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YIVO Institute for Jewish Research Privacy Policy

The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research ("YIVO", "we", "us" or "our") has created this privacy policy to demonstrate our firm commitment to protecting the personal information of visitors to our web site and of our donors (“you”) and to inform you of our data collection, use and disclosure practices. This privacy policy ("Policy") is our policy that addresses maintaining the privacy of personal information we collect.

The Policy describes our privacy practices both offline and in connection with your use of our website www.yivo.org and other websites maintained by YIVO which link to this Policy (collectively, the "Site"). Please read this privacy statement carefully. By using the Site, you agree that your information may be collected, used and disclosed in the ways we describe. Please do not use the Site if you do not agree with the practices described in this Policy.

We may need to change the Policy from time to time in order to address new issues and to reflect changes on the Site or in the law. We reserve the right to revise or make any changes to the Policy. Please bookmark this page and review it periodically to assure familiarity with the current version of the Policy.

WHO WE ARE: YIVO is a 501(c)(3) non-profit with an office in New York City. We are dedicated to the preservation and study of the history and culture of East European Jewry worldwide. We are the home of the foremost archives and library on this history and the presenter of acclaimed exhibitions, concerts, and lectures. For nearly a century, YIVO has pioneered new forms of Jewish scholarship, research, education, and cultural expression.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT AND TRACK. YIVO collects and retains two types of information. Personal Information and Tracking Data (collectively, “Information”).

(i) Personal Information – this is information that individuals, including donors, provide when interacting on the Site, or provide on certain other occasions (such as via the phone, in person meetings, emails or in response to mailings).

When we use the term "Personal Information," we mean information that can be used to identify you as an individual person.

Personal Information may include but is not limited to the following:

This Personal Information is required to accept donations from you, to provide information to you about YIVO’s activities and to provide services to you. If you do not provide the Personal Information we ask for, it may delay or prevent us from providing services to you.

We do not share personal information that we gather through cookies and similar technologies with third parties, except as set forth in this Policy.

(ii) Tracking Data – this is information that is automatically collected from every Site visitor. The tracking data we record includes, without limitation, information regarding the number and frequency of visits to the Site, the domain name of the website that you accessed before you visit the Site, the Internet software used to access the Site, and your IP address and Internet service provider.

You may decline to provide any Information, but please realize that you thereby may be unable to utilize the Site or participate in activities or services offered by YIVO.

INFORMATION ABOUT ONLINE DONATIONS AND PAYMENTS. When you make a donation or payment through the Site, you are redirected to an independent third-party for processing. That third-party collects your Information, using its own service providers to complete the transaction, and transmits the payment or donation to us, along with your name, contact information and other relevant details you provided in connection with the transaction, including, in some cases, your place of employment and job title. We use this Information to process the transaction or account for the donation, as applicable, to communicate with and interact with you as further described below and to meet our legal obligations.

INFORMATION WE OBTAIN FROM THIRD-PARTY SOURCES. We may collect publicly available information about you from third-party sources ("Third-Party Information"). If we associate Third-Party Information with Personal Information, we will treat the combined information as Personal Information in accordance with this Policy. If you choose to make a donation through the Site, we may gather information that is publicly available about you, for example, on your public social media accounts or published on websites like Wikipedia. We use this information to better understand our donors and inform our marketing and fundraising efforts.

HOW WE USE YOUR INFORMATION. The Information that we collect and that you provide to us is used for our business purposes and the purpose for which you provided it, including, without limitation, to respond to your requests or correspondence. YIVO may also use the Information to contact you about the Site. We may also use your Information to inform you about YIVO’S activities, services, events and fundraising efforts. The Information may also be analyzed so that we can provide you with useful information and can serve you in the best manner possible through enhanced features and functions on the Sites.

In addition to the uses described above, we may use your Personal Information for the following purposes:

We may also use services provided by third-parties (such as social media platforms) to serve targeted ads to you on third-party platforms. We may do this by providing a hashed version of your Personal Information to the third-party for matching purposes.

HOW WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION. Information provided to third-parties is limited to the Information needed to perform their functions. We seek to limit third-party use of Information; however, we are not responsible for such third-party use of Information that is not in compliance with this Policy.

We will not disclose any Information to third-parties, except (i) to parties who perform a service for us, such as sending you communications via the postal service or internet, web hosting, credit card processing and other similar services; (ii) when we believe that such disclosure is required by law; (iii) to enforce this Policy or the Terms; (iv) to protect the rights, property, security or safety of YIVO, YIVO donors, Site users or the public; (v) to respond to an emergency; or (vi) as otherwise stated in this Policy. In addition, we may disclose Information to certain third-parties if you have requested or authorized the disclosure of such Information.

We may share your personal information with:

Service Providers. We share your Information with third-party service providers who perform services on our behalf or for your benefit, such as web hosting and analytics. We use service providers to provide online payment processing services but we do not collect or store your payment card information, bank account numbers, or other financial data sent directly to those third-party payment processors.

Donor List Exchanges. In order to increase our fundraising ability, we occasionally exchange limited Information of donors with other non-profit organizations and subscription services with similar missions and values. Personal financial information is not sold to or traded with other parties as a part of these exchanges. You can opt out if you would prefer not to participate in exchanges, using the contact information for us listed below.

Contributor Recognition. We may disclose limited Personal Information of donors to recognize their participation in fundraising and other organizational events in annual reports and other promotional materials. Donors may choose to remain anonymous and should advise us of such at the time of the donation.

Promotional Communications. We have a legitimate interest in processing your Information for promotional purposes. This means we do not usually need your consent to send you promotional communications. However, where consent is needed, we will ask for this consent separately and clearly.

We will always treat your Information with the utmost respect and never sell or share it with other organizations outside YIVO for marketing purposes. You have the right to opt out of receiving promotional communications at any time by contacting us as provided below.

OUR LEGAL BASIS FOR PROCESSING DATA. All of our use of Information is in accordance with the law. We have a legal basis for processing such data, including the following:

Legitimate interests: We may rely on our legitimate interests to process your Information, provided that our interests are not overridden by your interests, fundamental rights, or freedoms. In particular, we may process your Information in reliance on a legitimate interest in the effective and lawful operation of this Site and our businesses, as well as the effective delivery of information and services to you. We may have other legitimate interests and, if so, we will make clear what those interests are at the relevant point in time.

Compliance with legal obligations: We may process your Information if necessary for us to comply with a legal obligation arising under an applicable law to which we are subject. We reserve the right to disclose any Information to comply with any law, regulation, decree, judgment, order, subpoena or any other governmental order ("Order") without any obligation to contest or verify the accuracy of such Order.

Consent: Where you have provided us with consent, we may rely on that consent to process your Information.

With respect to visitors to our Site from the European Economic Area (EEA) and the United Kingdom (UK), you acknowledge and consent that the personal data that we collect from you may be transferred to, processed and stored by us at destinations outside the EEA and the UK, including in the USA.

STATEMENT OF YOUR RIGHTS.
You have the following rights, which you can exercise free of charge:

Access The right to be provided with a copy of your Personal Information (the right of access)
 
Rectification The right to require us to correct any mistakes in your Personal Information
 
To be forgotten The right to require us to delete your personal information—in certain situations
 
Restriction of processing The right to require us to restrict processing of your Personal Information—in certain circumstances, e.g. if you contest the accuracy of the data
 
Data portability The right to receive the Personal Information you provided to us, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and/or transmit that data to a third-party—in certain situations
 
To object The right to object:
—at any time to your Personal Information being processed for direct marketing (including profiling);
—in certain other situations to our continued processing of your Personal Information, e.g. processing carried out for the purpose of our legitimate interests.
 
Not to be subject to automated individual decision-making The right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing (including profiling) that produces legal effects concerning you or similarly significantly affects you
 

If you would like to exercise any of those rights (known as “subject access request”), including but not limited to withdrawing consent for the collection of data, accessing data we collect about you or requesting a correction of such data, please contact us as per the details in section ‘How to contact us’. There is not normally any charge for a subject access request. If your request is ‘manifestly unfounded or excessive’ (for example, if you make repetitive requests) a fee may be charged to cover our administrative costs in responding.

We will respond to your subject access request within one month of receiving it. Normally, we aim to provide a complete response, including a copy of your personal data within that time. In some cases, however, particularly if your request is more complex, more time may be required up to a maximum of three months from the date we receive your request. You will be kept fully informed of our progress.

