Privacy Policy

Information we collect

We may obtain certain personal information (such as name and other contact details) when you choose to provide them through our Site. The types of personal information we may collect include:

• contact information, such as your name, postal address, e-mail address and telephone number
• date of birth
• username and password
• personal information in content you provide on our Site
• information concerning your interests and product preferences

In addition, when you visit our Site, we may collect certain information by automated means, such as cookies and web beacons. The information we collect in this manner includes IP address, browser characteristics, device characteristics, operating system, language preferences, referring URLs, information on actions taken on our site, and dates and times of website visits.

A “cookie” is a text file that websites send to a visitor’s computer or other Internet-connected device to uniquely identify the visitor’s browser or to store information or settings in the browser. On this Site, we use session cookies. Session cookies exist only for as long as your browser remains open. Once you close your browser, they are deleted. The cookies used on the Site may include those that are strictly necessary cookies for access and navigation, cookies that track usage (performance cookies) and remember your choices (functionality cookies), and cookies that provide you with targeted content or advertising.

We may use the information we obtain from your use of our cookies for the following purposes:

• to recognize your computer when you visit the Site
• to track you as you navigate the Site, and to enable the use of e-commerce capabilities
• to improve the Site's usability
• to analyze use of the Site
• to manage the Site
• to personalize the Site , including targeted advertisements that may be of particular interest to you.

We also may use “web beacons” on our Site. A web beacon, also known as a pixel tag or clear GIF, may be used to transmit information collected through cookies to our service providers’ servers, such as the server of Google Adwords. These web beacons enable our service providers to compile anonymous information about your browsing activity on the Site. For more information, see the section on “Online Tracking” below.

Your browser may tell you how to be notified when you receive certain types of cookies or how to restrict or disable certain types of cookies. Please note, however, that without cookies you may not be able to use all of the features of our Site.

How we use the information we collect

We may use the information we obtain through the Site to:

• create and manage your account;
• offer and provide products, services and information to you, including data feeds;
• permit you to participate in blogs, forums, and discussion groups;
• display content on our Site, such as stories, product reviews and photos;
• respond to and communicate with you about your requests, questions and comments;
• process claims we receive in connection with our products and services;
• operate, evaluate and improve our business (including developing new products and services; managing our communications; determining the effectiveness of our sales, marketing and advertising; analyzing and enhancing our products, services and Site; and performing accounting, auditing, billing, reconciliation and collection activities);
• perform data analyses and other processing (including market and consumer research, trend analysis),
• protect against, identify and prevent fraud and other criminal activity, claims and other liabilities; and
• comply with and enforce applicable legal requirements, relevant industry standards and our policies.

In addition, we use information collected online through cookies, web beacons and other automated means for purposes such as (i) recognizing your computer when you visit the Site, (ii) tracking you as you navigate the Site, and enabling the use of e-commerce capabilities, (iii) improving the Site’s usability, (iv) analyzing use of the Site, (v) managing the Site, and (vi) personalizing the Site , including targeted content and advertisements that may be of particular interest to you. We also use this information to help diagnose technical and service problems, administer our Site, identify users of our Site, and gather demographic information about our users. We use clickstream data to determine how much time users spend on web pages of our Site, how users navigate through our Site, and how we may tailor our Site to better meet the needs of our users.

We also may use the information we obtain about you in other ways for which we provide specific notice at the time of collection.

Online tracking

We may use third-party web analytics services on our Site, such as Google Analytics. These service providers help us analyze how users use our Site. The information collected for this purpose (including your IP address and other information collected by automated means) will be disclosed to or collected directly by these service providers. These service providers may retain and use anonymised, aggregated data collected from users of our Site in connection with their own businesses, including in order to improve their products and services. To learn more about opting out of data collection through Google Analytics, click the link below:

On the Site, we may collect information about your online activities for use in providing you with advertising about products and services tailored to your individual interests. This section of our Online Privacy Notice provides details and explains how to exercise your choices.

You may see certain ads on other websites based on your visits to our Site because we participate in advertising networks administered by third-party vendors, such as Google Adwords. Ad networks allow us to target our messaging to users considering demographic data, users’ inferred interests and browsing context. These networks track your online activities over time by collecting information through automated means, including through the use of cookies, web server logs and web beacons. The networks use this information to show you advertisements that are tailored to your individual interests, to track your browser across multiple websites, and to build a profile of your web browsing. The information our ad network vendors collect includes information about your visits to websites that participate in the vendors’ advertising networks, such as the pages or advertisements you view and the actions you take on the websites. This data collection takes place both on our Site and on third-party websites that participate in the ad networks. This process also helps us track the effectiveness of our marketing efforts.

We may use features of Google Analytics for Display Advertisers. That includes obtaining specific visitor cookie data, such as the source, medium and keywords used to visit our Site.

This Site is not designed to respond to “do not track” signals received from browsers.

Strictly necessary cookies

These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms.You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then work. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable information.

Cookies used

• _system_session
• OptanonConsent
• OptanonAlertBoxClosed

Information we share

We may share the information you provide with companies that are related to SSBM through common ownership. We may also share the personal information we obtain with our publishing partners.

In addition, if you agree, we share personal information with third parties who perform services on our behalf. For example, when you make a purchase we may share information about you and your transaction with other companies for the purpose of processing your transaction. In addition, we may retain third party service providers to manage our customer databases or distribute e-mail offerings.

Our Site may feature blogs, forums and discussion groups. Please be aware that some or all of the information you provide (including personal information) in connection with these activities may be made publicly available.

a court order or subpoena), (ii) in response to requests by government agencies, such as law enforcement authorities, or (iii) when we believe disclosure is necessary or appropriate to prevent physical harm or financial loss or in connection with an investigation of suspected or actual illegal activity. We reserve the right to transfer any information we have about you in the event we sell or transfer all or a portion of our business or assets (including in the event of a reorganization, dissolution or liquidation).

Links to other website

Our Site may contain links to other websites for your convenience and information. These may include, for example, some of the blogs and forums you may access through this Site. These websites may be operated by companies not affiliated with us. Linked websites may have their own privacy policies or notices, which we strongly suggest you review if you visit any linked websites. We are not responsible for the content of any websites that are not affiliated with SSBM, any use of those websites, or the privacy practices of those websites

Children’s privacy

Our Site is not directed to children under the age of 13 and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13 on our Site. If we become aware that we have inadvertently received personal information from a visitor under the age of thirteen on our Site, we will delete the information from our records.

How we protect personal information

We maintain administrative, technical and physical safeguards designed to protect the personal information you provide against accidental, unlawful or unauthorized destruction, loss, alteration, access, disclosure or use.

Your choices

We give you the option of requesting that we not use your information for marketing purposes, or share your information with related companies for their own marketing purposes. Click here.to send us an e-mail with your name and e-mail address, if you do not want us to use your information for marketing purposes, or share your information with related companies for their own marketing purposes.

Please be aware that we are able to process an opt-out request only for a specific e-mail address. So, if you have more than one e-mail address or if you have changed your e-mail address, your opt-out request may not be processed properly. If you believe you have opted out, but continue to receive e-mails from us, please contact us by one of the means listed under “How to Contact Us” below, and we will endeavor to resolve the issue.

Notice to California residents

Californian data protection law, CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) and CPRA (California Privacy Rights Act), Civil Code sections 1798.100 and 1798.140, provide California residents with the right to know what personal information companies in certain businesses are collecting about them, the right to opt out of the sale or sharing of their personal information, the right to receive equal services and pricing regardless of their data sharing choices, and the right to request deletion of their data.

In the alternative, such businesses may have in place a policy not to disclose personal information of customers to third parties for the third parties’ direct marketing purposes if the customer has opted out of such information-sharing. We have such a policy in place. As discussed above in the section entitled “Your Choices”, if you wish to opt-out of our sharing of your information with third parties for the third parties’ direct marketing purposes, please follow the appropriate opt-out link in that section.

Access and correction

Subject to applicable law, you may (i) have the right to access certain personal information we maintain about you and obtain a copy of that information, (ii) update or correct inaccuracies in that information, (iii) object to our use of your personal information, and (iv) delete your personal information from our database. To exercise these rights, please contact us as indicated in the How To Contact Us section of this Online Privacy Notice. To help protect your privacy and maintain security, we may take steps to verify your identity before granting you access to the information. If you are resident in the EU, a charge may be applicable before we provide a copy to you of any of your personal information that we maintain

Data transfers

We may transfer the personal information we collect about you to countries other than the country in which the information originally was collected. Those countries may not have the same data protection laws as the country in which you initially provided the information.

When we transfer your information to other countries, we will protect that information as described in this Online Privacy Notice and in accordance with applicable law. Where your personal information is collected in the EEA and we then transfer it outside the EEA, we will ensure that an adequate level of protection is in place to protect your personal information.

Updates to our online privacy notice

Changes to this Online Privacy Notice will become effective when those changes are posted to the Site. Your continued use of the Site subsequent to any change to this Online Privacy Notice constitutes your acceptance of the change. Please review this statement periodically to ensure you are aware of any changes or updates to this Online Privacy Notice. We indicate the effective date of this Online Privacy Notice (and any updates) at the top of the Notice.

Your Rights

Under the legislation applicable to you, you may be entitled to exercise some or all of the following rights:

• require (i) information as to whether your personal data is retained and (ii) access to and/or duplicates of your personal data retained, including the purposes of the processing, the categories of personal data concerned, and the data recipients as well as potential retention periods;
• request rectification, removal or restriction of your personal data, e.g. because (i) it is incomplete or inaccurate, (ii) it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected, or (iii) the consent on which the processing was based has been withdrawn;
• refuse to provide and - without impact to data processing activities that have taken place before such withdrawal - withdraw your consent to processing of your personal data at any time;
• object, on grounds relating to your particular situation, that your personal data shall be subject to a processing. In this case, please provide us with information about your particular situation. After the assessment of the facts presented by you we will either stop processing your personal data or present you our compelling legitimate grounds for an ongoing processing;
• take legal actions in relation to any potential breach of your rights regarding the processing of your personal data, as well as to lodge complaints before the competent data protection regulators;
• require (i) to receive the personal data concerning you, which you have provided to us, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and (ii) to transmit those data to another controller without hindrance from our side; where technically feasible you shall have the right to have the personal data transmitted directly from us to another controller; and/or
• not to be subject to any automated decision making, including profiling (automatic decisions based on data processing by automatic means, for the purpose of assessing several personal aspects) which produce legal effects on you or affects you with similar significance.

How to contact us

If you have any questions about this Online Privacy Notice, or if you would like us to update information we have about you or your preferences, please contact us by: E-mailing us at supportapi@springernature.com