Effective Date - Jan 1st 2020
This privacy policy has been compiled to better serve those who are concerned with how their 'Personally Identifiable Information' (PII) is being used online. PII, as described in US privacy law and information security, is information that can be used on its own or with other information to identify, contact, or locate a single person, or to identify an individual in context. Please read our privacy policy carefully to get a clear understanding of how we collect, use, protect or otherwise handle your Personally Identifiable Information in accordance with our website.
What personal information do we collect from the people that visit our blog, website or app?
When ordering or registering on our site, as appropriate, you may be asked to enter your name, email address, phone number or other details to help you with your experience.
When do we collect information?
We collect information from you when you fill out a form or enter information on our site.
How do we use your information?
We may use the information we collect from you when you register, make a purchase, sign up for our newsletter, respond to a survey or marketing communication, surf the website, or use certain other site features in the following ways:
How do we protect your information?
We do not use vulnerability scanning and/or scanning to PCI standards.
We only provide articles and information. We never ask for credit card numbers.
We do not use Malware Scanning.
Your personal information is contained behind secured networks and is only accessible by a limited number of persons who have special access rights to such systems, and are required to keep the information confidential. In addition, all sensitive/credit information you supply is encrypted via Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology.
We implement a variety of security measures when a user enters, submits, or accesses their information to maintain the safety of your personal information.
All transactions are processed through a gateway provider and are not stored or processed on our servers.
Do we use 'cookies'?
Yes. Cookies are small files that a site or its service provider transfers to your computer's hard drive through your Web browser (if you allow) that enables the site's or service provider's systems to recognize your browser and capture and remember certain information. For instance, we use cookies to help us remember and process the items in your shopping cart. They are also used to help us understand your preferences based on previous or current site activity, which enables us to provide you with improved services. We also use cookies to help us compile aggregate data about site traffic and site interaction so that we can offer better site experiences and tools in the future.
We use cookies to:
You can choose to have your computer warn you each time a cookie is being sent, or you can choose to turn off all cookies. You do this through your browser settings. Since browser is a little different, look at your browser's Help Menu to learn the correct way to modify your cookies.
If users disable cookies in their browser:
If you turn cookies off, Some of the features that make your site experience more efficient may not function properly. Some of the features that make your site experience more efficient and may not function properly.
Third-party disclosure
Do we disclose the information we collect to Third-Parties?
We sell,trade, or otherwise transfer to outside parties your name, any form or online contact identifier email, name of chat account etc., cookie number, ip address device serial #, unique device identifier, photo, video or audio file of child Personally Identifiable Information.
Third-party links
Occasionally, at our discretion, we may include or offer third-party products or services on our website. These third-party sites have separate and independent privacy policies. We therefore have no responsibility or liability for the content and activities of these linked sites. Nonetheless, we seek to protect the integrity of our site and welcome any feedback about these sites.
Google's advertising requirements can be summed up by Google's Advertising Principles. They are put in place to provide a positive experience for users. https://support.google.com/adwordspolicy/answer/1316548?hl=en
We use Google AdSense Advertising on our website.
Google, as a third-party vendor, uses cookies to serve ads on our site. Google's use of the DART cookie enables it to serve ads to our users based on previous visits to our site and other sites on the Internet. Users may opt-out of the use of the DART cookie by visiting the Google Ad and Content Network privacy policy.
We have implemented the following:
We, along with third-party vendors such as Google use first-party cookies (such as the Google Analytics cookies) and third-party cookies (such as the DoubleClick cookie) or other third-party identifiers together to compile data regarding user interactions with ad impressions and other ad service functions as they relate to our website.
Opting out:
We, along with third-party vendors such as Google use first-party cookies (such as the Google Analytics cookies) and third-party cookies (such as the DoubleClick cookie) or other third-party identifiers together to compile data regarding user interactions with ad impressions and other ad service functions as they relate to our website.
