Privacy Policy

Effective Date: January 1, 2013.

The Media Research Center (THE MRC or we) is the owner and operator of MRC.org (the Website), a multimedia news and commentary website.

In this Privacy Policy (Policy), we describe the information that we collect about you as you use our Website and our products and services contained in our Website (collectively, our Services). This Policy applies to information that we collect online and offline.

We are operated entirely within the United States. If you are located outside of the United States, please note that any information – including personal data – that we collect about you will be transferred to and processed in the United States. You hereby consent to these transfers.

This Policy is incorporated by reference into our Terms of Use Agreement.

WHAT TYPES OF INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?

  • PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFORMATION WE COLLECT FROM AND ABOUT YOU
  • INFORMATION COLLECTED AUTOMATICALLY WHEN USING OUR SERVICES

HOW DO WE USE YOUR INFORMATION?

WITH WHOM DO WE SHARE THE INFORMATION WE COLLECT?

HOW CAN YOU MAKE CHOICES ABOUT THE INFORMATION THAT WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU?

ADVERTISING

LINKS TO OTHER (THIRD PARTY) WEBSITES

HOW DO WE SECURE YOUR PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFORMATION?

CHILDREN

CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

SPECIAL NOTICE TO CALIFORNIA CONSUMERS

HOW TO CONTACT US

I. WHAT TYPES OF INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?

A. Personally Identifiable Information We Collect From and About You

Information We Collect Directly From You: THE MRC may collect certain types of personally identifiable information — that is, information that can identify an individual — directly from you, including but not limited to:

  • name
  • e-mail address
  • date of birth
  • zip code
  • credit or debit card information
  • username
  • password

We may collect some or all of this information if you:

  • visit the Website, make inquiries through the Website or offline
  • purchase products or services on the Website
  • use our Website
  • share your e-mail address to subscribe to email newsletters
  • post comments, messages, letters and the like on the Website
  • participate in any surveys, contests, or sweepstakes sponsored by THE MRC
  • register for our Services
  • provide tips, comments or questions to us
  • contact us for customer service or other purposes
  • provide it to us when contacting us about this Policy

Information We Collect About You From Third Parties: You may log in to post comments or share articles via your Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, Disqus, or other third-party account (collectively, “third party accounts”). In the future, we may permit additional login methods. When you log-in via your third party account, you must grant us permission to access certain information from these third-party accounts, which will vary based on the third party account. Before you log in through the particular site, you will be presented with the list of permissions, and you may cancel your log on if you do not want to proceed. For information about how the third party site may disclose your information, including any information that you make public, please consult the third party accounts’ privacy policy. We have no control over how a third party account uses or discloses the personally identifiable information that you provide to it. We may store the information that we collect from the third party account along with the other information that we collect from you or receive about you.

B. Information Collected Automatically When Using Our Services

THE MRC and our third party service providers collect information automatically through the use of electronic tools such as web beacons, “cookies,” Flash, clickstream data, and other automated devices that are deployed on the Website. We and our third party service providers may collect the following information about your use of our Website via these technologies: your IP address; your browser type and operating system; web pages you view; links you click; your interaction with our Website; length of time you are logged into our Website; and websites visited before our Website.

Web Beacons – A web beacon is a type of picture file used on the Internet. Web beacons are used in combination with cookies to help monitor traffic at MRC.org and understand the ways in which users interact with content on the Website. Among other uses, we may use web beacons to count visitors to our Website or to monitor how our users navigate our Website. We may include web beacons in email messages to count how many of the messages that we sent were opened, acted upon, and forwarded. We use web beacons to compile aggregate statistics about our Services and our marketing campaigns.

Cookies – Cookies help provide a customized user experience. We and our third party service providers may use cookies to, among other things, better serve you with tailored information and facilitate your ongoing access to and use of our Services. There are two types of cookies: session-based and persistent cookies. We also allow third party vendors to use cookies on our Site and Application.

  • Session Cookies. Session cookies exist only during an online session. They disappear from your computer when you close your browser or turn off your computer. We use session cookies to allow our systems to uniquely identify you during a session or while you are logged into our Services.
  • Persistent cookies. Persistent cookies remain on your computer after you have closed your browser or turned off your computer. We use persistent cookies to track aggregate and statistical information about user activity, which may be combined with other user information.

Third Party Cookies. We also engage third parties to track and analyze non-personally and personally identifiable Website data. To do so, we permit third parties to apply cookies to users of our Services, where permitted by law, and, subject to your right to opt-out through the Network Advertising Initiative (as discussed below). We use the data collected by such third parties to help us administer and improve the quality of our Services and to analyze use of our Services. We also use such third parties to assist us in serving advertisements. Such third parties may combine the information that we provide about you with other information that they have collected.

Disabling Cookies. You may choose not to provide such information by adjusting your Internet browser security settings to refuse cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but if you prefer you can edit your browser options to block them in 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. If you disable your web browser’s ability to accept cookies, you will be able to browse our Website, but certain pages and features may be limited.

ClickStream Data – THE MRC may use third-party software to analyze the Web pages that your computer visits while using our Services. This information, called “clickstream data,” is associated with your computer’s Internet protocol (IP) address and/or device ID, and includes other information such as the type of browser your computer/device uses to access the Internet. We may collect clickstream data to optimize search engine results and may also use clickstream data to analyze which portions of our Website draw the most traffic so we can improve performance of our Services. This clickstream data may be shared with third party advertisers and marketing companies.

Local Storage Objects – We and our third party service providers may use Flash Local Storage Objects (“Flash LSOs”) to store your Website and Application preferences, to personalize your visit or to display content based upon what you view on our Website and Application. Flash LSOs are different from browser cookies because of the amount and type of data stored. In addition, you cannot control, delete or disable the acceptance of Flash LSOs through your browser. For more information on Flash LSOs, or to learn how to manage your settings for Flash cookies, go to the Adobe Flash Player Help Page, choose “Global Storage Settings Panel” and follow the instructions. To see the Flash LSOs currently on your computer, choose “Website Storage Settings Panel” and follow the instructions to review and, if you choose, to delete any specific Flash LSO.

Analytics. We and our third party service providers conduct analytics of our Services to help us track and understand how visitors use our Services, using the technologies described in this section. For example, we use a variety of third party web analytics, to help us improve the performance and user experience of our Website and Application.

II. HOW DO WE USE YOUR INFORMATION?

We use your information, including the personally identifiable information that we collect about you (collectively, “information”), for various reasons, including:

  • to deliver content that you have requested from our Services;
  • to send e-mails that you have requested to receive from THE MRC;
  • to provide you with information, including via email, about services, products, and features that may be of interest to you, including products and services offered by third parties, as well as emails about our own Services;
  • for customer service purposes, such as in response to inquiries that you initiate with us about any aspect of our Website, to provide information about our Services, or any other customer service purpose; and
  • to understand how people use our Services, for research purposes, and to improve our Services.

III. WITH WHOM DO WE SHARE THE INFORMATION WE COLLECT?

THE MRC may share personally identifiable information with others, such as:

  • Third Party Service Providers that provide services on our behalf. Examples of these services include, but are not limited to: technical support for the operation of our Services; Website evaluation and statistics; and fulfilling your orders for products and services made available through our Site;
  • Law enforcement authorities, government agencies, courts, or other entities, when:
    • we believe in good faith that the law requires it
    • we deem it necessary or appropriate to provide such information
    • to otherwise protect our rights, other persons, or other users of our Services
    • Another entity, in the course of a sale to or merger of all or a part of our business with another entity
  • A court, another business, or other interested party in the event of a bankruptcy proceeding, in which case the information about you would be among the many assets shared or transferred.
  • Third-party merchants with from whom you choose to make a purchase through our Services;
  • Other non-affiliated third parties. We may share your information, including personally identifiable information, with non-affiliated third parties for their own marketing purposes. If you are a California resident, please see the special notice to you below about how you can obtain additional information about this sharing.
  • We also may disclose aggregate user statistics to third parties for a variety of purposes, including research, analytics, and marketing.

IV. HOW CAN YOU MAKE CHOICES ABOUT THE INFORMATION THAT WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU?

You can always choose not to submit any personally identifiable information to THE MRC.

If you do not wish to receive promotional communications from THE MRC, you can unsubscribe to our promotional e-mails. We will include an opt-out link or reply address in each such e-mail. Please allow us up to 10 business days to process your request. After unsubscribing, you may still receive messages about the status of your account, to resolve technical issues, to confirm a new registration with us, and for other customer services purposes.

V. ADVERTISING

We use third parties such as network advertisers to serve advertisements on our Website. Network advertisers are third parties that display advertisements based on your visits to our Website and other websites you have visited. 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), Flash LSOs and other 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 about your usage of our Site and our Services on an aggregated basis.

You may opt-out of many third-party ad networks. The website http://www.networkadvertising.org/optout_nonppii.asp provides information regarding this practice by Network Advertising Initiative (“NAI”) members, and your choices regarding having this information used by these companies, including how to “opt-out” of third-party ad networks operated by NAI members.

You also may contact the Digital Advertising Alliance at http://www.aboutads.info/choices/ for information about opting out of targeted advertising and your choices regarding having information used by About Ads member companies, including how to “opt-out” of third-party ad networks operated by About Ads members. Opting out of one or more NAI members or DAI members (many of which will be the same) only means that those members no longer will deliver targeted content or ads to you, but it does not mean you will no longer receive any targeted content or ads on our Website or other websites. You may continue to receive advertisements, for example, based on the particular website that you are viewing. Also, if your browsers are configured to reject cookies when you visit this opt-out page, or you subsequently erase your cookies, use a different computer or change web browsers, your NAI or DAI opt-out may no longer, be effective. Additional information is available on NAI’s and DAI’s websites accessible by the above links.

VI. LINKS TO OTHER (THIRD PARTY) WEBSITES

THE MRC may provide links to content or advertisements created, offered, sponsored, or available at third party websites. Your interactions with these third party websites are not governed by this Privacy Policy, but rather the privacy policies posted on those linked websites. THE MRC is not responsible for your access to and use of these websites or any information you may share with them.

VII. HOW DO WE SECURE YOUR PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFORMATION?

To prevent unauthorized access, maintain data accuracy, and ensure the appropriate use of the personally identifiable information we collect, we have implemented physical, electronic, and administrative procedures. These measures are based on commercially reasonable standards that similar companies use.

NO DATA TRANSMITTED OVER THE INTERNET, HOWEVER, CAN BE GUARANTEED TO BE 100% SECURE AT ALL TIMES. Although we have implemented security measures to protect your personally identifiable information, we cannot and do not guarantee the security of such information.

VIII. CHILDREN

This Website is not directed to children. THE MRC does not knowingly collect or solicit personally identifiable information from or about children under 13, except as permitted by law. If we discover that we have received any personally identifiable information from a child under 13, we will delete such information from our servers and records promptly.

IX. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

THE MRC reserves the right to change this Privacy Policy at any time. Please check this page periodically for changes. We will post a notice on this Website if and when this policy changes to alert visitors that a new policy is in place.

Material – that is, really important – changes to the way we use or disclose personally identifiable information will apply on a going-forward basis, unless we have your express consent to change the way we use or disclose the personally identifiable information we collected when the earlier version of this Privacy Policy was in effect.

X. SPECIAL NOTICE TO CALIFORNIA CONSUMERS

California residents may request a list of all third parties to which The MRC has disclosed certain personally identifiable information about you for marketing purposes. You may make one request per calendar year. In your request, please attest to the fact that you are a California resident and provide a current California address for your response. You may request this information in writing by contacting us at: administrator @mrc.org or Privacy Request, The Media Research Center, 325 South Patrick Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22314.

XI. HOW TO CONTACT US

Questions and comments regarding this Privacy Policy, or to review and/or correct your personal information gathered by MRC, or to inform MRC that you do not want your information shared, should be directed to administrator@mrc.org.

Copyright (c) 2013, The Media Research Center