Effective Date: January 2024
The Global FoodBanking Network (“Company,” “we,” “our,” or “us”) is committed to respecting and protecting the privacy of our users. This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) describes how we collect, use, and disclose personal information we obtain about visitors to our Web site located at the URL www.foodbanking.org (the “Site”) and the services available on the Site (the “Services”). In order to fully understand your rights we encourage you to read this Privacy Policy as well as our Terms of Use. This Privacy Policy describes the following:
1. What information we collect from you;
2. How we use your information;
3. Our use of cookies and other tracking mechanisms;
4. How we share your information;
5. Your choices regarding uses and disclosures of your information;
6. How we protect your information.
Questions regarding this statement should be directed to The Global FoodBanking Network by sending an email to info@foodbanking.org. Please reference this Privacy Policy in your subject line.
The types of information that we collect from you depends on how you use our Site and Services. We collect your information, including personal information, directly from you, from third parties, and automatically through your use of our Services.
Information We Collect Directly From You. If you complete a registration form, survey, questionnaire, or other form through the Site or Services, we collect information such as contact information that may include name, email address, format preference (HTML vs. Text), address, interests, and similar information. When you make a donation via the Site, we ask for your name, address, daytime phone number, e-mail address, and credit card information (which is processed by our third-party payment processors). If you contact us, we collect records and copies of your correspondence, including e-mail addresses and/or mobile telephone number. You consent to and will receive emails from us at the email address provided. By providing your mobile telephone number, you are opting in to receive text messages regarding GFN events, updates, fundraising or donating opportunities, and other promotional messages. You are not required to provide your mobile telephone number to make a donation. SMS alerts are available on most carriers. Message frequency varies. Message & Data Rates may apply. If you wish to unsubscribe from text messages at any time, simply reply STOP. Text HELP for help. Carriers are not liable for delayed or undelivered messages. No mobile information will be shared with third parties/affiliates for marketing/promotional purposes. All the above categories exclude text messaging originator opt-in data and consent; this information will not be shared with any third parties.
When you subscribe to receive updates from us about new features available on our Site or through the Services, we collect contact information from you, such as your name and email address. While you are navigating the Site or using the Services, we may also collect your search queries or information about your viewing history. Additionally, if you choose to provide it to us, we may also collect donor information, such as your name, address, daytime phone number and e-mail address from you through other means such as direct mail, call centers, e-mail communications, and personal visits. We also collect any information you choose to e-mail or communicate to us while using the Services.
Information We Collect Automatically. We automatically collect information about your use of our Services through cookies, web beacons, and other technologies. To the extent permitted by applicable law, we combine this information with other information we collect about you, including your personal information. Please see the Use of Cookies section below for more information.
Information We Collect from Third Parties. When you use the Services, we may collect information, including personal information, about you from third-party sources, such as service providers, marketing partners, or other third parties. Information we collect may be combined with other information we have collected about you in order to complete requests you have made or facilitate transactions you have initiated via the Services, or for other purposes, such as fraud prevention, authentication, and marketing or promotional purposes.
We use your information, including your personal information for transactional purposes, including to present our Site and its contents to you, to provide you with access to the Services, communicate with you about your use of the Services, and notify you about changes to the Services. We also use your information to process your donation(s) and for verification, authentication, and fraud prevention purposes. We use your mailing address to send your tax-deductible receipt(s) and to keep you informed about what we are doing in different parts of the world through our publications. We may also use contact information you provide in connection with honor cards to communicate with certain honorees for marketing, educational, informational, and other purposes.
We use your information to comply with our legal obligations, as part of our general business operations, and in situations where we believe necessary to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, and in situations involving potential threats to the safety of any person or violations of our policies. We also use your information to fulfill any other purpose for which you provide it, and for any other purpose with your consent.
Additionally, we may also use your information to better understand how users access and use the Services, both on an aggregated an individualized basis and for research and analytics purposes, including analyzing data, identifying trends and issues and creating statistical reports, analyzing the accuracy and effectiveness of our Services, including administering, troubleshooting, and enhancing and improving the Services.
Our Site may use cookies to enhance your experience while using our Site. Cookies are pieces of information that some Web sites transfer to the computer that is browsing that Web site and are used for record-keeping purposes at many Web sites. There are two types of cookies: session and persistent cookies.
• Session Cookies. Session cookies exist only during an online session. They disappear from your device when you close your browser or turn off your device. We use session cookies to allow our systems to uniquely identify you while you are visiting the Site.
• Persistent Cookies. Persistent cookies remain on your device after you have closed your browser or turned off your device.We use persistent cookies to track aggregate and statistical information about user activity.
Disabling Cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but if you prefer, you can edit your browser options to block them in the future. The Help portion of the toolbar on most browsers will tell you how to prevent your computer from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or how to disable cookies altogether. Visitors to our Site and Services who disable cookies will be able to browse certain areas of the Site, but some features may not function.
Clear GIFs, Pixel Tags and Other Technologies. Clear GIFs are tiny graphics with a unique identifier, similar in function to cookies. In contrast to cookies, which are stored on your computer’s hard drive, clear GIFs are embedded invisibly on web and app pages. We may use clear GIFs (a.k.a. web beacons, web bugs or pixel tags), in connection with our Services to, among other things, track the activities of Site visitors, help us manage content, and compile statistics about Site usage. We and our third-party service providers may also use clear GIFs in HTML e-mails to our customers, to help us track e-mail response rates, identify when our e-mails are viewed, and track whether our e-mails are forwarded.