California Online Privacy Protection Act
CalOPPA is the first state law in the nation to require commercial websites and online services to post a privacy policy. The law's reach stretches well beyond California to require any person or company in the United States (and conceivably the world) that operates websites collecting Personally Identifiable Information from California consumers to post a conspicuous privacy policy on its website stating exactly the information being collected and those individuals or companies with whom it is being shared. - See more at: http://consumercal.org/california-online-privacy-protection-act-caloppa/#sthash.0FdRbT51.dpuf
According to CalOPPA, we agree to the following:
Users can visit our site anonymously.
Once this privacy policy is created, we will add a link to it on our home page or as a minimum, on the first significant page after entering our website.
Our Privacy Policy link includes the word 'Privacy' and can easily be found on the page specified above.
You will be notified of any Privacy Policy changes:
Can change your personal information:
How does our site handle Do Not Track signals?
We honor Do Not Track signals and Do Not Track, plant cookies, or use advertising when a Do Not Track (DNT) browser mechanism is in place. Currently we do not have the functionality to recognize DNT browser signaling.
Does our site allow third-party behavioral tracking?
It's also important to note that we allow third-party behavioral tracking
COPPA (Children Online Privacy Protection Act)
When it comes to the collection of personal information from children under the age of 13 years old, the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) puts parents in control. The Federal Trade Commission, United States' consumer protection agency, enforces the COPPA Rule, which spells out what operators of websites and online services must do to protect children's privacy and safety online.
We do not specifically market to children under the age of 13 years old.
Fair Information Practices
The Fair Information Practices Principles form the backbone of privacy law in the United States and the concepts they include have played a significant role in the development of data protection laws around the globe. Understanding the Fair Information Practice Principles and how they should be implemented is critical to comply with the various privacy laws that protect personal information.
In order to be in line with Fair Information Practices we will take the following responsive action, should a data breach occur:
We will notify you via email
We also agree to the Individual Redress Principle which requires that individuals have the right to legally pursue enforceable rights against data collectors and processors who fail to adhere to the law. This principle requires not only that individuals have enforceable rights against data users, but also that individuals have recourse to courts or government agencies to investigate and/or prosecute non-compliance by data processors.
CAN SPAM Act
The CAN-SPAM Act is a law that sets the rules for commercial email, establishes requirements for commercial messages, gives recipients the right to have emails stopped from being sent to them, and spells out tough penalties for violations.
We collect your email address in order to:
To be in accordance with CANSPAM, we agree to the following:
If at any time you would like to unsubscribe from receiving future emails, you can email us at
Advertisements, Marketing Material and Other Offers.
Unless you tell us that you do not want to receive offers and subject to applicable law, we and our third party partners with whom we have a commercial relationship with, may occasionally send advertisements, marketing material or other offers that we think might be of interest to you. If you do not want to receive these advertisements, marketing material or other offers, please contact us using the contact information found at the end of this Policy. Where required by law, we will seek your consent prior to sending you any marketing materials. To the extent allowed by law, the provision of your email and phone number to us constitutes your prior express written consent, and electronic signature, authorizing us to contact you at that email address and phone number, including through the possible use of an automatic telephone dialing system or artificial or prerecorded voice, live calls and text messages, for both promotional and informational reasons. You agree that this consent may be assigned by us to third parties and affiliates. You are not required to provide such consent in order to make a purchase as you can always contact us directly to arrange an alternate purchase method. By providing your telephone number to us, you certify that this is your own number that you own, and not a line owned or used by another, and that you will immediately notify us if your number changes or is reassigned. You agree to indemnify us and our marketing partners if this is not the case and if the future owner or user of the number makes a claim against us for contact at that number. You may opt out of such contact at any time. A copy of our internal, written No-Not-Call Policy will be provided upon request.
Contacting Us
If there are any questions regarding this privacy policy, you may contact us using the information below.
CCPA PRIVACY NOTICE FOR CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS
This notice applies to consumers (and households) who interact with Instant Foreclosures who reside in the State of California. It supplements the information in our above Privacy Policy to comply with the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA). Terminology defined in the CCPA is defined the same here. No provision of this Notice may be construed to provide consumers any rights (or our company any obligations) beyond those required by the CCPA and other applicable law.
