Hari Ravichandran

Last Updated
September 26, 2018

Privacy Policy

SCOPE OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY

This Privacy Policy applies to HariRavichandran.com and all other websites, applications, online services, and other interactive features or downloads that post a link to this Privacy Policy (collectively, the “Sites”), that are owned or controlled by Hari K. Ravichandran and affiliated companies (“HKR”, “we” or “us”). This Privacy Policy describes what kind of information is collected when you interact with our Sites, how we use that information, the measures we take to protect your information, and how you can opt-out and change your preferences.

BY USING THE SITES, YOU ARE EXPRESSLY ACCEPTING AND CONSENTING TO THE PRACTICES DESCRIBED IN THIS PRIVACY POLICY, AS IT MAY BE AMENDED FROM TIME TO TIME.  WE MAY UPDATE AND EXPAND OUR SITES AND SERVICES, AND THIS PRIVACY POLICY MAY CHANGE, SO CHECK BACK TO THIS POLICY PERIODICALLY. 

This Privacy Policy only covers information collected through our Sites, although it may also apply to information we collect offline (e.g., if you provide us with information by phone, through the mail, or at book shows and fairs) if specifically stated at the time of collection or if the information is combined in our databases.

IF YOU LIVE OR RESIDE OUTSIDE THE UNITED STATES, BE AWARE THAT INFORMATION WE COLLECT FROM YOU THROUGH OUR SITES WILL BE TRANSFERRED AND PROCESSED IN THE UNITED STATES.  BY USING THE SITES OR PROVIDING US WITH YOUR INFORMATION, YOU FULLY UNDERSTAND AND CONSENT TO THIS TRANSFER, PROCESSING OF YOUR INFORMATION IN THE UNITED STATES, A JURISDICTION IN WHICH THE PRIVACY LAWS MAY NOT BE AS COMPREHENSIVE AS THOSE IN THE COUNTRY WHERE YOU RESIDE.

TYPES OF INFORMATION WE COLLECT

We collect information through our Sites to communicate with readers about authors and books we believe may interest them, and for our legitimate business needs. When you use the Sites, we may collect and process the following types of information about you:

Information You Provide Directly to HKR

We may collect personal information through the Sites that you directly and voluntarily provide to us on forms submitted to our Sites (e.g. Newsletters, polls, surveys, comments, desk copy orders), through contests and sweepstakes, and/or through your requests for customer or technical support, such as: your name, street address, email address, phone numbers, birthdate, zip code, text message address or other wireless device address, instant messaging address, social media handle, payment information, and/or other information that may identify you as an individual or allow online or offline contact with you as an individual.

Information Automatically Collected When You Visit HKR Sites
Certain information is collected automatically about your use and interaction with our Sites which may include: pages or content you open or interact with, pages you viewed or searched for, page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs), and methods used to browse away from the page. We may also collect technical information about your device, including an identifier, device type, IP address, phone, browser type and version, time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform.  The ways we collect your data automatically on our Sites are:

  1. Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies

We may use “cookies”, web beacons, or similar technologies to collect or receive information about you, including pages and content viewed.  Cookies are small data files that are sent to your browser or related software from a Web server and stored on your computer’s hard drive.  We may use these tracking technologies to enable certain features and functionalities of our Sites to remember you and your preferences, to track your use of our Sites, to serve targeted ads, and to provide content to users.  Some tracking technologies used on our Sites may be implemented and controlled by third-party partners.  Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, and some browsers offer a “Do Not Track” feature that lets you tell websites that you do not want to have your online activities tracked. We do not respond to these “Do Not Track” signals, but you can modify and control your own browser setting to decline cookies, or to indicate when they are being used.  If you choose to opt-out of these tracking technologies some features of our Sites may not function properly.

  1. Embedded Scripts

We may use embedded scripts, which are programming code designed to collect information about your interactions with the Sites, such as the links you click on.  The code is temporarily downloaded into your device from our web server or a third-party service provider.  Third-party services may use this code to track your interactions across sites where their embedded script is deployed, including third party sites.

Information from Third Party Social Media Networks

Our Sites contains links to third party social media sites (e.g. Linked In, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter).  If you choose to “like”, review, or “share” content though the Sites or otherwise post information from or via the Sites to a third-party websites, features or applications, that information may be publicly displayed and the third-party website may have access to information about you and your use of our Sites.  We may also receive information about you if you choose to participate in social media applications through which you allow us to collect (or the third party to share) information about you, including personal information.

Third party social media sites have different privacy policies than our own. We are not responsible for the content or privacy policies of any such other sites.  We encourage you to be aware that when you leave our Sites you should read the privacy policy of the other site you go to understand what that other site collects, and how it uses information about you with others.

THIRD PARTY TRACKING, ANALYTICS AND AD SERVERS

Third parties, such as ad networks, analytics companies and social networking platforms, may collect information about your online activities over time and across our Sites and other third party online properties or services.  These companies may use information about your visits to our Sites and other websites, and other general geographic information derived from your IP address, and may employ cookies, web beacons and similar technologies, to better understand your behavior and browsing activities, or to serve targeted advertising when you visit third-party sites.   We may also share non-personal, aggregated or de-identified or hashed information with third parties to serve you with relevant advertising, and to allow others to do so.  Third parties may track your Internet usage anonymously (that is, without being able to identify you personally) over time and across other websites in their networks beyond our Sites. To learn more about the use of this information or to opt out of having this information used by third-party network advertisers who are members of the Network Advertising Initiative, please visit http://www.networkadvertising.org/managing/opt_out.asp; or by participating companies in the Digital Advertising Alliance Self-Regulatory Program for Online Behavioral Advertising please visit http://aboutads.info/choices.

HOW WE USE YOUR INFORMATION

We use information we collect about you in various ways:

  • To enable us to provide and maintain our Sites, including Site administration and internal operations such as troubleshooting and testing;
  • To improve our Sites to ensure that content is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your device of choice;
  • To tailor content, recommendations and offers we display to you, both on the Sites and elsewhere online;
  • To send you information or special offers from us or on behalf of third parties;
  • To determine your eligibility to win and/or to send you a prize or award in connection with a contest or sweepstakes;
  • To respond to your questions or contact you about our Sites and services;
  • To enable targeted advertising for our books across unaffiliated web properties;
  • To notify you about changes to our Sites;
  • To keep our Sites safe and secure; and
  • To comply with legal and regulatory requirements.

HOW WE SHARE YOUR INFORMATION

We may share information about you, which may include personal information, with select third parties in the following ways or in the following circumstances:

  • We may share with business partners, suppliers and sub-contractors to the extent necessary to assist us in providing and maintaining our Sites, to fulfill requests, and for the improvement and optimization of our Sites;
  • We may share with service providers and business partners who supplement information we collect with additional information about our Sites’ visitors and help us better connect with our audiences;
  • We may share email with our authors whose lists you have opted-in to receive via our Sites so that they can reach out to you directly about events and newsletters;
  • We may share with third party advertisers to enable us to target ads;
  • We may share with third parties or co-sponsors of promotions which we conduct (i.e., when we are the Sponsor). In those situations, the information we obtain from you in connection with the promotion may be shared with our partner when we specifically indicate to users that we may do so and obtain your consent by participating in the promotion. In those situations, our partner will have the right to email you directly or to ask us to share our information about you with the other party for their own purposes consistent with their own privacy policies, which we urge you read before giving you consent, as we are not responsible for how partners may use the information; and
  • We may share aggregated demographic information with other third parties, but not information that describes or identifies any individual user.

STORAGE AND SECURITY OF YOUR INFORMATION

By visiting our Sites, using our Sites or submitting information to our Sites, you are consenting to the collection, transfer, storing, and processing of information about you. We will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your data is treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

We take reasonable precautions to protect your information both online and offline and allow only employees and third-party contractors who need the information to perform a specific job to access your information.

Some information you provide to us or our partners may be stored by third parties, on our behalf or in addition to our own storage. For example, we use third parties to operate some of our promotions, to store our subscription databases, and to process transactions. We take reasonable steps to confirm that those third-party partners who collect information on our behalf take appropriate steps to protect and secure your information.  Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure.  Although we do our best to protect your information, we cannot guarantee or warrant the security of your data; any transmission is at your risk.

HKR reserves the right to monitor all network traffic to our Sites to identify and/or block unauthorized attempts or intrusions, including the uploading or changing of our Sites to or to otherwise change information or cause damage to Sites in any manner. Anyone using our Sites expressly consents to such monitoring.  In the unlikely event that we believe that the security of your information in our possession or control may have been compromised, we may notify you by e-mail.

CHILDREN

Our Sites are for general audiences and are not intended for or directed to children under 13 years of age, nor does HKR knowingly collect or store personal information from the Sites from children under 13. If we discover that a user is under 13 years of age, he or she is not permitted to submit any personal information to the Sites, unless we have specified otherwise for a specific promotion on a Site.  If a parent or guardian becomes aware that his or her child has provided us with personal information without the parent or guardian’s consent, he or she should contact us at [email protected]. We will delete such information from our files within a reasonable amount of time.

CALIFORNIA PRIVACY RIGHTS

FOR RESIDENTS OF CALIFORNIA ONLY

Section 1798.83 of the California Civil Code requires select businesses to disclose policies relating to the sharing of certain categories of personal information with third parties. If you reside in California and have provided your personal information to us, you may request information about our disclosures of certain categories of personal information to third parties for direct marketing purposes. Such requests must be submitted to us at:

HKR
185 Dartmouth Street – Seventh Floor
Boston, MA  02116

Within thirty (30) days of receiving such a request, we will provide a list of the categories of personal information disclosed to third parties for third-party direct marketing purposes during the immediately preceding calendar year, along with the names and addresses of those third parties. This request may be made no more than once per calendar year. We reserve our right not to respond to requests submitted other than to the address specified in this section, if not labeled or sent properly, or do not have complete information.

MISCELLANEOUS

Legal Duty to Disclose your Information. We may share your information if we are under a duty to disclose or share information about you to comply with any court order or any legal obligation, or to enforce or apply our Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, or to protect the rights, property, or safety of HKR, our readers, or others.

CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY POLICY

HKR reserves the right to make changes to any terms of this Privacy Policy at any time.  Please check back frequently to see any updates or changes to this Privacy Policy. We may also notify you by email, in our discretion, or by posting a prominent notification on our Sites.  Your access and/or use of our Sites after the effective date of such changes will be deemed an acceptance of and consent to be bound by the terms as changed.

This Privacy Policy shall be interpreted under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, without regard to any conflict of laws provisions or principles.

CONTACT US

Questions, comments and requests regarding this Privacy Policy are welcomed and should be addressed to: [email protected].

Last Updated on September 26, 2018.