Privacy Statement
This statement was last revised on April 24, 2008.
BreakingPoint Systems, Inc. (also referred to in this document as “BreakingPoint Systems” or “BreakingPoint”) provides this Customer Privacy Statement to make you aware of our privacy practices and the choices you can make about how your personal information is collected and used, both online and off-line.
This Customer Privacy Statement, together with our Terms of Service and other published guidelines, governs your interaction with this site, and your registration for and use of BreakingPoint’s online services.
Customers are BreakingPoint’s most valuable asset. We recognize that building a long-term business relationship with you depends a great deal on trust. This trust begins with our commitment to respecting as well as protecting your privacy. We’ve structured our website so that you can visit us without identifying yourself or revealing any personal information. If you do share your personal information with us, you can be assured that it will only be used to support your relationship with BreakingPoint.
This Customer Privacy Statement covers 9 main areas: Notice, Choice, Access & Accuracy, Onward Transfer, Security, Children’s Privacy, Tailoring E-mail Communications and Web Experiences, How BreakingPoint Uses Cookies and Additional Information. These areas are described in detail below. Please keep in mind that our privacy practices may vary as required by local laws and policies.
Comments or questions about our privacy practices can be sent to: info@breakingpoint.com.
1. Notice
What information we collect
When BreakingPoint collects any personal information on our website, we will express our need for the personal data at the point of collection. Personal information is any information that can be used to identify an individual, and may include, but is not limited to, name, e-mail address, phone number, postal or other physical address, title, occupation, and other information required to provide a service, deliver a product, or carry out a transaction you have requested. To tailor our subsequent communications to you and improve our products and services, we may ask you to provide information regarding your personal or professional interests, demographics, experience with our products and contact preferences. Personal information may be required to determine access eligibility for certain restricted parts of our site. Some of the reasons we collect your personal information include:
Participation in discussion groups
Collaboration efforts
Registration to membership programs or newsletter subscriptions
Provide registered users a more personalized and meaningful experience on the BreakingPoint website.
How we use the information
BreakingPoint uses your personal information to better understand your needs and provide you with better products and service. Specifically, we use your personal information to help you complete a transaction, to communicate back to you, provide updates on service and products, provide the ability to create personal profile and to personalize our website and communications with you. From time to time, we may also use your information to contact you for market research or to provide you with marketing information we think would be of particular interest. We will always give you the opportunity to opt-out of receiving such contact. If you would like to read more about how to opt-out, please follow the directions given below in the “Choice” section of this document. In addition, we will also follow local requirements, where applicable.
Whom we share the information with
BreakingPoint does not sell, rent, or lease your personal information to others. Unless we have your permission or are required by law, we only share your personal information with other BreakingPoint business partners who are acting on our behalf for the uses described above. Such BreakingPoint business partners are governed by our privacy policies with respect to the use of this data and are bound by appropriate confidentiality agreements.
2. Choice
Except as provided below, BreakingPoint will not use or share your personal information in ways unrelated to the ones described above without first notifying you and offering you a choice. We will also provide you the opportunity to let us know if you wish to opt-out at any time of certain or all contact from BreakingPoint, and we will do everything we can to honor such requests. This choice may be offered at the bottom of our online or off-line communications to you, as well as on many of our web registration pages. If you have any difficulty exercising your choices, please send your request to info@breakingpoint.com.
We may respond to subpoenas, court orders, or legal process by disclosing your personal information and other related information, if necessary. We also may choose, in our discretion, to establish or exercise our legal rights or defend against legal claims.
We may collect and possibly share personal information and any other additional information available to us in order to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person, violations of BreakingPoint’s terms of use, or as otherwise required or permitted by law.
3. Onward Transfer
Subject to your permission or as permitted by law, the personal information that you provide to us may be transferred within BreakingPoint across state or country borders. This may be done to consolidate data storage or to simplify the management of customer information. Your personal information will be stored on BreakingPoint’s servers, which are currently located in Austin, Texas.
4. Access
To remove your personal information from our database, you must unsubscribe at unsubscribe@breakingpoint.com.
5. Security
BreakingPoint is committed to protecting the personal information you share with us. We utilize a combination of security technologies, procedures, and organizational measures to help protect your personal information from unauthorized access, use or disclosure.
While we strive to protect your personal information, we cannot ensure the security of the information you transmit.
We recommend that you take every precaution in protecting your personal information when you are on the Internet. For example, change your passwords often, use a combination of letters and numbers when creating passwords, and make sure you use a secure browser.
6. Children’s Privacy
BreakingPoint does not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 13. If we learn that we have collected personal information on a child under the age of 13, we will delete that data from our systems. BreakingPoint encourages parents and guardians to go online with their children. Here are a few tips to help make a child’s online experience safer:
Teach children never to give personal information (such as name, address, phone number, school, etc.) unless supervised by a parent or responsible adult.
Know the sites your children are visiting and which sites are appropriate.
Look for website privacy policies. Know how your child’s information is treated.
Please visit the FTC’s website for more tips on protecting children’s privacy online.
7. Tailoring E-Mail Communications and Web Experiences
On occasion BreakingPoint may employ technologies that enable us to review which recipients have opened our e-mail communications and which links they have accessed in the message. This helps us to tailor our communications in our attempts to send you the most relevant information, as local laws and your preferences and permissions allow. As a registered user, we may also monitor your web browsing session while you are logged-in to our website. In this way we will try to improve our website through personalization to better meet your needs. Any such monitoring is done in accordance with applicable laws.
8. How BreakingPoint Uses Cookies
A cookie is a piece of information either stored temporarily in your browser’s memory space (session cookie) or placed on your computer’s hard drive (stored cookie). Cookies allow a web application to respond to you as an individual, but without the need to identify you explicitly. Session cookies are destroyed when you terminate your browsing session by shutting down your browser. Stored cookies often have a predetermined expiration date after which they disappear from your hard drive. Cookies can be removed explicitly through functionality built into most web browsers. You may also set your web browser (e.g., Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator) to notify you of cookie placement requests, ask for permission to accept them, or decline cookies completely. Search for “cookies” under your web browser’s Help menu for more information on cookie management features available to you.
Cookie Usage
On occasion BreakingPoint may use cookies to help us analyze web traffic or to improve your web navigation experience. To facilitate the analysis, an ID is assigned to help us uniquely identify you each time you return to our website. We use multiple third parties to monitor web traffic, statistics, advertisement ‘click-throughs,’ and other activities on BreakingPoint’s sites. Where authorized by BreakingPoint, such third parties may use cookies, BreakingPoint’s web log files, web beacons, and other monitoring technologies to compile anonymous aggregate statistics on BreakingPoint’s website visitors.
By gathering and remembering information about your preferences, the web application can:
Tailor its operation to your needs, likes and dislikes.
Provide an automated log-in process as a convenience for previously registered customers. This insures that you will be accurately identified and linked with your registration data.
Be placed on your computer to ensure you are not surveyed multiple times during your visit(s) to an BreakingPoint website. This cookie has a limited life span and will not personally identify you.
Cookies help us provide a better web experience by letting us monitor what’s working and what isn’t through site traffic analysis. BreakingPoint wants to be sure you understand that accepting a cookie in no way gives us access to your computer or any personal information about you, other than the data you chose to share with us. This practice is strictly enforced.
9. Additional Information
Newsgroups/forums
BreakingPoint’s newsgroups and forums are public. Please consider this before posting material to them.
Links to Third Party Websites
Links to third party websites are provided solely as a convenience to you. If you use these links, you will leave the BreakingPoint site. BreakingPoint has not reviewed all of these third party sites; does not control and is not responsible for any of these sites, their content or their privacy policies. Thus, we do not endorse or make any representations about them, or any information, software or other products or materials found there, or any results that may be obtained from using them. If you decide to access any of the third party sites linked to this site, you do so entirely at your own risk.
Changes to the Privacy Statement
All material changes to our Privacy Policy and practices will be posted on this page. The revision date shown at the top of the page will be updated accordingly.
Contact Information
Please e-mail questions or comments about our privacy practices to: