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Last modified
January, 2006
Like you, we at Prolynx
Internet are concerned about customer privacy. We have a
long history of maintaining the privacy of information
we obtain in the normal course of providing our
services. We work hard to serve you through new and
exciting products and services. In the process, we
remain sensitive to privacy issues.
The Information We
Obtain and How We Use It
The information we obtain
from you is generally necessary for us to provide your
services and design new services for your future use.
For example, we need to know your name, address and the
services you buy from us to properly provide and bill
for those services. When you call us, our
representatives pull up account records and may refer to
your bill and other information we have to answer
questions you may have or recommend how we can best
serve you.
We may also use information
in our records to protect our customers, employees or
property — for instance, to investigate fraud,
harassment or other types of unlawful service activities
involving Prolynx Internet or other carriers that we do
business with. In some cases, it may be necessary to
provide this information to the government or third
parties who make a lawful demand for it.
Accuracy of the
Information We Hold
We want the information we
obtain and use about customers to be accurate. If your
service information or your personal contact information
changes or you see an inaccuracy on your Prolynx
Internet bill, let us know so we can correct it.
Security and
Accountability
We have information systems
that collect and store customer information in addition
to systems that store our own business records. These
systems have different types of security as appropriate
for the information stored. Prolynx Internet requires
employees to keep customer information confidential and
we hold them accountable for their actions.
Disclosure of
Information Outside
Prolynx
Internet
As a general rule, Prolynx
Internet does not release customer account information
to unaffiliated third parties without your permission
unless we have a business relationship with those
companies where the disclosure is appropriate. For
example, we may hire outside companies as contractors or
agents; or we might be engaged in a joint venture or
partnership with a company. Upon occasion, Prolynx
Internet may decide to stop providing a service or may
decide to sell or transfer parts of our business to
unaffiliated companies. When this happens, we may
provide confidential customer information to these
companies so that they can offer you the same or similar
services. In all of these situations, we provide
information to these other companies only as needed to
accomplish our business objectives and the companies are
bound by requirements to keep Prolynx Internet
customers' information confidential.
There are exceptions to the
general rule. Disclosures will be driven by legal
requirements imposed on Prolynx Internet. Prolynx
Internet complies with "legal process," such as a
subpoena or court order or other similar demand,
associated with either criminal or civil proceedings.
Disclosure of Account
Information
If you tell us in
writing to release your account information to
someone, we will honor your request and provide that
information.
Your account
information is released to other carriers when you
give us your permission or when they advise us they
have your approval to access the information. This
most often occurs with respect to a sale of service
they want to make or have made to you. Unless we are
advised that permission from you has been granted,
we do not release the information.
We may provide account
information to collection agencies when customers do
not pay their bills. We restrict the use that can be
made of this information to collection activities
only for our charges and for the charges we bill for
others.
Privacy Over the
Internet
Prolynx Internet
appreciates that some individuals believe that special
privacy concerns arise around information transmitted or
collected over the Internet or through web sites. Below
we describe our practices to address those concerns.
Cookies:
Some of Prolynx Internet's Web sites may use "cookies"
to improve our level of service and speed up the
delivery of information to our visitors. Cookies are
lines of text that are transmitted to your Web browser
when you click on a site. They provide a way for a
server to recall a previous request or previous
registration, or to keep track of a transaction as it
progresses, so that information does not have to be
repeated. Your browser stores the information on your
hard drive and when you return to that site later, the
cookie is transmitted back only to the servers that
originally sent it to you. To be notified when you are
about to receive a cookie you can configure your browser
to alert you when a site is attempting to send you a
cookie and at that time you will have the option of
refusing the cookie. You can check your hard drive for
cookie files in a "cookies" folder for Internet
Explorer, a "cookies.txt" file for Netscape, and under
"magic cookies" on a Macintosh.
Advertisers that serve ads
on our Web sites may also use their own cookies. These
cookies collect their own information independent of
Prolynx Internet. You can disable this cookie capability
as described above.
