Privacy Policy

The Alpharetta News (“we,” “us,” or the “Company”) was founded to be Alpharetta’s most trusted source of local news and information. We know that you care about how your personal information is used and shared, and we take your privacy very seriously. By visiting our website, registering with us or using any of our services, you are accepting and agree to comply with this privacy policy (the “Policy”). The column on the right provides a short explanation of the Policy and is not legally binding.

This Policy covers our treatment of personal information that we gather when you are on our website and when you use our services. This Policy does not apply to the practices of third parties that we do not own or control, or to individuals or entities that we do not employ or manage.

INFORMATION COLLECTED BY US

We only collect personal information that is relevant to the purpose of providing our news, information, software, and other services to you (collectively, the “Services”) through our website or mobile application (collectively, the “Application”). This information allows us to provide you with a customized and efficient experience. We collect the following types of information from our users:

INFORMATION YOU PROVIDE TO US

We receive and store any information you enter through our Application or that provide to us in any other way. You may choose not to provide us with certain information, but then you may not be able to take advantage of the Application or some of its special features. Newsletter: To receive our newsletter, we require certain personal information, such as your name and email address. Our lawful basis for collecting personal information from you is to provide our services and to communicate with you through your consent when you register with us. Our collection of personal information from you is limited to information that we require in order to provide our Service to you. Correspondence and comments: We may record your comments and opinions when you contact us directly (e.g. by email, phone, mail, or when you interact with our customer service) or when you respond to our surveys. We use this information to address your concerns and questions and to resolve any service issues you may have. You have the right to edit, update, access, or transfer your personal information, or to delete your personal information if you are terminating your registration with us.

THIRD-PARTY PAYMENT PROCESSOR

We use a third-party payment processor to process payments made to us. In connection with the processing of such payments, we do not retain any personally identifiable information or any financial information such as credit card numbers. Rather, all such information is provided directly to our third-party processor, Stripe, whose use of your personal information is governed by their privacy policy, which may be viewed at https://stripe.com/privacy.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT AUTOMATICALLY

We receive and store certain types of information whenever you interact with us. We and our authorized agents automatically receive and record certain “traffic data” on server logs from your browser and apps including your IP address, cookie information, and the page you requested. We use this traffic data to help diagnose problems with our servers, analyze trends and administer the Application. This does not involve collecting any of your personal information. In addition to the “traffic data,” we and our authorized agents may collect information about the device you’re using to access our Application, its operating system, unique device identifier, device settings such as language and crash data. Which data is specifically collected depends on the type of device and/or system running on that device. This data is again used to help us diagnose problems with the Application and analyze trends. This does not involve collecting any of your personal information. We may collect and use information regarding the geographic location of your devices. If the location data contains your personal information, then we will treat this location data in accordance with this Policy. Many companies offer programs that help you to visit websites anonymously. While we will not be able to provide you with a personalized experience if we cannot recognize you, we want you to be aware that these programs are available.

COMMUNICATIONS

E-mail: We are very concerned about your privacy, and we will never provide your email address to a third party without your explicit permission, as detailed in the “Sharing Your Information” section below. We may send out emails with Company-related news, products, offers, surveys or promotions. You may also receive notification emails from us that inform you of actions that have been performed on the site. We send these emails to you based on receiving your consent at registration. If you do not want to receive email from us, please visit the “Email Preferences” section of your user profile and/or follow the “unsubscribe” instructions contained in each email message. However, please note that in all cases you will continue to receive all system emails (e.g. those regarding forgotten user passwords) and legal notices (e.g. updates to our policies) from us unless you terminate your registration altogether.

COOKIES

These cookies aren’t meant to be eaten, but they do provide you with some good things. These “cookies” are alphanumeric identifiers that we transfer to your computer’s hard drive through your Internet browser to enable our systems to recognize your browser and tell us how and when pages in our website are visited and by how many people. Our cookies do not collect personal information. We also utilize third-party services like Google Analytics and Google AdWords to help analyze how our site is used and to inform, optimize, and serve ads based on your past visits to our Application. These services, including Google Analytics, also use cookies, such as the Google Analytics cookie, to collect information about visitors to our site (including IP addresses) in an anonymous form that does not include personal information. This means that vendors, including Google, will display our promotional material on other websites you visit across the Internet. The “help” portion of the toolbar on most browsers will direct you on how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to command the browser to tell you when you receive a new cookie, or how to fully disable cookies. We recommend that you leave the cookies activated because cookies allow you to use some of our best features. Some of our business partners, like our advertisers, may use cookies on our website. We have no access to, or control over, these cookies. You may opt out of Google Analytics for Display Advertisers including AdWords and opt out of customized Google Display Network ads by visiting the Google Ads Preferences Manager. To provide visitors more choice on how their data is collected by Google Analytics, Google has developed an Opt-out Browser add-on, which is available by visiting Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on to enable you to opt-out of Google’s programs.

THIRD-PARTY ANALYTIC SERVICES

We use services like Google Analytics and Parse.ly to help analyze and understand how our site and mobile applications are used, so that we can make our products more helpful to you. These tools capture data about how individual users are using our Application. This includes event logs, device type and device configuration settings such as language, crash data, and other data but never personal information. These third-party services treat the analytics data in accordance with this privacy policy, and we do not disclose your personal information to any third parties through our use of these services.

SHARING YOUR INFORMATION

Your trust is important to us. Rest assured that we will not rent or sell your personal information to anyone and that we will share your personal information only as described below: Our personnel: Our personnel and authorized consultants and/or contractors may have access to user information if necessary in the normal course of our business, but they will have contractual obligations to comply with this Policy. Business Transfers: In some cases, we may choose to buy or sell assets. In these types of transactions, user information is typically one of the business assets that is transferred. Moreover, if the Company, or substantially all of its assets, were acquired, user information would be one of the assets that would be transferred. Any transferee would still be obligated by law to comply with this Policy. Protection of the Company and Others: We may release personal information when we believe in good faith that release is necessary to comply with a law; to enforce or apply our Terms of Use and other policies; or to protect the rights, property, or safety of the Company, our employees, our users, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for fraud protection and credit risk reduction. Service Providers: We may share user information as well as information from tools such as cookies, log files, device identifiers, and location data, with third-parties that help us provide services to you (“Service Providers”). Our Service Providers will be given access to your information as is reasonably necessary for us to provide our services. We require Services Providers to protect your data in a manner consistent with this Policy and to limit the use of such information to the performance of services for us. We may also remove parts of data that can identify you and share anonymized data with Service Providers, including combining your information with other information in a way that it is no longer associated with you. Data Storage: Your encrypted personal information is stored on servers provided by a third-party cloud-based service provider that protects and stores your data in a manner that is consistent with this Policy. With Your Consent: Except as noted above, we will contact you when your personal information is shared with third parties or used for a purpose incompatible with the purpose(s) for which it was originally collected, and you will be able to opt out to prevent the sharing of this information. Aggregated personal data: In an ongoing effort to better understand and serve the users of the Application, we may conduct research on our customer demographics, interests and behavior based on personal data and other information provided to us. This research may be compiled and analyzed on an aggregate basis, and we may share this aggregate data with our affiliates, agents and business partners. This aggregate information does not identify you personally. We may also disclose aggregated user statistics in order to describe our services to current and prospective business partners, and to other third parties for other lawful purposes.

KEEPING INFORMATION SECURE

We take reasonable steps to protect the personal information provided through the Application from loss, misuse, and unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, or destruction, including by protecting your information behind a firewall within a perimeter network and encrypting your information during transmission However, no Internet or email transmission is ever fully secure or error-free. You can help protect your information against unauthorized access by logging off once you have finished using a shared computer and by keeping your password private and secure. Only employees who need personal information to perform a specific job (for example, a customer service representative) are granted access to it. All of our employees are kept up to date on our privacy and security practices.

WAYS TO CONTROL USE OF YOUR INFORMATION

As stated previously, you can always opt not to disclose information, but then you may be unable to use certain features in our Application. By visiting your user profile, you can correct, amend, add or delete personal information in the Application. If you do not wish to receive email from us, please visit the settings of your user profile and/or follow the instructions contained in the unwanted email message. However, please note that you will continue to receive all system emails (e.g. those regarding forgotten user passwords) and legal notices (e.g. updates to our policies) from us unless you terminate your registration with us. As explained earlier, the “help” portion of the toolbar on most browsers will direct you on how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to command the browser to tell you when you receive a new cookie, or how to fully disable cookies. Please note, however, that if your browser does not accept cookies, you will not be able to take advantage of some Application features.

CHILDREN UNDER 18 YEARS OF AGE

You must be 18 years or older to register to use our Application. As a result, we do not specifically collect information about children. If we learn that we have collected information from a child under the age of 13, we will delete that information as quickly as possible.

CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

We may amend this Policy from time to time, at our sole discretion. Use of information we collect now is subject to the Policy in effect at the time such information is collected. If we make changes to the Policy, we will notify you by emailing you at the current email address in your user profile and by posting an announcement on our website so you are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances if any, it is disclosed.

CONDITIONS OF USE

If you decide to use our website or Services, your use and any possible dispute over privacy is subject to this Policy and our Terms of Use, including limitations on damages, alternative dispute resolutions, and application of Texas law.
QUESTIONS If you have any questions, comments or requests relating to this Policy, please send an email to [email protected].

EFFECTIVE DATE OF THIS POLICY This Policy is effective as of March 29, 2022.