PayProtégé Privacy Policy

PayProtégé is committed to safeguarding your privacy online. Please read the following policy to understand how your personal information will be treated as you make full use of our many offerings. This policy may change from time to time so please check back periodically.

What personally identifiable information does PayProtégé collect from me? PayProtégé currently doesn't collect personal information other than what we feel is required to verify your identity so that we may allow you to access our services. This information includes your name, address, phone and email address and any information you wish to make viewable in your profile. We may ask you for personal information at other times, including (but not limited to) when you enter a sweepstakes, contest or promotion sponsored by PayProtégé and/or our partners and when you report a problem with our site. If you contact PayProtégé we may keep a record of that correspondence. PayProtégé also occasionally asks users to complete surveys that we use for research purposes. Wherever PayProtégé collects personal information we make an effort to include a link to this Privacy Policy on that page.

What are cookies and how does PayProtégé use them?

As part of offering and providing customizable and personalized services, PayProtégé uses cookies to store and sometimes track information about you. A cookie is a small amount of data that is sent to your browser from a web server and stored on your computer's hard drive. All pages on PayProtégé where you are prompted to login or that are customizable require that you accept cookies. Generally, we use cookies to:

  1. Remind us of whom you are in order to deliver to you a better and more personalized service. This cookie is set when you register or "Sign In" and is modified when you "Sign Out" of our service.
  2. Estimate our audience size. Each browser accessing PayProtégé is given a unique cookie which is then used to determine the extent of repeat usage, usage by a registered user versus by an unregistered user, and may be used to help target advertisements based on user interests and behavior.
  3. Track your progress and number of entries in some of our promotions, sweepstakes and contests. When a Pay Protégé-hosted promotion uses cookies, the information written to the cookie indicates the player's progress through the promotion, and may be used to track entries, submissions, and status in prize drawings.
  4. Measure certain traffic patterns, which areas of PayProtégé network of web sites you have visited, and your visiting patterns in the aggregate. We use this research to understand how our users' habits are similar or different from one another so that we can make each new experience on PayProtégé a better one. We may use this information to better personalize the content, banners, and promotions that you and other users will see on our sites. Advertising networks that serve ads onto PayProtégé may also use their own cookies. PayProtégé may also collect IP addresses for system administration and to report aggregate information to our advertisers.

How does PayProtégé use my information?

PayProtégé's primary goal in collecting information is to provide you, the user, with a customized experience on our site. This will include if not already, personalization services, interactive communications, online shopping and many other types of services, most of which are completely free to you. In order to provide services free of charge, we display advertisements. By knowing a little about you, PayProtégé is able to deliver more relevant advertisements and content and hence better service, to you.

In our role of delivering targeted advertisements, PayProtégé plays the middleman. Advertisers give us an advertisement and tell us the type of audience they want to reach (for example, males over 35 years old). PayProtégé takes the advertisement and displays it to users meeting those criteria. In this process, the advertiser never has access to individual account information. Only PayProtégé has access to individuals' accounts. This kind of advertisement targeting is done with banner ads as well as promotional email through PayProtégé Delivers. You will only receive special offers via email from PayProtégé if you have indicated that you would like to receive them. You can change your account preferences at any time.

PayProtégé does research on our users' demographics, interests, and behavior based on the information provided to us upon registration, during a promotion, from our server log files or from surveys. We do this to better understand and serve our users. This research is compiled and analyzed on an aggregated basis. PayProtégé may share this aggregated data with advertisers or business partners.

Who is collecting information?

When you are on a PayProtégé site and are asked for personal information, you are sharing that information with PayProtégé alone, unless it is specifically stated otherwise. If data is being collected and/or maintained by any company other than Pay Protégé, you will be notified prior to the time of the data collection or transfer. If you do not want your data to be shared, you can choose not to allow the transfer by not using that particular service.

Promotions that run on PayProtégé may be sponsored by companies other than PayProtégé or may be cosponsored by PayProtégé and another company. Some or all data collected during a promotion may be shared with the sponsor. If data will be shared, you will be notified prior to the time of data collection or transfer. You can decide not to participate in the promotion if you don't want your data to be shared. Currently, most PayProtégé promotions are limited to North American residents or US.

Please be aware that PayProtégé Internet access partners, advertisers, and web sites that have links on our site may collect personally identifiable information about you. This privacy statement does not cover the information practices of those Internet access partners, advertisers, and web sites linked to Pay Protégé.

With whom does PayProtégé share my information?

As a general rule, PayProtégé will not disclose any of your personally identifiable information except when we have your permission or under special circumstances, such as when we believe in good faith that the law requires it or under the circumstances described below. Please see the Terms of Service or Use Agreements for each of our products and services for more detailed information about how your personal information may be shared. The following describes some of the ways that your information may be disclosed.

Business Partners & Sponsors: PayProtégé may disclose your personal information to business partners or sponsors, but this is specifically described to you prior to data collection or prior to transferring the data. Details of shared use can be found in specific Terms of Service or Use Agreements, and sweepstakes and promotions rules. Some or all data collected during a PayProtégé promotion may be shared with a sponsor. If personally identifying data about you will be shared, we will tell you before we collect or transfer the data.

