Privacy Policy
Last Updated: September 19, 2010
Pepperplate.com Web Site Privacy Policy
This Privacy Policy governs your use of the web sites published and maintained by Pepperplate ("Pepperplate," "we," "us," "our," or other similar pronouns) including Pepperplate.com (a "Web Site"). By visiting this Web Site, and/or using the services offered on or through this Web Site, you agree to the terms of this Privacy Policy as they may be amended from time to time. As we update and expand our Web Site, this Privacy Policy may change, so check back to this page from time to time. This Privacy Policy is incorporated into, and part of, the Pepperplate Terms and Conditions, which governs your use of this Web Site in general.
Summary
It is Pepperplate’s policy to respect and protect the privacy of visitors to this Web Site. Accordingly, Pepperplate DOES NOT extract, without permission, Personal Information (as defined below) about its visitors or their computer at any time while on Pepperplate’s Web Site, except for Personal Information that is actively provided by such visitors through registration, logging in and out, online forms or other means. Pepperplate will, however, analyze information about our visitors as a group to make our Web Site better, but visitors are not individually identified when we do this.
When dealing with children who we have knowledge are under the age of 13, Pepperplate follows stringent guidelines that prohibit the sharing of Personal Information with any third parties, except in limited circumstances such as our service providers who use such information on our behalf. Our privacy policies regarding children are outlined in Pepperplate’s Parental Consent Policy section below.
This Privacy Policy does not apply to information that you may provide to us, or that we may obtain, other than through our Web Site, such as by phone, through postal mail and through other live and print mediums.
This Web Site is intended for users who are located in the United States of America. This Privacy Policy shall be interpreted under the laws of the United States, regardless of the location of individual users.
What We Collect
Pepperplate may collect a variety of statistical data about its Web Site visitors. This data includes the source IP address of the visitor, the time of visit, the areas of the site visited and information about browser, operating system and other system parameters. As of the date of this Privacy Policy, none of this information is used to personally identify any individual visitor, and is used solely for the purposes of analyzing overall traffic and usage patterns. However, Pepperplate reserves the right to begin matching such usage data with an individual’s Personal Information subsequent to the date of this Privacy Policy.
In order to make your visits to our Web Site and use of the services available on or through our Web Site as worthwhile as possible, Pepperplate may also collect Personal Information about its visitors, but only when a visitor provides such Personal Information to us in the process of ordering subscriptions, entering contests or sweepstakes, signing up for our newsletter(s), using our "Feedback" feature, registering with the Web Site or using other services available on or through our Web Site. The information that you give us and information about your order, purchases or other activities on the Web Site may be combined with other Personal Information (such as demographic information and past purchase history) available from our records and other sources. "Personal Information" includes, for example, names, postal addresses, e-mail addresses, wireless addresses, age, credit card and other payment information, demographic information, purchase history, subscription information and/or other information that may identify you as an individual or allow online or offline contact with you as an individual. This information is used by Pepperplate to fulfill your requests and for marketing and research purposes. This information may also be shared with other marketers to bring you offers of interest. If you prefer that we do not share your name and address with other marketers, please see the "Right to Opt Out" section below. Certain areas of Pepperplate’s Web Site will require user registration in order to gain access; once you register with the Pepperplate Web Site to use that content, you will no longer be anonymous to us.
Use of Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies
Pepperplate may use "cookie" technology to enhance a visitor's online experience by making it easier to navigate through our Web Site or to make an activity work better.
Cookies are small pieces of information or data files that are sent through your browser or related software from a Web server and are stored on your computer’s hard drive. Cookies may be used to track where you travel on our Web Site and what you look at and purchase, and they allow a computer to "remember" information from our Web Site for future use. The use of cookies is an industry standard and is practiced by most major Web sites. Cookies alone tell us nothing about who you are, but they may enable us to relate your use of our Web Site to other information, including your Personal Information, which you have provided to us when you registered or performed other activities while visiting our Web Site. All of these purposes serve to enhance your experience while using our services in the ways described below.
