GIA Website Privacy Notice

Last Updated September 25, 2023, v. 5.0

1. Introduction

2. Information We Collect About You

• Account and Registration: Your full name, email address, home and mailing address, telephone number, mobile number, and, where applicable, payment information. You may also provide additional required or voluntary information, where relevant. We also collect information in accordance with GIA’s Know Your Customer and Due Diligence Program.
• Communications: When you communicate with us, provide information through our surveys, in the context of a trade show, or otherwise, for example, if you participate in one of our seminars.
• Request That Your Establishment Be Listed on GIA’s Site:  Information about your store and business contact information for a representative of the store. (Note: in this context, someone other than you may provide us with your information if you are listed as the representative of that store).
• Seek to Find a Store Near You: Your location information (through the collection of your IP address) in order to locate a store near you.
• Purchase Items From Our Store:  Your full name, contact information, items purchased, billing and shipping information, and payment data. You may also provide additional required or voluntary information, where relevant.
• Your Usage of Our Services:  Your submission history, inquiries that you submit to us, records of purchases, and other interactions with us.
• At Trade Shows and Other Events:  We collect information from or about you at trade shows and other events, including at trade shows or other events that we may host or at booths that we may operate. We take photographs and film video at many of our events and use the photographs and videos to share information about our events on social media and other platforms and generally promote GIA’s products and services. Accordingly, when you attend our events, your likeness and image may be contained within these photos and videos.
• Social Network Form Fill: We may process your personal data when you authorize your social network to prefill a form on a Site (e.g., by signing into your social media account(s) through a button that appears on a Site). In that case, we will receive personal data about you from the social network pursuant to the policies of that social network. Examples of the personal data that we may receive includes your display name, first name, last name, profile URL, profile photo URL, social reach (number of followers), gender, email, date of birth, job title, and company. Your personal data will be processed by us in accordance with this Privacy Notice.
• User Content: You may post to the blogs and forums available within our Services. Any information that you post to a publicly facing blog or forum may be viewable by any other visitor to our Sites or App. We are not responsible for the privacy of any information that you choose to post to our Sites or App, or for the accuracy of any information contained in those postings. We cannot prevent such information from being used in a manner that may violate this Notice, the law or your personal privacy.
• Social Media: The Services may allow you to connect to and share information with social media platforms and we may be required to implement cookies, plug-ins, and APIs provided by those social media platforms to facilitate those communications and features. We may share information that you provide us or that we may collect about your use of the Services with those platforms and that information will be subject to their privacy policies. We encourage you to review the privacy policy of any social media platform that you use in connection with the Site. In addition, by choosing to use any third-party social media platform or choosing to share content or communications with any social media platform, you allow us to share information with the designated social media platform. We cannot control any policies or terms of such third-party platforms. As a result, we cannot be responsible for any use or disclosure of your information or content by third party platforms, which you use at your own risk.

3. Information We Collect Automatically

• Device and Online Usage: We collect information about your computer, browser, mobile or other device that you use to access the Services. We may use cookies, pixels, log files and other techniques to collect such information, including IP address, device identifiers and other unique identifiers, browser type, browser language, operating system name and version, device name and model, version, referring and exit pages, dates and times you access our Services, the length of time that you are logged in to or using our Services, the links you click or features you use, software crash reports and session identification number. Please see the “Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies” section below or our Cookie Policy for more information.
• Analytics: Using service providers, we compile and analyze information derived from the use of our Services, such as aggregate usage patterns, user preferences, and other usage information.

4. Our Use of Your Information

• Providing and Improving Our Services: To provide you with our Services, to improve our Services to enhance your experience using the Services, to respond to your inquiries, to develop new features, products, or services; to authenticate you; to perform technical operations, such as updating software; as well as for other customer service and support purposes;
• Marketing and Similar Communications: For marketing and advertising purposes, such as, to the extent permitted by applicable law, to send you emails and SMS about products, services, and events that we believe would be of interest to you; to send our newsletter to you;
• To Solicit Donations;
• Personalizing Content and Ads: To assist us in determining relevant advertising (i) on our Sites and App; (ii) on non-GIA websites and mobile applications; and (iii) through other media;
• Research and Analytics: To better understand how users access and use our Services, both on an aggregated and on an individualized basis, including monitoring, evaluating, and analyzing which features and portions of our Site and our Apps are most popular, for troubleshooting, for statistical purposes including identifying geographic regions of visitors to our Services, evaluating frequently asked questions from visitors, and for other statistical purposes;
• Protecting Rights and Interests: To protect the safety, rights, property, or security of GIA, the Services, any service provider, or the general public; to detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security, or technical issues; to prevent or stop activity that we consider to be, or to pose a risk of being, an illegal, unethical, or legally actionable activity; to use as evidence in litigation; and to enforce this Notice or our Terms of Use; and
• Legal Compliance: To comply with applicable legal or regulatory obligations, including as part of a judicial proceeding; to respond to a subpoena, warrant, court order, or other legal process; or as part of an investigation or request, whether formal or informal, from law enforcement or a governmental authority.

5. Disclosing Your Information

• GIA Entities:  We will share your information with GIA Entities, so that they may contact you about our Services (marketing) or respond to your customer service inquiries.

