Privacy Policy



Effective: December 16, 2011

OptTown, Inc. provides this Privacy Policy to inform you of our policies and procedures regarding the collection, use and disclosure of personal information we receive from users of www.opttown.com (the “Site”) and our application for mobile devices (the “Application”). This Privacy Policy applies only to information that you provide to us through the Site or Application. This Privacy Policy may be updated from time to time. We will notify you of any material changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on the Site or via the Application. You are advised to consult this policy regularly for any changes. Unless otherwise defined in this Privacy Policy, terms used in this Privacy Policy have the same meanings as in our OptTown Terms of Service and our OptTown Merchant Terms of Service, accessible at opttown.com/terms-of-service and opttown.com/merchant-terms, respectively.

OptTown, Inc. provides this Privacy Policy to inform you of our policies and procedures regarding the collection, use and disclosure of personal information we receive from users of www.opttown.com (the “Site”) and our application for mobile devices (the “Application”). This Privacy Policy applies only to information that you provide to us through the Site or Application. This Privacy Policy may be updated from time to time. We will notify you of any material changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on the Site or via the Application. You are advised to consult this policy regularly for any changes. Unless otherwise defined in this Privacy Policy, terms used in this Privacy Policy have the same meanings as in our OptTown Terms of Service and our OptTown Merchant Terms of Service, accessible at opttown.com/terms-of-service and opttown.com/merchant-terms, respectively.

Information Collection and Use

Our primary goals in collecting information are to provide and improve our Site, Application, services, features and content, to administer your use of the Site and Application (together, the “Service”) and to enable users to enjoy and easily navigate the Site and Application.

Personally Identifiable Information.

  • When you register with us through the Site or Application, as a Member or a Merchant or when you opt in to follow a Merchant via the Service, we will ask you for personally identifiable information. This refers to information about you that can be used to contact or identify you (“Personal Information”). Personal Information includes, but is not limited to, your name, phone number, credit card or other billing information, email address, website URLs and home and business postal addresses. We use your Personal Information mainly to provide the Service and administer your inquiries.
  • You can register to join the Service and become a Member by logging into your account with certain third party social networking sites (“SNS”) (including, but not limited, to, Facebook) via our Site and Application. If you decide to register by logging into an SNS via our Site or Application, we will obtain the Personal Information you have provided to the SNS (such as your “real” name, profile picture, email address and other information you make publicly available via the applicable SNS) from the account you have with such SNS and use that information to create your Account and you will become a Member; the information we obtain may depend on the privacy settings you have with the SNS.
  • We also collect the other information that you provide as part of registration and your use of the Service (e.g., without limitation, information on Offers you choose to redeem with Merchants via the Service, a list of Merchants you choose to follow, zip code (on its own) and individual preferences) (“Non-Identifying Information”). If you access the Service as a Merchant, we may collect Non-Identifying Information such as your business category, tag line, information about current events and your operating hours.
  • We use your Personal Information (in some cases, in conjunction with your Non-Identifying Information) mainly to provide the Service, charge Merchants applicable fees and administer your inquiries.
  • Certain Non-Identifying Information would be considered a part of your Personal Information if it were combined with other identifiers (for example, combining your zip code with your street address) in a way that enables you to be identified. But the same pieces of information are considered Non-Identifying Information when they are taken alone or combined only with other non-identifying information (for example, your viewing preferences). We may combine your Personal Information with Non-Identifying Information and aggregate it with information collected from other OptTown Users (defined below) to attempt to provide you with a better experience, to improve the quality and value of the Service and to analyze and understand how our Site and Service are used. We may also use the combined information without aggregating it to serve you specifically, for instance, to deliver a product to you according to your preferences or restrictions.
  • We also use your Personal Information to contact you with OptTown newsletters, marketing or promotional materials and other information that may be of interest to you. If you decide at any time that you no longer wish to receive such communications from us, please follow the unsubscribe instructions provided in any of the communications or update your “user preferences” information. (See “Changing or Deleting Information” below.)

Log Data

When you visit the Site and Application, whether as a Member, Merchant or a non-registered user just browsing (any of these, an “OptTown User”), our servers automatically record information that your browser sends whenever you visit a website (“Log Data”). This Log Data may include information such as pages of our Site and Application that you visit, the time spent on those pages, information you search for on our Site and Application, access times and dates, and other statistics. We use this information to monitor and analyze use of the Site and Application and for the Site’s and Application’s technical administration, to increase our Site’s and Application’s functionality and user-friendliness, and to better tailor our Site and Application to our visitors’ needs. We also use this information to verify that visitors to the Site and Application meet the criteria required to process their requests.

Cookies

Like many websites, we use “cookies” to collect information. A cookie is a small data file that we transfer to your computer’s hard disk for record-keeping purposes. We use cookies for two purposes. First, we utilize persistent cookies to save your login information for future logins to the Site and Application. Second, we utilize session ID cookies to enable certain features of the Site and Application, to better understand how you interact with the Site and Application and to monitor aggregate usage by OptTown Users and web traffic routing on the Site and Application. Unlike persistent cookies, session cookies are deleted from your computer when you log off from the Site and Application and close your browser. You can instruct your browser, by changing its options, to stop accepting cookies or to prompt you before accepting a cookie from the websites you visit. If you do not accept cookies, however, you may not be able to use all portions of the Site or Application or all functionality of the Service.