Disabled consumers who need these disclosures presented in an alternate medium, may contact us at the email address or telephone number listed further below.
Personal Information That We Collect
By providing your personal information to us, asking to be contacted or using us to interact with a third party, you are also specifically directing us to disclose your information to any third-parties listed, along with others who we feel may have information or offers you may be interested in.
We collect personal information directly from you and by observing your interactions on our website which identifies, relates to, describes and/or is capable of being associated with or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular consumer, household or device. In the last twelve months we have collected the categories of information listed below. We will not collect additional categories of personal information or use the personal information we collected for materially different, unrelated, or incompatible purposes without providing you notice. The following is an overview of information defined by the CCPA as personal information.
| A. Unique personal identifiers | A real name, account name, address, alias, bank account number, credit card number, email address, debit card number, driver's license number, insurance policy number, internet Protocol address, passport number, physical characteristics or description, postal address, online identifier, signature, Social Security number, state identification card number, telephone number, unique personal identifier, or other similar identifiers. |
| B. Characteristics of protected classifications under California or federal law | Age (40 years or older), ancestry, citizenship, color, disability (physical or mental), marital status, medical condition, national origin, race, religion or creed, sex (including gender, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy or childbirth and related medical conditions), sexual orientation, veteran or military status, genetic information (including familial genetic information). |
| C. Commercial information | Products or services considered, obtained or purchased, purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies, records of personal property. |
| D. Biometric information | Activity patterns used to extract a template, behavioral, biological, genetic or physiological characteristics, other identifiers or identifying information eg:, face, finger or voiceprints, gait tendencies, health information like exercise or sleep information, iris or retina scans, keystrokes or other physical patterns. |
| E. Internet or other electronic network activity information | Browsing history, search history, information regarding interaction with advertisements, applications or websites. |
| F. Geolocation information | Physical location or movements including trends. |
| G. Sensory information | Audio, electronic, visual, thermal, olfactory or similar data. |
| H. Professional or employment related information | Past or present job history, performance evaluations. |
| I. Non-public / Private (non-public) educational information protected by the Educational Rights and Privacy Act (20 U.S.C. Section 1232g, 34 C.F.R. Part 99)). | Class lists, disciplinary records, financial information, grades, identification codes, schedules, transcripts or other information directly related to a student which is collected by educational institutions or agencies acting on their behalf. |
| J. Inferences or conclusions drawn from personal information | Profiles reflecting an individual’s abilities, attitudes, aptitudes, behavior, characteristics, intelligence, predispositions, preferences, psychological trends etc. |
| K. Personal Information not governed by the CCPA | De-identified or aggregated consumer information, information excluded from the CCPA's scope (eg: health or medical information covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) and the California Confidentiality of Medical Information Act (CMIA) or clinical trial data). Personal information covered by certain sector-specific privacy laws, including the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FRCA), the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) or California Financial Information Privacy Act (FIPA), and the Driver's Privacy Protection Act of 1994, publicly available information from government records. |
We obtain personal information from the following categories of sources
| A. Client or their agents, directly or indirectly | C. Third parties, advertising networks, consumer data resellers, data analytics providers, government entities, internet service providers, social networks, operating systems and platforms |
| B. Government entities from which public records are obtained | D. Website interactions from our contact us and other web forms. |
How We Use Personal Information regulated by the CCPA
| A. As described upon collection of information | As set forth in the CCPA. |
| B. Complying with the law | Obeying the court, law and government regulations, responding to requests from law enforcement and other governing bodies. |
| C. Fulfill requests, the reason you provided the information | Answering questions, facilitating delivery, fulfilling purchases, providing information on products or services, price quotes, processing payments and transactions, processing product orders, processing returns. This includes, for example, when you make a request online to receive offers via email or telephone, or when you request or agree during one of our phone calls, to be transferred to a third-party product or service seller to receive such offers. |
| D. Maintaining safety and security | Preventing theft of information, products and services as well as technological resources and preventing transactional fraud. |
| E. Personalizing the customer experience | Personalizing your experience to deliver content, product and service offerings relevant to your interests (eg; targeting offers and ads through our website, third-party sites and via email or text messaging –with your consent, where required by law). |
| F. Product development | Product, service and website improvement, research and analysis |
| G. Providing support | Developing and personalizing our products, services and website, investigating and addressing concerns, monitoring and improving responses |
| H. Restructuring | Evaluating or conducing mergers, divestures, reorganization, sale or transfer or assets in the event of bankruptcy, liquidation, etc. |
Sharing Personal Information
We may disclose your personal information to a third party (eg: Service providers and data aggregators) for a business purpose. When we disclose your information for business purposes our contracts state the purpose and requires all parties use personal information for the sole purpose of executing the contract and also that all personal information be kept confidential.
