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Herpes-Coldsores.com Privacy Policy
The HC Support Network provides information, communication, support and awareness for the herpes virus. As part of this role we are committed to maintaining a high level of privacy for our visitors. It is important for our community to feel completely safe, anonymous and at ease. This allows people to talk openly about this disease and to become involved in our free support services.
Protecting Your Identity
Choose a Unique and Confidential User Name
When registering on our Support Forum please make sure to choose a User Name that:
- Is not related to your first name, last name or nickname
- Is not a word contained in your email address
- Is not an alias or screen name that use anywhere else
We run a public forum where the contents are crawled and indexed regularly by search engines. This includes user names, threads and posts (all conversations on the forums). For this reason please choose a user name that is confidential. Other account information, such as your email address and password, are automatically private.
Never Post Personal Information
The forum community at the HC Support Network is public, which means anyone who is surfing the internet is welcome to come in and join our conversations. Do not post any private details such as you or someone else’s real name, street address or telephone number – this type of information will be removed if detected. Please login to your account and change your username if it contains any detail that you could be recognized by. It must be completely anonymous.
Your profile page and photo, if you have uploaded one, is restricted to members only. This means that only other logged in members can view this information. However, all of the posts and threads on our forum – including your username and avatar, the image beside your name, are public for all to see. For this reason, please do not use your real name, nickname or a username that you use anywhere else, such as on messenger or other social networking sites, unless you wish to be recognized.
Closing an Account and Deleting Threads
If a you wish to close an account please contact us. In most cases the HC staff will delete your email address and close the account so that you are no longer associated with the forum. Normally posts and threads that have already been posted will not be removed as it leaves missing and incomplete information on the forums, affects other members’ post counts and takes manual labour to do.
Once a person reaches the post count of 2 or more posts they have the ability to edit their own posts, provided the post is no more than 7 days old. If there is a special circumstance where you need to remove a thread or a post please contact us so that we can help you.
Privacy Statement
The HC Support Network is bound by the National Privacy Principles (‘Principles’) contained in the Privacy Act 1988 (Commonwealth) in collecting, using and storing your personal information. The Principles govern the use of ‘personal information’, which they define as information or an opinion relating to an individual that can be used to identify that individual.
By accessing and using this website, you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as outlined in this Privacy Policy.
Use of Non-Personally Identifiable Data (Anonymous Data)
Most of the information the HC Support Network collects from this website is anonymous information, such as the pages you visit and searches you perform. Other information collected may include the name of your internet service provider, the website you used to link to our site, the websites you visit from our site, and your IP address. The HC Support Network uses this anonymous information to compile aggregate statistics about the use of our website and to help improve the content of this website. No personal information is collected.
Use of Personally Identifiable Information
Some areas of services on this website, such as creating an account, will require you to provide some personal information such as your birth date and email address. If you choose not to provide this information to us, it may not be possible for you to open an account and fully use our services.
Please be assured that the HC Support Network only collects your personal information when it is expressly requested from you. Anytime you choose to provide personally identifiable information to us through this website, the HC Support Network will tell you why the information is being requested and the purpose for which it will be used. The HC Support Network will not use or disclose your personal information for any purpose other than that advised to you.
Security and Confidentiality
As no internet transmission is ever completely secure or error-free, we recommend you take special care in deciding what information you send to us via e-mail.
Whilst the HC Support Network cannot guarantee against any loss, misuse or alteration to information, we take reasonable steps to ensure the security and confidentiality of personal information in our possession from loss, misuse and unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration and destruction. To reduce the risk of any unauthorized viewing of your personal information, the amount and type of information we transmit to your browser when you are at our internet sites and using our applications is limited.
Personal information is only accessible by employees that require access to it in order to undertake their work. The HC Support Network has directed its employees that personal information must be dealt with in accordance with this Policy and the National Privacy Principles and kept secure from unauthorized access or disclosure.
Disclosure of Personally Identifiable Information
The HC Support Network shall not sell your personal information to any third parties under any circumstance. If certain information is required by law, or by regulatory authorities, ethics committees, or for a monitoring or inspection process, the HC Support Network requires such third parties to comply with the terms of this Privacy Policy and the National Privacy Principles.
Links to other sites
This Privacy Policy applies only to this website. If you link from this website to any other site, any personal information collected, used or disclosed will be subject to that site owner’s privacy policy. The HC Support Network suggests you review their privacy policy before disclosing any personal information.
A ‘cookie’ is a small data file sent placed on your computer’s hard drive by a web page server. For some personal registration features, where permitted by law, we use cookies to remember your selections. Cookies by themselves cannot be used to discover the identity of the user. You can set your browser to notify you when you receive a cookie; this will enable you to decide if you want to accept it or not.
Please be assured that we do not use cookies to collect personal information without your consent.
Access to your personal information
If we hold personal information about you, you are able to access, change or update such personal information at any time by logging into your account and changing the information in the profile and settings areas. You may also withdraw your authorisation for future use of your personal information at any time. In such circumstances, please contact us.
Updates
This Privacy Policy is effective as at 9th August, 2012. By using this website, you signify your assent to our Privacy Policy. We reserve the right, at our discretion, to modify this policy at any time. Please refer to this page from time to time to review these and other new features. Your continued use of our website following the posting of changes to these terms means you accept these changes.
