Privacy Agreement
LinkedIn

LinkedIn Privacy Agreement

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

LinkedIn LinkedIn SlideShare LinkedIn Pulse SlideShare, a content sharing platform, and LinkedIn Pulse, a news reading application, are part of the LinkedIn family. Your Privacy Matters At LinkedIn, our fundamental philosophy is “members first.” That value powers all of the decisions we make, including how we gather and respect your personal information. We’ve crafted the policy below to be as clear and straightforward as possible. Our aim is for you—our members—to always feel informed and empowered with respect to your privacy on LinkedIn. Visit our Safety Center for tips on using LinkedIn smartly and securely. View our California DNT notice Introduction Last revised on March 26, 2014 Our mission is to connect the world’s professionals to enable them to be more productive and successful. Our Privacy Policy has been updated primarily to also cover, as part of LinkedIn, the SlideShare and Pulse services, reflecting LinkedIn’s acquisition of the two companies in 2012 and 2013, respectively, and our subsequent integration efforts. Please click here to read our summary of the changes. LinkedIn’s mission is to connect the world’s professionals to enable them to be more productive and successful. Our registered users (“Members”) share their professional identities, engage with their network, exchange knowledge and professional insights, post and view relevant content, and find business opportunities. Content on some of our services is also visible to unregistered viewers (“Visitors”). We believe that our services allow our Members to effectively compete and achieve their full career potential. The cornerstone of our business is to focus on our Members first. We protect your personal information using industry-standard safeguards. We may share your information with your consent or as required by law as detailed in this policy, and we will always let you know when we make significant changes to this Privacy Policy. Maintaining your trust is our top priority, so we adhere to the following principles to protect your privacy: We protect your personal information and will only provide it to third parties: (1) with your consent; (2) where it is necessary to carry out your instructions; (3) as reasonably necessary in order to provide our features and functionality to you; (4) when we reasonably believe it is required by law, subpoena or other legal process; or (5) as necessary to enforce our User Agreement or protect the rights, property, or safety of LinkedIn, its Members and Visitors, and the public. We have implemented appropriate security safeguards designed to protect your information in accordance with industry standards. This Privacy Policy applies to LinkedIn.com and the LinkedIn mobile application, SlideShare.net and SlideShare mobile app (“SlideShare”), Pulse.me and Pulse mobile app (“Pulse”), LinkedIn platform technology (such as “Share on LinkedIn” plugins for publishers) and all other LinkedIn websites, apps, developer platforms and other products and services (collectively “LinkedIn” or the “Services”). We may modify this Privacy Policy from time to time, and if we make material changes to it, we will provide notice through our Service, or by other means so that you may review the changes before you continue to use LinkedIn. If you object to any changes, you may close your account. Continuing to use LinkedIn after we publish or communicate a notice about any changes to this Privacy Policy means that you are consenting to the changes. 1. What information we collect 1.1. Data Controllers Our Privacy Policy applies to any Member or Visitor. If you live in the U.S., LinkedIn Corporation controls your information. If you live outside the U.S., LinkedIn Ireland controls your information. If you reside in the United States, then the personal information provided to or gathered by LinkedIn is controlled by LinkedIn Corporation, 2029 Stierlin Court, Mountain View, California 94043. If you reside outside the United States, then the personal information provided to or gathered by LinkedIn is controlled by LinkedIn Ireland, Gardner House, Wilton Place, Wilton Plaza, Dublin 2, Ireland. If you have any concern about providing information to us or having such information displayed on the LinkedIn services or otherwise used in any manner permitted in this Privacy Policy and the User Agreement (together also referred to as LinkedIn’s Terms of Service), you should not become a Member of LinkedIn, visit our websites, apps or otherwise use our Services. If you have already registered, you can close your account here and/or by visiting the SlideShare or Pulse account settings, as applicable. We collect your personal information in the following ways: 1.2. Registration When you create an account with us, you provide us with information (including your name, email address, and password) that we use to offer you a personalized, relevant experience on LinkedIn. To create an account on LinkedIn, you must provide us with at least your name, email address and/or mobile number, and a password. You can choose to provide further information about yourself during the registration process (for example, your gender and location). We use this information to provide you with more customized services like language-specific profile pages, updates, and content, more relevant ads, and more valuable career opportunities, and it may appear on your LinkedIn profile that is viewable by others. You understand that, by creating an account, LinkedIn and others will be able to identify you by your LinkedIn profile, and you allow LinkedIn to use this information in accordance with this Privacy Policy and our User Agreement. We may also ask for your credit card details if you purchase certain LinkedIn services. We also provide the option to register for a SlideShare account, for which you must provide at least your name, email address and/or mobile number, and a password. We no longer provide the option to register for a separate Pulse account, but you may continue to use your existing Pulse account if you already have one, as described here. 1.3. Profile Information You can add professional details – like your job title, education, and skills – to your profile. A complete profile helps you be