USE OF TRACKING DATA AND COOKIES. Tracking Data information may be used for a variety of purposes, including but without limitation, to compile statistical, demographic or aggregated information about visitors to the Site generally, or for load balancing metrics and also may be used to create reports on user demographics and the traffic patterns of the Site. This information may include IP addresses, browser type, internet service provider, referring/exit pages, operating system, date/time stamp, page views and/or clickstream data. We generally only use this data for purposes such as tracking traffic patterns on the Sites, security, fraud detection and protecting our rights. The reports that are generated from tracking data are used for a variety of purposes, including, for example, to improve the Site and our services.

We use cookies to enhance your experience while using the Site. "Cookies" are small pieces of information that a website transfers to your computer's hard drive for record-keeping purposes. The use of cookies makes web surfing easier by performing certain functions such as saving your passwords and your personal preferences in connection with your use of a particular website.

Many consider the use of cookies to be an industry standard. Your browser is probably set to accept cookies, but you are always free to decline our cookies if your browser permits. Your browser also probably allows you to delete cookies. If you choose to have your browser refuse cookies, or if you delete cookies, it is possible that some of the services provided on the Sites will not function properly.

Cookies and Other Data Collection Technologies: We and our affiliated companies, business partners and service providers use cookies and similar technologies to manage the services provided to you and to collect and track information about you and your activities online over time and across different websites and social media channels. In addition, we use technologies that can collect and store your information to help us recognize you and enhance your experience on the Site. For example, the "remember me" function saves a cookie on your computer's browser so that you can be automatically logged-in when interacting with the Site.

Most internet browsers allow you to remove or manage cookie functions and adjust your privacy and security preferences. For information on how to do this, access the "help" menu on your internet browser, or visit http://www.aboutcookies.org/how-to-control-cookies/. Please note, however, that disabling cookies on the Site may result in your inability to take full advantage of all the features of the Site.

Analytics: We use analytics providers such as Google Analytics to help us evaluate and measure the use and performance of the Site. To opt out of the aggregation and analysis of data collected about you on the Site by Google Analytics, visit https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout and download and install the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.

HOW YOUR INFORMATION IS PROTECTED. We take reasonable and appropriate precautions to protect your Information from loss, misuse or alteration. Sensitive credit card information is not stored on any of our servers and, though order information is retained for our records, this information is not shared with other organizations or persons. It is important for the user to protect his or herself against unauthorized access to his or her password and computer. We advise that the user use a known and trusted secure connection and to log off when finished using a shared computer. The user should be aware that there is always some risk involved in transmitting information over the Internet. There is also some risk that others could find a way to thwart our security systems. As a result, while we strive to protect your information, we cannot ensure or warrant the security and privacy of any information the user transmits to us, and the user does so at their own risk. We are not liable for any breach of our systems or interception of our transmission, and we hereby fully disclaim, to the fullest extent provided under law, any liability associated with any claim relating to a breach of security, data or information.

CHILDREN UNDER THE AGE OF 13. We do not knowingly collect Information from anyone under 13 years of age without the consent of a parent or guardian. We encourage parents or guardians to participate in and monitor their children's online activity. If a child under 13 has provided Personal Information to us, we encourage the child's parent or guardian to contact us through the contact information provided below to request that we remove the information from our systems. If you are under the age of 13, do not provide us with any Personal Information.

DATA RETENTION. We will retain your Information for as long as it is reasonably useful for our mission and organizational effectiveness. We will retain and use your Information as necessary to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations or data retention policies.

LINKS TO OTHER WEBSITES. The Site may include links to websites operated by other third-party organizations. These features may collect your IP address, which page you are visiting on our Site and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. This privacy statement does not apply to, and we are not responsible for the content, privacy policies or data practices of third-parties that collect your information. We encourage you to review the privacy policies for those third-parties to learn about their information practices.

APPLICABLE LAW. This Policy will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of New York, without regard to any principles of conflicts of law. You agree that any action at law or in equity that arises out of or relates to any use of the Site will be filed only in the state or federal courts located in New York County, and you hereby consent and submit to the personal jurisdiction of such courts for the purposes of litigating any such action.

HOW TO CONTACT US.
You may contact us by any of the following means:

YIVO Institute for Jewish Research
Address: 15 West 16th Street, New York, NY 10011-6301
Phone: (212) 246-6080 (If calling from outside the USA, please dial 001 before the number)
Email: info@yivo.org