Privacy Policy

World Archives Holdings LLC

Effective Date: 10/01/2021

Thank you for doing business with World Archives Holdings LLC (“World Archives,” “Company,” “we,” “our,” or “us”). We welcome you and hope you find our network of websites, applications, products, and other subscription services and tools (collectively, the “Services”) helpful and useful. We have adopted this privacy policy (“Privacy Policy”) to help our website visitors, users, current and potential customers, clients, their employees, our employees, and other business partners (“you” or “your,”) understand what Data we collect, store, share, and use, how and why we do so, and what your rights are in regard to that Data.

We always seek to improve our Services to you, and that requires that we collect, store, share, and use information about you and your usage preferences. As we do so, we are absolutely committed to protecting your privacy and the security of your personal information.

In this Privacy Policy, we use the word “Data” to describe all the information we collect that relates to you and your use of our Services. “Data” is broken into different categories, which are defined in the “Data We Collect and How We Use It” https://newspaperarchive.com/privacypolicy/ section of this Privacy Policy. We may refer to the different categories separately, but when we use the word “Data,” we mean all the different categories described in this Privacy Policy. For clarity, the term “Data” does not apply to de-identified and aggregated data that may be derived from Data, including traffic patterns, search activity, and other information that cannot be reasonably connected with any individual (“De-identified Data”). We may use De-identified Data for our own purposes in any manner and without attribution or compensation to any person.

1. DESCRIPTION OF SERVICES

World Archives provides a set of tools and services designed to help our subscribers power their historical and genealogical research, make family connections, and build their family trees. The term “Services” in this Privacy Policy means those items defined as “Services” in our Terms of Service https://newspaperarchive.com/terms/. Our Services consist of a network of Services, including different websites, tools, applications, and products, and we share all Data with each service within the network without restriction. For your information, our network is all owned and operated by World Archives only.

2. LAWFUL BASIS FOR PROCESSING

Many jurisdictions require that we disclose to you the lawful basis for our processing of your Data. We do that in Section 4 and throughout this Privacy Policy. In general, our lawful basis for processing your Data is based on your specific consent, your contract with us, or our legitimate interest in processing that Data, all as described in this Privacy Policy.

By accessing or using any of the Services or by otherwise interacting with us online, you consent to our use of your Data as described in this Privacy Policy and Terms of Service. If our processing of your Data is based on your consent, you may withdraw your consent at any time, and we will cease collecting your Data. However, in some cases, this may result in your inability to receive partial or full access to the Services, and your withdrawal of consent does not limit our ability to use the Data that has been aggregated and anonymized for use by us in connection with our legitimate business efforts in the future. In addition, your withdrawal of consent does not prevent us from retaining and processing Data if we are required or allowed to do so by applicable law or in order to preserve legal claims. It also doesn’t prevent us from processing Data that has been gathered pursuant to a different lawful basis. For example, if you give your consent for us to process your Data, but we are also required by law to keep your Data, that separate “lawful basis” will still apply, even if you withdraw your consent.

When you enter into an agreement with us, either by accessing the Services, by executing an agreement in hard copy or by clicking “I Accept” or similar language online, we will process your Data for the purposes of fulfilling the terms of our contract with you. In that case, our processing of your Data is based on the contract, so your withdrawal of consent will only be effective after the purposes for processing that Data have been fulfilled and after we no longer have a legal obligation to keep that Data.

In all cases, we will comply with applicable law and we will cease processing your Data after the legal right, obligation, or other lawful basis expires, except as expressly provided in the Terms of Service.

3. INTENDED USERS

The Services are directed solely to persons 18 years of age or older or of children under 18 who are supervised by a parent, guardian, or other caregiver. Other than for Data collected for the specific purpose of providing the Services to users, we do not knowingly collect Data from users who are under 13. If we become aware that we have gathered Data from a person under 13, except to provide the Services to such person, and except to the extent allowed or required by law, then we will attempt to delete such Data as soon as possible, subject to our obligations under applicable law. If you believe that we have gathered Data from a person under 13 in contravention of this policy, please contact us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com.