found by other people for opportunities. It also means we can show you relevant ads and content. After you create an account (other than the distinct SlideShare and Pulse accounts), you may choose to provide additional information on your LinkedIn profile, such as descriptions of your skills, professional experience, and educational background. You can list honors, awards, professional affiliations, LinkedIn Group memberships, networking objectives, companies or individuals that you follow, and other information including content. With your approval, your connections may provide recommendations and endorsements of you. Providing additional information enables you to derive more benefit from LinkedIn by helping you express your professional identity; find other professionals, opportunities, and information; and help recruiters and business opportunities find you. It also enables us to serve you ads and other relevant content on and off LinkedIn. If you have or create an account on SlideShare, you can choose what additional personal information you provide there besides the required information (name, email address and password). Most of your SlideShare profile, as well as all content that you post on SlideShare, is publicly displayed (with the exceptions provided in the SlideShare account settings), so please do not provide personal information you would not want to be public. We may use and share information you provide in a SlideShare profile and/or Pulse account in the same manner as the information provided in a LinkedIn.com profile, in accordance with this Privacy Policy and our User Agreement. 1.4. Address Book and Other Services That Sync with LinkedIn We collect information when you sync non-LinkedIn content – like your email address book, mobile device contacts, or calendar – with your account. We use this information to improve your experience and allow you and your network to be better connected. You can remove your address book and any other synced information whenever you'd like. You may use the LinkedIn contacts importer (or other similar mechanisms provided by LinkedIn) to upload individual contacts or your entire address book into LinkedIn. LinkedIn stores this information and uses it to help you manage and leverage your contacts. We also use this information to enhance your LinkedIn experience by helping you to grow your network by: identifying your contacts already on LinkedIn; providing a template to send invitations to your contacts that have not registered with LinkedIn; and suggesting people you may know but who may not be in your LinkedIn contacts. LinkedIn may also use this information to show you and other Members that you share the same uploaded contacts who may or may not be Members. Please note that when you send an invitation to connect to another individual (a “connection”), that person may have access to your email address or, for SMS invitations, mobile number because it is displayed in the invitation. LinkedIn will also remind you of pending invitations. Your LinkedIn connections will also have access to your email address. LinkedIn makes other tools available to sync information with LinkedIn, and may also develop additional features that allow Members to use their LinkedIn account in conjunction with other third-party services. For example, LinkedIn’s mobile applications may allow you to sync your device’s calendar, email and/or contacts apps with LinkedIn to show you the LinkedIn profiles of meeting attendees, email correspondents and/or your contacts. Another example are software tools that allow you to see LinkedIn and other public social media information about the people you email or meet with and leverage LinkedIn to help you gain insights from and grow your network. If you grant these products (mobile applications or other LinkedIn services that sync external email and calendar services, such as LinkedIn Connected) permission to access your email and calendar accounts, they will access and may store some of your email header and calendar history information in order to match it to LinkedIn and other public social media profiles. LinkedIn’s products that sync with external email services may also temporarily cache message content for performance reasons, in a way that is unreadable by LinkedIn and its service providers. Any information that you upload or sync with LinkedIn is covered by the User Agreement and this Privacy Policy. You can remove your information at your convenience using the features LinkedIn makes available or in accordance with Section 3. You can remove your address book and any other synced information at any time. 1.5. Customer Service When you contact our Help Center, we collect information to respond to your questions and better serve you. When you contact our customer support services (e.g. on LinkedIn’s Help Center and SlideShare’s Help Center), we collect information that helps us categorize your question, respond to it, and, if applicable, investigate any breach of our User Agreement or this Privacy Policy. We also use this information to track potential problems and trends and customize our support responses to better serve you. 1.6. Using the LinkedIn Sites and Applications We collect information when you visit LinkedIn (including SlideShare and Pulse), use our mobile applications, and interact with advertising on LinkedIn. We collect information when you use (whether as a Member or a Visitor) the LinkedIn websites (including SlideShare.net and Pulse.me), applications (for example, LinkedIn or Pulse for iPhone or Android), LinkedIn platform technology (such as “Share on LinkedIn” plugins for publishers) or other Services. For example, we collect information when you view or click on ads, import your address book, join and participate in groups, participate in polls, install a LinkedIn mobile application, view content on Pulse or SlideShare, and share articles on LinkedIn. If you are logged in on LinkedIn.com, SlideShare.net, the Pulse app or another Service or a LinkedIn cookie on your device identifies you, your usage information and the log data described in Section 1.10 of this policy, such as your IP address, will be associated with your account. Even if you’re not logged into a Service, we log information about devices used to access our Services, including IP address. 