Calyx Institute Privacy Policy

November 21, 2013

I. Introduction

The Calyx Institute ("Calyx") is dedicated to preserving and protecting your privacy, and our Internet test bed, suite of Internet programs and services and educational programs that we recommend are designed from the ground up with that as Calyx's foremost objective. This privacy policy ("Privacy Policy") details the information about you that we collect, including personally identifiable information ("personal information"), to provide you with our programs and services. Personal information is information that can be used to identify you.

In summary

We keep personal information only to the extent you provide it and we need it to communicate with you or recognize any contribution from you.
We strive to protect your privacy, and limit the amount of your personal information we collect, retain and use in order to manage and maintain our mission and provide our services and programs. We keep minimal logs of Internet activities other than on an aggregate basis to detect and correct problems with our servers which we will delete after we have resolved any problems.
We do not sell or share personal information or data with other individuals or groups not affiliated with Calyx other than as necessary to upgrade, maintain and repair our network and infrastructure.
We will attempt to defend your personal information from disclosure and to notify you of any requests for disclosure unless notification is prohibited by law.
We do not monitor your Internet usage or communications.
We encrypt all personal information that is stored on our network and servers.

We limit the amount of personal information we receive and retain, and thereby strive to protect your privacy. Our fundamental policy is to collect only the personal information that is essential to provide the programs and services we offer and plan to offer. We pursue this goal in a variety of ways, including providing you with multiple ways of setting up, managing and paying for your membership, limiting the number of resources our Websites load from third parties, and using only a minimal number of session cookies. We do not collect any personal information for the purpose of advertising, marketing, or consumer research. Furthermore, we do not collect information from other sources, such as credit information from credit agencies or commercially available demographic and marketing information from third parties, and we do not purchase e-mail lists from third parties.

This Privacy Policy governs your privacy in connection with your use of the following Calyx programs and services:

Internet Services (including the Calyx test bed and suite of Internet programs and services, collectively called "Internet Services").
Websites (including calyxinstitute.org and calyx.net, collectively called "Websites").
Educational Programs and Materials (including publications and training materials called "Educational Materials", and presentations and forums called "Educational Programs", and collectively with Educational Materials called "Educational Programs and Materials").

As stated in our Terms of Use, of which this Privacy Policy is a part, by using the Internet Services and Websites, or by accessing our Educational Materials, or by registering for, or participating in our Educational Programs, you consent to our Terms of Use, and to the collection, retention and use of your personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

II. Information That We Collect

The personal information that we obtain about our users occurs primarily through four activities and only to the extent that you provide it to us: membership registration, payment processing, operating our Websites and providing our Internet Services and Educational Programs and Materials.

A. Personal Information

Use of our Websites requires disclosure of limited personal information. Your IP address may be logged, but we will delete such logs on a regular basis. We make our Websites available via the Tor Project’s anonymity network as "hidden services" which makes it easier for users to cloak their true IP address and protect their web browsing metadata from third parties. We may use cookies on our Websites for the purposes of tracking your session but we do not include third party cookies.

Calyx may provide Internet Services via its servers. Connecting to these servers may reveal your IP address, but as with our Websites logs, we plan to retain this information only for a limited period of time as set forth in this Privacy Policy.

We offer, and plan to offer, a number of Educational Programs and Materials to educate the public. Some of the Educational Materials may be available on our Websites, and browsing and downloading them will produce the same personal information that browsing our Websites in general produces. Some Educational Materials may be available only in physical form which could necessitate that you provide a delivery address to enable us to provide such Educational Materials to you. Finally, some Educational Programs may be conducted only at Calyx's offices or at other locations, and may require that you provide personal information, such as your name and membership number, to register your attendance in advance. Furthermore, such Educational Programs may be video or audio recorded and documented for preservation and promotional purposes. Your attendance at any Educational Program or other Calyx event constitutes your consent to being photographed and recorded and to having your image, likeness and voice included in those recordings for such purposes.

Calyx depends almost entirely on contributions from the public to provide its Internet Services, Websites and Educational Programs and Materials, and we strongly urge anyone who values our mission to become an active participant with Calyx. Without your generous support, Calyx is unlikely to be able to provide its programs and services. If you become a member of Calyx ("Member") we will collect the personal information that you provide, including your name, address, email address and telephone number. Furthermore, when you become a Member, you are assigned a unique membership identifier and we will collect payment information. If you pay via either cash or Bitcoin, we retain no personal information other than the information you provide and your membership identifier. If you pay by check, then we retain the information available on the check. If you pay by credit card, Calyx retains the name, billing address, and credit card information necessary to charge your credit card. If you establish a recurring credit card payment to pay for your membership, Calyx retains your name, billing address, and credit card information until we are notified that you cease to be a Member.

If you become a Sustaining Member, and elect to subscribe to the wireless broadband service that is offered as a benefit to Sustaining Members and above, we also collect and retain information related to the equipment associated with your subscription. This is only the membership identifier and the MAC address of the device.

Any personal information will be maintained and protected on an encrypted basis for as long as you are a Member or maintain your registration with us. If you cease being a Member of Calyx, your personal information will be deleted promptly once we are no longer required to retain such information in accordance with our retention policy and applicable law.

B. Technical and Usage Information

Calyx may collect aggregate information in order to ensure the quality of the network, Internet Services, Websites and Educational Programs and Materials. We maintain this information only for as long as reasonably necessary.

