Florida Atlantic University College of Engineering & Computer Science Video Community

uTIPu is committed to protecting your online privacy. The following policy explains how your personal information will be treated when you use the uTIPu service. We will tell you about material changes to this policy in advance, by posting a notice on our Web site, and informing you of any choices you may have about those changes.

If you have questions or concerns regarding this statement, please contact uTIPu by e-mail at Privacy Department.

What uTIPu is and why your information is needed

uTIPu is a Web based service enabling users to record, store and share help tips about computer related tasks ("Tip"). This policy explains the personal information we collect in connection with your use of the uTIPu service and how we use it.

What personal information is collected from you

uTIPu collects personal information when you register, including your User Id, your zip code, a password, and your email address. Once registered, you are part of the uTIPu community, a customer account is created, and you can take full advantage of uTIPu's services.

After you register, we may ask you for additional personal information from time to time, such as when you respond to a survey or request for information about your preferences, enter a contest or promotion sponsored by uTIPu, and when you report a problem with the service or with your account. If you contact uTIPu we keep a record of that interaction, including any email you send. A link is included to this Privacy Policy wherever uTIPu collects personal information.

What cookies are and how they are used

In order to provide a personalized service, uTIPu uses cookies to store some information about your account. A cookie is a small amount of data that is sent to your browser from a web server that is stored on your computer's hard drive. uTIPu uses both session ID cookies and persistent cookies. Generally, we use cookies:

• To establish an authenticated session with the service when you login to your uTIPu account using our web interface. When you use uTIPu's web interface to access your account, logging in will require that you accept a session ID cookie. When you close your web browser, the session ID cookie will terminate.
• To remember some of your basic account preferences in order to deliver a better, more personalized service. A persistent cookie may be set when you register, "Sign In," or use the uTIPu web interface to record certain application settings and other preferences.

You have choices with respect to cookies. By modifying your browser preferences, you have the choice to accept all cookies, to be notified when a cookie is set, or to reject all cookies. If you choose to reject all cookies, you will be unable to access your uTIPu account via the web interface.

uTIPu may also record your IP address for system administration, monitoring, and fraud prevention purposes.

To enhance usability of our service, when you search for Tips about a particular task, uTIPu has the ability to collect certain system configuration information of your device such as operating system version, application version (e.g. Microsoft Office 2003) and hardware type and model (e.g. Toshiba Satellite M115). uTIPu may use this information to narrow down the search for you automatically. When you record Tips, uTIPu also has the option to collect such configuration data to better describe the applicability of the Tips. When such data are collected, you will always be given the option to disable the collection of such data.

This privacy statement covers the use of cookies by uTIPu only and does not cover the use of cookies or web beacons by any advertisers on the site or any other business partners. Some of our business partners (e.g. advertisers) use cookies on our site. We have no access to or control over these cookies.

Advertising Networks

We and our advertisers may from time to time use advertising network providers to help present advertisements on uTIPu. These advertising networks use cookies, web beacons, or similar technologies on your computer in order to provide targeted advertisements about goods and services that may be of interest to you while visiting other Web sites. We may share certain information about you as a user that is not personally identified to you (such as user age and zip code) with certain advertising network providers in order to help them deliver more relevant advertisements through their ad networks. The use of cookies, web beacons, or similar technologies by ad network providers is subject to their own privacy policies. We encourage you to return to this section periodically for updated information about advertising networks and the choices that you have about these technologies.

How your information is used

uTIPu uses the personal information we collect or receive about you to operate and improve the service, as well as to communicate with you and respond to your inquiries.

uTIPu will use your e-mail address to send you e-mails that are generated when you perform certain functions within the service. The types of e-mails that are sent include, but are not limited to, welcome e-mails, share e-mails, and cancellation e-mails.

uTIPu will use configuration information of your PC (if you permit us to collect it) to help you and other users to narrow down the scope of searches. This will allow us to show you only Tips that are recorded on systems having similar configurations as yours.

uTIPu does research on customer demographics and behavior based on the information you provide and how you use the service. We gather information about how you use the service using log files, tracking pixels, and database history tables. We do this to better understand and serve our customers. This research is compiled and analyzed on an aggregated and de-identified basis.

With whom your information may be shared

uTIPu will not disclose any of your uTIPu personal information except when we have your permission, in response to legal process or under the circumstances described below. uTIPu does not sell or give access to our customer e-mail list or other customer profile information to third parties. The following describes some of the ways that your information may be disclosed.

• Data in the Aggregate: uTIPu may disclose aggregated statistics (for example, 45% of our users are female) in order to describe our services to prospective partners, advertisers, and other third parties, and for other lawful purposes.
• Service Providers: When you sign up for an uTIPu premium paid service, we will pass relevant information to a third party payment processing company. Sensitive payment information (for example, credit card account number) is encrypted for added security during these transmissions. We prohibit these companies from retaining, sharing, storing or using this personally identifiable information for any other purpose.
• Third Party Retail Distributors: If you register for uTIPu through one of our third party retail distributors, uTIPu may disclose your email address to that specific third party retail distributor.
• uTIPu Files: We do not use the data, information or files that you submit, upload, post, or download on or through uTIPu ("uTIPu Files"). If, however, you disclose your uTIPu Files on public areas of the service, or make such uTIPu Files available to others, such as by sharing, you understand and agree that other online users will have access to any information you provide.
• Special Circumstances: Your uTIPu account information or your uTIPu Files may be accessed and disclosed in response to legal process (for example, a court order, search warrant, or subpoena); in other circumstances in which uTIPu believes the uTIPu service is being used in the commission of a crime; 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 the rights or property of uTIPu, or for us to render the service you have requested.

How you can access, update or delete your information

You can edit your uTIPu account information at any time by accessing your account using our web interface. Your profile information can be modified by accessing the "My Profile" page once you are logged in.

The security precautions in place to protect the loss, misuse, or alteration of your information

When you register for an uTIPu account, the signup page may ask you for personal information. We use industry-standard SSL encryption to help protect the registration information you provide.

Your uTIPu account information and uTIPu customer profile are password-protected to help ensure that you, and only you, have access to this personal information. You may edit your uTIPu account information by logging into our web interface using your uTIPu username and password.

We require that you do not divulge your password to anyone. uTIPu will never ask you for your password in an unsolicited phone call or e-mail. Also remember to sign out of your uTIPu account and close your browser window when you finish your work to help ensure that others cannot access your personal information or files if you share a computer with someone or use a computer in a public place like a library or Internet cafe.

As an Internet company, uTIPu has international sites and users all over the world. When you give uTIPu personal information, that information may be sent electronically to servers outside of the country where you originally entered the information, such as to the United States or other countries. In addition, that information may be used, stored and processed outside of the country where you entered it.

Unfortunately, no data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, uTIPu cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us or while using the service, and you do so at your own risk. We have implemented technical, administrative, and physical safeguards designed to help protect personal information stored in our systems.

How uTIPu uses contact information that you might provide when "Sending an Invitation "?

When you use uTIPu to "Send an Invitation" with someone, you normally enter the intended recipient's e-mail address into the system so that a message can be sent informing him or her of the share. We do not sell or make those e-mail addresses available to any 3rd parties.

When you use uTIPu's "Send an Invitation" feature, you can elect to have the system send a notification message on your behalf by entering the e-mail address(es) of the person(s) with whom you want to invite to join uTIPu or to see a tip. If you prefer, you can instead generate a web link to the tip, which can be sent as part of your own message. "Send an Invitation" notification messages sent by uTIPu are one-time only messages with the sole intent of notifying the recipient of the shared file.

How uTIPu protects privacy of a child?

In compliance with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), we will not knowingly provide access to uTIPu to persons under the age of thirteen (13). If uTIPu later learns that a member is under the age of thirteen (13) we will take appropriate steps to remove the member's information from the database and restrict the individual from future access to the uTIPu service.

What else you should know about your online privacy

Please keep in mind that whenever you voluntarily disclose personal information online - for example on message boards, through e-mail, in chat areas, or in the Tips that you share - that information can be collected and used by others. uTIPu does not control and is not responsible for how others use that information.

This web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that uTIPu is not responsible for the privacy or other practices of other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every web site that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this web site.

Ultimately, you are responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your passwords and/or any account information. Please be careful and responsible online.

Additional Information

Questions regarding this statement should be directed to [email protected] or to uTIPu Inc. 901 Yamato Road, Suite 116, Boca Raton, FL 33496.

Other Resources

• Electronic Frontier Foundation - a civil liberties organization working to protect your rights online.
• Electronic Privacy Information Center - established to focus public attention on emerging civil liberties issues relating to the National Information Infrastructure.
• Privacy Issues Page - from the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT).
• The EPIC Cookies Page - definitions, links, and news.
• How to Protect Your Privacy - information from the Federal Trade Commission

Updated on: 09/17/2007