Spongecell Privacy Policy

This privacy statement (the "Privacy Policy") applies to all personally identifiable information (collectively, "Personally Identifiable Information") and other information that is collected by Spongecell LLC ("Spongecell") through its website (the "Site") and communications. Please review this Privacy Policy carefully before using the Spongecell Site, products, or services.

Your access to and use of our products and services requires acceptance of the Terms of Use displayed on the Site.

Spongecell takes online privacy very seriously. If you have any questions concerning this Privacy Policy, please email us at privacy@spongecell.com.

1. Collecting and Processing Personally Identifiable Information.

   When you use Spongecell software, our registration form may require you to give us certain information such as your name, email address, and zip code. Spongecell will also collect other information you volunteer to us through use of our products and services. We refer to this information as "Personally Identifiable Information." You may always choose not to provide such Personally Identifiable Information; however, this may limit our ability to provide you with complete use of Spongecell products or services. We may also collect demographic and other data, which may include Personally Identifiable Information, generally through surveys and forms which you may or may not choose to participate in. Spongecell only processes Personally Identifiable Information for the purposes described herein or in other applicable Privacy Policies and/or privacy notices provided for specific services. Such purposes include:

   • Providing our products and services to users, including the display of customized content and advertising;
   • Auditing, research and analysis in order to maintain, protect and improve our products and services;
   • Ensuring the technical functioning of our products, services and network; and
   • Developing new services.

2. Spongecell Use of Information.

   Spongecell does not sell, share or otherwise provide any Personally Identifiable Information you give to us with any Business Partner (as defined in Section 4) without your consent, which may be obtained through an opt-in or opt-out request, unless required by law, court order or as we state in Section 4. Spongecell does reserve the right to share your Personally Identifiable Information with its parent, subsidiary or affiliated entities ("affiliated entities" are those companies owned or controlled by Spongecell's parent company). We use the collected Personally Identifiable Information to notify you about and schedule events for you, to contact the recipients on your Spongecell guest list, to contact you in connection with your transactions, posting and other activities on the site, to forward to you messages from other users, to communicate with you about events or activities in your area and to operate the Spongecell service. These types of communications may contain commercial messages, such as banner ads and special offers. Each communication we send to you, other than SMS reminders and communications sent to you for the sole purpose of addressing a technical or operational issue regarding the Spongecell products or services, give you the opportunity to opt-out of receiving further communications from us. In addition, we use your Personally Identifiable Information to help us provide you with personalized content, advertising, and commercial messages.

3. Security of Information.

   We take appropriate security measures to protect against unauthorized access to or unauthorized alteration, disclosure or destruction of data. These include internal reviews of our data collection, storage and processing practices and security measures, as well as physical security measures to guard against unauthorized access to systems where we store Personally Identifiable Information.

   We restrict access to Personally Identifiable Information to Spongecell employees, contractors and agents who need to know that information in order to operate, develop or improve our products and services. These individuals are bound by confidentiality obligations and may be subject to discipline, including termination and criminal prosecution, if they fail to meet these obligations. Although we make good faith efforts to store the information collected by Spongecell in a secure operating environment that is not available to the public, we cannot guarantee complete security.

   We process Personally Identifiable Information on our servers in the United States of America and may in the future utilize servers in other countries.

4. Sharing Information.

   Spongecell works with third-party advertising companies, sponsors and other companies with whom we do business ("Business Partners") to place advertising on our site and in emails sent to our registered users, and to recipients of event invitations, reminders, and other communications related to Spongecell products, services, and events. Spongecell only shares Personally Identifiable Information with other companies or individuals outside of Spongecell in the following limited circumstances:

   • We have your consent.
   • We provide such information to affiliated companies or other trusted businesses or persons for the purpose of processing Personally Identifiable Information on our behalf. We require that these parties agree to process such information based on our instructions and in compliance with this Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.
   • We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request, (b) enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations thereof, (c) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, or (d) protect against imminent harm to the rights, property or safety of Spongecell, its users or the public as required or permitted by law.

   We may share with third parties certain pieces of aggregated, non-personal information such as the number of users who responded to an event promotion, or how many users are using the Spongecell service. Such information does not identify you individually. Spongecell may also correlate or match registered users' information, including Personally Identifiable Information, with information held by our Business Partners to target events and ads or otherwise improve the effectiveness of our service.

   In the event of a sale or transfer of the assets of our business (an "Acquisition"), we may transfer or sell information, including Personally Identifiable Information to the acquiring entity. We will include provisions in any selling agreement that the purchaser treat Personally Identifiable Information in the same manner required by this Privacy Policy, inclusive of any amendments to this Privacy Policy. If Spongecell becomes involved in an Acquisition, we will provide notice before personal information is transferred and becomes subject to a different privacy policy.

   PLEASE NOTE: The privacy practices of advertisers and other companies who provide services or advertising through our Site are not covered by this privacy policy. Please contact those companies directly for more information about their privacy practices. If you wish to prevent those companies from setting cookies on your browser, you may set your browser to refuse cookies or to warn you before setting a cookie. Disabling cookies set by companies whose products or services are advertised on this site should not affect your ability to use this Site.

5. Exclusions.

   This Privacy Policy shall not apply to any unsolicited information (such as comments and feedback) you provide to Spongecell through the Site and/or that you post to any public areas of the Site, such as comments and discussion boards (collectively, "Unsolicited Information"). All such Unsolicited Information shall be deemed to be non-confidential and Spongecell shall be free to reproduce, use, disclose, and distribute such Unsolicited Information to others without limitation or attribution. You should be aware that if you voluntarily disclose Unsolicited Information online, that Unsolicited Information can be collected and used by others. For example, if you post your email address in comments sections or online forums, you may receive unsolicited messages from others. Spongecell has no control over the use of Personally Identifiable Information that you voluntarily post in public forums.

   Spongecell reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to reject, refuse to post or remove any posting or communication (including email) by you, or to restrict, suspend, or terminate your access to all or any part of the Site at any time, for any or no reason, with or without prior notice, and without liability.

6. Your Guests' Information.

   In order to send messages or invitations to your guests ("Guests") through the Spongecell service, we require that you submit to Spongecell a current, valid email addresses for your Guests. All Guests that you submit to us will not be treated as if they have opted in, and besides your message or invitation, they will not receive any additional marketing information unless they affirmatively opt-in themselves. When you send messages, invitations, reminders, or other correspondences to your Guests through our service, we collect and retain the email addresses or other pertinent contact information of your Guests. Except as described in this Privacy Policy, we do not sell, share or otherwise provide the Guest contact information you submit to Spongecell to any third party.

   Also, certain technical processing of email messages and their content may be required to: (1) send and receive messages; (2) conform to connecting networks' technical requirements; (3) conform to the limitations of the Spongecell service; or (4) conform to other similar requirements.

7. Spongecell User Page.

   If you choose to build a Spongecell user page (a "User Page") you will be required to supply a user name, password, valid email address and your zip code. You will also be asked a series of questions, many, but not all of which are optional, regarding your interests that will allow us and our partners and affiliates to share information with you. If you choose, you may allow your responses to these questions to be viewable only by other users and/or guests who are invited to the same events as you. Spongecell may capture data entered by you on the Spongecell service in order to make suggestions to you regarding what activities or topics might be of interest to you. You may also contact other people through their Spongecell User Pages.

   Users and/or guests invited to the same events as you will be able to view the Personally Identifiable Information that you provide on your User Page, unless you choose to hide such information. You also may choose to have the Personally Identifiable Information you supply on your User Page viewable to Spongecell users in general. In addition, other users may choose to email you. However, to ensure your privacy, Spongecell will not display or give out your email address or any other contact information to other users. We have developed a message center that uses a "double-blind" email system, which hides the email addresses of both the sender and recipient of email messages to protect the privacy of both the sender and receiver. When using the message center, it is up to you to choose when you are comfortable disclosing your email address, or any other contact information, to others through private communications.

8. Policy Standards

   Spongecell adheres to the US safe harbor privacy principles of Notice, Choice, Onward Transfer, Security, Data Integrity, Access and Enforcement, and is registered with the U.S. Department of Commerce's safe harbor program.

9. Cookies.

   Spongecell and certain Business Partners use a software technology called "cookies" to collect non-personal information about Internet visitors. Cookies are small text files that uniquely identify the browser you use to access the Internet. We use cookies to understand your use of Internet sites, including our Site, remember your preferences and improve your experience when using Spongecell products and services. Most browsers come pre-configured to accept cookies, but you can adjust your browser settings to refuse all cookies or to specify the conditions under which it will allow a cookie to be set. Some Spongecell features may not function correctly if cookies are disabled.

10. Log Files.

    We use IP addresses to analyze trends, administer the Site, and gather broad Internet usage and demographic information for aggregate use. IP addresses are not linked to Personal Data and are not themselves considered Personal Data. We may also collect other Log File information such as the type of browser software a visitor uses to access the Internet (i.e. Internet Explorer, Firefox , Netscape, etc.); type of operating system (i.e. Windows, Macintosh, etc.); or the domain name of the visitor's Internet service provider and referring web site address.

11. Pixel Tags.

    Spongecell uses pixel tags to gather information about the emails we send to our registered users and to recipients of messages. Pixel tags are tiny graphic files, not visible to the human eye, that are included in our HTML-encoded email messages. When such a message is opened in an HTML-capable email program, the recipient's computer will access our server to retrieve the pixel tag file, allowing us to record and store, along with your email address, the date and time the recipient viewed the invite or reminder, that the recipient's email program is capable of receiving HTML-encoded email, and other standard logging information. The pixel tag also may see or read cookies. For more information about cookies and how to disable their use, see the section above on "Use of Cookies."

12. Updating Information.

    Spongecell processes Personally Identifiable Information only for the purposes for which it was collected and in accordance with this Policy or any applicable service-specific privacy notice. We review our data collection, storage and processing practices to ensure that we only collect, store and process the Personally Identifiable Information needed to provide or improve our products and services. We take reasonable steps to ensure that the Personally Identifiable Information we process is accurate, complete, and current, but we depend on our users to update or correct their Personally Identifiable Information whenever necessary.

13. Other Web Sites; Links

    This Web site contains links to other Web sites. Spongecell is not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of such Web sites.

14. Notification of Changes.

    From time to time we may make changes to our Privacy Policy. If we make changes, we will post them on the Site so users will always understand what information we collect, how we use it, and when we may disclose it. A User is bound by any changes to the policy when she or he uses the Site after those changes have been posted. If, however, we are going to use Personally Identifiable Data in a manner materially different from that stated at the time of collection we will post a notice on our Site for 30 days.

15. Opt-Out/Correct/Delete/Deactivate

    You may elect not to receive future communications from the Company or a promoter who uses Spongecell, or to discontinue use of our products or services. If you are a registered user, please send an email with your name, email address, and request to opt-out to privacy@spongecell.com. If you are not a registered user but are a recipient of a Spongecell email or invitation, you may opt- out of any further communication by clicking the opt-out option at the bottom of any message.

16. Opt-Out Cookies

    You may elect not to receive traceable cookies by visiting the Opt-Out Cookies page.

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