Privacy Policy

Bay Area Older Adults®: Website Privacy Policy

Bay Area Older Adults®, Inc. has provided this privacy policy because we value your right to privacy. This privacy policy applies to your use of the BAO website located at www.bayareaolderadults.org (the "BAO Website"), but not does apply to any third party sites that may be linked to them, or any relationships you may have with the business listed on the BAO Website. This policy is effective as of December 1, 2009 and governs the collection of personal information through the BAO Website on or after this date. This policy describes the types of information Bay Area Older Adults, Inc. collects from its users and how that information is used. Please read this policy carefully before providing us with any personal information. If you have questions about this policy, contact us.

The terms "we" , " us" , " our" , " BAO" and " Bay Area Older Adults" refer to Bay Area Older Adults®, Inc., a California corporation. The terms " you" , " your" and " user" refers to the customer visiting the BAO Website and/or contributing to the BAO Website. The term "personal information" means information that you provide to us which personally identifies you to be contacted or identified, such as your full name, email address, zip code, mailing address, age range, gender, interests and any other associated data. Personal information also includes contact information for other people that you provide to us that allows us to identify them. BY USING THE BAO WEBSITE, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE TERMS OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE WITH THESE TERMS, PLEASE DO NOT USE THE BAO WEBSITE.

Information we collect

We use commercially reasonable efforts to ensure that the collection of personal information is limited to that which is necessary to fulfill the purposes identified below. If we use your information in a manner different than the purpose for which it is collected, then we will ask you for your consent prior to such use.

You do not need to give us any information about yourself in order to access most of bayareaolderadults.org. You can visit our pages, read our publications, and learn about our member services on a completely anonymous basis.

If you want to take advantage of some of the optional services available on bayareaolderadults.org, however, we will sometimes request information that allows us to identify you ("personal information" ).

1. Unregistered users

We encourage you to register with us in order to take advantage of Bay Area Older Adults®;' many personalization features. However, you may choose not to register but still may take advantage of any feature of the BAO Website where registration is not required. If you do not register, then the information we collect from you is limited. We log your IP address and the type of browser you use, in order to help diagnose problems with our server, administer the BAO Website and track usage statistics. Your IP address may vary each time you visit, or it may be the same, depending on whether you access the BAO Website through an always-on type of Internet connection (e.g., cable modem or DSL), or through a dial-up connection (e.g., AOL or Earthlink). Either way, it would be extremely difficult for us to identify you through your IP address, and we make no attempt to do so. If you reached the BAO Website by clicking on a link or advertisement on another site, then we also log that information. This helps us to maximize our Internet exposure, and to understand the interests of our users. All of this information is collected and used only in the aggregate; that is, it is entered into our database, where we can use it to generate overall reports on our visitors, but not reports about individual visitors.

We also place small files known as "cookies" (and/or similar technology) on your computer's hard drive to maintain the integrity of our content and to provide our users with a better site experience. Like an IP address, a "cookie" is a kind of online identification tag that allows us to recognize your computer each time you visit Bayareaolderadults.org. A cookie may contain information that allows us to track your path through the BAO Website and to determine whether you have visited us before. However, unless you register with us, it contains no personally identifiable information that would allow us to identify you. Cookies cannot be used to read data off of your hard drive, and cannot retrieve information from any other cookies created by other websites. We use cookies in this manner to help us understand how visitors use the BAO Website, and to help us to improve the BAO Website. By gathering this information, we can learn, among other things, how many people visit Bayareaolderadults.org, which Bayareaolderadults.org pages are the most and least popular, and which other websites are the most frequent referral sources for Bayareaolderadults.org.

You may refuse to accept a cookie from us by following the procedures specific to your Web browser. Although you may do so, you may find that your browser reacts strangely when visiting not only the BAO Website, but other websites as well. Since cookies don't provide us with any information from which we can identify you, we suggest you allow us to place one on your computer.