Personal Information Disclosed in the Last 12 Months
In the last twelve months, we have disclosed the categories of personal information below for a business purpose.
| A. Biometric information? No | F. Internet or other electronic network activity information? Yes |
| B. Characteristics of protected classifications under California or federal law? No | G. Non-public / Private (non-public) educational information protected by the Educational Rights and Privacy Act (20 U.S.C. Section 1232g, 34 C.F.R. Part 99))? Yes |
| C. Commercial information? Yes | H. Professional or employment related information? Yes |
| D. Geolocation information? Yes | I. Sensory information? No? |
| E. Inferences or conclusions drawn from personal information? Yes | J. Unique personal identifiers? Yes |
Personal Information Sold in the Last 12 Months.
In the last twelve months we have sold the categories below of personal information for a business purpose. Note that under the CCPA, a business does not “sell” personal information when a consumer uses or directs the business to intentionally disclose personal information or uses the business to intentionally interact with a third party, provided the third party does not also sell the personal information, unless that disclosure would be consistent with the provisions of this title. An intentional interaction occurs when the consumer intends to interact with the third party, via one or more deliberate interactions.
| A. Unique personal identifiers? No. | F. Geolocation information? No. |
| B. Characteristics of protected classifications under California or federal law? No | G. Sensory information? No |
| C. Commercial information? No | H. Professional or employment related information? No |
| D. Biometric information? No | I. Non-public / Private (non-public) educational information protected by the Educational Rights and Privacy Act (20 U.S.C. Section 1232g, 34 C.F.R. Part 99))? No |
| E. Internet or other electronic network activity information? No | J. Inferences or conclusions drawn from personal information? No |
Your Rights and Choices
The CCPA provides consumers with specific rights regarding their personal information if they are California residents. The following is an overview of these rights and an explanation of how to exercise them.
1. Specific Information Access and Data Portability Rights California residents have the right to request the disclose of what CCPA personal information we have collected about them in the last twelve months and what we have used it for during this time period. To the extent required by the CCPA, when we receive a verifiable consumer request, we will disclose the following information, after verifying your identity, if we can:
| A. Business or commercial purposes for collecting or selling personal information. | F. Personal information categories that each information recipient category disclosed to each recipient. |
| B. Categories of personal information collected about you. | G. Personal information categories that each information recipient category sold to each recipient. |
| C. Categories of sources we use to collect personal information about you. | H. Specific pieces of personal information we collected about you, so that you can make a data request. We will provide you with this information in a portable format. |
| D. Categories of third parties we share your personal information with. | I. Whether we disclosed or sold your personal information for a business purpose, two separate lists. |
| E. Internet or other electronic network activity information collected or maintained. |
2. Deletion Request Rights California residents have the right to request that we delete any of the CCPA personal information which we collected about them. After we have received and confirmed your verifiable consumer request (see Exercising Access, Data Portability, and Deletion Rights), we will delete your personal information and instruct our service providers to delete your information as well. We may not delete your information if it is required to us or our service providers to do the following:
| A. Completing the contract or transaction for which we collected the personal information, providing goods or services requested, taking reasonable actions within the scope of our ongoing business relationship with you. | F. Finding and resolving defects or errors impacting intended product, service or website functionality. |
| B. Complying with the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act (Cal. Penal Code § 1546 et. seq.), and other legal obligations. | G. Internal processes in alignment with your relationship with us. |
| C. Complying with free speech rights, engaging in free speech, ensuring consumers right to exercise their free speech. | H. Identifying security risks, protecting against deceptive, fraudulent, malicious, or illegal activity, or prosecuting individuals involved in such activities. |
| D. Complying with other laws. | I. Participating in public or peer-reviewed historical, scientific, or statistical research which is in the public interest and abides by ethics standards, if the information is required to complete the research and you have provided informed consent. |
