BLUTONIC EU PRIVACY POLICY

Last Modified: May 18, 2018

 

INTRODUCTION:

Welcome to the bluTonic Privacy Policy (“Privacy Policy”). By visiting our Privacy Policy, you’ve taken the first step in educating yourself about advertising businesses such as ours that contribute to the Internet’s ability to remain largely an ecosystem of free content, as well as to provide a better user experience for consumers.

At bluTonic Inc, or any of its subsidiaries, including Tracsion, a bluTonic Company (“bluTonic,” “we,” “us,” or “our”), we provide online advertising services. To do this, we follow information usage practices based on two beliefs: first, that protecting user privacy is essential to the growth and prosperity of the Internet; second, that a personalized web experience can provide significant benefits to Internet end users if done properly. In accordance with these beliefs, bluTonic creates results for advertisers and publishers in revolutionary ways without compromising individual privacy.

If you have questions or concerns regarding this statement, please contact us by clicking here.

By visiting any bluTonic website or mobile application, or any website or mobile application of one of its subsidiaries or affiliates (collectively, “Site” or “Sites”) or sharing any information with us, you agree to be bound by this Privacy Policy.

To start, it is important for you to know two definitions that are key to understanding our programs and privacy practices:

Personally Identifiable Information (“PII”): Information that can be linked to an identifiable individual person. This type of data includes things like full name, home address, telephone number, or email address.

Non-Personally Identifiable Information (“Non-PII”): Information that cannot identify an individual person, such as IP address, browser types, operating systems, domain names, access dates and times, referring website addresses, online transactions and browsing and search activity.

Please take some time to read about what our business does, learn how we ensure that data you share with us is collected and used safely, and visit resources that provide more depth on our industry.

 

CONTENTS

Short Form Privacy Policy

Scope

What bluTonic Does

Privacy by Design

Information Collection & Use

Self-Regulation & Voluntary Compliance

Your Choices

Use of the bluTonic Sites as a Visitor or Client

Contact Us

Your Representations

Modifications to this Privacy Policy

 

SHORT FORM PRIVACY POLICY

We have included a table summarizing our practices solely for your convenience and reference purposes. This table is not an exhaustive description of our privacy practices and should not be construed to define, limit, and/or describe the scope or extent of this Privacy Policy. As a result, we urge you to read the entire Privacy Policy:

Information Collection: PII We do not collect PII except as expressly provided for herein. For example, PII may be collected should a consumer contact bluTonic on his/her own initiative, register with a publisher to download a mobile app, or as part of our lead generation business.
Information Collection: Non-PII The Non-PII we collect may include, as an example, IP address, browser types, operating systems, domain names, platform type, language preference, access dates and times, referring website addresses, online transactions and browsing and search activity.
How Information is Used We may use your Non-PII for purposes such as enhancement of our services, marketing, and to more effectively match advertisements, applications, and website content to your interests.
Sharing Your Information We may share your information with third party service providers with whom we have contracted, our subsidiaries and affiliates, third party marketing partners, business partners and our clients and publishers, and as expressly provided for herein.
Your Choices You may regulate the collection and use of Non-PII via the opt-out options provided herein or by uninstalling or electing not to install a web browser or mobile application.
Security We use reasonable and appropriate security measures to protect your data.
Retention We retain Non-PII we collect or receive online for no more than eighteen (18) months for advertising purposes. Aggregate Non-PII data for reporting and analytics may be retained for a longer period.
Changes We may change this Privacy Policy at any time by posting the revised Privacy Policy on the Site along with the date such Privacy Policy was last updated.
Contact Us If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, or the practices discussed herein, please contact us by clicking here.

 

SCOPE

This Privacy Policy is primarily intended to provide a description of the ways in which we collect and use information to deliver advertising across the Internet. For more on how we handle information collected from clients and publishers or visitors to our Sites, please see “Use of the bluTonic Sites as a Visitor or Client” below.

This Site is not intended for use by those who are not legal residents of the European Union. Neither the Sites, nor our online activities or services for our clients, are directed toward or intended for children. We do not collect PII from any person of whom we have actual knowledge is under the age of 13. By using our website, the website of any of our publishers in our networks or submitting information to us, you consent to our use and sharing of the information collected or submitted as described in this Privacy Policy.