Bayareaolderadults.org includes links to other websites, some of which are operated by Bay Area Older Adults' Service Providers or approved vendors, and some of which are not. Websites operated by Bay Area Older Adults' Service Providers and approved vendors may also collect personal information, and may have their own privacy policies that differ from, and are not covered by, this privacy policy. It is important that you review any privacy policies on these sites carefully before you use any services or programs offered.

When you click to unaffiliated third-party sites, Bay Area Older Adults is not responsible for, and has no control over, the information collection or privacy practices of that site. It is important that you review and understand the privacy policies posted on any linked sites you visit before volunteering any of your personal information. These websites may also collect cookies, or allow third-party advertisers on their sites to collect cookies. You can often find information regarding a site and its privacy policy on the website's home page. If you cannot find or do not like a site's privacy policy, you may prefer not to do business with, or offer information to, that site.

We use vendors for various purposes. For example, BAO uses a vendor to place BAO-approved banner advertisements on Bayareaolderadults.org. The cookies allow BAO to manage the delivery of these ads - for example, by counting the number of times a visitor has viewed different banners. If a visitor has viewed the same banner a number of times, BAO can use the vendor's system to automatically display different banners in the next visit. BAO has complete control over the banners that are placed on Bayareaolderadults.org through this system.

We may also use a vendor to collect aggregate information about Bayareaolderadults.org usage - such as the most visited pages and features. This vendor also uses cookies and transparent image tags to collect this information. Like cookies, image tags do not allow us or the vendor to identify you by name or other personal characteristics. These vendors do not collect any personal information from members on Bayareaolderadults.org, and they do not share the non-personal information collected on Bayareaolderadults.org with anyone else for any other purpose.

If you are uncomfortable allowing cookies to be placed on your computer, please read this section "information about cookies" section) on Bayareaolderadults.org that explains how to set your browser so that it will not accept these cookies, or so that it will notify you whenever a website is trying to use cookies. If you choose not to accept cookies, however, you may not be able to use certain features of Bayareaolderadults.org or linked sites. You will still be able to visit the general Bayareaolderadults.org pages on an anonymous basis, just as you have in the past.

2. Registered users

If you choose to register with us, you'll be able to add content to the BAO Website. For example, you may post your own reviews and participate in our discussion forums. You will also be able to email Bay Area Older Adults®; content to yourself. In addition, you will benefit from the ability to personalize your BAO Website experience by using your own personal calendar to schedule activities. The benefits of registering will increase over time as we get to know you better and introduce new features. We encourage you to register so that you can experience everything that Bay Area Older Adults®; has to offer!

You will need to provide us with your full name, email address and zip code and to create a user name and password to use certain features of the BAO Website. By registering on the BAO Website, you agree that you will not (i) select or use a name of another person with the intent to impersonate that person; (ii) select or use a name subject to the rights of any person without authorization; (iii) select or use a name in violation of the intellectual property rights of any person; or (iv) select or use a name that we, in our sole discretion, deem inappropriate or offensive. You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of the password and account, and are responsible for all activities (whether by you or by others) that occur under your password or account. You will notify us immediately of any unauthorized use of your password or account or any other breach of security. We assume no liability for any loss or damage arising from any unauthorized use of your password or account by a third party.

If you register with us, we will collect personal information from you in addition to the non-personal information described above. The personal information you will be required to provide will include your full name, email address, password and zip code. Providing other personal information including gender, age range, mailing address and your interests is entirely optional. The information we collect may vary, but we only collect the information that you manually enter into our forms or otherwise authorize us to collect. We may store all or some of that information in a cookie file on your hard drive, so that our system will recognize you each time you visit the BAO Website. In that way, we can save your preferences from visit to visit and present you with a customized BAO Website, without requiring you to log into our site every time you visit. Additionally, authorized Bay Area Older Adults personnel may update your registration information to accurately reflect any new information included in communications received from you.

