Privacy Policy
Privacy Policy
Effective May 17, 2007
The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan
think tank that seeks to broaden the public debate about strategies
to achieve a prosperous and fair economy. This privacy policy
covers Web sites maintained by EPI (including
epi.org, epinet.org, sharedprosperity.org,
stateofworkingamerica.org, and jobwatch.org), and discloses EPI's
practices regarding information collected from users of its Web
sites.
1. What personally identifiable information EPI collects.
2. What personally identifiable information third parties collect
through the Web site.
3. What organization collects the information.
4. How EPI uses the information.
5. With whom EPI may share user information.
6. What choices are available to users regarding collection, use,
and distribution of the information.
7. What types of security procedures are in place to protect the
loss, misuse, or alteration of information under EPI control.
8. How users can correct any inaccuracies in the information.
If users have questions or concerns regarding this document, they should contact the Economic Policy Institute's Web Manager.
Economic Policy Institute
Web Manager
1333 H Street, NW
Suite 300, East Tower
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 775-8810
webmaster@epi.org
Information Collection and Use
Information Collection
EPI is the sole
owner of the information collected on www.epi.org and other EPI Web
sites. EPI collects information from our users at several different
points on our Web site.
Publication Orders
We request information from the user on our order form. A user must
provide contact information (such as name, email, and shipping
address) and financial information (such as credit card number and
expiration date). This information is used for billing purposes and
to fill customer's orders. If we have trouble processing an order,
the information is used to contact the user.
Newsletter signup page
We request
information from the user on our newsletter signup page. A user may
provide their name, email, and/or mailing address to receive news
and other information via email and/or postal mail. If a user
wishes to subscribe to any of our electronic newsletters, we
require only an email address.
Information Use
Cookies
A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user's computer tied to
information about the user. Usage of a cookie is in no way linked
to any personally identifiable information while on our site.
Cookies are used by our shopping cart ("EPI Bookstore"). If users
reject the cookie, they may still use our site. The only drawback
to this is that the user will not be able to complete a purchase
using our online bookstore (we do, however, also accept orders by
phone and mail).
To find more information about cookies, if you are using Microsoft
Internet Explorer as your browser, visit the Microsoft Web site at
http://www.microsoft.com/info/cookies.mspx; users of
Mozilla browsers (including Firefox) should visit http://kb.mozillazine.org/Cookies.
Log Files
Like most standard Web site servers, we use log files. This
includes Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, browser type, Internet
service provider (ISP), referring/exit pages, platform type,
date/time stamp, and number of clicks. We use this information to
analyze trends, administer the site, track user's movement in the
aggregate, and gather broad demographic information for aggregate
use. IP addresses, etc. are not linked to personally identifiable
information.
Communications From the Site
Newsletter
If a user wishes to subscribe to any of our electronic newsletters,
we require only an email address. Out of respect for our users'
privacy, we provide a way to opt-out of these communications.
Please see the "Choice" and "Opt-out" sections below.
Information Sharing
Legal Disclaimer
Though we make every effort to preserve user privacy, we may need
to disclose personal information when required by law wherein we
have a good-faith belief that such action is necessary to comply
with a current judicial proceeding, a court order, or legal process
served on our Web site.
These are the instances in which we will share
users' personal information:
Third-party Intermediaries
We use an outside Internet service provider to host and maintain
our web servers and bulk email service, a shipping company to ship
orders by mail, and a credit card processing company to bill users
for goods and services. These companies do not retain, share,
store, or use personally identifiable information for any secondary
purposes.
Choice/Opt-out
Our users are given the opportunity to 'opt-out' of having their
information used for purposes not directly related to our site at
the point where we ask for information.
Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletters and/or
promotional communications may opt-out of receiving these
communications by visiting EPI's unsubscribe page. Alternately, users may send an email to
EPI's Web Manager, identifying
which communication(s) the user is subscribed to, and indicating
the email address(es) to be removed from the email list(s). We also
offer opt-out mechanisms at the bottom of each such message. Users
may also unsubscribe from email lists by contacting EPI's Web
Manager by phone or postal mail using the contact information
listed below.
While we require an email address when placing an order online,
we do not use or retain that address for any purpose other than
order processing.
Links
This Web site contains links to
other sites. Please be aware that EPI is not responsible for the
privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be
aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy policies of
each and every Web site that collects personally identifiable
information. This privacy policy applies solely to information
collected by this Web site.
"Email This Page" Feature
If a user elects to use our referral service for informing a friend
about our site, we ask them for the recipient's email address, as
well as the sender's name and email address. EPI will automatically
send the friend a one-time email inviting them to visit the site.
EPI does not retain this information; it is collected for the sole
purpose of sending this one-time email.
Security
This Web site takes every precaution to protect our users'
information. When users submit sensitive information via the Web
site, their information is protected both online and off-line.
When our shopping cart (i.e., bookstore order form) asks users to
enter sensitive information (such as credit card number and/or
social security number), that information is encrypted and is
protected with the best encryption software in the industry — SSL.
While on a secure page, such as our Contribute page or Bookstore/shopping cart checkout page, the padlock icon on the bottom of Web
browsers such as Mozilla and Microsoft Internet Explorer becomes
locked, as opposed to unlocked, or open, when users are just
"surfing."
While we use SSL encryption to protect sensitive information
online, we also do everything in our power to protect
user-information off-line. All of our users' information, not just
the sensitive information mentioned above, is restricted in our
offices. Only employees who need the information to perform a
specific job (for example, our billing clerk or a customer service
representative) are granted access to personally identifiable
information. All employees are kept up-to-date on our security and
privacy practices. Any time new policies are added, our employees
are notified and/or reminded about the importance we place on
privacy, and what they can do to ensure our users' information is
protected. Finally, the servers that store personally identifiable
information are housed in a secure environment.
If users have any questions about the security at our Web site,
they should contact EPI at webmaster@epi.org.
Correcting/Updating/Deleting/Deactivating
Personal Information
If a user's personally identifiable information changes (such as
zip code, phone, email, or postal address), or if a user no longer
desires our service, we provide a way to correct, update, or
delete/deactivate users' personally identifiable information. This
can usually be done by emailing us at webmaster@epi.org, or by contacting
us via telephone or postal mail using the contact information
listed below.
Notification of Changes
If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those
changes to this page and
other places we deem appropriate so our users are always aware of
what information we collect, how we use it, and under what
circumstances, if any, we disclose it.
If, however, we are going to use users' personally identifiable information in a manner different from that stated at the time of collection, then we will notify users by posting a notice on our Web site for 30 days.
Contact Information
If users have any questions or suggestions regarding our privacy
policy, please contact the Economic Policy Institute's Web Manager
at:
Economic Policy Institute
Web Manager
1333 H Street, NW
Suite 300, East Tower
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 775-8810
webmaster@epi.org
