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Privacy Policy

 

Girls Inc. is committed is committed to protecting the online and offline privacy of users and donors.

Portions of our site are directed to our adult donors, friends, and supporters, while other areas include content specifically designed for girls. Please review the information below to familiarize yourself with our policies on privacy, and contact Girls Inc. if you have any questions.

OVERVIEW OF THE GIRLS INC. DONOR PRIVACY POLICY
Girls Inc. adheres to the standards of ethics laid out in the Association of Fundraising Professionals “Donor Bill of Rights”:

  • To be informed of the organization’s mission, of the way the organization intends to use donated resources, and of its capacity to use donations effectively for their intended purposes.
  • To be informed of the identity of those serving on the organization’s governing board, and to expect the board to exercise prudent judgment in its stewardship responsibilities.
  • To have access to the organization’s most recent financial statements.
  • To be assured their gifts will be used for the purposes for which they were given.
  • To receive appropriate acknowledgement and recognition.
  • To be assured that information about their donation is handled with respect and with confidentiality to the extent provided by law.
  • To expect that all relationships with individuals representing organizations of interest to the donor will be professional in nature.
  • To be informed whether those seeking donations are volunteers, employees of the organization or hired solicitors.
  • To have the opportunity for their names to be deleted from mailing lists that an organization may intend to share.  As well, Girls Incorporated will not sell donor information to any third-party entity, nor share donor information with outside parties without the express consent of the donor.
  • To feel free to ask questions when making a donation and to receive prompt, truthful and forthright answers.

OVERVIEW OF THE GIRLS INC. WEBSITE PRIVACY POLICY
This Privacy Policy applies to information collected online when visiting our website and governs online data collection and usage at the Girls Inc. site.

  • You do not have to provide personal information to visit and enjoy many features of our site. To make a contribution online, purchase products, participate in message boards, or sign up for e-updates or newsletters, or engage in certain other activities, we will request personal information from you, such as your name, age, address, e-mail address, and, if visitors are identified to be under 13, a parent’s e-mail address.
  • We use the information that you voluntarily provide to fulfill your requests, such as signing you up for e-updates or newsletters or filling your purchase order, and for surveys and user research to improve our site.
  • We do not share your personal information with third parties, other than with our agents who provide technical support for our site or help fill your purchase order. If you are under the age of 13 and wish to receive e-updates or newsletters, we will request your name, e-mail address, and your parent’s e-mail address to notify your parent about this.
  • We may offer community features for girls at our site. Entry to our message boards requires a user name only. Message board postings are screened in advance to prevent disclosure of personally identifiable information. We collect anonymous, aggregate data to improve our site and features.

INFORMATION YOU PROVIDE
Visitors can visit our site without registering or providing personal information, but we do collect personal information to make certain features and options available. We collect personal information when it is voluntarily provided, for instance when signing a guest book, registering for e-mail updates, completing our online surveys, making a donation, or purchasing products. In our girls area, we typically require only a first name and e-mail address to respond to a question; that information is then deleted. To process newsletter and update signup requests for children under age 13, we also ask for a parent’s e-mail address. In our adult area, we may ask for first and last name, mailing address, phone number, and an e-mail address; an address and phone number is required to process online orders or donations, and other demographic information is requested to help us understand our visitors’ backgrounds, needs, and interests.

INFORMATION GIRLS INCORPORATED COLLECTS AUTOMATICALLY
Your web browser offers “cookies” which, if you allow their use, store small amounts of data on your computer when you visit a web site. Cookies do not contain any personally identifiable information about you and therefore cannot be used to identify you personally. You have the ability to accept or decline cookies by modifying your browser and our web sites are viewable even if you disable the cookie function on your browser. However, if you disable cookies, some advanced and customized features of our site will not be available to you.

Girls Incorporated may utilize cookie technology to assist us in tracking which of our features you like best. Cookies also enable us to provide online shopping, customize our content according to your preferences, and to age screen users for compliance with our policies for children under age 13. We DO NOT use cookies or other non-consensual methods to take personally identifiable or online contact information about you or your family off of your computer. Girls Incorporated DOES NOT use cookies for direct marketing or promotional purposes. Cookies are also NOT used to collect information specifically about you or your family for sharing with third parties [without consent.]

WHAT WE DO WITH COLLECTED INFORMATION
We use the personal information we collect to fulfill your requests. For instance, if you wish to start a Girls Incorporated in your area, donate to Girls Incorporated, or purchase a product online, we will use the information you provide to provide you with information, process your donation or purchase order. If you visit the girls site and register to receive a newsletter, we will use the registration information to send the newsletter. We also use collected information to evaluate and administer our service, respond to any problems that may arise, and to gauge user trends to determine what features are of most interest to our visitors.

We may, at times, produce reports containing aggregate information about our users such as demographic, age, and online usage information. This allows us to provide information and features that are most relevant to our users. We do not include personally identifiable information in these reports.

Children’s Privacy Although Girls Incorporated is a non-profit organization and does not operate a commercial website, we pay special attention to protecting the privacy of visitors under age 13. Girls Incorporated uses technical tools (i.e., cookies) to check the age of visitors who sign up for newsletters and updates. We ask visitors who indicate they are under age 13 when signing up for e-mail newsletters or updates to provide the e-mail address of a parent or legal guardian so we can send the parent a notice. Online contact information will be used only to directly respond to the child’s one-time request or, with parental notification, to sign the child up for our e-mail updates. Our community features, if available, are designed to prevent visitors from posting personally identifiable information. Participation requires only a user name, and postings are screened to prevent inclusion of personal information. Girls Incorporated will NOT:

  • Collect more information than needed to respond to a question or one-time request from a child under 13, provide parental notice, or obtain parental consent.
  • Collect personally identifiable offline contact information from users known to be under 13 without prior verifiable parental consent.
  • Distribute to third parties any personally identifiable information collected from children known to be under 13 absent parental consent.

OUR SECURITY FEATURES
We use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology to protect credit card data during transmission. Girls Incorporated employees are made aware of its website privacy practices and we limit access to personal information to those employees with a specific need to retrieve this information. Girls Incorporated may give other companies access to our information database, but only if necessary to allow them to provide technical or fulfillment services to Girls Incorporated. We may also give other companies access to the information necessary to fill your order if you purchase products from our site or to process you donation. Our technical and fulfillment agents must agree to use personal information only to process or fulfill your requests or to service our site.

UPDATING YOUR PREFERENCES
A user can, at any time, change, correct, modify or delete any personal information they may have provided to Girls Incorporated. Users can also unsubscribe from any newsletters or opt out of various promotional e-mailings at any time by clicking on “unsubscribe” links in the newsletter or e-mails. Parents may review and request that we update or delete their child’s information by sending a signed request, including their e-mail address, the child’s e-mail address, birth date, and first name, to our Content Manager at the address below.

VISITORS FROM OUTSIDE THE UNITED STATES
Girls Incorporated and the server which makes this site available worldwide is located in the United States. All matters relating to this site are governed by the laws of the State of New York in the United States. Any information you provide will be transferred to the U.S. By visiting this site and submitting information you authorize this transfer.

PROTECTING OUR SITE
We reserve the right to use or disclose any information without notice or consent as needed to satisfy any law, regulation or legal request; to conduct investigations of consumer complaints or possible breaches of law; to protect the integrity of our site and our property; to protect the safety of our visitors or others; to fulfill your requests; or to cooperate in any legal investigation.

CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY POLICY
We will occasionally update this Privacy Policy as necessary to maintain the highest protection for our users and to comply with a changing environment. We recommend that you check the policy when you visit our site to be sure you are aware of and understand our current policy. If we make material changes to this policy or in how we will use or collect your personally identifiable information, we will prominently post such changes prior to implementing the change. We will not make retroactive changes in how we handle previously collected personal information unless legally required to do so.

We want all our visitors to have fun surfing our site and urge you to use common sense whenever disclosing personal information on this site or anywhere on the Internet.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact Treopia Cannon, President/CEO, at gi@girlsinc-houston.org