Analytics. We use automated devices and applications, such as Google Analytics, to evaluate usage of our Site. We also may use other analytic means to evaluate our Site. We use these tools to help us improve the performance of our Site and user experiences. These entities may use cookies and other tracking technologies, such as web beacons or local storage objects (LSOs), to perform their services. To learn more about Google’s privacy practices, please review the site “How Google uses data when you use our partners’ sites or apps,” located at https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites. You can also download the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on to prevent your data from being used by Google Analytics at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.
Do-Not-Track Signals. Currently, our systems do not recognize browser “do-not-track” requests. You may, however, disable certain tracking as discussed in this section (e.g., by disabling cookies); you also may opt-out of targeted advertising by following the instructions in the Ad Networks section.
Ad Networks. We use third parties such as network advertisers to serve advertisements on our Site and on third-party websites or other media (e.g., social networking platforms). This enables us and these third parties to target advertisements to you for products and services in which you might be interested. Third-party ad network providers, advertisers, sponsors and/or traffic measurement services may use cookies, JavaScript, web beacons (including clear GIFs), and other tracking technologies to measure the effectiveness of their ads and to personalize advertising content to you. These third-party cookies and other technologies are governed by each third party’s specific privacy policy, not this one. We may provide these third-party advertisers with information, including personal information, about you.
There are industry solutions that allow individuals in the United States to opt out of interest based advertising from participating companies. For example, you may go to the Digital Advertising Alliance (“DAA”) Consumer Choice Page for more information. In the U.S., you may also go to the Network Advertising Initiative (“NAI”) Consumer Opt-Out Page for more information. Opting out from one or more companies listed on the DAA or the NAI will opt you out from those companies’ delivery of interest-based content or ads to you, but it does not mean you will no longer receive any advertising through our Site, Services, or on other websites. You may continue to receive advertisements, for example, based on the particular website that you are viewing (i.e., contextually based ads) and as described above. Also, if your browsers are configured to reject cookies when you opt out on the DAA or NAI websites, your opt out may not be effective. Additional information is available on the DAA’s website at www.aboutads.info or the NAI’s website at www.networkadvertising.org.
We may share your information, including personal information, as follows:
Vendors, Service Providers, and Other Processors. We may disclose the information we collect from you to vendors, service providers, contractors, agents, or other processors who perform functions on our behalf. For example, we share your information with payment processors to process your donations. We also share information with service providers who host our Site, assist us in detecting and deterring fraud, security incidents, or other unlawful activity, and for other business purposes as described in the How We Use Your Information section.
Subsidiaries and Affiliates. We may disclose the information we collect from you to any current or future parent company, affiliate, subsidiary, or division.
Analytics Providers/Advertisers. As set forth above, we share information with analytics providers and advertisers to assist us in implementing and evaluating relevant advertising. Often, the information that we share is collected from you through cookies and other tracking technologies on our Sites and Application. See the section Our Use of Cookies and Other Tracking Mechanisms for more information.
Business Transfers. If (i) we or our affiliates are or may be acquired by, or merged with, another company or (ii) if any of our assets are or may be transferred to another company, whether as part of a bankruptcy or insolvency proceeding or otherwise, we may transfer the information we have collected from you to the other company. As part of the business transfer process, we may share certain of your personal information with lenders, auditors, and third-party advisors, including attorneys and consultants.
In Response to Legal Process. We disclose your information to comply with the law, a judicial proceeding, court order, or other legal process, such as in response to a court order or a subpoena.
To Protect Us and Others. We disclose your information when we believe it is appropriate to do so to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the safety of any person, violations of our Terms of Use or this Policy, or as evidence in litigation in which we are involved.
Aggregate and De-Identified Information. We may also use and share aggregate or de-identified information about users with third parties for marketing, advertising, research, or other purposes.
Donations. If you would like to donate but do not want your name or contact information shared outside of our organization, you can send anonymous donations simply by sending a money order to us at the address found at the bottom of this section. However, if you do not provide your name and address, we will be unable to send you a tax-deductible receipt.
E-mails. We may send periodic promotional emails to you. You may opt-out of promotional emails by following the opt-out instructions contained in the email. If you opt-out of receiving promotional emails, we may still send you emails about any services you have requested or received from us.
Restricting Sharing. If you do not want us to share your personal information outside of our organization, you may submit a request by contacting us via the information included in the Contact Us section. In your request, please include your full name, address, phone number, and e-mail address in your request.
We have implemented precautions to protect the information we collect from loss, misuse, and unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, and destruction. Please be aware that despite our efforts, no data security measures can guarantee security.
You should take steps to protect against unauthorized access to your password, phone, and computer by, among other things, signing off after using a shared computer, choosing a robust, unique password that nobody else knows or can easily guess, and keeping your log-in and password private. We are not responsible for any lost, stolen, or compromised passwords or for any activity on your account via unauthorized password activity.
Our Site contains links to other Web sites. Please note that when you click on one of these links, you are entering another Web site for which The Global FoodBanking Network has no responsibility. We encourage you to read the privacy statements on all such sites as their policies may be different than ours.
We may change this Policy from time to time, so please be sure to check back periodically. We will post any changes to the Policy on our Site.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or would like to make a complaint, you can contact:
The Global FoodBanking Network
70 E. Lake Street, Suite 1200
Chicago, IL 60601
Email: info@foodbanking.org
