document: title: web privacy policy
text: Commitment to Your Privacy

This site is owned and operated by the University of Hartford. Your privacy on the Internet is of the utmost importance to us. At the University of Hartford, we want to make your online experience as satisfying and safe as possible.

Because we gather certain types of information about our visitors, we feel you should fully understand the terms and conditions surrounding the capture and use of that information. This privacy statement discloses what information we gather and how we use it.

Under no circumstances does the University of Hartford divulge any information about an individual user to a third party except to comply with applicable law or valid legal process or to protect the personal safety of our visitors or the public.




Information the University of Hartford Gathers and Tracks

University of Hartford gathers two types of information about visitors:

*Information that visitors provide through optional, voluntary submissions. These are voluntary submissions to receive our electronic newsletters, to participate in our message boards or forums, to email a friend, and from participation in polls and surveys:

  
*Information the University of Hartford gathers through aggregated tracking information derived mainly by tallying page views throughout our sites. This information allows us to better tailor our content to readers' needs. Under no circumstances does the University of Hartford divulge any information about an individual user to a third party.

  
The University of Hartford gathers User Information In The Following Processes:

Optional Voluntary Information

We offer the following free services, which require some type of voluntary submission of personal information by visitors:

1\. Electronic newsletters (Dispatches)

We will offer a free electronic newsletter to visitors. The University of Hartford gathers the email addresses of visitors who voluntarily subscribe. Visitors may unsubscribe from this mailing list by following the link provided in every newsletter that points visitors to the subscription management page. Visitors can also subscribe to the newsletters at the time of registration.

2\. "E-mail this to a friend" Service

Our site visitors can choose to electronically forward a link, page, or documents to someone else by clicking "e-mail this to a friend." The user must provide his or her email address, as well as that of the recipient. This information is used only in the case of transmission errors and, of course, to let the recipient know who sent the email. The information is not used for any other purpose.

3\. Polling

We may offer interactive polls to visitors so they can easily share their opinions with other visitors and see what our audience thinks about important issues. Opinions or other responses to polls are aggregated and are not identifiable to any particular user. The University of Hartford may use a system to "tag" visitors after they have voted, so they can vote only once on a particular question. This tag is not correlated with information about individual visitors.

4\. Surveys

The University of Hartford may occasionally conduct user surveys to better target web content to our audience. We never share any of this information about specific individuals with any third party.

Children

Consistent with the Federal Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA), we will never knowingly request personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 13 without requesting parental consent.

Usage tracking

The University of Hartford tracks user traffic patterns throughout all of our sites. However, we do not correlate this information with data about individual visitors. The University of Hartford does break down overall usage statistics according to a user's domain name, browser type, and MIME type by reading this information from the browser string (information contained in every user's browser).

The University of Hartford sometimes tracks and catalogs the search terms that visitors enter in our Search function, but this tracking is never associated with individual visitors. We use tracking information to determine which areas of our sites visitors like and don't like based on traffic to those areas. We do not track what individual visitors read, but rather how well each page performs overall. This helps us continue to build a better service for you.

Cookies

We may place a text file called a "cookie" in the browser files of your computer. The cookie itself does not contain personal information although it will enable us to relate your use of this site to information that you have specifically and knowingly provided. But the only personal information a cookie can contain is information you supply yourself. A cookie can't read data off your hard disk or read cookie files created by other sites. The University of Hartford uses cookies to track user traffic patterns (as described above). 

You can refuse cookies by turning them off in your browser. If you've set your browser to warn you before accepting cookies, you will receive the appropriate notification with each cookie. You do not need to have cookies turned on to use this site. However, you do need cookies to participate actively in message boards, forums, polling and surveys.




Use of Information

The University of Hartford uses any information voluntarily given by our visitors to enhance their experience in our network of sites, whether to provide interactive or personalized elements on the sites or to better prepare future content based on the interests of our visitors.

As stated above, we use information that visitors voluntarily provide in order to send out electronic newsletters and to enable visitors to participate in polls, surveys, message boards, and forums. We send out newsletters to subscribers on a regular schedule (depending on the newsletter). The University of Hartford never shares newsletter mailing lists with any third parties.

When we use tracking information to determine which areas of our sites visitors like and don't like based on traffic to those areas, we do not track what individual visitors read, but rather how well each page performs overall. This helps us continue to build a better service for you. We track search terms entered in the Search function as one of many measures of what interests our visitors. But we don't track which terms a particular user enters.

The University of Hartford creates aggregate reports on user demographics and traffic patterns. We will not disclose any information about any individual user except to comply with applicable law or valid legal process or to protect the personal safety of our visitors or the public.




Sharing of the Information

The University of Hartford uses the above-described information to tailor our content to suit your needs. We will not share information about individual visitors with any third party, except to comply with applicable law or valid legal process or to protect the personal safety of our visitors or the public.




Security

The University of Hartford operates secure data networks protected by industry standard firewall and password protection systems. Our security and privacy policies are periodically reviewed and enhanced as necessary and only authorized individuals have access to the information provided by our customers.




Opt-Out Policy

We give visitors opt-out options wherever necessary and practical. Such choices include:

*Opting not to register to receive our electronic newsletters.

  
*Opting not to participate in certain interactive areas, which completely alleviates the need to gather any personally identifiable information from our visitors




Your Consent

By using this site, you consent to the collection and use of this information by the University of Hartford. If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes on this page so that you are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances we disclose it.