Please be aware that in addition to our Sites, the websites of our clients and publishers, applications on which we place advertisements and any third party websites linked to one of our Sites, may also collect information from you for various purposes, including, but not limited to, providing advertisements about goods and services likely to be of greater interest to you. Such information collected by such websites and mobile applications and their affiliated or third party partners may include Non-PII through the use of cookies and other technologies. It may also include any PII you choose to provide in registering and transacting with such websites and mobile applications. Although we choose our business partners and clients carefully, bluTonic is not responsible for the privacy practices of websites and mobile applications operated by such third parties. You should check the applicable privacy policies of such websites and mobile applications you visit to determine how they handle any information they collect from you.

 

WHAT BLUTONIC DOES

While you may only visit certain websites and mobile applications, there are other companies working behind the scenes to help provide you with a great digital experience. These third party companies provide vital services such as analytics, advertising and fraud prevention for retailers, publishers, and other organizations. These services enable these third party companies to, among other things, provide the advertising that keeps your favorite blogs free, your favorite stores in business, and your advertising experience more relevant.

We help companies provide digital advertising, both in browsers and mobile applications, and we do it in a variety of ways, from banner ads to coupon codes. To make some of these things possible, we need to utilize information to provide smarter decision making. Technologies such as cookies and mobile device IDs enable companies like ours to provide more relevant advertising while keeping your identity anonymous to bluTonic.

In addition to our advertising services, we also utilize our technology to provide life-saving messages during tornadoes and AMBER Alerts, geotargeted to individuals in affected areas. To learn more about these internationally-recognized programs established by bluTonic through an organization called the Federation for Internet Alerts, click here.

 

PRIVACY BY DESIGN

Our philosophy on privacy follows the framework of Privacy by Design. We integrate privacy in strategy, product development, and more. We set the tone for privacy protection early and often, proactively working to keep PII out of bluTonic’s systems, and building technologies that are effective without the use of PII. We can protect consumer privacy AND provide relevant advertising, which benefits everyone involved, especially advertisers, consumers, and small business websites and mobile applications. Ensuring the protection of privacy throughout the entire lifecycle of the data is of the utmost importance, and we are careful to protect privacy as data is collected, used, and destroyed responsibly.

We constantly strive to maintain unparalleled visibility with consumers. We provide transparency and choice through our website, encourage the same practice throughout the Internet, and utilize AdChoices on each banner advertisement tailored to consumers’ interests.

bluTonic has developed a strong privacy foundation and has a company culture aimed at the prevention of the receipt and use of PII. We respect consumer privacy and give consumers the ability to opt out of interest-based advertising (“IBA”).

 

INFORMATION COLLECTION AND USE

Information Collected by bluTonic

bluTonic only collects Non-PII from you (unless PII is provided by you voluntarily), and may collect this in a variety of ways. We may use technologies such as cookies, log files, pixel tags or other similar technologies to collect Non-PII about the browser or device you are using, including browsing activity, online transactions, and IP addresses. We may also receive Non-PII from third parties. Some clients contribute PII such as your name, address, email address, and associated transactional information directly to a third party with whom bluTonic has a contractual relationship. This third party removes the PII data points and provides bluTonic only the Non-PII for our use in providing advertising to you. All Non-PII received and collected by bluTonic from the various sources may be combined and used to provide you advertising, and for other purposes as determined by bluTonic.

We may also conduct surveys by serving interactive ads that ask you to provide information such as your gender and age range, which information may be associated with a device ID or a cookie ID. If you decide to respond, your demographic information will also be associated with a device ID or cookie ID and used only for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy.

“Cookies” are files that are stored on your web-enabled device and are used to improve your experience when seeing web and mobile advertisements. We may use cookies to estimate the total reach of an advertising campaign, as well as frequency of display, and to serve advertisements which are relevant to you. This allows advertisers to determine with greater accuracy the composition of the audience they reach and attempt to reach an audience that is interested in their products or services. There are many misconceptions about cookies. Cookies cannot erase your hard drive, install programs, or collect PII from your browser or device.

“Device IDs” are unique identifiers associated with your mobile device to be used for advertising. These identifiers are assigned by your mobile device operating system, such as Apple’s iOS and Google’s Play Services for Android, and do not reveal your identity. Device IDs can be reset in your mobile device settings.

