Effective Date: August 24, 2021

This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) describes how the Tiny News Collective (“Tiny News,” “we,” “our,” “us”) collects, processes, uses, and discloses certain information obtained through your use of our website (the “Site”), which is available at https://tinynewsco.org/privacy, as well as the features made available to you through the Site (collectively, the “Services”).

Information We Collect and Maintain About You

We collect information from you directly when you provide it to us through the Services. We further automatically collect certain information about you and your smartphone or other device when you use, access, or interact with our Services.

Personal information provided by Founders. If you an aspiring Founder (“Founder”) and fill out an application on our website, we may collect the following information from you or about you in order to process your application:

Full name
Email address
Demographic information (such as your age, gender, and race)
Location
Subject areas you wish to cover
Information about why you wish to be a Founder
Information about your local community
Information about your previous experiences (such as employment and education history)
Other information related to your application

Other personal information collected through the Site. You may navigate the Site without submitting any personal information. However, if you use certain features on the Site, such as the “Contact Us” or “Nominate a Founder” feature, we may collect any personal information that you provide through those features (either about yourself or the person you nominate).

Server logs. Server logs automatically record information and details about your online interactions with us. For example, server logs may record information about your visit to our Site on a particular time and day and collect information such as your device ID or IP address.

Cookies. We also use cookies on the Site. Cookies are small files that are stored on your mobile device through the Site. A cookie allows the Site to recognize whether you have visited before and may store user preferences and other information. For example, cookies can be used to collect or store information about your use of the Site during your current session and over time (including the pages you view and the files you download), your device’s operating system, your device ID, IP address, and your general geographic location.

Pixel tags. A pixel tag (also known as a web beacon, clear GIF, pixel, or tag) is an image or a small string of code that may be placed in an advertisement or email. It allows companies to set or read cookies or transfer information to their servers when you load a webpage or interact with online content. For example, we or our service providers may use pixel tags to determine whether you have interacted with a specific part of our Services, viewed a particular advertisement, or opened a specific email.

SDKs and mobile advertising IDs. Our Services may include third-party software development kits (“SDKs”) that allow us and our service providers to collect information about your activity. In addition, some mobile devices come with a resettable advertising ID (such as Apple’s IDFA and Google’s Advertising ID) that, like cookies and pixel tags, allow us and our service providers to identify your mobile device over time for advertising purposes.

Third-party online tracking. We also may partner with certain third parties to collect, analyze, and use some of the personal and other information described in this section. For example, we may allow third parties to set pixels through the Site. This information may be used for a variety of purposes, including analytics and interest-based advertising, as discussed below (see the section entitled “With Whom and Why We Share Your Information”).

Aggregated or deidentified information. We may also share aggregated or deidentified information about users of the Services, such as by publishing a report on trends in the usage of the Services. Such aggregated or deidentified information will not identify you personally.

How We Use and Process Your Information

The purposes for which we use your information include to:

Provide you with our Services;
Respond to your questions or requests concerning the Services;
Fulfill the terms of any agreement you have with us;
Fulfill your requests for our Services or otherwise complete a transaction that you initiate;
Send you information about our Services and other topics that are likely to be of interest to you, including newsletters, updates, or other communications, including promotional emails;
Improve our artificial intelligence and machine learning;
Deliver confirmations, account information, notifications, and similar operational communications;
Improve your user experience and the quality of our products and Services;
Comply with legal and/or regulatory requirements;
Aggregate and deidentify information;
Serve advertisements;
Analyze how visitors use the Services and its various features, including to count and recognize visitors to the Services;
Create new products and Services; and
Manage our business.

With Whom and Why We Share Your Information

We share your information with third parties for a variety of purposes, as described below.

Third-party service providers. Tiny News uses third-party service providers that perform Services on our behalf, including web-hosting companies and mailing vendors. These service providers may collect and/or use your information, including information that identifies you personally, to assist us in achieving the purposes discussed above.

We may also share your information with third parties when necessary to fulfill your requests for Services; to complete a transaction that you initiate; to meet the terms of any agreement that you have with us or our partners; or to manage our business.

Analytics. We partner with certain third parties to obtain the automatically collected information discussed above and to engage in analysis, auditing, research, and reporting. These third parties may use pixels or server logs, and they may set and access device IDs and IP addresses from your device.

Interest-based Advertising. The Services also enable third-party tracking mechanisms to collect information about you and your computing devices for use in online interest-based advertising. For example, third parties, such as Facebook, may use the fact that you visited our App to target online ads to you about our Services. In addition, our third-party advertising networks might use information about your use of our Services to help target advertisements based on your mobile activity in general. For information about interest-based advertising practices, including privacy and confidentiality, visit the Network Advertising Initiative website or the Digital Advertising Alliance website.

The use of online tracking mechanisms by third parties is subject to those third parties’ own privacy policies, and not this Policy. If you prefer to prevent third parties from setting and accessing cookies on your computer or other device, you may set your browser to block cookies. Additionally, you may remove yourself from the targeted advertising of companies within the Network Advertising Initiative by opting out here, or of companies participating in the Digital Advertising Alliance by opting out here. Although our Site currently does not respond to “do not track” browser headers, you can limit tracking through these third-party programs and by taking the other steps discussed above.

You may also opt-out of interest-based by adjusting the advertising preferences on your mobile device (for example, in iOS, visit Settings > Privacy > Advertising > Limit Ad Tracking, and in Android, visit Settings > Google > Ads > Opt out of interest-based ads). Additionally, you may opt out for companies that participate in the Digital Advertising Alliance's AppChoices tool by downloading it here and following the instructions in the app.

Legal purposes. We also may use or share your information with third parties when we believe, in our sole discretion, that doing so is necessary:

To comply with applicable law or a court order, subpoena, or other legal process;
To investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, violations of our terms and conditions, or situations involving threats to our property or the property or physical safety of any person or third party;
To establish, protect, or exercise our legal rights or defend against legal claims; or
To facilitate the financing, securitization, insuring, sale, assignment, bankruptcy, or other disposal of all or part of our business or assets.

Your Choices

If you wish to access, correct, or delete the personal information we have on file, you may contact us at privacy@tinynewsco.org.

If you wish to opt-out of marketing emails you receive from us, you may do so by following the instructions in those emails or by contacting us at privacy@tinynewsco.org

External Links

The Site may contain links to third-party websites. If you use these links, you will leave the Site. We have not reviewed these third-party sites and do not control and are not responsible for any of these sites, their content, or their privacy policy. Thus, we do not endorse or make any representations about them, or any information, software, or other products or materials found there, or any results that may be obtained from using them. If you decide to access any of the third-party sites listed on our website, you do so at your own risk.

Data Security

We employ physical, technical, and administrative procedures to safeguard the personal information we collect both online and offline. However, no website or platform is 100% secure, and we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to the Services or to us, and you transmit such information at your own risk.

Data Retention

We retain personal information about you necessary to fulfill the purpose for which that information was collected or as required or permitted by law. We do not retain personal information longer than is necessary for us to achieve the purposes for which we collected it. When we destroy your personal information, we do so in a way that prevents that information from being restored or reconstructed.

International Users

The information that we collect through or in connection with the Services is transferred to and processed in United States for the purposes described above. We may also subcontract the processing of your data to, or otherwise share your data with, affiliates or third parties in countries other than your country of residence. The data-protection laws in these countries may be different from, and less stringent than, those in your country of residence. However, we comply with all applicable laws regarding international data transfers.

By using the Services or by providing any information to us, you expressly consent to such transfer and processing.

Children

Content on the Services is not directed at children under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from children under the age of 13.

Changes to this Policy

We may make changes to the Services in the future and as a consequence will need to revise this Policy to reflect those changes. We will post all such changes on the Services, so you should review this page periodically.

How to Contact Us

Should you have any questions or concerns about this Policy, you can contact us by email at privacy@tinynewsco.org.