Privacy Policy

Our Commitment to Your Privacy

Cimore is a nonprofit public interest research and social impact organization. Trust is the foundation of our work: people share their views with us so that human choices can shape how AI is used. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect through this website and our services, how we use it, and the choices you have. It applies to our website, email list, community, events, store, and donations. How we handle research survey responses is covered separately, and in more detail, in our Data Sharing Policy.

Information We Collect

• Contact information you give us. When you join our email list or contact us through email or our Google Form, we collect the information you enter, such as your email address and any message or suggestions you include.
• Community account information. If you join the Cimore community, we collect the name, email address, and profile details you provide, along with the content you post.
• Survey responses. Our Human Choice Surveys are hosted on SurveyMonkey and are anonymous by design: we do not collect names, email addresses, or IP addresses with responses. If you accidentally include identifying details in a written answer, that information will be removed before the data is used or shared. See the Data Sharing Policy.
• Event registration. Event sign-ups are processed by Eventbrite under its own privacy policy. Eventbrite shares attendee information (such as your name and email) with us so we can run the event.
• Purchase and donation information. When our store and online giving are active, we collect order details and contact information. Payment card details are handled by our payment processors and never stored on our servers. If you tick the box at checkout asking to be invited to review your order, we send one email about two weeks after your order ships, as described in our Terms of Use. Reviews you submit may be shown publicly on our product pages with your name, after we have read them. At checkout you can also choose to receive updates about our research, events and community.
• Fellowship and internship applications. If you apply for a Cimore fellowship, internship, or research position, we collect the information you submit in your application, such as your name, contact details, educational background, and any materials you provide.
• Research report purchases. If you purchase a research report or other Cimore publication, we collect your contact and billing information to fulfill your order.
• Advocacy and public engagement. If you sign a petition, submit a public comment, or participate in an action alert through our website, we collect the information you provide, such as your name, email address, and any message you submit. Some of this information may be shared with legislators or government bodies as part of the submission, and we will let you know before that happens.
• Automatic information. Like most websites, our server keeps standard technical logs (such as IP address, browser type, and pages visited) for security and troubleshooting.

How We Use Your Information

• To provide and improve the website, community, events, store, and donation services
• To send you the updates you signed up for, such as new surveys, events, and findings
• To answer your messages and requests
• To conduct and publish our public interest research, using the safeguards in the Data Sharing Policy
• To keep the site secure and prevent fraud or abuse
• To meet legal, tax, and accounting obligations
• To process and evaluate fellowship, internship, and research position applications
• To fulfill purchases of research reports and publications
• To facilitate your participation in advocacy campaigns, petitions, and public comment submissions

We do not sell your personal information or share it for cross-context behavioral advertising.

Legal Basis for Processing

Depending on where you are located, we rely on one or more of the following legal bases to process your personal information:

• Consent: when you sign up for our email list, create a community account, or submit a form. You can withdraw your consent at any time; withdrawal does not affect processing that already took place.
• Legitimate interest: to operate and improve our services, conduct our nonprofit research mission, and keep our website secure.
• Legal obligation: to comply with tax, accounting, and other legal requirements.
• Performance of a contract: to process purchases and fulfill orders from our store.

Who We Share Information With

We share personal information only with the service providers that make this website work, and only what they need to do their jobs:

• Flywheel hosts this website.
• Google (Google Forms and Google Workspace) processes our contact and email-list form and our internal documents.
• SurveyMonkey hosts our surveys (responses are anonymous).
• Eventbrite handles event registration and ticketing.
• Brevo delivers our transactional and update emails; our website’s email and contact tools (the Fluent suite of WordPress plugins) store subscriber and community data within our own site database.
• Google Analytics helps us understand how visitors use our website by collecting usage data such as pages visited, time on site, and referring URLs.
• CookieYes powers our cookie consent banner and stores a record of the cookie preferences you select.
• Payment processors (such as Stripe or PayPal, once online payments launch) process purchases and donations under their own privacy policies.

Beyond service providers, we disclose personal information only with your consent, to comply with the law, or to protect the rights and safety of Cimore and others. Anonymized research findings are shared as described in the Data Sharing Policy: summary findings publicly, and further aggregated versions of the dataset only with approved external organizations under written agreements that prohibit re-sharing, commercial use, and use for training AI models.

Cookies

We use cookies and similar tracking technologies on our website. Some cookies are necessary for the site to function. Others help us understand how visitors use the site and measure the effectiveness of our outreach.

When we run online advertisements, our advertising partners may place cookies or similar technologies on your browser to measure ad performance and help us reach people interested in our mission. These technologies may collect device identifiers, IP addresses, and browsing activity associated with your visit.

You can manage your cookie preferences through your browser settings or our cookie banner at any time. Disabling certain cookies may affect your experience on the site.

Do Not Track Signals

Some browsers offer a "Do Not Track" setting. Our website does not currently respond to Do Not Track signals. We will update this policy if that changes.

Third-Party Websites and Links

Our site links to outside services such as SurveyMonkey, Eventbrite, Google Forms, and social media platforms. Those sites operate under their own privacy policies, and we encourage you to read them. We are not responsible for the practices of sites we do not control.

Children’s Privacy

Our website and services are intended for adults aged 18 and older. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18, including children under 13 as defined by the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). If you are a parent or guardian and believe your child under 18 has provided us with personal information, please contact us at engage@cimore.org and we will promptly delete that information.

Your Rights and Choices

• Email: every update email includes an unsubscribe link, and you can ask us to remove you at any time.
• Access, correction, and deletion: you may request a copy of the personal information we hold about you, ask us to correct it, or ask us to delete it by emailing engage@cimore.org. We will verify your request and respond as required by applicable law.
• Community: you can edit your profile or ask us to delete your account and posts.
• Survey data: because responses are anonymous, we cannot connect a stored response to you afterward, which also means we cannot retrieve or delete an individual response.

Data Retention and Security

We keep personal information only as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described above. General retention periods include:

• Email list data: retained until you unsubscribe or request deletion.
• Community account data: retained until you delete your account or request deletion.
• Donation and purchase records: retained for at least ten years to meet tax and accounting obligations.
• Server logs: retained for up to 90 days for security and troubleshooting.
• Fellowship and internship applications: retained for up to four years after the application cycle closes.

After the applicable retention period, we delete or anonymize the information.

We use reasonable technical and organizational safeguards, including encrypted connections (HTTPS), access limited to authorized staff and volunteers who need it, and who are bound by confidentiality obligations, and reputable service providers selected for their security practices. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure, but we work to protect your information and will notify you as required by law if a breach affects you.

Where Data Is Processed

Cimore is based in the United States and our services are hosted there. If you use the site from outside the U.S., your information will be transferred to and processed in the United States.

Information for Users Outside the United States

If you are located in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom, or Switzerland, we process your personal information on the basis of our legitimate interest in operating our nonprofit mission, or with your consent where required. In addition to the rights described above, you may have the right to:

• Request that we restrict or stop processing your personal information
• Object to our processing of your personal information
• Request a portable copy of the personal information you have provided to us
• Lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority

To exercise any of these rights, contact us at engage@cimore.org.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this policy as our services grow, for example when online donations launch. The current version, with its effective date, will always be posted on this page.

Contact Us

Cimore
2108 N Street #16999
Sacramento, CA 95816
Email: engage@cimore.org