Phishing

Identity theft and the practice currently known as “phishing” are of great concern to OptTown. Safeguarding information to help protect you from identity theft is a top priority. We do not and will not, at any time, request your credit card information, your login information, or national identification numbers in a non-secure or unsolicited e-mail or telephone communication. For more information about phishing, visit the Federal Trade Commission’s website.

Information Sharing and Disclosure

OptTown Members. When you register through the Site and Application, OptTown Members with whom you are SNS friends will see information related to your use of the Service, including, but not limited to, the Merchants you follow via the Service and any comments you make via the Service. We recommend that you guard your anonymity and sensitive information.

OptTown Merchants. We will share your Personal Information and Non-Identifying Information, including, but not limited to, your name, age, gender and location (city and state), with the Merchants who you opt in to follow via the Service. If you would like to stop following any Merchant, you may do so by via the “Places” section of the Service; however, please note that we will provide the information described in this section to the applicable Merchant when you choose to follow such Merchant via the Service.

Merchant Information. As a Merchant, your business name, category, logo (if you choose to provide via the Service), tag line and location will be publicly viewable via the Service. If a Member chooses to follow your business, such Member will also be able to access your address, phone number, a description of your business, a link to your website(s), your operating hours and a list of your Offers, news and events. We recommend that you guard your sensitive information.

SNSs. The Service gives you the option to share information contained in your Account or related to your use of the Service with certain SNSs (including but not limited to Facebook). We will not share such information, which may contain your Personal Information, with such SNSs unless you expressly authorize such disclosure.

Aggregate Information and Non-Identifying Information. We may share aggregated information that does not include Personal Information and we may otherwise disclose Non-Identifying Information and Log Data with third parties for industry analysis, demographic profiling and other purposes. Any aggregated information shared in these contexts will not contain your Personal Information.

Service Providers. We may employ third party companies and individuals to facilitate our Service, to provide the Service on our behalf, to perform Site-related services (e.g., without limitation, maintenance services, database management, web analytics and improvement of the Site’s and Application’s features) or to assist us in analyzing how our Site and Application are used. These third parties have access to your Personal Information only to perform these tasks on our behalf and are obligated not to disclose or use it for any other purpose.

Compliance with Laws and Law Enforcement. OptTown cooperates with government and law enforcement officials and private parties to enforce and comply with the law. We will disclose any information about you to government or law enforcement officials or private parties as we, in our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate to respond to claims and legal process (including but not limited to subpoenas), to protect the property and rights of OptTown or a third party, to protect the safety of the public or any person, or to prevent or stop activity we may consider to be, or to pose a risk of being, illegal, unethical or legally actionable..

Business Transfers. OptTown may sell, transfer or otherwise share some or all of its assets, including your Personal Information, in connection with a merger, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets or in the event of bankruptcy.

Changing or Deleting Your Information

All Members and Merchants may review, update, correct or delete the Personal Information in their registration profile by contacting us or directly via the Service. If you completely delete all such information, then your Account may become deactivated. If you would like us to delete your Account in our system, please contact us at support@opttown.com with a request that we delete your Personal Information from our database. We will use commercially reasonable efforts to honor your request. We may retain an archived copy of your records as required by law or for legitimate business purposes.

Security

We will make any legally required disclosures of any breach of the security, confidentiality, or integrity of your unencrypted electronically stored “personal data” (as defined in applicable state statutes on security breach notification) to you via email or conspicuous posting on this Site in the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay, insofar as consistent with (i) the legitimate needs of law enforcement or (ii) any measures necessary to determine the scope of the breach and restore the reasonable integrity of the data system.

International Transfer

Your information may be transferred to — and maintained on — computers located outside of your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where the privacy laws may not be as protective as those in your jurisdiction. If you are located outside the United States and choose to provide information to us, OptTown transfers Personal Information to the United States and processes it there. Your consent to this Privacy Policy followed by your submission of such information represents your agreement to that transfer.

Links to Other Sites

Our Site and Application contain links to other websites, including, but not limited to, the websites of Merchants. If you choose to click on a third party link, you will be directed to that third party’s website. The fact that we link to a website is not an endorsement, authorization or representation of our affiliation with that third party, nor is it an endorsement of their privacy or information security policies or practices. We do not exercise control over third party websites. These other websites may place their own cookies or other files on your computer, collect data or solicit personal information from you. Other websites follow different rules regarding the use or disclosure of the personal information you submit to them. We encourage you to read the privacy policies or statements of the other websites you visit.

Our Policy Toward Children

The Site and Application are not directed to persons under 13. We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from children under 13. If a parent or guardian becomes aware that his or her child has provided us with Personal Information without their consent, he or she should contact us at support@opttown.com. If we become aware that a child under 13 has provided us with Personal Information, we will delete such information from our files.

Contacting Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at support@opttown.com