Mercury Grove Privacy Policy

Effective July 8, 2007

About Mercury Grove Web Groups
Mercury Grove cares deeply about online privacy. If you have any questions concerning this privacy policy, please email us at privacy@mercurygrove.com.

Information Collection and Use by Mercury Grove
Online services offered by Mercury Grove may collect user submitted information such as name and email address to authenticate users and to send notifications to those users relating to the service. Mercury Grove online services may also collect other profile data in order to assist users in finding and communicating with each other.

Mercury Grove online services may also log non-personally-identifiable information including IP address, profile information, aggregate user data, and browser type, from users and visitors to the site. This data is used to manage the website, track usage and improve the website services. This non-personally-identifiable information may be shared with third parties to provide more relevant services to members. User IP addresses are recorded for security and monitoring purposes.

User profile information including members' pictures and names are displayed to people in order to facilitate user interaction in the Mercury Grove community. Email addresses are used for the purposes of inviting new friends to join Mercury Grove online services, to add users to members' service, and to send notifications related to the service. To facilitate searching within a service, Mercury Grove allows users to search for information using tags. We may also use a user's email address to send updates, newsletters or news regarding the service.

Invitations and Other Communications to Non-members
Mercury Grove online services members can invite users to join the service by sending invitation emails via our automated invitation system. Mercury Grove online services may store the email addresses that members provide so that the respondents may be added to the user’s list of the member sending the invitations, and also to send reminders of the invitations. Mercury Grove online services does not sell these email addresses or use them to send any other communication besides invitations, invitation reminders (up to three (3) per email address). Recipients of invitations from Mercury Grove online services may contact Mercury Grove to request the removal of their information from our database.

Mercury Grove online services members may also store email addresses of people they know in their internal contact book.

Use of Cookies
Mercury Grove online services use cookies to store visitors' preferences and to record session information, for purposes including customizations of newsletters, advertising, and Web page content based on browser type and user profile information. We do not link the information we store in cookies to any personally identifiable information you submit while on our site. You may be able to configure your browser to accept or reject all or some cookies, or notify you when a cookie is set -- each browser is different, so check the "Help" menu of your browser to learn how to change your cookie preferences -- however, you must enable cookies from Mercury Grove online services in order to use most functions on the site.

Links
Mercury Grove's online services may contain links to other sites. Mercury Grove is not responsible for the privacy policies and/or practices on other sites. When linking to another site a user should read the privacy policy stated on that site. Our privacy policy only governs information collected on Mercury Grove's online services.

Message Boards and Public Forums
Please be aware that whenever you voluntarily post public information to Message Boards or any other Public Forums, that information can be accessed by the public and can in turn be used by those people to send you unsolicited communications.

Correcting/Updating or Removing Information
Mercury Grove online service users may modify or remove any of their personal information at any time by logging into their account and accessing features such as Edit Profile.

Security
Mercury Grove online service member accounts are secured by member-created passwords. Mercury Grove takes precautions to insure that member account information is kept private. We use reasonable measures to protect member information that is stored within our database, and we restrict access to member information to those employees who need access to perform their job functions, such as our customer service personnel and technical staff. Please note that we cannot guarantee the security of member account information. Unauthorized entry or use, hardware or software failure, and other factors may compromise the security of member information at any time For any additional information about the security measures we use on Mercury Grove online services, please contact us at privacy@mercurygrove.com.

Sharing and Disclosure of Information that Mercury Grove Collects
Except as otherwise described in this privacy statement, Mercury Grove will not disclose personal information to any third party unless we believe that disclosure is necessary: (1) to conform to legal requirements or to respond to a subpoena, search warrant or other legal process received by Mercury Grove, whether or not a response is required by applicable law; (2) to enforce the Mercury Grove online service Terms of Use Agreement or to protect our rights; or (3) to protect the safety of members of the public and users of the service. Mercury Grove reserves the right to transfer personal information to a successor in interest that acquires rights to that information as a result of the sale of Mercury Grove or a Mercury Grove online service or substantially all of its assets to that successor in interest. For more information see the "Changes in Our Privacy Policy" section below.

Changes in Our Privacy Policy
From time to time we may make changes to our privacy policy. If we make changes, we will post them on our site to make users aware of what the changes are so users will always be aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and when we may disclose it. A user is bound by any minor changes to the policy when she or he uses the site after those changes have been posted. If, however, we are going to use users' personally identifiable information in a manner materially different from that stated at the time of collection we will notify by posting a notice on our Web site for 30 days.

Contacting the Web Site
If you have any questions about this privacy statement, the practices of this site, or your dealings with this web site, please contact us at privacy@mercurygrove.com.

© 2007 Mercury Grove