Privacy Policy
Last modified: October 3, 2010 (view archived versions)
This Privacy Policy applies to all of the products, services and websites offered by Google Inc. or its subsidiaries or affiliated companies except Postini (Postini Privacy Policy). Sometimes, we may post product specific privacy notices or Help Center materials to explain our products in more detail.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please feel free to contact us through our website or write to us at
Privacy Matters
c/o Google Inc.
1600 Amphitheatre Parkway
Mountain View, California, 94043
USA
We may collect the following types of information:
- Information you provide – When you sign up for a Google Account, we ask you for personal information.
We may combine the information you submit under your account with
information from other Google services or third parties in order to
provide you with a better experience and to improve the quality of our
services. For certain services, we may give you the opportunity to opt
out of combining such information. You can use the Google Dashboard to
learn more about the information associated with your Account. If you
are using Google services in conjunction with your Google Apps Account,
Google provides such services in conjunction with or on behalf of your domain administrator.
Your administrator will have access to your account information
including your email. Consult your domain administrator’s privacy
policy for more information.
- Cookies – When you visit Google, we send one or more cookies
to your computer or other device. We use cookies to improve the quality
of our service, including for storing user preferences, improving
search results and ad selection, and tracking user trends, such as how
people search. Google also uses cookies in its advertising services to
help advertisers and publishers serve and manage ads across the web and
on Google services.
- Log information – When you access Google
services via a browser, application or other client our servers
automatically record certain information. These server logs
may include information such as your web request, your interaction with
a service, 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 or your account.
- User communications – When you send email or
other communications to Google, we may retain those communications in
order to process your inquiries, respond to your requests and improve
our services. When you send and receive SMS messages to or from one of
our services that provides SMS functionality, we may collect and
maintain information associated with those messages, such as the phone
number, the wireless carrier associated with the phone number, the
content of the message, and the date and time of the transaction. We
may use your email address to communicate with you about our services.
- Affiliated Google Services on other sites –
We offer some of our services on or through other web sites. Personal
information that you provide to those sites may be sent to Google in
order to deliver the service. We process such information under this
Privacy Policy.
- Third Party Applications – Google may make
available third party applications, such as gadgets or extensions,
through its services. The information collected by Google when you
enable a third party application is processed under this Privacy
Policy. Information collected by the third party application
provider is governed by their privacy policies.
- Location data – Google offers
location-enabled services, such as Google Maps and Latitude. If you use
those services, Google may receive information about your actual
location (such as GPS signals sent by a mobile device) or information
that can be used to approximate a location (such as a cell ID).
- Unique application number – Certain
services, such as Google Toolbar, include a unique application number
that is not associated with your account or you. This number and
information about your installation (e.g., operating system type,
version number) may be sent to Google when you install or uninstall
that service or when that service periodically contacts our servers
(for example, to request automatic updates to the software).
- Other sites – This Privacy Policy applies to
Google services only. We do not exercise control over the sites
displayed as search results, sites that include Google applications,
products or services, or links 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.
In addition to the above, we may use the information we collect to:
- Provide, maintain, protect, and improve our services (including advertising services) and develop new services; and
- Protect the rights or property of Google or our users.
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.
Google processes personal information on our servers in the
United States of America and in other countries. In some cases, we
process personal information outside your own country.
Choices
You can use the Google Dashboard to review and control the information stored in your Google Account.
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 Google features and services may
not function properly if your cookies are disabled.
Google uses the DoubleClick advertising cookie
on AdSense partner sites and certain Google services to help
advertisers and publishers serve and manage ads across the web. You can
view and manage your ads preferences associated with this cookie by
accessing the Ads Preferences Manager. In addition, you may choose to opt out of the DoubleClick cookie at any time by using DoubleClick’s opt-out cookie.
Information sharing
Google only shares personal information with other companies or
individuals outside of Google 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 Privacy 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 harm to the rights, property or safety of Google,
its users or the public as required or permitted by law.
If Google becomes involved in a merger, acquisition, or any form of
sale of some or all of its assets, we will ensure the confidentiality
of any personal information involved in such transactions and 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,
including appropriate encryption and physical security measures to
guard against unauthorized access to systems where we store personal
data.
We restrict access to personal information to Google employees,
contractors and agents who need to know that information in order to
process it on our behalf. 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.
Accessing and updating personal information
When you use Google 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. Because of the way we maintain
certain services, after you delete your information, residual copies
may take a period of time before they are deleted from our active
servers and may remain in our backup systems. Please review the service
Help Centers for more information.
Enforcement
Google adheres to the US Safe Harbor Privacy Principles of Notice,
Choice, Onward Transfer, Security, Data Integrity, Access and
Enforcement, and is registered with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Safe Harbor Program.
Google regularly reviews its compliance with this Privacy
Policy. When we receive formal written complaints, it is Google’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
Google and an individual.
Changes to this Privacy Policy
Please note that this Privacy Policy may change from time to time.
We will not reduce your rights under this Privacy Policy without your
explicit consent. We will post any Privacy 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 Privacy
Policy changes). We will also keep prior versions of this Privacy Policy in an archive for your review.