Privacy Policy

To The Point Privacy Policy

TO THE POINT, Inc. shares your concern about the protection of your personal information online. This is our policy regarding the privacy of information we collect on our web sites.

Information Gathered and Tracked by TO THE POINT, Inc.
 
TO THE POINT, Inc. gathers two types of data about users: (a) personal information, which individual users provide (i) when registering for our free mailing list, (ii) when registering as a subscriber to one of our premium subscription services, and (iii) voluntarily at certain other points, such as contests or surveys; and (b) tracking information, which is automatically collected about all visitors to our sites.

Personal Information

Personal information is gathered in several places on our web sites, but if you prefer, you may talk offline to a customer service representative and provide the required information over the telephone or via email.

Free Mailing List

In order to register for the Free Mailing List, you’ll have to supply us with your email address.

General

When you subscribe, and at other times, we may collect personally identifiable information from you that may include your name, age, address, e-mail address, credit-card number and facts about your computers, profession, and similar information. We do not, however, knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of thirteen.

Surveys

We may conduct occasional online surveys. For example, when you’re within our Web site, you may see a pop-up window offering you the optional opportunity of participating in a survey. These surveys are entirely voluntary and you may easily decline to participate.

Web Site Usage Information

We automatically collect IP addresses and Web site usage information from you when you visit our Web site. This information helps us evaluate how our visitors and subscribers use and navigate our Web sites on an aggregate basis, including the number and frequency of visitors and subscribers to each Web page, and the length of their visits. Tracking data consists of both individual and aggregated tracking information and is automatically gathered using "cookies".

What is a "cookie"?

A cookie is a small file that is sent to your computer by a site’s server. A cookie can be a record of your visit to a site, including information such as your User Name, time of last visit, pages viewed, etc. Cookies created by the servers of one site can be retrieved only by that site’s servers. Thus, information in TO THE POINT cookies is not accessible to other sites.  Cookies are either stored temporarily by the browser (while the web browser is open, called "session cookies"), or written to the user’s hard drive ("stored cookies") by a web server, and used to track the pages visited. Cookies used by TO THE POINT, Inc. do not contain user passwords or billing information. The individual information gathered in this manner is used for internal purposes only, such as accessing a member’s account information. We also use the information on an aggregate basis, to track the readership of stories and analyze traffic patterns on our site.

You can control your browser’s settings regarding cookies by selecting "Internet Options" or "Preferences" in the menu bar of your browser. This will allow you to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, have your browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or disable cookies altogether. However, in order to access the TO THE POINT web site, you must at least enable "session" cookies.

Tracking by our Advertisers

In addition to cookies placed by TO THE POINT, advertisers and advertising vendors that serve ads onto our web sites may use their own cookies or other tracking technologies. We cannot be responsible for the privacy policies or practices of any such advertisers and vendors.

Use of the Information
 
TO THE POINT, Inc. uses information obtained from its users as stated in this Privacy Policy, and to enhance users’ experiences on our sites. As a general rule, we will not disclose any personal information to any third parties, except when we believe in good faith that the law requires it, to protect other users of TO THE POINT’s services, or to respond to an emergency. Tracking information is used to create aggregate reports on user demographics and site traffic patterns and then provided to our advertisers and partners, enabling them to better target their advertisements to our users. None of the information provided to them can be connected to the identities or other personal information of individual users.

Premium Services

If you’re a Subscriber, we use your e-mail address, postal address or fax number to deliver our premium products and services. You can view your account information at any time by visiting the Edit Profile page or by contacting our Member Service department by email at info@tothepointnews.com or by telephone at 703-531-1897, between the hours of 9:30 AM and 4:30 PM EST.

Special Offers and Advertisements

We may from time to time send you special offers and advertisements for products or services offered by third parties. We will not disclose any of your personal information to such third parties when we do this.

Agents

Your personal information may be given to contractors or other agents engaged by TO THE POINT to provide certain services, such as bulk e-mail delivery, shipping, and contest administration. Information will be shared with such contractors only to the extent reasonably necessary for them to perform services on our behalf, and pursuant to reasonable confidentiality obligations.

Corporate Transfers

We reserve the right to transfer any personal information or tracking information that we have collected to a third party in the event that we sell or otherwise transfer substantially all of our assets related to any web site that we own or operate and any product or service that we offer.

Security
 
TO THE POINT, Inc. uses reasonable security methods to protect the data that resides on our servers. However, no security system is impenetrable. We cannot guarantee the security of our servers, nor can we guarantee that information that users supply will not be intercepted while being transmitted to us over the Internet.

Policy Modifications: We may change this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will post any changes here, so be sure to check back periodically.