“Log files” track actions occurring on Sites and collect data including, as an example, your IP address, browser type, Internet service provider, referring/exit pages, operating system, date/time stamp, click data and types of advertisements viewed.

“Web beacons” are objects that are embedded in a web page or e-mail and are usually invisible to the user but are used to track a web user’s navigation of a website or collection of websites or pages, interaction with an e-mail, use of mobile applications, the completion of transactions, submittal of applications and browsing behavior.

“Location Data” recognizes a consumer’s location while they are on their device which is utilized by bluTonic to deliver advertisements. As with all data bluTonic collects, this is limited to non-precise as defined by the Network Advertising Initiative’s current definition of imprecise location data unless the consumer has opted in to allow their precise location to be used for IBA.

The Non-PII collected is used for marketing purposes, enables us to determine which advertisements perform well, allows us to more effectively match ads, mobile application and website content to your interests, assists us in improving the operation of our services, helps us to maintain the quality of our services, enhances our services to our business partners and clients and enables us to provide general statistics to our business partners and clients regarding use of bluTonic’s services. bluTonic may also act as a delivery agent when its products and services are used directly by a client to facilitate advertisements and other communications.

When a consumer responds to or views an Internet advertisement served by bluTonic (such as through third-party websites or email solicitations) or visits a bluTonic site, we may assign an anonymous, unique identifier to the end user’s Internet browser or device, often via a cookie. One function of these technologies is to provide bluTonic with information for the purpose of paying third-parties affiliate commissions when an Internet user clicks on a link, creates a lead, or makes a purchase on an advertiser’s website. If the Internet user re-visits the advertiser’s site directly, bluTonic is able to continue to track the user’s activities (excluding PII) on the advertiser’s site and credit the third-party website that referred the user.

We also may use Internet browsing, cross-mobile application browsing and online purchase data associated with a user, on a Non-PII level, across multiple devices to develop a predictive statistical user profile of the end user’s needs and interests for the purpose of sending them relevant advertisements on multiple browsers and devices. This is called cross-device IBA.

To opt out of bluTonic IBA, please follow the opt-out instructions below in the “Your Choices” and “Mobile Device Choices” sections of our Privacy Policy. Upon opt-out, we will no longer collect behavioral data on your browser and will also no longer send behavioral data to other browsers or devices associated with you. However, data that was collected on your browser or device prior to you opting out may still impact the advertisements you see on other browsers and devices associated with you. To opt out of interest-based advertising on all browsers and devices, you will need to follow the instructions below for each browser and device.

Information Sharing by bluTonic

bluTonic will only share your information for limited purposes such as those provided in this Privacy Policy. This may include sharing information (1) to enable third party service providers to assist or facilitate in the services we provide to our clients; (2) to comply with applicable laws and regulations or to respond to a subpoena, search warrant or other lawful request for information received by us, whether or not a response is required by applicable law; (3) to enforce our terms of use and other agreements or to protect our rights ; (4) to protect the safety of members of the public and users of the service; (5) with bluTonic affiliates and clients for marketing purposes; (6) with vendors, administrative service providers, technology providers, and carefully selected partners for services including, but not limited to, data validation, enhancement, information verification and suppression services; or (7) for any other purpose for which you provide consent. None of this information will include PII except as provided herein. While bluTonic strongly encourages clients and partners to adopt responsible approaches to online marketing, bluTonic is not responsible for the information practices of such clients and partners. With respect to IBA, bluTonic and other third parties may use Non-PII collected or shared with respect to your visits to websites with whom we have relationships for various purposes, including, but not limited to, providing advertisements about goods and services likely to be of greater interest to you.

In the event that bluTonic is acquired by or merged with a third party, we reserve the right, in any of these circumstances, to transfer or assign the information we have collected from you as part of such merger, acquisition, sale, or other change of control. In the unlikely event of our bankruptcy, insolvency, reorganization, receivership, or assignment for the benefit of creditors, or the application of laws or equitable principles affecting creditors’ rights generally, we may not be able to control how your information is treated, transferred, or used.

Service-specific Provisions for Information Collection and Use:

Some products and services offered by bluTonic have privacy considerations unique to those offerings. These considerations are covered here.