Most Web browsers can be set to inform you when a cookie has been sent to you and provide you with the opportunity to refuse that cookie. Additionally, if you have a Flash player installed on your computer, your Flash player can be set to reject or delete Flash cookies. However, refusing a cookie may, in some cases, preclude you from using, or negatively impact the display or function of, the Web Site or certain areas or features of the Web Site.
We may use cookies and other tracking technologies in a variety of ways, including:
- Keeping count of return visits to our Web Site or our advertisers’ or partners’ sites
- Accumulating and reporting anonymous, aggregate (data collected in mass), statistical information on website and advertisement usage
- Determining which features our customers like best
- Saving your password so you don’t have to re-enter it each time you visit our Web Site
How Pepperplate Uses Personal Information
Personal Information is used to enhance and custom-tailor each user's experience on the Web Site. Such information may be used to determine what site content is of interest to which users, what types of e-mail newsletters and other communications are appropriate for individual users, and to identify user-generated content such as message board postings, votes in online polls and participation in online games. Such information will also be used, for example, to process your orders, respond to your requests and inquiries and provide you with the services and features offered on or through our Web Site.
Pepperplate may also use Personal Information to maintain our internal record keeping. We reserve the right to match information collected from you through different means or at different times, including both Personal Information and Web Site usage information, and use such information along with information obtained from other sources. In addition, we may send you notices (for example, in the form of e-mails, mailings, and the like), and otherwise correspond with you, about products, services, companies and events, sponsored by us and others, that we think might interest you. You may opt-out of receiving such notices from us by following the instructions in the Right to Opt Out section above.
In addition, Pepperplate may use Personal Information to generate aggregate data about our Web Site’s visitors.
Send-to-a-Friend
Visitors to the Web Site can forward information about areas and/or services available on or through the Web Site, to their friends. In order to do this, visitors are asked to provide only their first name and their friend's first name and e-mail address, all of which are deleted once the postcard is sent.
Requests For Feedback
Pepperplate may request feedback from visitors to the Web Site regarding an activity or piece of content on the Web Site. Such feedback is used for internal purposes only.
Correspondence and Newsletters
Pepperplate uses automated e-mail systems to e-mail newsletters and to collect and answer correspondence from our visitors. Pepperplate tries to make it easy for visitors to contact us and we provide easy instructions on our Web Site on how you can either edit Personal Information previously given (such as your address) or opt out of receiving any automated messages generated by Pepperplate. For more information on opting out, please see the Right to Opt Out section above. Should you have a technical problem doing this please contact onlinesupport@Pepperplate.com.
Public Forums
When you contribute to a public area or feature of our Web Site, such as a chat room, bulletin board, list serve, blog, wiki or other open forum that we may make available on or through our Web Site, the information that you submit will be made available to the general public. For this reason, we recommend that you do not submit any sensitive information, including your full name, home address, phone number, other information that would enable other users to locate you, or financial information on these areas of our Web Site. Instead, you should make up a username that does not disclose your personal identity.
Business Transfer
In the event that Pepperplate, or substantially all of its assets, are acquired by one or more third parties as a result of an acquisition, merger, sale, reorganization, consolidation or liquidation, Personal Information may be one of the transferred assets.
Third Party Ad Servers
We may use third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our Web site. These companies may use information (generally not including your name, address, e-mail address or telephone number) about your visits to this and other Web sites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. These companies may employ cookies and clear gifs to measure advertising effectiveness. Any information that these third parties collect via cookies and clear gifs is generally not personally identifiable (unless, for example, you provide personally identifiable information to them through an ad or e-mail message). We encourage you to read these businesses' privacy policies if you should have any concerns about how they will care for your Personal Information.
Advertisers and Third Party "Linked-To" Web Sites
Pepperplate may include advertisements and/or links to Web sites operated by third parties that are not sponsors and are not affiliated with Pepperplate. Pepperplate tries to make sure that when there are links off the Web Site, they are working and lead visitors to interesting, fun and informative areas. However, it is hard to guarantee what exactly is presented on other Web sites or where links elsewhere may lead. Pepperplate is not responsible for the content, practices, or information provided or requested on Web sites operated by third parties. Further, advertisements on and links to or from Pepperplate.com do not constitute sponsorship, endorsement, or approval by Pepperplate of the content, policies, practices or products or services offered on these Web sites.
