Privacy Statement

Updated: April 19, 2012

This Privacy Statement describes how Avira, Inc. (“Avira”, “we”, “us”, “our”) collects and uses the personally identifying information you provide on our website at www.socialshield.com (“Site”). If you have questions about this Privacy Statement, please email us at info@socialshield.com.

  1. HOW WE COLLECT AND USE YOUR INFORMATION.

    Avira obtains information from and about you and your child (or children) in a number of different ways, including:

    1. General Information.

      As do many other websites, we gather web server log file information automatically: such as your IP address, browser type, referring/exit pages, web pages visited, operating system and domain name of your Internet service provider. We use this information to administer the Site, understand how visitors navigate through the Site and to improve visitors’ experience when using the Site. In addition, we may provide general information about our customers, sales, website traffic patterns and related information to our affiliates or third parties.

    2. Personally identifying information.

      You must provide certain personally identifying information to us as part of the registration process in order to receive the services defined in our Terms of Service. We will not rent or sell your personally identifying information to other companies or individuals, unless we have your consent.
      1. Registration Information. When you register at the Site, you will be required to provide certain personally identifying information, including but not limited to, your name, address, email address, phone number, credit card information, and the name and email address of the child or children you add to your account.
      2. Information from Social Networks. If you connect to your child's account on a social network (including but not limited to, Facebook, MySpace and Twitter) via our service, we will access and store the information about your child explicitly allowed by the social network in their terms of service, once you explicitly allow us to do so through an interface provided by the social network. We use the information from the social networks to provide reports and email notifications as set forth in our Terms of Service. Because we do not have control over the user interfaces provided by social network platforms, we do not take any responsibility for any changes or problems with the user interface or exchange of information provided by any of these social networks.
      3. Third Party Information. We supplement your child’s personally identifiable information collected on the Site with information from other sources. In addition, when you register at a third party website, and provide personally identifying information to such third parties, we may (pursuant to agreements between us and those third parties) obtain such information to populate our registration forms for use when you hyperlink to our Site; and
      4. Email Information. When you send us email messages, we may retain the content of your email, together with your email address and our response to you.

      We will retain your information for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you our services. If you wish to cancel your account or request that we no longer use your information to provide you our services, contact us at info@socialshield.com. We will retain and use your information as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.

      Cookies. Cookies are small text files that are stored by a user’s web browser on the hard drive of the user’s computer. The cookies we use on the Site may be “session” cookies that are erased when you leave the Site, or may be "persistent" cookies that remain on your computer’s hard drive after you leave the Site. The only personally identifying information a cookie can contain is information provided by you. Cookies served by us do not permit us to read data from your hard drive or to read cookie files created by other websites.

      We use cookies on the Site and we link the information we store in cookies to the personally identifiable information you submit while on the Site to:

      1. help our visitors navigate the Site;
      2. facilitate the registration and login process for our services;
      3. personalize your experience;
      4. analyze our visitors’ visits and usage of product features; and
      5. measure advertising and promotional effectiveness.

      Third Party Cookies. The use of cookies by our marketing affiliates and tracking utility service providers is not covered by this Privacy Statement. We do not have access or control over these cookies. Our affiliates and service providers use “session” cookies to make it easier for you to navigate our Site.

      Clear Gifs (Web Beacons/Web Bugs). Our third party web analytics partners employ a software technology called clear gifs (also known as Web Beacons/Web Bugs), that help us better manage content on our Site by informing us what content is effective. Clear gifs are tiny graphics with a unique identifier, similar in function to cookies, and are used to track the online movements of Web users. In contrast to cookies, which are stored on a user’s computer hard drive, clear gifs are embedded invisibly on Web pages and are about the size of the period at the end of this sentence. We do not tie the information gathered by clear gifs to our customers’ personally identifiable information. We use clear gifs in our HTML-based emails to let us know which emails have been opened by recipients. This allows us to gauge the effectiveness of certain communications and the effectiveness of our marketing campaigns. If you would like to opt-out of these emails, please see “Choice and Opt-out” in Section 4 below.