C. We Do Not Collect or Retain Information from Children Under the Age of 13

Our programs and services, including our Websites and Internet Services, are not designed to attract or be used by children under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under the age of 13 unless we first obtain permission from that child's parent or legal guardian. If you are a parent and we have mistakenly collected information about your child. You may alert us via email and we will delete the information we possess. The address to email is help@calyxinstitute.org.

D. A Note About Third Party Web Activity

Please note that when you visit third party websites or utilize web services operated by third parties, your personal information may be collected and stored according to such third party’s privacy policy. We advise you to read carefully the privacy policies of the websites you visit and the services you use to maintain robust privacy protection. Also, our Websites may link to files hosted on other sites. In that case, those sites might track personal information that we cannot control.

III. How We Use This Information

We collect and maintain personal information as well as technical information only to the extent necessary to provide you with our programs and services. We do not sell, and do not contemplate selling your personal or technical information to anyone for any reason other than in connection with the transfer of all or substantially all of the assets of Calyx to a third party which transfer must be approved by the Office of the Attorney General of the State of New York. We will exercise our best efforts to provide notice on our Websites prior to such an event to enable any Member or other person registered with us to remove his/her personal information at that time.

A. Personal Information

The confidentiality of your personal information is very important to us. We will use your personal information only in connection with providing our Internet Services, Websites and Educational Programs and Materials. Thus, membership information will be used for maintaining your registration and active membership. Specific logging information will be used to diagnose problems with our Websites, and potentially to improve what we provide on our Websites. These activities typically include:

To initiate, provide and manage the Internet Services, Websites and Educational Programs and Materials you have accessed, and to respond to your questions or comments;
To bill, and collect, if any charge must be imposed, for our programs. services and merchandise; and
To communicate with you regarding service updates and the status of our programs and services.

B. Technical and Usage Information

The confidentiality of technical information related to your use of our programs and services is also very important to us. We use the technical information we collect only to address network integrity, quality control, capacity, misuse, viruses, and security issues, as well as for network planning, engineering and technical troubleshooting purposes. Additionally, this information may be used in the case of any lawsuit initiated against Calyx, or to protect Calyx’s rights.

IV. How This Information Is Shared With Third Parties

It is our policy not to disclose your personal information to any individual not affiliated with Calyx without your express prior consent, other than as set forth in this Privacy Policy or as required by applicable law.

Technical information related to your use of our service may be disclosed to a third party in connection with providing upgrades, or maintenance or repairs to our network and infrastructure. We seek to require all third parties to be subject to contractual obligations to respect your personal information as provided under this Privacy Policy.

We reserve the right, however, to disclose your information, both personal and technical, if we have a good faith belief it is entirely necessary to comply with the law, protect the integrity of our programs and services, or act in an emergency to protect your safety or that of another. This information will be shared only if the appropriate third party properly requests it. This process is explained below.

V. How We Respond to Requests for Data from Law Enforcement and Government Agencies

We will share personal information available to us with law enforcement or other government agency in any of the following circumstances:

With the user’s written and signed consent;
When the request is made pursuant to a warrant, subpoena, court order, or other apparently valid legal process; or
When we are required in other instances to disclose personal information in order to comply with applicable law.

Sometimes a law enforcement or other government agency request may contain a “gag order” that prohibits us from disclosing to a user that a request has been made for his or her personal information (for example, a “National Security Letter” pursuant to 18 USC § 2709(c)). Calyx's Executive Director has experience challenging the Constitutionality of a National Security Letter. Although we may not be able to able to challenge all secrecy demands, we have designed our Internet Services (including our system infrastructure), Websites and Educational Programs and Materials with an eye toward user privacy, as described in other Sections of this Privacy Policy and elsewhere on our Websites. In addition, regardless of the nature of the legal proceeding, we will carefully consider every third-party attempt to get your personal information to determine how much and what kind of data we must share. Our foremost goals are to communicate with you whenever possible about who is attempting to acquire information related to you and to use our best efforts to respond in a way that protects your privacy to the extent the law permits.

However, we will not violate the law and we must comply with lawful governmental orders and investigations. We will try to protect your privacy to the extend the law permits.

VI. How You Can Access and Change Your Personal Information.

If you would like to review or correct your personal information we maintain, please contact us. Calyx will use good faith efforts to respond to any requests from Members to review their personal information maintained in reasonably retrievable form, and we will correct information found to be inaccurate.

We can be contacted via email at help@calyxinstitute.org or via postal mail at The Calyx Institute, 254 36th Street, Suite C660, Brooklyn, NY 11232.

VII. How Data That is Stored Is Protected; Notification of Security Breach

Except as otherwise provided in this Privacy Policy, we encrypt all personal information, and restrict access to personal information to our employees or other personnel (such as independent contractors) who need to know the information to help provide you with any of our programs and services. All contracted third parties who work with personal information will be subject to contractual obligations to respect your personal information as provided for under this Privacy Policy.

In the unlikely event that the security of our storage facilities is compromised, resulting in an unauthorized third party having access to any of your information, we will attempt to contact you and let you know. You may provide us an email address that we will notify in the event of a breach.

VIII. Changes to the Privacy Policy; Effective Date.

From time to time, we may change our Privacy Policy to reflect more accurately our evolving programs and services. Any modification to our Privacy Policy will be reflected on this page, and, whenever we decide to alter materially any part of this Privacy Policy, we will provide you with prominent notice prior to the date of the change (for example, an e-mail notification or alert on our Websites). Your continued attendance at, or participation in or access of our Internet Services, Websites, Educational Programs and Materials will constitute your acceptance of the changes.

This Privacy Policy is effective as of the date first set forth above.