How online information
Prolynx
Internet collects
is used:
Generic Information -- To gauge the effectiveness
of our Web sites, we do collect some
non-individually-identifiable generic information about
our visitors. Our Web servers automatically recognize a
visitor's Internet service provider, the IP address, the
domain name, the type of browser, and the operating
system. And, also which pages are viewed on our sites,
the Web page you were on when you link to our sites, how
much time a visitor spends on each page and other
information related to the operation and interaction of
Prolynx Internet Web sites. This information does not
reveal a visitor's identity. We aggregate this
information and use it to evaluate and improve our Web
sites.
Identifiable Information --
You can choose to provide individually-identifiable
information to Prolynx Internet in a number of ways
through our Web sites - by ordering a service from us,
sending us email, registering to receive news or
information, applying for a job, or entering a contest.
When visitors supply information about themselves for a
specific purpose, Prolynx Internet uses the information
for that purpose (such as to provide the information the
visitor has requested or to consider a visitor for a
particular job). In addition, when visitors use our Web
sites to order services, or to request information about
our services, we may use the individually-identifiable
information as we would use the same information
obtained off-line - for example, to evaluate your
service needs and contact you regarding additional
services you may find useful.
Sometimes Prolynx Internet
co-sponsors events with another company, such as
contests or features. In that case, if you provide
individually-identifiable information it most likely
will be used by both Prolynx Internet and the
co-sponsor.
A user may choose to
provide us individually-identifiable information to
customize a personal home page. We use this information
to better understand and serve our customers, but we do
not share that information outside of Prolynx Internet.
This information may be compiled on an aggregated basis
and shared with our advertisers or business partners but
the user will be anonymous.
We treat information we
collect on line similarly to that we collect off-line.
We do not sell or disclose individually-identifiable
information obtained on-line to non-Prolynx Internet
entities except as described above (when Prolynx
Internet is in a business relationship with an
unaffiliated party and then under confidentiality
restrictions) unless you specifically authorize it, it
is required by law (including the service of subpoenas
or court orders in either civil or criminal lawsuits),
or disclosure is necessary to protect the safety of
customers, employees or property.
The Prolynx Internet Web
sites may contain links to other sites. We are not
responsible for the content or privacy practices
employed by other sites. Other Web sites may have
different privacy policies or no policy. Users should
review the privacy policies of any Web site before
providing personal information.
Prolynx Internet places
banner ads on others' web sites. When we do this, we
collect non-personally identifiable information through
the aid of third parties with whom we contract, using
the most current browsing technology. This activity
allows us to recognize a browser's cookie when a browser
visits the site and helps us target our Internet
advertisements. The information collected is anonymous
and does not contain any information that would
personally identify you. The information is shared among
our contracting agents and our business operations in
order to assess the results of a promotion or event.
Security of Your Information:
Prolynx Internet has databases and systems that
are maintained to reasonably secure all of Prolynx
Internet's commercial information, including information
about customers. All credit card and bank account
information you submit is encrypted through Secure
Sockets Layer (SSL) software. We transmit the entire
credit card number or bank information to the
appropriate financial institution during processing.
E-Mail Communications:
Prolynx Internet or its business partners may use
email to communicate with customers about events or new
products and services or to respond to visitors' emails.
Prolynx Internet will not send commercial solicitations
via email to customers who request it not be sent
through the process outlined earlier.
Children:
Prolynx Internet does not currently target its
online services to children under 18 years of age; and
Prolynx Internet has no intention of collecting any
information from children under 18 years old. However,
some of our sites may contain links to content providers
that collect such information. These companies are
expected to comply with all laws pertaining to the
collection of information from children. Because the
Internet offers open access to a wide range of
information, it is important that parents supervise and
prevent access to inappropriate content, email or chat
sessions.
To improve the services it
can offer you, Prolynx Internet may opt to expand its
capabilities for obtaining information about users in
the future. Prolynx Internet will update this privacy
policy continually to ensure that you are aware of
developments in this area.
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