4. DATA WE COLLECT AND HOW WE USE IT

Listed below are the categories of Data we collect when you use our Services. We never sell your Data, and we always have a lawful basis for gathering the Data, but that lawful basis might be different for different categories, and we describe those categories and uses below. Regardless, we never use the Data for any purpose other than the purpose for which we gathered the Data in the first place (which may include expanded uses within our network of Services and improvements on current Services), unless we get your prior explicit consent.

1. Registration Data

1. Data Description: Registration Data consists of the name, e-mail address, street address, and other contact information you provide us using the Services, whether at the time you sign up online or thereafter. Registration Data also includes your username, subscription type and membership end date, if any.
2. Lawful Basis for Processing: Our lawful basis for processing Registration Data is (1) our contract with you or your employer, (2) our legitimate interest in providing the Services to you or your employer, and/or (3) your consent. We can only provide certain of the Services to you if we have the Registration Data, so we need to store and access that Registration Data during the term of our contract. Even when the Registration Data is not critically necessary to the provision of the Services, we may still process that Registration Data to facilitate our contractual interactions with you or your employer.
3. How We Use It and Who We Share It With: Registration Data is accessible only to us and to you. We use it only to provide the Services to you and in the event of a chargeback or other dispute with you. At times, we will share the Registration Data with other third parties at your request or to fulfill requests that you make of us. We may also use your Registration Data to offer our own goods or services to you, either directly through e-mails or through third party platforms, but you may opt out of those offers at any time. We will never share your username or password with any third party. However, we provide your log-in credentials on a “single sign-on” basis, so your credentials for any service within our network will allow access to any of the websites or services within our network.

2. Engagement Data

1. Data Description: Engagement Data consists of all the information you input or record using the Services, except as otherwise stated in this policy. It also includes all information that is proprietary to you regarding your use of the Services (other than the data that qualifies as “Usage Data” below) that is collected or processed by the Services. For clarity, Engagement Data does not include Data described as “Your Content” in our Terms of Service.
2. Lawful Basis for Processing: Our lawful basis for processing Engagement Data is (1) our contract with you or your employer, (2) our legitimate interest in providing the Services for your employer, and/or (3) your consent.
3. How We Use It and Who We Share It With: Your Engagement Data is accessible only to us, to you, and where it relates directly to a party who either interacts with you using the Services or provides services to you or receives services from you, to that party, in which case that party will be obligated to protect the confidentiality of your Engagement Data. We do not share Engagement Data with other third parties, except at your specific request, and except in connection with a chargeback or other dispute with you.

3. Usage Data

1. Data Description: Usage Data consists of the following and similar information:
• Information about your interactions with the Services, most commonly our website, which includes the date and time of any requests you make. This also may include details of your use of Third-Party Applications and any advertising you receive via the Services.
• Adjustments you make to the default state of the Services, such as custom categories or settings.
• The timing of the information you post to the Services including messages you send and/or receive via the Services and your interactions with our customer service team, but not including the content of those interactions and messages, which would be included as Engagement Data.
• Technical data which may include URL information, cookie data, your IP address, the types of devices you are using to access or connect to the Services, unique device IDs, device attributes, network connection type (e.g. WiFi, 4G, LTE, Bluetooth) and provider, network and device performance, browser type, language, information enabling digital rights management, operating system, and application version.
2. Lawful Basis for Processing: Our lawful basis for processing Usage Data is (1) our contract with you or your employer, (2) our legitimate interest in providing the Services to your or your employer, and/or (3) your consent.
3. How We Use It and Who We Share It With: Usage Data is accessible to us and to you. We do not share it with third parties, except at your specific request, but we may use Usage Data to make improvements to the Services and in the event of a chargeback or other dispute with you. To the extent we are required to delete any Usage Data about you, we may still retain aggregated and anonymized information that may have originated as your Usage Data.

4. Payment Data

1. Data Description: Payment Data is only collected when your use of the Services is subject to the payment of a fee or other charge. Payment Data is the information necessary for us to process your payments for premium Services. Payment Data will vary depending on the payment method you use (e.g. direct via your mobile phone carrier or by invoice) but will include information such as:
• Name;
• Date of birth;
• Certain credit card information used to reference a credit card; (Please note that we use a third-party provider to collect credit card information. The third party’s collection tool is layered over our shopping cart, so your credit card information never hits our system at all.)
• Address and postal code; and
• Mobile phone number
2. Lawful Basis for Processing: Our lawful basis for processing Usage Data is (1) our contract with you and (2) our legitimate interest in improving our Services based on the Payment Data we receive from you.
3. How We Use It and Who We Share It With: We only use Payment Data to facilitate payment and in the event of a chargeback or other dispute with you, and we only communicate it to those parties who are strictly necessary for that purpose.

5. Acquired Data

We currently do not acquire data for marketing purposes from third parties, such as data brokers, and we haven’t done so in the last twelve months. We will disclose any revision to this policy in the future.

6. Your Content

We take the security and privacy of your Data very seriously, and we try to give you control of the Data that relates to you as much as possible. With respect to users of the Services, Data that is described as “Your Content” under the Terms of Service is managed and shared pursuant to the provisions of the Terms of Service and not under this Privacy Policy. Our lawful basis for processing Your Content is our contract with you, your consent, and our legitimate interest in processing Your Content as provided in the Terms of Service.
When you post or create Your Content using the Services, that content may include the personal information of third parties who are living. The Terms of Service require that you warrant that you are entitled to create or post that content. We rely on that warranty. Our lawful basis for processing the content that includes information about living third parties is our legitimate interest in providing you a service that allows you to organize and sort your own information. Our system is designed to prevent Your Content that consists of information about living individuals from being shared with third parties, except by your express invitation.

7. Legacy Contacts

When you sign up for the Services, you will be prompted to designate an individual who can serve as your “legacy contact” when you die. We will communicate with your legacy contact at the time we learn of your death, and that legacy contact will be entitled to manage Your Content at that time, all as described in our documentation when you sign up. Our lawful basis for processing your Data after your death is your consent, our contract with you, and our legitimate interest in doing so.

5. SHARING YOUR INFORMATION

Except where a specific limitation is noted above, we may share your Data as follows:

1. At Your Instruction. If you request us to make your Data available to a third party, and such request furthers the purposes of our Services, we will do so.

2. Sharing with Vendors. In certain cases, we use the services of third-party vendors, to assist us in providing the Services. We may share your Data with such vendors solely for that purpose, and we will require those parties to abide by our privacy policies or privacy policies substantially in consonance with ours.

3. Third-Party Offers. You can always opt out of any third-party offers we may make available to you. Subject to that opt-out right, we may allow other companies to offer you their products and services, including offers through our Services, co-branded pages hosted by the third parties, or via email. Whether or not you decide to participate in any such offers is up to you. If you purchase a product or service on a co-branded page, or via a third-party offer on our Services that requires you to submit financial and personal information, you are also consenting to our delivery of this information to that party. The offer will notify you if any financial or personally identifiable information will be shared. Such third party will be authorized to use this information in keeping with our contractual relationship with them and in accordance with their own privacy policy and information practices. We do not control these third parties and you agree that we are not liable for their acts, or any failure to act on their part.

4. Third-Party Advertising. We may use aggregated, statistical information to describe our membership and to establish advertising and other business relationships with third parties. We may serve you with targeted advertisements based on your personal or profile information, but we do not provide any of this personal or profile information to an advertiser or any third party with the exception of those uses expressly disclosed in this policy. However, if you click or view an ad on our Services then you consent to the likelihood that the advertiser will assume that you meet the targeting criteria, if any, used to display such ad, and as described above, you will be subject to the advertiser's privacy policy and information collection practices (if any).

5. Service Providers and White Label Offerings. We may sometimes use a third party to provide specific Services on our behalf, including sending e-mails to our members, conducting member surveys, processing transactions or performing statistical analysis of our Services. In these cases, we may provide certain personal information, such as your name and e-mail address and other financial information necessary for the service to be provided. However, these third parties are required to maintain the confidentiality of this information and are prohibited from retaining, sharing, storing or using this information for any other purposes. We may also make other services available to you that are offered by third parties but white labeled by us, meaning that we provide the services under our own name and that your contractual relationship is with us, but that we use a third party to provide those services. For example, we may offer an opportunity for you to organize and publish Your Content (as defined in our Terms of Service) in a book or other format using a third-party service. When you sign up for such a service, you agree that we may share Your Content with such third-party providers for the sole purpose of rendering the service in question.

6. Business Transitions. In the event that we go through a business transition, such as a merger, acquisition, liquidation or sale of all or a portion of our assets, the information we have about you will, in most instances, be part of the assets transferred. We reserve the right to transfer that information in connection with such transactions without notice to you. We will not be required to obtain your consent for such a transfer.

7. Legal Disclosure. We may disclose your Information if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to conform to applicable law, comply with a judicial proceeding, court order or legal process served on us, protect and defend our rights or property, or investigate, prevent or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person, or violations of our terms of service.

If we ever plan to use any Data in the future for any other purposes not identified above and we do not have a separate lawful basis for that new purpose for processing, we will only do so after obtaining your specific consent.

6. TECHNOLOGIES WE USE

The technologies we use for automatic Data collection may include the following:

• Cookies (or browser cookies). A cookie is a small file placed on the hard drive of your computer. You may refuse to accept browser cookies by activating the appropriate setting on your browser. However, if you select this setting you may be unable to access certain parts of our Services. Unless you have adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies, our system will issue cookies when you direct your browser to our Services.
• Flash Cookies. Certain features of our Services may use local stored objects (or Flash cookies) to collect and store information about your preferences and navigation to, from and on our Services. Flash cookies are not managed by the same browser settings as are used for browser cookies.
• Web Beacons. Pages of the Services and our e-mails may contain small electronic files known as web beacons (also referred to as clear gifs. pixel tags and single-pixel gifs) that permit the Company, for example, to count users who have visited those pages or opened an e-mail and for other related website statistics (for example, recording the popularity of certain website content and verifying system and server integrity).
• Other Technologies. We may also use device identifiers, local storage, html modifiers, and different types of caching to help us understand the devices and users who access the Services. Those methods include device identifiers that are either hardware-based or software-based, persistent or non-persistent, and which may identify either a device or a software module within a device (such as a web browser).

7. YOUR CHOICES REGARDING OUR USE AND DISCLOSURE OF YOUR DATA

By using our Services, you agree that we may use your Data to market our other Services to you. If, after giving your consent, you wish to opt-out of our using your Data to market Services to you, please follow the instructions below.

1. Receiving electronic communications from us: If you no longer want to receive marketing-related emails from us on a going-forward basis, you may opt-out of receiving these marketing-related emails by sending a request for list removal to customerservice@newspaperarchive.com.

2. Our sharing of your Data with unaffiliated third parties for their (or their customers') direct marketing purposes: If you would prefer that we do not share your information on a going-forward basis with unaffiliated third parties for their direct marketing purposes, you may opt-out of this sharing by emailing customerservice@newspaperarchive.com from the email that you have signed up or used in receiving the Services.

3. Any other disclosure of your Data: Except as provided in this Privacy Policy regarding anonymized and aggregated Data and except for Data that is processed by us pursuant to a lawful basis other than your consent, you may instruct us to cease disclosure or use of your Data by contacting us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com.

We will comply with your request(s) as soon as reasonably practicable. Please also note that if you do opt-out of receiving marketing-related emails from us, we may still send you messages for administrative or other purposes directly relating to your use of the Services, and you cannot opt-out from receiving those messages.

8. PRIVACY FOR EU RESIDENTS

The General Data Protection Regulation made effective in Europe on May 25, 2018 (“GDPR”) requires that we clearly describe to data subjects the data we collect and how we use that data. This Privacy Policy does that, and we hope that if you have any questions for us regarding our data collection, you will write us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com.

The GDPR also requires that we have a lawful basis for our processing of any personal data about an individual residing in Europe. For an individual browsing our website or otherwise accessing our Services, our lawful basis is our legitimate interest in providing the Services to you in the manner that you desire, and all the Data that we collect from such individuals will be used only for those purposes, as described in this Privacy Policy. For an individual purchasing products from us, our lawful basis is the contract under which you purchase products, and the Data we collect from such individuals will be used only in connection with our contractual relationship with you and only in a manner that furthers the purposes of that contractual relationship, as set forth in this Privacy Policy.

For employees and other authorized users operating in their role as administrators or users of our services, our lawful basis is the legitimate interest we have in providing the services to their employer.

The GDPR also requires us to take appropriate technical and organizational measures to protect the security of Data relating to residents of Europe. We make commercially reasonable efforts to ensure the privacy and security of the Data of our European visitors and customers, and we are happy to give you a complete description of our most current efforts, if you will write us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com. You may also write us at that address to communicate with our chief technology officer who will serve as our data protection officer, also available at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com.

Pursuant to the GDPR, residents of Europe have the right to obtain our confirmation of whether we maintain personal information relating to them in the United States. If you are a resident of Europe, upon request from you, we will provide you with access to the Data that we hold about you. You may also correct, amend, or delete the Data we hold about you, subject to our rights and obligations under the GDPR, as described in this Privacy Policy. Individuals who seek access, or who seek to correct, amend, or delete Data transferred to the United States, should direct their queries to customerservice@newspaperarchive.com. If requested to remove Data, we will respond within a reasonable timeframe.

9. PRIVACY FOR CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS

California has also adopted the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), which took effect at the beginning of 2020. We comply with the requirements of the CCPA to the extent they apply to us.

If you are a California resident and we qualify as a “business” under the terms of that law, you will have the following rights:

• You have the right to request that we disclose the categories and the specific items of Data about you that we collect, use, disclose, and/or sell and that Data about you that we have collected, used, disclosed, and/or sold during the 12 months prior to your request.
• You also have the right to have the Data we collect about you deleted. We use a two-step process to verify your identity and to have the information deleted. Your rights to have Data deleted are subject to several exceptions, specifically the Data that is necessary for us to:
• complete your transaction;
• provide you a good or service;
• perform a contract between us and you;
• protect your security and prosecute those responsible for breaching it;
• fix our system in the case of a bug;
• protect the free speech rights of you or other users;
• comply with the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act (Cal. Penal Code § 1546 et seq.);
• engage in public or peer-reviewed scientific, historical, or statistical research in the public interests that adheres to all other applicable ethics and privacy laws;
• comply with a legal obligation; or
• make other internal and lawful uses of the information that are compatible with the context in which you provided it.
• To make any request under the CCPA, you must complete the Data Request Form found at https://newspaperarchive.com/ccpa/ or send an e-mail to customerservice@newspaperarchive.com. You will be asked to give us your name, e-mail address, telephone number, and any other information we request to reasonably verify your identity. We will respond to your request within 10 days after receipt of your request, and we will then take action to verify your identity and fulfill your request, as required by the CCPA.
• We will provide you with a CSV copy of your stored data within 45 days of your request, assuming we are able to verify your identity in that period and so long as you provide a correct email address for successful correspondence.
• You have the right not to receive discriminatory treatment by us for the exercise of any privacy rights conferred by the CCPA, which means that we will not take any action to hurt or punish you for exercising your rights under the CCPA.
• You may designate an authorized agent to make a request under the CCPA on your behalf by writing us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com. Upon receipt of your request, we will provide you with the information you will need to designate that agent.

Note that we are not allowed by law to at any time disclose your Social Security number, driver’s license number, or other government-issued identification number, financial account number, any health insurance or medical identification number, or any account password or security questions or answers.

We have listed the specific and general categories of information we have collected, disclosed, or sold in the last 12 months in the section above entitled “Data We Collect and How We Use It.” That section also lists the specific and general categories of Data we have disclosed to third parties for our business purposes.

We do not sell your Data.

We do not sell the personal information of minors under 16 years of age.

For more information, please direct your questions to us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com.

Certain of the information made available using our Services consists of newspaper articles and other publicly available information that has been published by third parties in the exercise of their free speech rights under applicable law, and we are simply providing access to such articles and other information. We are not the publisher or owner of that information, and our policy is not to remove references to individuals that may contain personal information, because that would infringe upon the free speech rights of others. If there is any publicly available information that you feel endangers the physical safety of you or other persons, you may submit a request that we remove access to that information at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com. We will make the determination of whether to remove access to that information in our sole and absolute discretion and without any liability whatsoever to you or others.

10. SECURITY

The security of your Data is important to us. We use commercially reasonable efforts to store and maintain your Data in a secure environment. We take technical, contractual, administrative, and physical security steps designed to protect Data that you provide to us. We have implemented procedures designed to limit the dissemination of your Data to only such designated staff as are reasonably necessary to carry out the stated purposes we have communicated to you.

11. THIRD-PARTY POLICIES

You may be able to access third-party websites and other tools and services or products via a link, or via our other tools. The privacy policies of these third parties are not under our control and may differ from ours. The use of any Data that you may provide to any third parties will be governed by the privacy policy of such third party or by your independent agreement with such third party, as the case may be. If you have any doubts about the privacy of the information you are providing to a third party, we recommend that you contact that third party directly for more information or to review its privacy policy.

This Privacy Policy does not address, and we are not responsible for, the privacy, information or other practices of any third parties, including any third party operating any offering, site or other products and Services used in connection with the Services. The inclusion of a link does not imply endorsement of the linked site or service by us or by our affiliates.

12. RETENTION

We will keep your information for as long as it remains necessary for the identified purpose or as required by law, which may extend beyond the termination of our relationship with you. We may retain certain data as necessary to prevent fraud or future abuse, or for legitimate business purposes, such as analysis of aggregated, non-personally-identifiable data, account recovery, or if required by law. All retained information will remain subject to the terms of this Privacy Policy. Please note that if you request that your information be removed from our databases, it may not be possible to completely delete all of your information due to technological and legal constraints, and if you are a subscriber to the Services, such removal will be subject to the Terms of Service.

13. AMENDMENT OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY

We reserve the right to change this Privacy Policy at any time. If we decide to change this Privacy Policy in the future, we will post or provide appropriate notice. Any change to this Privacy Policy will become effective on the date that is 30 days from their posting on the Services or sent via email to your listed email address. Unless stated otherwise, our current Privacy Policy applies to all Data that we have about you and your account. The date on which the latest update was made is indicated at the top of this document. We recommend that you print a copy of this Privacy Policy for your reference and revisit this policy from time to time to ensure you are aware of any changes. Your continued use of the Services signifies your acceptance of any changes.

14. ACCESS AND ACCURACY

You have the right to access the information we hold about you in order to verify the information we have collected in respect to you and to have a general account of our uses of that information. Upon receipt of your written request, we will provide you with a copy of your information, although in certain limited circumstances we may not be able to make all relevant information available to you, such as where that information also pertains to another user. In such circumstances we will provide reasons for the denial to you upon request. We will endeavor to deal with all requests for access and modifications in a timely manner.

We will make every reasonable effort to keep your information accurate and up-to-date, and we will provide you with mechanisms to update, correct, delete or add to your information as appropriate. As appropriate, this amended information will be transmitted to those parties to which we are permitted to disclose your information. Having accurate information about you enables us to give you the best possible service.

15. CONTACT US

You can help by keeping us informed of any changes such as a change of your personal contact information. If you would like to access your information, if you have any questions, comments or suggestions of if you find any errors in our information about you, please contact us at customerservice@newspaperarchive.com. If you have a complaint concerning our compliance with applicable privacy laws, we will investigate your complaint and if it is justified, we will take appropriate measures.