3. Exercising Access, Data Portability, and Deletion Rights Only you or someone registered with the California Secretary of State who is authorized to act in your interests may make a request for information or deletion. Once you have made a verifiable consumer request, we will provide your personal information is a portable manner so that you can access it easily. Any information you provide will only be used to verify your identity. You can make a request following the instructions below:
| A. Use our online Request to Know form, call us or email us using the contact information found at the end of this notice. We will confirm receipt within 10 days and then provide a written response within 45 days. If we require more time (up to 90 days), we will inform you in writing of the reason. | E. Select the format in which you would like to receive your personal information. This format should be readily accessible and allow you to transport the data to others without issue. |
| B. Provide us with information necessary to verify your identity so that we may release the information to the individual to whom it belongs, or an authorized representative. | F. We will provide access to your personal information for the last twelve-month period or provide an explanation as to who we cannot comply with the request. |
| C. You need not create an account to make requests, but if you have an account and login with us, signing in through our portal with a password serves to verify your identity. | G. There is no fee to process your verifiable consumer request unless it is excessive. In with case we will inform you of the fee before proceeding. |
| D. Provide enough detail in your request that we understand you, can evaluate the request and provide an answer. |
You will need to prove your identity to us. If you have no password-protected account with us, you will need to provide us with at least 2 data points which we already maintain about you, and possibly other information and a signed declaration under penalty of perjury if the information maintained about you is of a sensitive nature. In some cases, we might not be able to successfully verify your information and in such a case, we will notify you as to why we cannot provide it.
4. Personal Information Sales Opt-Out and Opt-In Rights California residents who are sixteen years of age or older have the right to dictate that we do not sell their personal information. If you opt-in to information sales, either verbally or in writing, you may opt-out at any time. Minors are not allowed to use our websites or services and we do not intentionally collect any personal information for or regarding those under the age of eighteen. To opt out please contact us using the contact information found at the end of this notice.
5. Financial Incentives & Non-Discrimination Rights To the extent required by the CCPA, we will not discriminate against individuals who choose to exercise any of their rights under the CCPA. Unless allowed by the CCPA, we will not:
| A. Deny you good or services because you exercised your rights. | H. We may, however, offer financial incentives to those who provide personal information which may result in variations in price, rates or quality depending on the value of the information provided. |
| B. Charge different rates or prices, impost penalties or grant differential discounts for punitive purposes. | I. You must opt-in or provide prior written consent to participate in financial incentive programs and you may revoke this consent at any time. |
| C. Provide (or suggest) those who exercise their rights a different quality goods or a different level of service. |
We do not offer financial incentives to consumers to induce their agreement for us to sell their personal information. Rather, if you do not agree, we might not be allowed to provide your information to third parties who have the quotes, services or other information you have requested. Note that under the CCPA, the “sale” of information does not include the disclosure of information at the consumer’s request.
6. Other California Privacy Rights
California's "Shine the Light" law (Civil Code Section § 1798.83) provides California residents with the right to request information regarding our disclosure of personal information to third parties for their direct marketing purposes. To make a request, please contact us using the contact information found at the end of this notice.
Changes to Our Privacy Notice
We reserve the right to amend this notice of privacy at any time and at our sole discretion. When changes are made, we will post a notice on the main website and the date the changes take effect. Continued use of this website indicates your acceptance of these changes.
Contact Information
If you have any questions, comments or queries about our privacy policy, how we collect or use personal information, your rights regarding such use, or how to exercise your rights please feel free to contact us at the following email address: