8HANDS PRIVACY POLICY

At 8hands, which is operated by EglooMedia, we take your privacy seriously. This Privacy Policy explains how EglooMedia will use the information you provide to us via the 8hands software and service, described in the 8hands End User License Agreement, available at http://www.8hands.com/terms-of-use. By using 8hands, you are accepting the practices described in this Privacy Policy. EglooMedia may amend this Privacy Policy from time to time, and the revised Privacy Policy will be posted on this web site, available at http://www.8hands.com/privacy-policy. This Privacy Policy does not apply to information collected by third party web sites and web services linked to or otherwise accessible from 8hands. The information collected or received by third party web sites is subject to their own privacy policies.

 

To protect your privacy, we adhere to the following principles:

 

 

Collection of Information

 

Registration

In order to become an 8hands user, you must first register and create an account. To create an account you are required to provide a valid email address and choose a username and password. In addition, in order to access certain third party web sites and web services through 8hands, you are required to enter your user name(s) and password(s) for those sites and services. We store your user name(s) and password(s) on our secure servers in order to facilitate your access to such third party web sites and web services from multiple locations and ensure safer access from shared computers.

 

Personal information

 

We collect and store personally identifiable information about you when you interact with 8hands as a registered user. Depending on how you use the service, we may collect information about your 8hands dashboard; your friends and contacts; your activities and events (including, for example, comments posted to your blogs, pictures and videos, friend requests, and items you uploaded); and your 8hands instant messaging communications.

 

Non-personal information

 

We collect and store certain technical information when you use 8hands, including: the type of operating system you are using, CPU type, your manner of connecting to the Internet; Internet protocol address; other information about your geographic location; and the domain name of your Internet service provider.

 

Cookies

 

We may use cookies (pieces of data stored on your computer tied to information about you) to enhance and personalize your experience on 8hands; to help authenticate your identity when you visit and transact with 8hands; to remember your preferences and registration information; to present and help measure and research the effectiveness of 8hands offerings, advertisements, and email communications; and to customize the content and advertisements provided to you by 8hands.

 

Usage statistics

 

We may track usage statistics in order to monitor and improve 8hands' performance, service and features. Usage information will be anonymized so that it cannot be traced back to you, not even by us.

 

Using Your Information

 

Your information is stored on our secure servers and used to operate and improve the 8hands service; to conduct research about your use of 8hands; to personalize the content and advertisements provided to you; and to communicate with you and respond to your inquiries.

 

Your user name(s) and password(s) stored on our secure servers will be used strictly to facilitate your access to third party web sites and web services, which require such log-in credentials. We will never use your user name(s) and password(s) for any other purpose.

 

8hands aggregates information about your social networking activities and events for presentation on your dashboard. Such information is used by 8hands primarily to be presented back to and edited by you when you access the service. In some cases, where your privacy settings permit it, other 8hands users may be able to access the information presented on your dashboard.

 

Certain third party web sites and web services require manual authorization to allow remote access by applications such as 8hands. To enhance your 8hands experience, we will automatically provide such authorization on your behalf on any such site or service you chose to add/track.

 

8hands notifies you in real time concerning any activity on your social network locations. In addition, we may use your name and email address to send you notifications regarding new services offered by 8hands that we think you may find valuable.

 

8hands applies a proprietary ranking algorithm to rank your friends in all social networking locations according to the level of interaction they have with you. If you set your privacy settings to permit it, other 8hands users would be able to access this information.

 

Another 8hands proprietary ranking algorithm ranks your own aggregate level of social networking activities. If you set your privacy settings to permit it, other 8hands users would be able to access this information too.

 

Sharing Your Information

 

We share your information with third parties only in limited circumstances where we believe such sharing is (a) permitted by you, (b) reasonably necessary to offer the service, or (c) legally required.

 

8hands allows you to share information with friends, while restricting other third parties from accessing your information. You always retain control over information you provide to friends through 8hands. 8hands allows you to make informed choices about who has access to your information, and about which information, including activities, events and items, will be shared with any given user. In addition, you can at any time withdraw your consent to share information with any given user, thereafter blocking such user's access to your information. In the future, we may include an automatic notification feature to warn you of actions which may jeopardize your privacy. You will always be able to ignore such notifications and continue with your actions, if you so choose.

 

We will share your user name(s) and password(s) with a third party web site or web service, only as necessary to facilitate your access to such third party web site or web service through 8hands. We may share your personal information with our authorized service providers that perform certain functions or services on our behalf. Specifically, we may use third parties to facilitate our business, such as to host the service at a co-location facility for servers, to send out email updates about 8hands, to remove repetitive information from our user lists, to process payments for products or services, or to provide search results or links. In connection with these offerings and business operations, our service providers may have access to your personal information for use for a limited purpose and time. Where we utilize third parties for the processing of any personal information, we implement reasonable protections limiting the use of that information to the specified purpose.

 

Your 8hands user information, including the contents of your instant messaging communications, may be accessed and disclosed in response to legal process (for example, a court order, search warrant or subpoena); in other circumstances in which we believe the 8hands software or service is being used in the commission of a crime; to prevent fraud or other illegal activity perpetrated through the 8hands software or service or using the 8hands name; when we have a good faith belief that there is an emergency that poses a threat to the safety of you or another person; or when necessary either to protect or defend the rights or property of EglooMedia or the safety of the public. This may include sharing information with other companies, lawyers, agents or government agencies.

 

In the event that ownership of EglooMedia, or individual business units owned by EglooMedia, was to change as a result of a merger, acquisition or transfer to another company, your information may be transferred to the new owner so the service can continue. In any such transfer of information, your user information would remain subject to the promises made in this Privacy Policy.

 

Security

 

We implement industry standard and proprietary technologies to help prevent unauthorized access to or misuse of your information. Your information is located on secured servers behind a firewall. We restrict access to your information to those employees who need it to perform their job functions, such as customer service personnel and technical staff. However, we cannot guarantee that your personally identifiable information will never be disclosed in a manner inconsistent with this Privacy Policy (for example, as a result of unauthorized acts by third parties that violate applicable law or agreements). To protect your privacy and security, 8hands uses passwords to help verify your identity before granting access or making corrections to any of your information. You are responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your password. We advise that you do not divulge your password to anyone. If a third party discovers your password through no fault of us, we cannot be held responsible for unauthorized access to your information.

 

Children’s Privacy

 

8hands is intended for a general audience. Children under the age of 13 are not permitted to register with 8hands. Should a child whom we know to be under 13 send personal information to us, we will use that information only to respond directly to that child to inform him or her that we must have parental consent before receiving his or her personal information.

 

Changes to this Privacy Policy

 

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time, so you should review it periodically. If there are significant changes to 8hands' information practices, you will be provided with appropriate online notice. You may be provided with additional privacy-related information in connection with special features and services that may be introduced in the future.

 

How to Contact Us

 

If you have any questions or concerns about the 8hands Privacy Policy or its implementation, you may contact us at this email address: info (at) 8hands (dot) com.

 

LAST UPDATED 24 FEBRUARY 2008