    3. Links to Other Websites.

      The Site contains links to other websites, including links to third party referral websites. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other websites. We encourage you to review and learn about the privacy practices of those other websites.

    4. Community Features.

      We provide a community in which visitors may communicate with other visitors and with us. The community features include, but are not limited to, “Question and Answer” features and parenting tips. To use certain community features in the community, you must first become a member of SocialShield and agree to our Terms of Service. The content you provide in the community will be shared with other members and will also be viewable by non-members. To request removal of your personally identifying information from our blog or community forum, contact us at info@socialshield.com. In some cases, we may not be able to remove your personally identifying information, but we will let you know if we are unable to do so and why.

    5. Online Surveys.

      We occasionally conduct consumer surveys to learn about your views on our products. We use the survey data for research and to improve our services. We may share the aggregate survey results with the media and our partners. We never share any survey information about a specific response unless that individual consents.

  2. HOW WE SHARE YOUR PERSONALLY IDENTIFYING INFORMATION

    We may provide your personally identifying information to companies that provide services to help us with our business activities, such as web site analytics or customer service. These third parties are authorized to use your personally identifying information only as necessary to provide these services to us. We may also disclose your personally identifying information:

    1. as required by law (for example to comply with a subpoena or similar legal process);
    2. when we believe in good faith that disclosure is necessary to protect our rights, protect your safety or the safety of others, investigate fraud, or respond to a written government request; and
    3. to any other third party with your prior consent to do so.

      4. We will share your and your child's or children’s personally identifying information with third parties only in the ways that are described in this Privacy Statement. We will not otherwise disclose or distribute your or your child's or children’s personally identifying information to third parties unless we have your consent to do so.

      If you provide us personal information about others, or if others give us your information, we will only use that information for the specific purpose for which it was provided to us.

  3. ACCESSING AND UPDATING YOUR PERSONALLY IDENTIFYING INFORMATION.

    If you need to make changes to the personally identifying information you provided to us, you may do so by logging into your SocialShield account and updating your Account Settings, or by contacting us at info@socialshield.com.

  4. OPT OUT FROM SOCIALSHIELD’S COMMUNICATIONS.

    If you register at our Site, you may receive marketing communications from us or our affiliates, including but not limited to, a welcome email and notification emails. If you do not wish to receive such communications, you may update your preference by following the instructions in those communications, by logging on to your SocialShield account and modifying your account settings, or by contacting us by email at support@socialshield.com. We will honor your request beginning on the tenth business day after our receipt of your request. Regardless of any such notice from you, we may still contact you about services for which you have registered.

  5. SECURITY.

    We use 128-bit SSL encryption to protect your personally identifying information. Only employees who need the information to perform a specific task (for example, billing or customer service) are granted access to your personally identifying information. The computers and servers in which we store personally identifying information are kept in a secure environment. However, no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure. Therefore, we cannot guarantee the absolute security of your personally identifying. If you have any questions about security on our Site, you can contact us by email at info@socialshield.com.

  6. CUSTOMER TESTIMONIALS/COMMENTS/REVIEWS

    We post customer testimonials/comments/reviews on our Site, which may contain personally identifiable information. We obtain the customer's consent via email prior to posting the testimonial if their name is posted with their testimonial.

  7. CHILDREN.

    Our service is not intended for children under 13. Children aged 13 or older should not submit any personally identifying information without the permission of a parent or legal guardian. By using our service, you are representing that you are at least 18 years old, or that you are at least 13 years old and have your parent's or legal guardian’s permission to use our service.

  8. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY STATEMENT

    We may update this Privacy Statement to reflect changes to our privacy practices. If we make any material changes, we will notify you by means of a notice on our Site prior to the change becoming effective. We encourage you to periodically review this page for the latest information on our privacy practices.

If you have any questions or suggestions regarding the Privacy Statement, please contact us at info@socialshield.com.