1.7. Using Third-Party Services and Visiting Third-Party Sites We collect information when you use your LinkedIn account to sign in to other sites or services, and when you view web pages that include LinkedIn plugins. You can opt out of our collection of plugin impressions anytime. We receive information when you use your LinkedIn account to log in to a third-party website or application. Also, when you visit a third-party site that embeds LinkedIn professional plugins (such as “Share on LinkedIn” for publishers) we receive information that those pages have loaded in your web browser. If you are logged in as a Member when you visit sites with LinkedIn plugins, we use this information to recommend tailored content to you. LinkedIn will use this information to personalize the LinkedIn-provided functionality on third-party sites, including providing you insights from your LinkedIn network and allowing you to share information with your network (1st and 2nd degree connection on LinkedIn). Users wishing to disable this personalization may opt out here. LinkedIn’s retention of this data is addressed in Section 3.2. We do not use this information for advertising. LinkedIn may provide reports containing aggregated impression information to companies hosting LinkedIn plugins and similar technologies to help them measure LinkedIn-generated traffic to their websites. You can opt out of LinkedIn using your impression data by clicking here. Please note that SlideShare.net, Pulse.me and the Pulse app are part of the LinkedIn Services, not third-party sites or applications. 1.8. Cookies We use cookies to help personalize your LinkedIn experience and show you relevant ads. We use cookies and similar technologies, including mobile application identifiers, to help us recognize you across different Services, improve your LinkedIn experience, increase security, measure use and effectiveness of our Services, and serve advertising. You can control cookies through your browser settings and other tools. For more information, including the types of cookies found on LinkedIn, please read LinkedIn’s Cookie Policy. By visiting LinkedIn, you consent to the placement of cookies and beacons in your browser and HTML-based emails in accordance with this Privacy Policy and LinkedIn’s Cookie Policy. 1.9. Advertising Technologies and Web Beacons We target ads to you on and off LinkedIn, based on information you included in your profile and your use of LinkedIn. We give you a number of ways to opt out of these ads, including through the Ad Choices icon shown with any LinkedIn ads on third-party sites. If you do not want to receive LinkedIn ads on third-party sites, you can opt out. We target ads to Members and Visitors both on and off LinkedIn through a variety of ad networks and ad exchanges, using: Advertising technologies like web beacons, pixels, ad tags, cookies, and mobile identifiers as permitted by mobile platforms both on and off LinkedIn; Member-provided profile information and categories (for example, “product managers in Texas”); Information inferred from a Member’s profile (for example, using job titles to infer age, industry, seniority, and compensation bracket; or names to infer gender); Your use of LinkedIn (for example, your LinkedIn search history, the content you read on SlideShare or Pulse, who you follow or is following you on SlideShare, etc.) or clicking on a LinkedIn ad; Information from advertising partners which we use to help deliver ads more relevant to you. We do not share personally identifiable information with any third-party advertiser or ad network, although your profile is visible to other Members and through public search depending on your settings. LinkedIn may show you sponsored content in your Network Update Stream (NUS), which will be designated as sponsored content and will behave like other NUS updates. If you take social action (for example, if you “like or “comment” on the sponsored content), your action will be seen by your network and other Members who are shown the sponsored content after you have acted on it. Please note that all social actions on SlideShare (e.g. liking certain content, following or being followed by others) are public, unless expressly specified otherwise with respect to premium accounts. LinkedIn ads that are delivered on third-party sites contain the label “Ads by LinkedIn.” You may opt out of (i) these ads served to you on third-party sites and/or (ii) us using information from advertising partners to target ads by going here. The Ad Choices icon shows you that we adhere to the Digital Advertising Alliance’s self-regulatory principles for online behavioral advertising. Please see http://www.aboutads.info for details. If you wish to not receive targeted ads from most third party companies, you may opt-out by, as applicable, clicking on the AdChoice icon or “Ads by LinkedIn” link in or next to the ad or by visiting http://preferences-mgr.truste.com/ and http://www.networkadvertising.org/managing/opt_out.asp. Please note this does not opt you out of being served advertising. You will continue to receive generic ads or targeted ads by companies not listed with these opt-out tools. 1.10. Log Files, IP Addresses, and Information About Your Computer and Mobile Device We collect information from the devices and networks that you use to access LinkedIn. This information helps us improve and secure our Services. When you visit or leave LinkedIn sites or apps (whether as a Member or Visitor) by clicking a hyperlink or when you view a plugin on a third-party site, we automatically receive the URL of the site from which you came or the one to which you are directed. Also, advertisers receive the URL of the page that you are on when you click an ad on LinkedIn. We also receive the internet protocol (“IP”) address of your computer or the proxy server that you use to access the web, your computer operating system details, your type of web browser, your mobile device (including your mobile device identifier provided by your mobile device operating system), your mobile operating system (if you are accessing LinkedIn using a mobile device), and the name of your ISP or your mobile carrier. We may also receive location data passed to us from third-party services or GPS-enabled devices that you have set up, which we use to show you local information (for example, Pulse articles about your area) on our mobile applications. Most mobile devices allow you to prevent real time location data being sent to LinkedIn, and of course LinkedIn will honor your settings. In the case of our Android apps, you will be provided notice of the types of data (e.g. location) that will be sent to us. If you choose to use our app after this notice, we process this data to enable registration or preview product features for you (e.g. jobs near you). If you choose not to become a Member, we will delete this information. 