PRIVACY POLICY
Policy
Thank you for visiting the website of the Washington Fire Department (WFD). Your privacy is important to us and to better protect it, this page explains our online information practices and your choices for the way your information is collected and used on WFD websites.
This Privacy Policy explains the WFD data practices regarding Personal Data (as defined below) and other information that we collect in connection with:
One of the WFD websites.
The WFD events you may attend
WFD members-only social network
By using our websites and/or the app, you consent to the policies and practices described in this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with the data practices described in this Privacy Policy, you should not use our websites or the app.
Please take the time to read this Privacy Policy as it is important for you to understand how we collect and use your data when you use a WFD website. This policy explains how we collect, use, and store the personal information you provide to us.
This policy may change from time to time and, if it does, the up-to-date version will always be available on this page. We are proud to give you access to any owned websites and, in return, we may collect, use, and share your personal information as is necessary for us to make our websites available in accordance with the Terms and Conditions of use of the WFD websites and to give you the best user experience. We will only use personal information for our purposes in a manner permitted by relevant data protection legislation.
If you hear from us, we will always aim to be respectful, relevant, and appropriate. If at any time you don't feel we've lived up to our philosophy, please let us know straight away by getting in touch with us.
Collect
WFD primarily collects Personal Data provided to us by individuals when they interact with our products, services, and customer service. There are three main ways we can collect your data:
For example, you may voluntarily provide us with Personal Data when you register for an event, sign-up for a membership, enter contests, vote in polls or otherwise express an opinion, subscribe to one of our services (such as our online newsletters, online education, or magazine subscription), or participate in our online community, register for an event, update your profile, access members-only content, download resources, enter to win a giveaway, submit form online, call or email us directly, or submit your business card at our trade show.
The types of personally identifiable information that may be collected when you take any of these actions on any of the WFD websites may vary based on the services offered and may include: your name, address, email address, telephone number, fax number, credit card information, and information about your interests in and use of various products, programs, services, and other information that you voluntarily submit to us.
Members-only products and services require a login, and therefore, trackable personal information. In certain areas of our websites, only persons who provide personally identifiable information can access products, programs, and services or otherwise participate in the sites’ activities and offerings.
Finally, we also may collect certain non-personally identifiable information when you visit many of our web pages such as the type of browser you are using (e.g., Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, Chrome), the type of operating system you are using, (e.g., Microsoft Windows or Mac OS), the type of viewing device you are using (e.g. phone, tablet, or desktop), and your IP address. The types of automatically collected data collected on our websites through the use of these and other tools that we may add from time to time may include: the search terms you used, new or returning user information, browser information, computer or device type, operating system, internet service provider, website usage, referring/exit pages, platform type, date/time stamp, number of clicks, and ads viewed. Please see the “Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies” section below to learn more about how we use Tracking Technologies. These data points help us provide a better user experience and more relevant content on your dashboard.
FAQ: What information does WFD collect if I sign up for a newsletter? –If you sign up to receive one or some of the WFD newsletters we will collect personal information from you in order to honor this newsletter service, namely your email address, name and what you are interested in hearing more about. You can always edit, amend or reset your subscription preferences.
Why
WFD may use the information you provide about yourself to fulfill your requests for our products, programs, and services; to respond to your inquiries about our offerings, and to offer you other products, programs, or services that we believe may be of interest to you.
We may also use your information for the following purposes:
Availability: To help us make the website and other related content available to you (see the "Will we share your information with anyone else?" section below for more information).
Relevance: To make the website more relevant for you and our other visitors. This includes sometimes requesting personal information from you to help us run and develop our website and associated functions.
Fulfillment: To send you our newsletters if you have signed up to receive them.
Survey: To carry out occasional surveys to analyze our user base — ultimately we want to ensure that we provide everything that you — our audience — is looking for
Connect: To check whether you are eligible for a competition or a giveaway and to contact you if you win.
Legalese: To comply with the law and/or as we feel is necessary to prevent illegal activity or to protect our interests.
Membership: To contact you about your account with us.
We may use the information we collect for the following primary reasons:
Product & Service Fulfillment
Marketing, Promotions & Advertising
Internal Operations
Fraud Prevention, Security & Compliance
We may combine information collected from different sources.
MARKETING:
We may display offers, promotions, products or services on our websites that we think will interest you based on the information we collect from your cookies. You may withdraw your consent to direct marketing at any time by managing your cookies.
We also use your contact information to contact you by email or by phone regarding information that we think may be of interest to you. If you do not wish to receive marketing materials, brochures, or emails from WFD and its other websites, you may inform us of your preference by contacting us. You may also unsubscribe or edit your selection by editing your ”my Subscriptions” preferences or clicking on the “unsubscribe” link located on the bottom of our e-mails.