• Service Providers: We disclose your personal data to our service providers, contractors, professional advisors, agents, or others who perform functions on our behalf.  These service providers include vendors who assist us with sending out email correspondence, SMS messages, payment processors, and other providers consistent with completing your request to GIA.
• Social Networking Companies: We disclose your email address to Facebook to assist us in determining relevant advertising on Facebook and through other media. See Online Advertising below.
• Other Users: As stated above, you may choose to submit information on a blog or in a forum. Any information that you submit will be available to other users of our Services.
• General Business Operations: We disclose personal data where necessary to the administration of our general business, accounting, record keeping and legal functions, to our tax advisors, legal counsel and other professional services entities or agents.
• Business Transfers: If we are acquired by or merge with another entity, if some or all of our assets are transferred to another company, or as part of a bankruptcy proceeding, we may transfer the information we have collected from you to the acquiring entity. We also may transfer certain of your personal information to another company in the course of evaluating a prospective transfer, where permitted by law.
• In Response to Legal Process: We disclose your personal data to comply with the law, a judicial proceeding, court order or other legal process, such as in response to a subpoena or warrant.
• To Protect Us and Others: We disclose your information where we believe it is necessary to investigate, prevent or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the safety rights, property, or security of GIA, the Services, or of any person or violations of our Terms of Service or this Notice.
• Aggregate and Anonymized Information: We may share aggregate or anonymized information about use of the Services with service providers for marketing, advertising, research, analytics or other similar purposes. We also may publish reports in the aggregate about usage trends of our Services.

6. Cookies and Other Technologies

• Session Cookies. Session cookies exist only during an online session. They disappear from your computer when you close your browser or turn off your computer. We use session cookies to allow our systems to uniquely identify you during a session or while you are logged in to the Site (and the Apps). This allows us to process your online transactions and requests and verify your identity, after you have logged in, as you move through our Sites and App.
• Persistent Cookies. Persistent cookies remain on your computer after you have closed your browser or turned off your computer. We use persistent cookies to track aggregate and statistical information about user activity, which may be combined with other user information.

Google Maps.

YouTube.

7. Online Advertising

• EU: www.youronlinechoices.eu
• U.S.: www.aboutads.info

• Apple: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4228
• Android: http://www.google.com/policies/technologies/ads/
• Windows: http://choice.microsoft.com/en-US/opt-out

8. Marketing Choices

9. Links

10. Rights of California Residents

11. California Automated License Plate Recognition (“ALPR”) Usage

12. Security

13. Job Applicants

14. Transfer of Your Personal Data

15. Additional Information for EEA Individuals or Where Applicable and Required by the Laws of Your Jurisdiction

• Right to Access, Correct and Delete Your Personal Data: GIA will use reasonable measures designed to ensure that all personal data is accurate and up to date. You also have a responsibility to ensure that changes in personal circumstances (for example, change of address, bank account, etc.) are notified to GIA so that we can ensure that your personal data is up-to-date.
  
  You have the right to request access to any of your personal data that GIA may hold and to request correction of any inaccurate personal data relating to you. You furthermore have the right to request deletion of personal data we hold about you.
• Right to Withdraw Consent: In the event your personal data is processed on the basis of your consent, you have the right to withdraw consent at any time with effect for the future.
• Data Portability: To the extent that we use your personal data on the basis of consent for the performance of a contract and that personal data is processed by automatic means, you have the right to receive all such personal data that you have provided to GIA in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, and also to require us to transmit it to another data controller where this is technically feasible.
• Right to Restrict Personal Data Use and Right to Object: You have the right to restrict our use of your personal data where (i) you contest the accuracy of the personal data; (ii) the use is unlawful but you do not want us to erase the personal data; (iii) we no longer need the personal data for the relevant purposes, but you require it for the establishment, exercise or defense of legal claims; or (iv) you have objected to our personal data use justified on our legitimate interests pending verification as to whether GIA has indeed compelling interests to continue the relevant personal data use.
• Lodge a Complaint: You also have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, in particular in your country of residence, if you consider that the collection and use of your personal data violates this Notice or applicable law.

Where EU data protection law applies, and where applicable under other data protection laws, we process your personal data for the purposes set out in Appendix A, under the following legal bases:

• Our Contract With You: Our processing is necessary to perform our obligations under a contract with you or to perform steps requested by you prior to entering into a contract with you (e.g., to verify the information you have provided to us).
• Our Legitimate Interests: Our processing is necessary for our legitimate interests, including to protect the security of our services; to protect the health and safety of you or others; to establish, protect and defend our legal rights and interests; to prevent fraud and verify identity and authorization of clients; to understand and analyze usage trends; and to improve our products and services.
• Legal Compliance: Where our processing is required to comply with applicable law (for example, to maintain your payment transaction history for tax reporting purposes: e.g., in response to subpoenas, court orders and other lawful requests by regulators, courts and law enforcement agencies, or related to national security requests).
• Your Consent: When we have your express consent as defined by applicable law.

16.Changes to This Notice

17.Contact

If you would like to contact us regarding our privacy practices or to exercise your rights, please contact us at:
Attn: Privacy Office – MS 20
Gemological Institute of America, Inc.
The Robert Mouawad Campus
5345 Armada Drive
Carlsbad, CA 92008
United States
or via email at privacy@gia.edu.