1.11. Other We are constantly innovating to improve our Services, which means we may create new ways to collect information on the Services. LinkedIn is a dynamic, innovative environment, which means we are always seeking to improve the services we offer you. We often introduce new features, some of which may result in the collection of new information (for example, when the Endorsements feature launched, we began collecting information about skills for which Members were endorsed and the individuals who endorsed them). Furthermore, new partnerships or corporate acquisitions may result in new features, and we may potentially collect new types of information. 2. How we use your personal information At LinkedIn, we take pride in our mantra of “Members first,” which means that above all else we strive to use your information to provide you world-class services in a professional and trustworthy manner. 2.1. Consent to LinkedIn Processing Information About You When you join LinkedIn, you acknowledge that information you provide on your profile can be seen by others and used by us as described in this Privacy Policy and our User Agreement. The personal information you provide to us may reveal or allow others to identify aspects of your life that are not expressly stated on your profile (for example, your picture or your name may reveal your gender). By providing personal information to us when you create or update your account and profile, you are expressly and voluntarily accepting the terms and conditions of LinkedIn’s User Agreement and freely accepting and agreeing to our processing of your personal information in ways set out by this Privacy Policy. Supplying to us any information deemed “sensitive” by applicable law is entirely voluntary on your part. You have the right to withdraw or modify your consent to LinkedIn’s collection and processing of the information you provide at any time, in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Policy and the User Agreement, by changing your account settings or your profile on LinkedIn or SlideShare, or by closing your respective account here or in the applicable SlideShare or Pulse settings. 2.2. LinkedIn Communications We communicate with you using LinkedIn messaging, email, and other ways available to us. We may send you messages relating to the availability of the Services, security, or other service-related issues. We also may send promotional InMail messages to your LinkedIn inbox. You can change your email settings at any time. We communicate with you through email, notices posted on the LinkedIn websites or apps, messages to your LinkedIn inbox, and other means available through the Services, including mobile text messages and push notifications. Examples of these communications include: (1) welcome and engagement communications - informing you about how to best use LinkedIn, new features, updates about other Members you are connected to and their actions, etc.; (2) service communications – these will cover service availability, security, and other issues about the functioning of LinkedIn; (3) promotional communications – these include both email and InMail messages (InMail messages are only delivered to your LinkedIn InBox), and may contain promotional information directly or on behalf of our partners, including job opportunities and information from companies that are hiring. These messages will be sent to you based on your profile information and messaging preferences. LinkedIn tracks the open rate of your InMails to provide your InMail acceptance score. You may change your email and contact preferences at any time by signing into your account and changing your email settings here or in the applicable SlideShare account settings. You can also opt out of promotional messages by sending a request to LinkedIn Help Center. Please be aware that you cannot opt out of receiving service messages from LinkedIn. 2.3. User Communications With certain communications you send on LinkedIn, the recipient can see your name, email address, and some network information. Many communications that you initiate through LinkedIn (for example, an invitation sent to a non-Member) will list your name and primary email address in the header of the message. Messages you initiate may also provide the recipient with aggregate information about your network (for example, how many people are in your network). Other communications that you initiate through the Services, like a request for an introduction, will list your name as the initiator but will not include your personal email address contact information. Once you have connected with an individual, regardless of who sent the invitation, your contact information will be shared with that individual. 2.4. Customized Content We use the information you provide on your profile to customize your experience on LinkedIn. We use information that you provide to us to customize your experience and the experiences of others on LinkedIn. For example, when you sign in to your account, we may display the names of new Members who have recently joined your network or recent updates from your connections and companies you follow. We also use aggregated information from your network and other users to show you content, such as news and presentations relevant to you, your industry, or your profession. 