Parents/guardians should check each Web site's privacy policy and terms of use in order to understand their policies and practices regarding the collection and use of personally identifiable information. Pepperplate also suggests that parents/guardians review the privacy policies of all Web sites that their children visit, including those Web sites linking to or from the Pepperplate Web Site. Information provided to those web sites will be subject to the privacy policy posted at that web site.
Security
The importance of security for all Personal Information associated with visitors to our Web Site is of utmost concern to us. Pepperplate exercises great care and implements a variety of technologies in an effort to help make the Pepperplate Web Site secure against unauthorized access and to protect the Personal Information visitors choose to provide to us. Pepperplate periodically reviews and updates these measures. Unfortunately, due to the inherent nature of the Internet as an open global communications vehicle, no data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed to be secure, and Pepperplate cannot guarantee that information, during transmission through the Internet or while stored on our system or otherwise in our care, will be absolutely safe from intrusion by others, such as hackers. As a result, while Pepperplate strives to protect a visitor's Personal Information, Pepperplate cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information transmitted to us or from our online products or services, and a visitor does so at his/her own risk. Pepperplate uses the industry standard, SSL (secure socket layer) encryption when credit card information is transmitted to us.
If you contact us by e-mail or a "contact us" or similar feature on our Web site, you should be aware that your transmission might not be secure. A third party could view information you send by these methods in transit.
You may be able to create an account on our Web Site with a username and password. If so, you are responsible for maintaining the strict confidentiality of your account password, and you shall be responsible for any access to or use of the Web Site by you or any person or entity using your password, whether or not such access or use has been authorized by or on behalf of you, and whether or not such person or entity is your employee or agent. You agree to (a) immediately notify Pepperplate of any unauthorized use of your password or account or any other breach of security, and (b) ensure that you exit from your account at the end of each session. It is your sole responsibility to control the dissemination and use of your password, control access to and use of your account, and notify Pepperplate when you desire to cancel your account on this Web Site. We will not be responsible or liable for any loss or damage arising from your failure to comply with this provision.
We will have no liability for disclosure of your information due to errors or unauthorized acts of third parties during or after transmission.
In the unlikely event that we believe that the security of your Personal Information in our possession or control may have been compromised, we may seek to notify you of that development. If a notification is appropriate, we would endeavor to do so as promptly as possible under the circumstances, and, to the extent we have your e-mail address, we may notify you by e-mail. You consent to our use of e-mail as a means of such notification. If you prefer for us to use another method to notify you in this situation, please e-mail us at onlinesupport@Pepperplate.com with the alternative contact information you wish to be used.
Phishing
With identity theft a continuing problem, it has become increasingly common for unauthorized individuals to send e-mail messages to consumers, purporting to represent a legitimate company such as a bank or on-line merchant, requesting that the consumer provide personal, often sensitive information. Sometimes, the domain name of the e-mail address from which the e-mail appears to have been sent, and the domain name of the web site requesting such information, appears to be the domain name of a legitimate, trusted company. In reality, such sensitive information is received by an unauthorized individual to be used for purposes of identity theft. This illegal activity has come to be known as "phishing."
If you receive an e-mail or other correspondence requesting that you provide any sensitive information (including your Web Site password or credit card information) via e-mail or to a Web site that does not seem to be affiliated with our Web Site, or that otherwise seems suspicious to you, please do not provide such information, and report such request to us at support@Pepperplate.com.
Consent to Processing
By providing Personal Information to this Web Site, you understand and consent to the collection, maintenance, processing and transfer of such information in and to the United States and other countries and territories.
Changes to this Privacy Policy
Pepperplate reserves the right to change or update this Privacy Policy, or any other of our policies or practices, at any time, and will notify users of this Web Site by posting such changed or updated Privacy Policy on this page. Any changes or updates will be effective immediately upon posting to this Web Site. Under certain circumstances, we may also elect to notify you of changes or updates to our Privacy Policy by additional means, such as posting a notice on the front page of our Web Site to sending you an e-mail.