Many promotions offer opportunities to request additional information from sponsors. By requesting more information, you give PayProtégé permission to transfer your personal information to the sponsor so they can fulfill your request. In many instances, only your email address will be shared. If more information will be shared with the sponsor, you will be notified prior to the transfer.

PayProtégé Stores & Shopping: If you make a purchase from a store hosted by Pay Protégé, or a merchant in PayProtégé site, the information obtained during your visit to those stores, and the information you give such as your credit card number and contact information, is provided to the merchants. This is to enable transactions to take place.

Merchants listed in PayProtégé Shopping or site or in PayProtégé Stores have separate privacy and data collection practices. PayProtégé has no responsibility or liability for these independent policies. For more information regarding the merchant, their store, and their privacy policies, return to that store's home page and click on their Information link.

From time to time, you may be offered the opportunity to receive materials or special offers from third parties. If you opt-in to receive information from these third parties, PayProtégé will (with your permission) share your name and email address with them.

Third Party Data & Data in the Aggregate: Under confidentiality agreements, PayProtégé may match user information with third party data. Also, PayProtégé discloses aggregated user statistics in order to describe our services to current and prospective partners, advertisers, and other third parties, and for other lawful purposes.

Other: PayProtégé may also disclose account information in special cases when we have reason to believe that disclosing this information is necessary to identify, contact or bring legal action against someone who may be violating PayProtégé Terms of Service or may be causing injury to or interference with (either intentionally or unintentionally) PayProtégé rights or property, other PayProtégé users, or anyone else that could be harmed by such activities. PayProtégé may disclose or access account information when we believe in good faith that the law requires it and for administrative and other purposes that we deem necessary to maintain, service, and improve our products and services.

What are my choices regarding collection, use, and distribution of my information?

PayProtégé may, from time to time, send you email regarding our products and services. In addition, if you are interested in receiving offers or information from PayProtégé and our partners, we may occasionally send you direct mail about products and services that we feel may be of interest to you. Only PayProtégé (or agents working on behalf of PayProtégé and under confidentiality agreements) will send you these direct mailings and only if you indicated that you do not object to these offers. If you do not want to receive such mailings, simply tell us when you give us your personal information.

On some types of PayProtégé promotions, we will ask for your email address in order to update you on your score, entries, and status in prize drawings. When you participate in these types of promotions, you automatically receive promotion-related email, unless you choose the no-email option that some promotions offer. Occasionally these promotion-related email messages may include targeted advertisements.

You also have choices with respect to cookies. By modifying your browser preferences, you have the choice to accept all cookies, to be notified when a cookie is set, or to reject all cookies. If you choose to reject all cookies you will be unable to use those PayProtégé services that require registration in order to participate. You can still use PayProtégé and many other PayProtégé sites even if you do not accept cookies.

PayProtégé does not sell or rent user information to anyone. We will notify you at the time of data collection or transfer if your data will be shared with a third party and you will always have the option of not permitting the transfer. If you do not wish to allow your data to be shared, you can choose not to use a particular service or not to participate in certain promotions or contests.

Your PayProtégé account can be deleted or deactivated, but doing so will result in not being able to access any members-only area of the PayProtégé website. Residual information will remain within our archive records.

Knowing that you use certain services or features may help us to offer you better and more relevant content and advertisements. But as with all personally identifiable information, we do not make this available to any third parties without your permission. Any user statistics that we may provide to prospective advertisers or partners regarding financial product or service usage on PayProtégé are provided in the aggregate only and do not include any personally identifiable information about any individual user.

Please note that there may, in the near future, be several places on the PayProtégé Web site where you can transmit credit card information in order to complete a purchase transaction or for verification purposes. Any time we ask for a credit card number we transmit that credit card number in an encrypted format. We use industry-standard, SSL (secure socket layer) encryption.

What security precautions are in place to protect the loss, misuse, or alteration of my information?

Your PayProtégé Account Information and PayProtégé Profile are password-protected so that you and only you have access to this personal information.

We recommend that you do not divulge your password to anyone. PayProtégé will never ask you for your password in an unsolicited phone call or in an unsolicited email. Also remember to sign out of your PayProtégé account and close your browser window when you have finished your work. This is to ensure that others cannot access your personal information and correspondence if you share a computer with someone else or are using a computer in a public place like a library or Internet cafe.

Whenever PayProtégé handles personal information as described above, regardless of where this occurs, PayProtégé takes steps to ensure that your information is treated securely and in accordance with the relevant Terms of Service and this Privacy Policy.

Unfortunately, no data transmission over the Internet or any wireless network can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, PayProtégé cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us or from our online products or services, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your transmission, we make our best effort to ensure its security on our systems.

What else should I know about my privacy?

Please keep in mind that whenever you voluntarily disclose personal information online - for example on message boards, through email, or in chat areas - that information can be collected and used by others. In short, if you post personal information online that is accessible to the public, you may receive unsolicited messages from other parties in return.

Ultimately, you are solely responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your passwords and/or any account information. Please be careful and responsible whenever you're online.

Additional Information

If you have a question that was not addressed in this privacy policy you may contact us at Info@PayProtege.com.
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