We will send you push notifications from time to time in order to update you about any events. To ensure you receive proper notifications, we need to collect certain information about your device such as operating system and user identification information.
Where required by the applicable law (for example, if you are an EU Data Subject), we will send you marketing information or notifications only with your consent, which was given at the time you provided us with the Personal Data. In such case, if you do not provide us with your consent to the processing of your Personal Data for this purpose, we will not send you this information.
With your permission, we may also use the information you provide to us as a testimonial posted on our websites.
CORRESPONDENCE:
If you correspond with WFD and its companies via e-mail, the postal service, our web forms, or other forms of communication, we may retain the correspondence and the information it contains. We may use the information for business purposes, including responding to your inquiry, notifying you of WFD-related opportunities, and other marketing purposes (please read the Marketing section above for more information on our marketing practices and how to opt-out or unsubscribe).
URL AND IP ADDRESS:
WFD collects information about users’ IP addresses, including users’ utilization of our websites, to help us design our websites to better suit our users’ needs. We may use information about your IP address to help diagnose problems with our server, administer our websites, analyze trends, track visitor movements, and gather information that assists us in identifying visitor preferences. We also may use your IP address to enhance our security and investigate an actual or potential security incident.
AGGREGATED DATA:
We may also compile, anonymize and/or aggregate Personal Data and other information collected about Websites’ visitors, as described in this Privacy Policy, and use such anonymized and/or aggregated data for our business purposes, including disclosing such data to our partners, service providers, advertisers and/or other third parties for marketing or promotional purposes. This aggregate information does not identify you.
TRANSACTION INFORMATION:
We collect transaction information including items purchased and the date and time of your transaction. This allows us to process payments, comply with our accounting and auditing needs, and allows you to keep a transaction history.
Cookies
WFD and its partners use cookies and other technologies to analyze trends, administer our websites, track users’ movements around our websites, gather demographic information about our user base as a whole and collect information about your browsing habits in order to make advertising relevant to you and your interests, as described below.
When you first visit our websites, you will be asked to consent to the use of cookies and similar technologies on the websites in accordance with this Policy, and if you accept we will store cookies and similar technologies on your computer.
It is worth noting that as outlined in our Terms and Conditions, by using WFD websites, you consent to the use of cookies. However, as your privacy is important and because you should have control over how your data is collected and used, you may choose at any time to disable all or part of these cookies, with the exception of those which are necessary for the operation of our websites.
WFD uses Google DoubleClick for Publishers to present or serve the advertisements that you may see on washmofire.org web pages. This third-party ad server may use cookies, Web beacons, clear .gifs or similar technologies to help present such advertisements, and to help measure and research the advertisements' effectiveness.
Security
We have put in place appropriate physical, electronic, and managerial procedures to safeguard and help prevent unauthorized access, maintain data security, and correctly use the information we collect online.
We are committed to making reasonable efforts to secure the information that you choose to provide us, and we use a variety of security technologies and procedures to help protect against unauthorized access to or alteration, disclosure, or destruction of Personal Data. We restrict access to Personal Data to our employees, contractors, and service providers (described in the “Disclosure of Information” section above) who need to know the information in order to operate, develop, or improve our services.
Unfortunately, no transmission of Personal Data over the Internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. Accordingly, and despite our efforts, WFD cannot guarantee or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us, or to or from our online products or services. WFD has no responsibility or liability for the security of information transmitted via the Internet. If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or the security of your Personal Data, please contact us.
We retain your Personal Data for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you services, comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements. We retain Personal Data collected through the Platforms we process on behalf of our Clients for as long as needed to provide services to our Clients and pursuant to our contract with that Client.
We are regularly updating our systems with the latest online protection methods, and put in place data privacy protection protocols compliant with the European Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (General Data Protection Regulation), aka GDPR.
Access
Access to personally identifiable information that is collected from our sites may be accessible for a limited period of time from the point of collection. For example, if you created a password-protected account within our site, you can access that account to review the information you provided.
You may also send an email or letter to the following email or street address requesting access to or correction of your personally identifiable information. For verification purposes please include your first name, last name, email address, and the password you use for said service.
Contact
If you have any questions or concerns about the online privacy statement for this site or its implementation you may contact us at the following address. We may ask you to provide proof of identity before we show you this personal information - so we can prevent unauthorized access.
Washington Fire Department
200 East 14th Street
Washington MO 63090
wfd@washmo.gov
636.390.1020
Effective
The Privacy Statement was last
updated on January 01, 2023.
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All Rights Reserved.