, we may choose to buy or sell business assets. In these transactions, user information may by included in the transferred business assets to another company. In the event that the ownership of ActiveCouncil or their assets changes as a result of a merger, acquisition, sale of assets, or in the unlikely event of a bankruptcy, your information may be transferred to another company. You acknowledge that such transfers may occur and that any acquirer of us or our assets may continue to use your information and/or your user-provided content.
Information Disclosed for Our Protection and the Protection of Others: We reserve the right to access, preserve, and disclose any information as we reasonably believe is necessary, in our sole discretion, to (i) satisfy any law, regulation, legal process, governmental request, or governmental order, (ii) enforce this Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use (https://activecouncil.net/legal/terms), including investigation of potential violations hereof, (iii) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues (including exchanging information with other companies and organizations for fraud protection and spam/malware prevention), (iv) respond to user support requests, or (v) protect the rights, property, health or safety of us, our users, any third parties or the public in general, including but not limited to situations involving possible violence, suicide, or self-harm.
Information Disclosed for Other Reasons: At ActiveCouncil's sole discretion, we may share information we receive from you in the following situations: (a) It is necessary to respond to lawful governmental requests or legal process (for example, a court order, search warrant, or subpoena); (b) To facilitate resolving an issue that you report directly to a ActiveCouncil partner through the Services; (c) If we have your permission to share certain information; (d) If we have given you prior notice that certain information will be shared, and with whom; or (e) If we aggregate or de-identify the information so that it does not personally identify you.
Information We Share with Your Consent or at Your Request: If you ask us to release information that we have about your Account, we will do so if reasonable and not unduly burdensome.
ActiveCouncil uses various methods to collect information about you through the use of Services.
Use of Cookies: ActiveCouncil uses web cookies to enable our servers to recognize your web browser and tell us how and when you use the Services. Cookies are pieces of text that may be sent to and saved by your web browser when you access a website. Your web browser stores these cookies in a way associated with each website you visit, and you can see your cookies through your browser settings. Our cookies do not, by themselves, contain information that personally identifies you, and we don't combine the general information collected through cookies with other such information to tell us who you are. However, we do use cookies to identify that you have logged in and that your web browser has accessed aspects of the Services, and we may associate that information with your Account, if you have one. This information, in turn, is sometimes used to personalize your experiences on the Services, such as by presenting you with content we believe is most interesting to you.
Many web browsers have an option for turning off (disable) the cookie feature, which will prevent your browser from accepting new cookies. If you disable cookies, you won't be able to log into your Account and will not be able to use the vast majority of our Services. Some third-party services that we use, such as Google Analytics, may also place their own cookies on your browser. Individual blogs on our network may contain code that places their own cookies too. Note that this Privacy Policy covers our use of cookies only and does not cover the use of cookies by third parties.
Both registered and unregistered users can access and delete cookies through their web browser settings.
Web Beacons: We may place information called web beacons in our emails to you, which allow us to detect when you read our email messages. This helps us measure our email deliverability and effectiveness.
Do Not Track (DNT) Signals: Some web browsers may allow users to configure the browser to transmit a "do not track" signal to web sites and online services that communicate with the user's web browser. ActiveCouncil does not take action on those signals.
When you use the Services you may be presented with advertisements via advertising networks. Those advertising networks may collect and analyze more information about you beyond the scope of this Privacy Policy. They may also provide information about you to third parties and advertisers that have no relationship to ActiveCouncil.
Our Site and Services are not intended for use by children 13 years of age and younger, so you must be at least 14 years of age to use the Services. Accordingly, we do not knowingly collect information from or direct the Services to anyone under 14 years of age. We encourage parents and legal guardians to monitor their children's mobile app and Internet usage and enforce our Privacy Policy by instructing their children never to provide Personal Data to ActiveCouncil Services without their parental permission. If you have reason to believe that a child under the age of 14 has provided Personal Data to us, please contact us at legal@activecouncil.net, and we will delete that information from our databases as soon as is reasonably practicable.
ActiveCouncil is based in the United States, and, regardless of where you use our Services or otherwise provide information to us, the information may be transferred to and maintained on servers located in the United States or elsewhere. By using our Services or by providing us with your information, you consent to this collection, transfer, storage, and processing of information to and in the United States or elsewhere.
Although no one can guarantee the security of the information collected and received, we do employ a number of safeguards intended to mitigate the risk of unauthorized access or disclosure of this information. For example, your Account information is protected by a password for your protection. You need to prevent unauthorized access to your Account and Personal Information by selecting and protecting your password appropriately and limiting access to your computer and browser by signing off after you have finished accessing your Account on the Services.
Unauthorized entry or use, hardware or software failure, and other factors may compromise the security of user information at any time.
If you want to close your Account, you may send a request by sending a request to legal@activecouncil.net. Closing your Account will not fully remove the User-Provided Content associated with your Account. Your user-Provided Content can remain publically available indefinitely and in the possession of our partners and Third Parties.
As part of the Services, you may occasionally receive email and other communications from us, such as administrative communications relating to your Account. These communications are considered transactional or relationship-related and are a necessary part of the Services and your Account. These communications might include for example Account recovery messages, password reset messages, or notifications of Privacy Policy changes. You may not be able to opt-out from receiving these communications. See your Account settings page for available opt-out communication options.
Note for security purposes, we will never email you to ask for your password or other Account information. If you receive such an email, forward it to us at security@activecouncil.net.
We may amend this Privacy Policy from time to time. If changes, other than corrections to typographical errors or formatting improvements, are made we will notify users including by but not limited to email, regular mail, postings on the Service, or other reasonable means now known or hereinafter developed. Use of information is subject to the Privacy Policy in effect at the time such information is used.
If you have any questions or concerns regarding privacy using the Services, please send us a detailed message at legal@activecouncil.net.