2.5. Sharing Information with Affiliates We share your information accross different LinkedIn Services, among companies in the LinkedIn family. We may share your personal information with our LinkedIn affiliates (meaning entities controlled by, controlling or under common control with LinkedIn) outside of the LinkedIn entity that is your data controller (for example, LinkedIn Corporation may share your information with LinkedIn Ireland, or other LinkedIn operating entities) as necessary to provide the Services. By agreeing to this Privacy Policy, you are consenting to this sharing. For clarity, LinkedIn and its affiliates combine information internally across different Services. For example, SlideShare may recommend better content to you based on your LinkedIn content preferences and the articles you read on Pulse, and LinkedIn could present you a better tailored network update stream based on your SlideShare activity, whether or not you tied your SlideShare, Pulse and/or LinkedIn accounts (e.g. by signing in SlideShare or Pulse with your LinkedIn account), as we may be able to identify you across different Services using cookies or similar technologies. 2.6. Sharing Information with Third Parties Any information you put on your profile and any content you post on LinkedIn may be seen by others. We don’t provide any of your non-public information (like your email address) to third parties without your consent, unless required by law, or as described in Sections 2.6 and 2.14 of this Policy. Other people may find your LinkedIn profile information through search engines (you can choose which parts of your public profile are accessible to public search engines in your settings), or use services like Twitter in conjunction with your LinkedIn account. LinkedIn offers a “public profile” feature that allows Members to publish portions of their LinkedIn profile to the public Internet. This public profile will be indexed and displayed through public search engines when someone searches for your name. You may choose the parts of your profile that search engines index or completely opt out of this feature in your LinkedIn account settings, or limit the publicly visible information in your SlideShare profile. However, third-party search engines may not automatically update their caches, which may contain old public profile information. Unless you delete them, your profiles on LinkedIn.com and our corresponding app or on SlideShare.net are always viewable on the respective Services. We do not rent or sell personal information that you have not posted on LinkedIn, except as described in this Privacy Policy. We will not disclose personal information that is not published to your profile or generated through engagement with other LinkedIn services, such as Groups and Company Pages, without your consent or to carry out your instructions (for example, to process payment information) unless LinkedIn has a good faith belief that disclosure is permitted by law or is reasonably necessary to: (1) comply with a legal requirement or process, including, but not limited to, civil and criminal subpoenas, court orders or other compulsory disclosures; (2) enforce this Privacy Policy or our User Agreement; (3) respond to claims of a violation of the rights of third parties; (4) respond to Member service inquiries; or (5) protect the rights, property, or safety of LinkedIn, our Members, Visitors, or the public. See Section 2.14 for additional details about LinkedIn’s compliance with legal requests for information. LinkedIn supports middleware providers that offer archiving solutions to firms subject to financial services regulation, which, with your permission, facilitate the archiving of your communications and other LinkedIn activity by a third party for compliance purposes. Content distributed through LinkedIn’s sharing features and third-party integrations may result in displaying some of your personal information outside of LinkedIn. For example, when you post content to a LinkedIn Group that is open for public discussion, your content, including your name as the contributor, may be displayed in search engine results. Also, if you have bound your LinkedIn account to your Twitter account or your SlideShare or Pulse account to your Facebook account, you can easily share content from LinkedIn to Twitter or from SlideShare or Pulse to Facebook, in accordance with your applicable account settings (which you may change at any time) and respective Twitter or Facebook policies. Further, LinkedIn allows third parties to look-up profile information (subject to your privacy settings) using your email address or first and last name information through its profile API (see Section 2.7. below). Third parties (for example, your email provider) may give you the option to upload certain information in your LinkedIn contacts onto their own service. If you choose to share your LinkedIn contacts, you will be granting your third party provider the right to store, access, disclose and use your LinkedIn contacts in the ways described in such third party's terms and privacy policy. 2.7. Third Parties Using LinkedIn Platform Services We work with developers to build Platform Applications using LinkedIn’s developer tools. Whether you use Platform Applications is up to you. If you have given a Platform Application access to your LinkedIn account, you can revoke that permission anytime. Also, you can opt out of providing information to developers through your connections. We collaborate with and allow third parties to use LinkedIn’s developer platform to offer services and functionality in conjunction with LinkedIn. These third-party developers have either negotiated an agreement to use LinkedIn platform technology or have agreed to our self-service API and Plugin terms in order to build applications (“Platform Applications”). Both the negotiated agreements and our API and Plugin terms contain restrictions on how third parties may access, store, and use the personal information you provide to LinkedIn. If you choose to use a Platform Application, you will be asked to confirm acceptance of the privacy policy and user agreement of the third-party developer. To revoke permission granted to a Platform Application, please visit your settings. Note, however, that even if you revoke the permission granted to a Platform Application, your connections may still be using the Platform Application, so the Platform Application may still have access to certain information about you, just as your connections do. You may opt out of providing information to third-party developers through your connections by accessing the “Turn on/off data sharing with third-party applications” control in the “Groups, Companies, and Applications” tab under settings. 