QUITNOW MEN PRIVACY STATEMENT
British Columbia Lung Association (“British Columbia Lung Association”, “we”, “us”) provides this website service at www.mens.quitnow.ca to provide you with internet based resources to assist you to quit smoking. British Columbia Lung Association is committed to protecting your privacy and to providing you with a service that provides a safe online experience.
This privacy statement summarizes the privacy practices at the QuitNow Men Online Web Service. By using the QuitNow Men Online Web Service, you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information in accordance with this statement.
Collection of Your Personal Information
Information you provide us
We collect personal information which you supply to us voluntarily by using the QuitNow Men Online Web Service. This includes information that you provide when you:
(a) fill out surveys or self assessment questionnaires,
(c) use the quit date function to report a quit date,
(d) make requests for expert advice,
(e) make posts on the forum or shared stories platforms.
Please keep in mind that if you directly disclose personally identifying information or personally sensitive data through the QuitNow Online Web Service forums, clubs, chat, message boards and other community resources, this information may be collected and used by others and we are not responsible for those uses. You can choose what information is disclosed to other members of the community who view your profile. Please review your privacy settings carefully before sharing information on the QuitNow Men Online Web Service.
Information Automatically Collected
There is also information about your computer hardware and software that is automatically collected by the QuitNow Men Online Web Service. Like many other organizations’ web sites, ours automatically collects certain non identifying information regarding users of our site, such as the Internet Protocol (IP) address of your computer, the IP address of your internet service provider, the date and time you access the QuitNow Men Online Web Service, the operating system you are using, the sections of our web service that you visit, the pages of our web service that you read. This non identifying information is used for the operation of the QuitNow Men Online Web Service, to maintain quality of the service, and to provide general statistics regarding use of the QuitNow Online Web Service.
We make no attempt to link this information with the identity of individuals visiting our web service. We may, however, review service logs for security purposes, for example to detect intrusions into our network. The possibility therefore exists that service log data, which contains visitors’ IP addresses, could in instances of criminal malfeasance be used to trace and identify individuals. In such instances, raw data logs would be shared with the appropriate investigative bodies authorized to investigate such breaches of security. The QuitNow Men Online Web Service uses “cookies” to allow us to tailor your experience at our web service to be more helpful.
A “cookie” is a text file that is placed on your hard disk by a web page server. You may choose to decline cookies if your browser permits, but doing so may affect your use of the QuitNow Men Online Web Service and your ability to access certain features of our web service.
Use of Your Personal Information
British Columbia Lung Association collects and uses your personal information to operate the QuitNow Men Online Web Service and deliver services you have requested.
If you register with our services we use the email address you provide to contact you periodically for surveys of your success in quitting unless you opt out and request that we not contact you.
One form of support provided by the QuitNow Men Online Web Service is online counselling. All counsellors have agreed to policies to ensure confidentiality of your information.
You have the right to request that we communicate to you for support and advice in a certain way. You may change your email address to a work address or whatever address you prefer.
We also use the information we collect about you to operate and improve our website. We may need to access your user information to keep our web service running. This includes troubleshooting technical support issues. If you report a problem with the site, we may access your user information to identify the web browser you are using or to reproduce a problem you have reported. We will also periodically run reports to determine how many people are online, what features they are using, and what the general characteristics of our users are. For example, we will run a report to show us how many users have set quit dates or how many users have registered in a given period. Development of an effective online smoking cessation program is a continuing task. Throughout the process of improving the site, we will perform a variety of analyses to answer questions about how users like you use our site. We use this information internally and will never release personal information to outside marketers. We deploy content targeted to you based on information in your user profile. For example, If you receive emails, the content of these emails will be customized based on your quit date.
Disclosure of Your Personal Information
As a general rule, all information concerning users of the QuitNow Men Online Web Service is held by us in strict confidence and, except in limited circumstances, is not revealed to anyone else unless expressly or implicitly authorized by such individuals.
We do not sell or share your personal information with outside organizations. There are, however, a few exceptions. We may provide personal information to outside suppliers or contractors from whom we obtain services. We may also disclose personal information to meet regulatory requirements or otherwise without your consent, as required or permitted by law. Where we are obliged or permitted to disclose personal information without consent, we will not disclose more information than is required.
British Columbia Lung Association has engaged Smallbox Inc. as our service provider to host and operate the QuitNow Online Web Service on our behalf. Smallbox Inc. is based in Canada. The QuitNow Online Web Service is hosted and stored on servers located in Canada
We sometimes share aggregate information with our agents, contractors or medical researchers for research related matters. This information does not include anything that could be used to identify you.
Security of Your Personal Information
In operating the QuitNow Men Online Web Service, British Columbia Lung Association secures your personal information from unauthorized access, use or disclosure. British Columbia Lung Association secures the personally identifying information you provide on computer servers in a controlled, secured environment, protected from unauthorized access, use or disclosure.
Employees and contractors engaged in the operation of the QuitNow Men Online Web Service are trained to respect the information that they access in the course of working with the QuitNow Men Online Web Service. For example, when you ask a question of an expert counsellor, that counsellor will not reveal your name or email address to anyone else if he or she needs to discuss details about a particular question to better help you. If you report a technical problem, while the technical person solving the problem may see information such as your quit date, he or she would never pass that information along to anyone else unless it is necessary to solve the problem.
We Will Protect You When You Are On Our Site
The QuitNow Men Online Web Service may contain optional links to partners and third party information sites and services that may collect data from you or your computer. Please be aware that if you choose to leave our site via a link, British Columbia Lung Association assumes no responsibility for the privacy practices or the content of other websites. We encourage you to review the privacy statements of websites you choose to link to from the QuitNow Men Online Web Service so that you can understand how those websites collect, use and share your personal information.
Evolving Practices
This statement is in effect as of June 26, 2014. The development of British Columbia Lung Association’s procedures for protection of personal information is an ongoing process. Due to changes in technology and legal requirements and other reasons, British Columbia Lung Association will from time to time review and revise this statement. New versions of this statement will be posted here. Accordingly, when you use the QuitNow Men Online Web Service you should check the date of this statement and review any changes since the last version.
Important Information
Please review the BC Lung Association’s Privacy Policy for further information.
How to Contact Us
You may contact us regarding your questions or concerns about our privacy practices at:
Privacy Officer
British Columbia Lung Association
PO Box 34009 Station D
Vancouver, British Columbia V6J 4M2
or at: