Privacy Policy

How and Why We Collect and Use Information

Observer collects Personally Identifiable Information that may be used to identify you personally and can include information such as your name, email address, physical address, telephone number, or job title, when you sign up for an account. Observer will use information collected about you consistent with this Privacy Policy. Observer will use information you provide to us, to better serve you and enhance your experience with the Site and Observer mobile application, among other things.

Observer will use Personally Identifiable Information: (1) to market the Site and services to you; (2) to provide services and products requested by you; (3) to serve advertisements for our Site; (4) to enable our vendors and contractors to provide and assist us in the marketing, operation, troubleshooting and analysis of the Site and other services; (5) to conduct research and analyze data to improve our products, services, and Site; (6) to deliver email messages like updates, newsletters, customer service, and service announcements; (7) to engage in any other lawful activities we believe are consistent with the foregoing.

Our servers automatically recognize visitors’ domain names and IP addresses (the number assigned to computers on the Internet). No personal information about you is revealed in this process. The Site may also gather anonymous “traffic data” that does not personally identify you, but that may be helpful for marketing purposes or for improving the services we offer. We may use anonymous information to analyze Site traffic, but we do not examine this information for individually identifying information. In addition, we may use anonymous IP addresses to help diagnose problems with our server, to administer the Site, or to display the content according to your preferences. Traffic and transaction information may also be shared with business partners and advertisers on an aggregate and anonymous basis.

You do not have to give us any of your personal information to access the Site. If you choose to create a “Profile” on the Site, any information you add to the public portion of a Profile will be available to us as well as to other users of the Site.

Social Media and Mobile Applications

If you use a social media platform or your mobile device to interact with our Site, the application may have a specific privacy statement that governs its use of your Personal Information related to that application. For example, if you use an Observer mobile application and your mobile device’s settings permit, we may collect azimuth and triangulation information from your device. Our application may be designed to collect information even if you are not logged into the Observer application or our Site. If you have questions about the security and privacy settings of your mobile device, please refer to instructions from your mobile service provider or the manufacturer of your device to learn how to adjust your settings.

By proceeding through any of the above steps, you grant Observer permission to access all of the elements of your social network profile information that you have made available to be shared and to use it in accordance with the social network’s terms of use and this Privacy Policy.

Cookies and Tracking User Traffic

Some pages on our Site use “cookies” (small files that our Site places on your hard drive for identification purposes). A cookie file can contain information such as a user ID to track the pages visited, but the only personal information a cookie can contain is that which you supply yourself. These files are used for site registration, enable you to shop on our Site and may be used in a variety of ways to enhance or personalize your online browsing and e-commerce experience. For example, cookies enable use of certain website features, remember the items in your cart, store your preferences, recognize you when you return to our Site, track orders, and monitor and maintain information about your use of our Site.

Some parts of our Site may also use cookies to track user traffic patterns. Observer does this in order to determine the utility of our Site information to our users and to see how effective the navigational structure is in helping our users reach the desired information. Please note that cookies cannot read data on your hard drive and your web browser may allow you to be notified when you are receiving a cookie, giving you the choice to accept it or not. If you prefer not to receive cookies while browsing our Site, your browser can be set to warn you before accepting cookies and refuse the cookie when your browser alerts you to its presence. You can also refuse all cookies by turning them off in your browser but by not accepting cookies, some pages may not fully function and you will not be able to access your account information or make purchases on our Site.

Do we share your Information?

Your Personal Information is never shared outside Observer without your permission unless you consent to the sharing of your information to a third party service provider working on our behalf to serve you, or requiring us to provide you with a product or service. Observer will also disclose your personal information, if required to do so by law, or in urgent circumstances, to protect personal safety, the public or our Site.

How secure is your Information?

Observer strives to protect your personal information, using commercially reasonable efforts to prevent unauthorized access such as using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology to protect personal information as it is transmitted. To ensure access to our secure server before submission of personal financial information, look at the lower left-hand corner of your browser. If you see an unbroken key or a closed lock (depending upon your browser), then SSL is active. Alternatively, look at the URL or location line of your browser and secure server access is reflected in the first characters of the address changing from “http” to “https.”

However, we urge you to take every precaution to protect your personal data when you are on the Internet. Change your passwords often using alphanumeric combinations.

Children’s Privacy

We do not knowingly collect or save any information from children under the age of 13.

Cookies

We may use cookies to improve your experience using the Site. These cookies do not generally allow us to personally identify a specific user.

Certain Disclosures

We may disclose your personal information if required to do so by law or subpoena or if we believe that such action is necessary to (a) conform to the law or comply with legal process served on us or Affiliated Parties; (b) protect and defend our rights and property, the Site, the users of the Site, and/or our Affiliated Parties; (c) act under circumstances to protect the safety of users of the Site, us, or third parties.

Public Forums

The Site may include interactive forums such as message boards and chat rooms. Please remember that any information that is disclosed in these areas becomes public information and you should exercise caution when deciding to disclose your personal information.

Sale or Change of Control

If Observer or substantially all of its assets are acquired, your information will be one of the assets transferred to the acquirer.

Links to Third Party Sites

We are not responsible for the practices employed by websites linked to or from our Site nor the information or content contained therein. Often, links to other websites are provided solely as pointers to information on topics that may be useful to the users of our Site.

Please remember that when you use a link to go from our Site to another website, our privacy policy does not extend to third party sites. Your browsing and interaction on any other website, including websites which have a link on our Site, is subject to that website’s own rules and policies. Please read over those rules and policies before proceeding.

Transfer of Data

We process personal information on leased dedicated servers located in the United States of America and in other countries. In some cases, we process personal information outside your own country. If you use the Observer site from outside the United States and provide personal information to us, your personal information may be transferred to the United States. If you use the Observer site from within the United States and provide personal information to us, your personal information may be transferred out of the United States. Through your use of our Service, you consent to such transfer and to the use of the information between countries.

Your Consent

By using our Site you consent to our collection and use of your personal information as described in this Privacy Policy. If we change our privacy policies and procedures, we will post those changes on our Site to keep you aware of what information we collect, how we use it and under what circumstances we may disclose it.

Observer will treat all information in accordance with this Privacy Policy unless you have otherwise given express consent, which consent may be withdrawn at any time by notifying us at privacy@commercialobserver.com.

You will be able to access, update and modify the information concerning your account by visiting your account’s settings page.

California Privacy Rights

California Civil Code Section 1798.83 permits customers of Observer who are California residents to request certain information regarding our disclosure of personal information to third parties for their direct marketing purposes. Observer does not share information with third parties for their direct marketing purposes unless you affirmatively agree to such disclosure, by opting in to receive information from a third party that is participating in some activity described on our Site. To make such a request, please email us at capriv@commercialobserver.com Observer is only required to respond to 1 request per customer per year, and is not required to respond to requests made by means other than via the email address provided.

If you have any questions about our Privacy Policy, please email us at privacy@commercialobserver.com