Lead Generation:

bluTonic provides lead generation services to clients where we work with website publishers who utilize their display, search and email distribution channels to generate consumer interest or inquiry into advertiser products and services. The co-registration component refers to the process in which bluTonic facilitates the exchange of consumer information (typically PII held by website publisher in accordance with their Privacy Policy) from website publishers to advertisers.

We may receive PII that our clients have collected in connection with our services for our clients or that clients have collected for access or transmittal purposes to other clients. We may hold such information and/or transmit or allow access to such information to the intended recipients or categories of recipients as requested by our clients.

As part of the Lead Gen services, online forms hosted by us, our clients, or third parties acting on the behalf of us or our clients may collect PII that a consumer has voluntarily provided. This information may be used for the same purposes listed in “Information Sharing by bluTonic,” above. This information may also be used to verify any information submitted to use or any of our clients, and for any suppression or opt-out purposes.

bluTonic may serve advertisements to you based, in part, on the demographic and geographic information you submitted to our clients during the website registration process, and lifestyle information about you that we obtain from them and other bluTonic entities and third parties.

Security

The security of your information is important to us. We have implemented appropriate security measures to protect the information in our care, both during transmission and once we receive it. We take physical and technical security measures to protect our data from unauthorized access, as well as unauthorized disclosure or destruction of data.

No transmission of data over the Internet is guaranteed to be completely secure. While we strive to protect your data, it may be possible for third parties not under the control of bluTonic to unlawfully intercept or access transmissions or private communications. Unauthorized entry or use, hardware or software failure, and other factors may compromise data security. bluTonic cannot ensure or warrant the security of information you transmit to us. You acknowledge and assume this risk when communicating with bluTonic.

Retention

We retain Non-PII for IBA for no more than eighteen (18) months. Aggregate reports generated from such data may be retained for a longer period, as ad delivery and reporting data.

 

SELF-REGULATION & VOLUNTARY COMPLIANCE

Our industry has a rigorous voluntary self-regulatory regime, and we are active members of industry groups such as the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI), Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA) and Digital Advertising Alliance of Canada (DAAC) who promulgate codes of conduct to which their members must adhere. These codes impose requirements on participating companies such as transparency and choice around the use of data for IBA, and require regular audits of member privacy practices.

bluTonic is an active member of these and other groups, and where bluTonic engages in activities regulated by these programs, we comply with the NAI Codes of Conduct. We also support the DAA Self-Regulatory Principles and the DAAC Self-Regulatory Principles.

 

YOUR CHOICES

We hope that after reading through this Privacy Policy that you feel comfortable we are collecting and using data responsibly, and that the cumulative benefits of our work are valuable to the Internet as a whole and your individual browsing experience.

You will need to make this selection on each browser or device on which you do not want to receive IBA from bluTonic. If you or your privacy software deletes the opt-out cookies from your computer, you will need to repeat the process.

As part of our commitment to consumer privacy, we give consumers the ability to opt out of IBA. If you would like to opt out of IBA, you may visit the Network Advertising Initiative opt-out page at: www.networkadvertising.org/choices.

bluTonic may place ads on websites that are part of the Google Display Network. Based on your visits to these websites, Google uses an advertising cookie (from DoubleClick) to associate your browser with interest and demographic categories. Google then uses these categories for IBA on these websites. To learn more about this and your choices from Google, please click here.

Mobile Device Choices

For mobile websites, you can follow the opt-out instructions provided above.

To learn how to opt out receiving relevant advertisements on mobile applications, please visit this page: http://www.networkadvertising.org/mobile-choices

 

USE OF THE BLUTONIC SITES AS A VISITOR OR CLIENT

You can browse the bluTonic Sites without providing any PII. You may choose to provide PII to us voluntarily if you interact with our Site in certain ways, such as applying for employment with bluTonic, responding to an advertisement for bluTonic, or using one of our contact forms. This information is used only for the reasons it was collected, such as responding to your communication, and is not shared with third parties other than to fulfill the purpose for which it was collected.

bluTonic may also collect Non-PII, through the use of technologies such as cookies, including IP address, browser type, operating system, domain name, language preference, access dates and times, referring website addresses, online transactions and browsing and search activity. We may use this Non-PII for purposes including enhancement of our services, marketing, IBA, and to more effectively match website content to your interests. We may share your information with our third party service providers, bluTonic and its subsidiaries and affiliates, third party marketing partners, our clients and publishers, and as expressly provided for herein.

We also use cookies to simplify login and to facilitate secure navigation through the password protected areas of the Site. Visitors who choose to reject all cookies may have difficulty navigating the password protected areas of the Site depending on the nature of their connection (dynamic IP, proxy server, etc.).

We may also partner with third parties who collect information on our Sites, and we may maintain links to other websites on our Sites. This Privacy Policy does not apply to the privacy practices of other websites or of third parties who collect information on our Sites. We would encourage you to visit the applicable policies of those third parties, or visit www.AboutAds.info to learn more about interest-based advertising and to see your opt-out choices from other participating companies that may be collecting and using data on bluTonic’s websites.

For Clients and Publishers

The bluTonic network includes our clients and publishers involved in advertising campaign transactions. Information collected from clients and publishers includes PII that is necessary to conduct business, such as name, phone number, and email address. Payments made to and from bluTonic require the collection of PII that may include credit card numbers and bank account information. Phone numbers may be used for sales or inventory acquisition purposes. This information is collected, modified and stored in a password protected environment and is used for purposes including service, media delivery, contact, billing and accounts payable. We will not sell or rent this information to non-bluTonic entities. All client and publisher information collected for these purposes is explicit, voluntary, manually entered, and can be opted-out.

Security:

See “Security” under Information Collection and Use, above.

Information Sharing:

This client and publisher information is not shared with any third party outside bluTonic and its affiliated companies, except for that necessary to conduct business, such as clearing a credit card transaction for an advertising campaign purchase or making an ACH direct deposit to pay a publisher, or as required by law. The security of this information is crucial to our success in the highly competitive field of online advertising. bluTonic may, from time to time, use “gallery” pages to identify clients or publishers by business identity ONLY (e.g. Adcycle.com is a new Publisher in the bluTonic Network).

Log Files:

We record the IP address of new clients and publishers at sign-up. This can assist in administering the Site and client or publisher accounts, including features designed to enhance the Client experience. This information is part of the secure member database and is password protected.

Our Communications:

We send all new clients and publishers a welcoming email to verify password and user name, and may communicate with you about program or other information at the contact information you provide. We me also email individuals that have provided us with their contact info so that we can communicate information about bluTonic’s services. You can request to opt out of these emails by filling out this form.

Site and Service Updates:

We may send Site and service announcement updates by email. Because these announcements contain important information about services, it is not possible to unsubscribe. We also communicate with clients and publishers to provide requested services and in regards to issues relating to their account via email or phone.

Correction/Updating PII:

If a client’s or publisher’s PII changes (such as email address) or they would like PII removed from our system, we provide several ways to correct or update PII. The following options are provided:

Fill out a form by clicking here

Contact your account manager.

All requests to remove a client or publisher from our system will be verified prior to removal to ensure the proper identity of the requester.

 

CONTACT US

Have a question on something not addressed or have a complaint? Please use the Feedback form located here.

 

YOUR REPRESENTATIONS

YOU UNDERSTAND AND AGREE THAT ANY DISPUTE OVER PRIVACY IS SUBJECT TO THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY AND APPLICABLE SITE TERMS AND CONDITIONS. You also agree that you have provided notice to, and obtained consent from, any third party individuals whose information you supply to us with regard to: (a) the purposes for which such third party’s information has been collected; (b) the intended recipients or categories of recipients of the third party’s information; (c) which of the third party’s data are obligatory and which data, if any, are voluntary; and (d) how the third party can access and, if necessary, rectify the data held about them. It is the express wish of the parties that the Privacy Policy and all related documents have been drawn up in the English language and that the English version of this Privacy Policy shall be the sole version used in interpreting and enforcing this Privacy Policy.

YOU AGREE THAT OUR LIABILITY FOR ANY BREACH OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY SHALL BE LIMITED TO THE VALUE OF THE TRANSACTIONS OR SERVICES PROVIDED TO YOU BY US TO THE EXTENT SUCH CLAIM IS NOT OTHERWISE BARRED BY OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS.

 

MODIFICATIONS TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

We may occasionally make changes to this Privacy Policy. If we do, we will update the “Last Modified” date above. If we make a material change, such as the ways in which we use PII, we will notify you.