2.8. Polls and Surveys We conduct our own surveys and polls and also help third parties do this type of research. Your participation in surveys or polls is up to you. You may also opt out of getting invitations to participate in surveys. Polls and Surveys may be conducted by LinkedIn, Members, or third parties. Some third parties may target advertisements to you on the results page based on your answers in the poll. LinkedIn or third parties may follow up with you via InMail regarding your participation unless you have opted out of receiving InMail messages. We may use third parties to deliver incentives to you to participate in surveys or polls. If the delivery of incentives requires your contact information, you may be asked to provide personal information to the third party fulfilling the incentive offer, which will be used only for the purpose of delivering incentives and verifying your contact information. It is up to you whether you provide this information, or whether you desire to take advantage of an incentive. Your consent to use any personally identifiable information for the purposes set forth in the poll or survey will be explicitly requested by the party conducting it. LinkedIn is a member of the Council of American Survey Research Organizations (“CASRO”) and abides by CASRO guidelines for market research. You may opt out of participating in surveys by changing your settings to stop receiving these inquiries and requests. 2.9. Search LinkedIn helps you search for other professionals, companies, groups, professional content, and jobs. You can search for Members, employment opportunities, information about companies, and community content from LinkedIn Groups on LinkedIn. For example, you can find Members with particular expertise or experience, or Members that you may know from your industry or profession. You can also find employment opportunities and information about companies. You can also find content from LinkedIn Groups, SlideShare and Pulse. We use personal information from LinkedIn, including Member profiles, Groups content, and Company Pages, to inform and refine our search service. 2.10. Groups You are responsible for any information you post on LinkedIn, and this content will be accessible to others. If you participate in LinkedIn Groups, share content on your Network Update Stream, or import a blog or other content, you should be aware that any information you choose to disclose using these services can be read, collected, and used by other Members in these forums, developers, and other third parties. LinkedIn is not responsible for the information you choose to submit in these forums. Some content in LinkedIn Groups may be public and searchable on the Internet if the group owner has not closed the group for public discussions. You can identify closed groups by the padlock icon next to the group name. You can remove your LinkedIn Groups posts at any time. However, others may have copied and used the information that you shared. 2.11. Testimonials and Advertisements Placed through LinkedIn Ads If you provide any testimonials about our goods or services or place advertisements through the LinkedIn Ads, we may post those testimonials and examples of advertisements you place in connection with our promotion of these services to third parties. Testimonials and advertisements may include your name and other personal information that you have provided. For more information about LinkedIn Ads, please see the LinkedIn Ads Terms of Use. 2.12. Talent Recruiting, Marketing and Sales Solutions We offer a premium service to recruiters and others, which can be used to search for, organize, and communicate with potential candidates or offer business opportunities. Subscribers to this service may export limited information from Members’ public profiles to effectively manage candidate sourcing. You can control how your information is exported by changing which parts of your public profile are accessible to search engines. We offer customized people-search functionality along with organizational and communications tools as part of our talent recruiting, marketing and sales solutions. These services allow subscribers – generally, enterprises and professional organizations - to export limited information from Members’ public profiles, such as name, headline, current company, current title, and location (for example, San Francisco Bay Area), in order to effectively manage candidate sourcing. You may limit or prevent such subscribers from exporting your profile information by configuring your public profile visibility settings to restrict access to these fields. We do not provide email or other contact information to these subscribers. However, if you post that information as part of your profile it will be available to them and others. A recruiter or other such subscriber may also manage and store information it has independently obtained about you outside of our Services, such as a resume, in connection with LinkedIn’s platform. Any personal information obtained independently of LinkedIn services will not be added by LinkedIn to your profile and is not under LinkedIn’s control but is subject to the policies of the LinkedIn recruiting, marketing or sales solution subscriber. We store such information on behalf of such subscriber who can remove it at any time. We do not further process such information. 2.13. Pages for Companies, Schools, Influencers, and Other Entities Companies and other entities can create pages on LinkedIn. If you follow one of these pages, you’ll be listed as one of the company’s followers, and non-identifiable information about you will be provided to the page’s administrators. LinkedIn allows companies, schools, charities, and other organizations as well as thought leaders and influencers to create pages dedicated to their brand, business, and mission. These pages are public, and any communications or information shared through them will be accessible by the entity that created them. If you follow a person or organization, you will be listed among its followers, which can be viewed by others. LinkedIn uses aggregate information about followers and viewers to provide data about its performance (for example, visits and updates). 