Privacy Policy

June 15, 2006

At ECRI we recognize that privacy is important. This Policy applies to all of the products and services offered by ECRI (collectively, ECRI's "services") on its website.

If you have any questions about this Policy, please feel free to contact us through our website or write to us at ECRI, 420 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY USA.

Information we collect and how we use it:

We offer a number of services that do not require you to register for an account or provide any personal information to us, such as ECRI Search. In order to provide our full range of services, we may collect the following types of information:

• Information you provide - When you sign up for an ECRI service or promotion that requires registration, we ask you for personal information (such as your name, email address and an account password). For certain services we also request credit card or other payment account information which we maintain in encrypted form on secure servers.
• ECRI cookies - When you visit ECRI, we send one or more cookies—a small file containing a string of characters - to your computer that uniquely identifies your browser. We use cookies to improve the quality of our service by storing user preferences and tracking user trends, such as how people search. Most browsers are initially set up to accept cookies, but you can reset your browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, some ECRI features and services may not function properly if your cookies are disabled.
• Log information - When you use ECRI services, our servers automatically record information that your browser sends whenever you visit a website. These server logs may include information such as your web request, Internet Protocol address, browser type, browser language, the date and time of your request and one or more cookies that may uniquely identify your browser.
• User communications - When you send email or other communication to ECRI, we may retain those communications in order to process your inquiries, respond to your requests and improve our services.
• Affiliated sites - We have no affiliated sites.
• Other sites - This Privacy Policy applies to web sites and services that are owned and operated by ECRI. We do not exercise control over the sites linked from within our various services. These other sites may place their own cookies or other files on your computer, collect data or solicit personal information from you.

ECRI only processes personal information for the purposes described in the applicable Privacy Policy and/or privacy notice for specific services. In addition to the above, such purposes include:

• Providing our products and services to users, including the display of customized content;
• Auditing, research and analysis in order to maintain, protect and improve our services;
• Ensuring the technical functioning of our network.

ECRI processes personal information on our servers in the United States of America.

Choices for personal information

When you sign up for a particular service that requires registration, we ask you to provide personal information. If we use this information in a manner different than the purpose for which it was collected, then we will ask for your consent prior to such use.

If we propose to use personal information for any purposes other than those described in this Policy and/or in the specific service notices, we will offer you an effective way to opt out of the use of personal information for those other purposes. We will not collect or use sensitive information for purposes other than those described in this Policy and/or in the specific service notices, unless we have obtained your prior consent.

You can decline to submit personal information to any of our services, in which case ECRI may not be able to provide those services to you.

Information sharing

ECRI only shares personal information with other companies or individuals outside of ECRI in the following limited circumstances:

• We have your consent. We require opt-in consent for the sharing of any sensitive personal information.
• We provide such information to our subsidiaries, affiliated companies or other trusted businesses or persons for the purpose of processing personal information on our behalf. We require that these parties agree to process such information based on our instructions and in compliance with this Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.
• We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request, (b) enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations thereof, (c) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, or (d) protect against imminent harm to the rights, property or safety of ECRI, its users or the public as required or permitted by law.

If ECRI becomes involved in a merger, acquisition, or any form of sale of some or all of its assets, we will provide notice before personal information is transferred and becomes subject to a different privacy policy.

Information security

We take appropriate security measures to protect against unauthorized access to or unauthorized alteration, disclosure or destruction of data. These include internal reviews of our data collection, storage and processing practices and security measures, as well as physical security measures to guard against unauthorized access to systems where we store personal data.

We restrict access to personal information to ECRI employees, contractors and agents who need to know that information in order to operate, develop or improve our services. These individuals are bound by confidentiality obligations and may be subject to discipline, including termination and criminal prosecution, if they fail to meet these obligations.

Data integrity

ECRI processes personal information only for the purposes for which it was collected and in accordance with this Policy or any applicable service-specific privacy notice. We review our data collection, storage and processing practices to ensure that we only collect, store and process the personal information needed to provide or improve our services. We take reasonable steps to ensure that the personal information we process is accurate, complete, and current, but we depend on our users to update or correct their personal information whenever necessary.

Accessing and updating personal information

When you use ECRI services, we make good faith efforts to provide you with access to your personal information and either to correct this data if it is inaccurate or to delete such data at your request if it is not otherwise required to be retained by law or for legitimate business purposes. We ask individual users to identify themselves and the information requested to be accessed, corrected or removed before processing such requests, and we may decline to process requests that are unreasonably repetitive or systematic, require disproportionate technical effort, jeopardize the privacy of others, or would be extremely impractical (for instance, requests concerning information residing on backup tapes), or for which access is not otherwise required. In any case where we provide information access and correction, we perform this service free of charge, except if doing so would require a disproportionate effort.

Enforcement

ECRI regularly reviews its compliance with this Policy. Please feel free to direct any questions or concerns regarding this Policy or ECRI's treatment of personal information by contacting us through this web site or by writing to us at ECRI, 420 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY, 10170, USA. When we receive formal written complaints at this address, it is ECRI's policy to contact the complaining user regarding his or her concerns. We will cooperate with the appropriate regulatory authorities, including local data protection authorities, to resolve any complaints regarding the transfer of personal data that cannot be resolved between ECRI and an individual.

Changes to this policy

Please note that this Privacy Policy may change from time to time. We will not reduce your rights under this Policy without your explicit consent, and we expect most such changes will be minor. Regardless, we will post any Policy changes on this page and, if the changes are significant, we will provide a more prominent notice (including, for certain services, email notification of Policy changes). Each version of this Policy will be identified at the top of the page by its effective date.