If you visit the BAO Website by "clicking-through" from a site operated by one of our partners, and you have registered with that partner, then certain information about you that you have provided to that partner may be transmitted to us. You should review the privacy policy of the website from which you reached the BAO Website in order to determine what information was collected and how you agreed that our partner could use that information. Regardless of what information was transmitted to us, however, we do keep the information if you are a registered user.

If you reach the BAO Website through one of our partners (whether or not you have registered with our partner), and you choose to register with us, we may be required to give our partner some or all of your registration information. We will only do so in accordance with this policy, but we cannot control how our partner uses the information. If you have questions about our partner's privacy policy, you should review their policy before providing information to us. Of course, you can ensure that the personal information you provide to us is not shared with our partners (except in accordance with this policy), by visiting the BAO Website directly instead of clicking-through from one of our partners.

How we use the information we collect

We use the personal information we collect to help both of us! As we mentioned above, registering with us allows you to personalize the BAO Website so that it is most useful to you. It also allows you to log into the BAO Website automatically each time you visit, rather than manually typing your user name/e-mail address and password every time.

The term "submissions" refers to the information that you submit or post to the BAO Website for public display, such as ratings, reviews, feedback, photos, comments, text, images, audio video and all other forms of data or communication. We store and may publicly display your submissions at our sole discretion.

To the extent you include personal information in your submissions (such as a photo of yourself), third parties may be able to identify you, associate you with your user account, and contact you. Third parties can also associate you with your user account, if you include information in your submission that allows the third party to distinguish you from other users. Please do not include information in your submissions that you expect to keep private. In addition, you can reduce the risk of being personally identified by choosing a fictitious account name.

If you contact us to provide feedback, register a complaint, or ask a question, we will record any personal information and other content that you provide in your communication so that we can effectively respond to your communication.

We may use the information we collect in connection with your use of the BAO Website (including your personal information) in order to investigate, enforce, and apply our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

We store your membership application information in our computer files, and use this information to service your membership account and answer any questions you may have about membership. We may also use your personal information to periodically contact you with news or important information from Bay Area Older Adults®;, to provide you with special member benefits, discounts and offers from BAO or with other information or invitations related to your membership or the Bay Area Older Adults community, and to request your feedback on our site. In addition to these periodic updates, we may email you additional materials, but only if you specifically request them. These might include opt-in newsletters and other materials that you proactively request from Bay Area Older Adults.

In addition to these communications, if you have provided an email address, we may use your personal information to send you notifications about special offers or to tell you about opportunities available from our partners. You may opt-out of any or all marketing communications from Bay Area Older Adults in any commercial e-mail we send or at any time, as well as access and update your personal information, by logging into your own account.

We may also use certain information that you provide in order to present you with advertising that you may find interesting. This benefits both of us. It benefits us because advertising helps pay the bills, and we can charge our advertisers more if they know that their ads will be seen by somebody more likely to find it useful. It benefits you because you see advertising that may actually be interesting to you, rather than annoying.

We record information relating to your use of the BAO Website, such as the searches you undertake, the pages you view, your browser type, IP address, requested URL, referring URL, and timestamp information. We use this type of information to administer the BAO Website and so we can understand our members' interests and evaluate the effectiveness of our offerings. We also use this information in the aggregate to perform statistical analyses of user behavior and characteristics in order to measure interest in and use of the various areas of the BAO Website and learn more about member characteristics and needs. You cannot be identified from this aggregate information. As explained in the Questions and Answers below, we may ask for additional information in your visits to Bayareaolderadults.org. All of this information helps us evaluate, modify, and develop services that are likely to be of interest to our members.

As indicated above, on occasion, we will also use your membership information to send you notices in the mail or by e-mail about special member benefits, discounts, and offers. If you do not want to receive these mailings, you can:

1. E-mail us at info@bayareaolderadults.org,

2. Write to us at BAO, 4750 Almaden Expressway Ste 124-125, San Jose, CA 95118

In addition, each issue of these e-mail newsletters or notices will always include instructions for unsubscribing. Again, these notices are designed to describe the benefits of BAO membership, but we do not want to send them to you if you are not interested in receiving them. Some affiliated sites may also send you promotional e-mails if you asked to receive them when you registered for their respective services.

You can cancel your registration with us by emailing us at info@bayareaolderadults.org and placing your email address in the subject of the e-mail and "cancel my registration" in the text of the email. We will send you an e-mail to confirm your request. After we receive confirmation, we will remove your information from our active database, but some information may remain in our archives. We may not be able to remove your information from our partners' databases, if we have transmitted any information to them. In the event of termination, we retain the right to use Your Content as described in the Terms of Use (hotlink to Terms of Use page).

As a registered BAO user, you can modify some of your personal information and your privacy preferences by emailing info@bayareaolderadults.org. Upon your request, BAO will use commercially reasonable efforts to close your account. Nevertheless, we may still retain your personal information in our systems.

Disclosure of your personal information

Bay Area Older Adults®;, Inc. may provide aggregate personal information from our users or anonymized individual information from our users to third parties. The information will not be in a form that will allow any third party to identify you personally.

We share your personal information only with companies we have selected to provide official BAO member services, support BAO operations or with granting agencies for audit purposes. In instances when we provide any information that identifies you personally, our contracts with these companies and agencies require them to keep the information confidential, and allows them to use the information only to offer the contracted services to BAO and BAO members and in the case of granting agencies, for audit purposes.

As you might expect, Bay Area Older Adults, Inc. must cooperate with legal authorities, and may in some circumstances be required to disclose personally identifiable information in response to requests from law enforcement authorities, or in response to a subpoena or other legal process. We don't expect this to happen, but if it does, we will provide only the information required. In other words, we will not simply turn over our database in response to a specific legal requirement. We can also turn over information about you if we believe we must in order to prevent a violation of the law, and by accepting this policy, you consent to our doing so, in our sole discretion. You also consent to our disclosing information about you in the course of legal proceedings if we are legally required to do so, if we reasonably believe that doing so may mitigate our liability, or if doing so will assist us in enforcing our legal rights. Please note that we are not required to question or contest the validity of any search warrant, subpoena or other similar governmental request that we receive. Finally, we may release personal information to protect or defend BAO and its members. We also may share your information in connection with a corporate transaction, such as a divestiture, merger, consolidation, or asset sale, and in the unlikely event of bankruptcy.

Bay Area Older Adults will not share your email address with any other members nor display it any public manner. If you choose to participate in our member-to-member communications programs, you may be contacted by other Bay Area Older Adults members, using Bay Area Older Adults as an intermediary. All Bay Area Older Adults members will have the option to turn off the member-to-member communication features at any time.

Your account is password protected. We use industry standard measures to protect the personal information that is stored in our database. We limit the access to your personal information to those employees and contractors who need access to perform their job function, such as our customer service personnel. If you have any questions about the security on the BAO Website, please contact us. Although we take appropriate measures to safeguard against unauthorized disclosures of information, we cannot assure you that your personal information will never be disclosed in a manner that is inconsistent with this Privacy Policy.

You hereby acknowledge that BAO is not responsible for any intercepted information sent via the internet, and you hereby release us from any and all claims arising out of or related to the use of intercepted information in any unauthorized manner.

Others' information

You may choose to provide us with another person's e-mail address so that person may be invited to create an account on the BAO Website and become your friend. We use this information to contact and, if necessary, remind that person about the invitation. By providing us with another person's e-mail address, you represent to us that you have obtained the consent of the person concerned as regards such disclosure to us of their personal information. All invitees are provided with the option not to receive further invitations. We may disclose such information if required to do so in order to comply with legal process, as described above.

How you can review and update your personal information

You can review and update the personal information you have provided through the registration process by contacting Bay Area Older Adults.

Privacy protection in BAO interactive areas

It is important to understand that the information you submit in personal profiles, message boards, reviews, chat rooms, and user groups is publicly displayed. Your messages will be seen by people and organizations not related to BAO, and may be used by these third parties to contact you. As a result, you should be very careful about the information that you publish online. Because these unrelated parties will also see your "User Name" on any postings that you make in online discussions if you so elect, you may not want to use your actual name. Read the Terms of Use to learn more about using the BAO Online Community.

Steps we take to protect your personal information

Bay Area Older Adults® has implemented security procedures to help protect the personal information stored in our systems. For example, we limit access to personal information about you to employees who we believe reasonably need to come into contact with that information. But please know that there is no way for us to guarantee the security of your personal information. In order to protect your personal information, we may use technologies and processes such as encryption, access control procedures, network firewalls, physical security, password hashing, login auditing idle session termination and other measures to protect against unauthorized access to your personal information. These measures increase the security and privacy of information traveling to, from, and within Bayareaolderadults.org. Only our authorized employees or agents carrying out permitted business functions are allowed to access personal information. Employees who violate our privacy access policies may be subject to disciplinary actions, including termination when appropriate.

In order to interact with Bayareaolderadults.org, we require you to use a password to protect your account from unauthorized access by others. If you do allow others, including family or household members, to access BAO members-only services through your personal password or to use your membership account number, please understand that you are responsible for the actions of those individuals.

This privacy policy describes the types of information we currently collect, and the ways we use and protect that information. If you are uncomfortable with our policies and practices, please do not provide any personal information to us through Bayareaolderadults.org and do not use the BAO Website.

Your choices

We respect your choices. You may elect not to receive information about BAO activities, such as educational programs, or about the activities of other BAO affiliates by emailing us at info@bayareaolderadults.org. Despite your indicated e-mail preferences, we may send you notices of any updates to our Terms of Use or Privacy Policy.

For more information

To exercise your choices, or ask questions about your membership information, please contact us by email at info@bayareaolderadults.org or mail at BAO, 4750 Almaden Expressway Ste 124-125, San Jose, CA 95118.

We will do our best to investigate any complaint you may have and respond promptly to your concerns.

For more information about online privacy issues generally, we encourage you to visit the web sites of the Federal Trade Commission.

Children's privacy

This BAO Website is a general audience site, and we do not knowingly collect information about children. Should a child whom we know to be under 13 send personal information to us, we will use that information only to respond directly to that child to inform him or her that we must have parental consent before receiving his or her personal information.

Changes to this privacy policy

From time to time, we may collect different types of information and use that information in different ways - for example, when we add features or services to Bayareaolderadults.org. In these cases, we may edit this policy to explain the new practices. Because protecting members' privacy is very important to us, we do not expect major changes in policy. However, we reserve the right to change this policy at our sole discretion should we deem it advisable to do so.

We may modify this Privacy Policy at any time, and we will post any new versions on this page. Be sure to return to this page periodically to review the most current version of the Privacy Policy. We reserve the right at any time, at our sole discretion, to change or otherwise modify the Privacy Policy without prior notice. The revised Privacy Policy will appear on the BAO Website and your continued access or use of the BAO Website signifies your acceptance of the updated or modified Privacy Policy. If you are uncomfortable with the updated or modified Privacy Policy, please discontinue use of and/or terminate your membership to Bay Area Older Adults®;.

Dispute resolution

If you believe that BAO has not adhered to this Privacy Policy you may write to the BAO at the following address: Bay Area Older Adults, 4750 Almaden Expressway Ste 124-125, San Jose, CA 95118.

In your letter, please describe in as much detail as possible ways in which you believe the Privacy Policy has not been complied with. We will investigate your complaint promptly.

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, the privacy practices of the BAO Website, or if you want to exercise any of the rights that you are given under this Privacy Policy, you can contact us using the contact information listed above.

Information about Cookies

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