2.14. Compliance with Legal Process and Other Disclosures We may disclose your personal information if compelled by law, subpoena, or other legal process, or if necessary to enforce our User Agreement. It is possible that we may need to disclose personal information, profile information, or information about your activities as a Member or Visitor when required by law, subpoena, or other legal process, or if LinkedIn has a good faith belief that disclosure is reasonably necessary to (1) investigate, prevent, or take action regarding suspected or actual illegal activities or to assist government enforcement agencies; (2) enforce the User Agreement, investigate and defend ourselves against any third-party claims or allegations, or protect the security or integrity of our Service; or (3) exercise or protect the rights, property, or safety of LinkedIn, our Members, personnel, or others. We attempt to notify Members about legal demands for their data when appropriate in our judgment, unless prohibited by law or court order or when the request is an emergency. In light of our principles, we may dispute such demands when we believe, in our discretion, that the requests are overbroad, vague or lack proper authority, but do not commit to challenge every demand. To find out more about how LinkedIn engages with government requests for data see our Law Enforcement Data Request Guidelines. 2.15. Disclosures to Others as the Result of a Change in Control or Sale of LinkedIn Corporation If there is a change in control or sale of all or part of LinkedIn, we may share your information with a third party, who will have the right to use that information in line with this Privacy Policy. We may also disclose your personal information to a third party as part of a sale of the assets of LinkedIn Corporation, a subsidiary, or division, or as the result of a change in control of the company or one of its affiliates, or in preparation for any of these events. Any third party to which LinkedIn transfers or sells LinkedIn’s assets will have the right to continue to use the personal and other information that you provide to us in the manner set out in this Privacy Policy. 2.16. Service Providers We may employ third parties to help us with the Services. We may employ third party companies and individuals to facilitate our Services (e.g. maintenance, analysis, audit, marketing and development). These third parties have limited access to your information only to perform these tasks on our behalf and are obligated to LinkedIn not to disclose or use it for other purposes. 3. Your Choices & Obligations 3.1. Rights to Access, Correct, or Delete Your Information, and Closing Your Account You can change your LinkedIn information at any time by editing your profile, deleting content that you have posted, or by closing your account. You can also ask us for additional information we may have about your account. You have a right to (1) access, modify, correct, or delete your personal information controlled by LinkedIn regarding your profile, (2) change or remove your content, and (3) close your account. You can also contact us for any account information which is not on your profile or readily accessible to you. If you close your account(s), your information will generally be removed from the Service within 24 hours. We generally delete closed account information and will de-personalize any logs or other backup information within 30 days of account closure, except as noted below. With respect to SlideShare accounts and activity, if you would like us to delete your record and/or remove a particular comment you have made on SlideShare.net, or to provide a copy of any personal data to which you may be entitled, please contact us at privacy@slideshare.com. We will remove your information from SlideShare.net within 24 hours and delete and/or de-personalize it from our systems within 30 days of closure, except as noted below. Please note: Information you have shared with others (for example, through InMail, network updates, content sharing, or LinkedIn Groups) or that others have copied may also remain visible after you have closed your account or deleted the information from your own profile. LinkedIn Groups content associated with closed accounts will show an unknown user as the source. In addition, you may not be able to access, correct, or eliminate any information about you that other Members copied or exported out of LinkedIn, because this information may not be in our control. Your public profile may be displayed in search engine results until the search engine refreshes its cache. 3.2. Data Retention We keep your information for as long as your account is active or as needed. For example, we may keep certain information even after you close your account if it is necessary to comply with our legal obligations, meet regulatory requirements, resolve disputes, prevent fraud and abuse, or enforce this agreement. We retain the personal information you provide while your account is in existence or as needed to provide you services. LinkedIn may retain your personal information even after you have closed your account if retention is reasonably necessary to comply with our legal obligations, meet regulatory requirements, resolve disputes between Members, prevent fraud and abuse, or enforce this Privacy Policy and our User Agreement. We may retain personal information, for a limited period of time, if requested by law enforcement. LinkedIn's Customer Service may retain information for as long as is necessary to provide support-related reporting and trend analysis only, but we generally delete or de-personalize closed account data consistent with Section 3.1., except in the case of our plugin impression data, which we will try to de-personalize at the time of collection, but in any event, we will de-personalize within 7 days. 3.3. Your Obligations Please respect the terms of our User Agreement, our Policies, and your fellow Members. As a Member, you have certain obligations to other Members. Some of these obligations are imposed by applicable law and regulations and others have become commonplace in communities of like-minded Members such as LinkedIn: You must, at all times, abide by the terms and conditions of the current Privacy Policy, User Agreement, and other policies of LinkedIn. This includes respecting all intellectual property rights that may belong to third parties, such as trademarks or copyrights. You must not upload or otherwise disseminate any information that may infringe on the rights of others or which may be deemed to be injurious, violent, offensive, racist, or xenophobic, or which may otherwise violate the purpose and spirit of LinkedIn and its community of Members. You must keep your username and password confidential and not share it with others. Any violation of these guidelines or those detailed in our User Agreement or elsewhere may lead to the restriction, suspension, or termination of your account at the sole discretion of LinkedIn. 4. Important Information 4.1. Minimum Age You have to meet LinkedIn’s minimum age requirements to create an account. Visit our Safety Center for tips on using LinkedIn smartly and securely. As described in Section 2.3 of the User Agreement, persons must be of Minimum Age to use LinkedIn. Please visit LinkedIn’s Safety Center for additional information about safely using LinkedIn. 4.2. TRUSTe and Safe Harbor We partner with TRUSTe because we take your privacy seriously and are committed to putting you and all of our Members first. TRUSTe certifies our compliance with the TRUSTe program and verifies our compliance with the US-EU and US-Swiss Safe Harbor programs. If you can't resolve a complaint through LinkedIn Customer Support, you may also contact TRUSTe. TRUSTe European Safe Harbor certification LinkedIn.com and SlideShare.net have been awarded TRUSTe's Privacy Seal signifying that this Privacy Policy and its practices have been reviewed by TRUSTe for compliance with TRUSTe's program requirements. If you have questions or concerns regarding this Policy, you should first contact LinkedIn. If contacting us does not resolve your complaint, you may raise your complaint with TRUSTe by Internet, by fax at 415-520-3420, or mail to TRUSTe Safe Harbor Compliance Dept. (click for mailing address). The complaint should include the name of company, the alleged privacy violation, your contact information, and whether you would like the particulars of your complaint shared with the company. The TRUSTe dispute resolution process shall be conducted in English. The TRUSTe program only covers information collected through www.linkedin.com, and does not cover information that may be collected through downloaded software or Plugins. LinkedIn complies with the U.S.-E.U. and U.S.-Swiss Safe Harbor Frameworks as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce regarding the collection, use, and retention of personal data from European Union member countries and Switzerland. LinkedIn has certified that it adheres to the Safe Harbor Privacy Principles of notice, choice, onward transfer, security, data integrity, access, and enforcement. To learn more about the Safe Harbor program, and to view LinkedIn Œs certification, please visit http://www.export.gov/safeharbor/. 4.3. Changes to this Privacy Policy We will notify you when we change this Privacy Policy. We may change this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make significant changes in the way we treat your personal information, or to the Privacy Policy, we will provide notice to you on the Services or by some other means, such as email. Please review the changes carefully. If you agree to the changes, simply continue to use our Services. If you object to any of the changes to our terms and you no longer wish to use LinkedIn, you may close your account(s). Unless stated otherwise, our current Privacy Policy applies to all information that LinkedIn has about you and your account. Using LinkedIn after a notice of changes has been communicated to you or published on our Services shall constitute consent to the changed terms or practices. 4.4. California's Shine the Light Law We don’t share any of your personal information with third parties for direct marketing. California Civil Code Section 1798.83, known as the “Shine The Light” law, permits our customers who are California residents to request and obtain from us a list of what personal information (if any) we disclosed to third parties for direct marketing purposes in the preceding calendar year and the names and addresses of those third parties. Requests may be made only once a year and are free of charge. Under Section 1798.83, LinkedIn currently does not share any personal information with third parties for their direct marketing purposes. 4.5. Security We take privacy and security seriously and have enabled HTTPS access to our site (turn on HTTPS), in addition to existing SSL access over mobile devices. Also, please know that the Internet is not a secure environment, so be careful and select strong passwords. We have implemented security safeguards designed to protect the personal information that you provide in accordance with industry standards. Access to your data on LinkedIn is password-protected, and sensitive data (such as credit card information) is protected by SSL encryption when it is exchanged between your web browser and the LinkedIn Services. We also offer secure https access to the the LinkedIn.com website. To protect any data you store on our servers, we also regularly monitor our system for possible vulnerabilities and attacks, and we use a tier-one secured-access data center. However, since the Internet is not a 100% secure environment, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information that you transmit to LinkedIn. There is no guarantee that information may not be accessed, disclosed, altered, or destroyed by breach of any of our physical, technical, or managerial safeguards. It is your responsibility to protect the security of your login information. Please note that emails, instant messaging, and similar means of communication with other Members are not encrypted, and we strongly advise you not to communicate any confidential information through these means. Please help keep your account safe by using a strong password. How To Contact Us If you have questions or comments about this Privacy Policy, please contact us online or by physical mail at: For Members in the United States: LinkedIn Corporation Attn: Privacy Policy Issues 2029 Stierlin Court Mountain View, CA 94043 USA For Members outside the United States: LinkedIn Ireland Attn: Privacy Policy Issues Gardner House, Wilton Place, Wilton Plaza, Dublin 2 Ireland Close this window All content Copyright © 2014, LinkedIn Corporation