Your privacy is important to Hythiam. We understand that health is a very personal, private subject, and we want you to feel as comfortable as possible visiting our website. Perhaps you are visiting Hythiam to learn about health for yourself, perhaps on behalf of someone else. This Privacy Policy and Agreement ("Privacy Policy") will tell you what information we collect about you and about your use of our website. It will explain how we protect that information and what choices you have about how it is used. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully so that you will understand clearly both our commitment to you and your privacy, and how we may collect and use information. By using the Hythiam site, you agree to the terms of this Privacy Policy. Here are the topics covered:
- What personally identifiable information of yours is collected;
- What organization is collecting the information;
- How the information is used;
- With whom the information may be shared;
- What choices are available regarding collection, use and distribution of the information;
- What kind of security procedures are in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of information under our control; and,
- How you can correct any inaccuracies in the information.
Be advised that if you access a third-party site from a link on Hythiam, any information you reveal on that site is not subject to this Privacy Policy. You should consult the privacy policies of each site you visit.
Part One -
Personal Information We Collect
Personal information is information that can be used to identify you or contact you. We collect any personal information you voluntarily provide in e-mails that you send through the "Contact Us" or "Contact Hythiam" links on our site. We use the Personal Information that you provide to respond to questions from you, provide information about our programs, and/or inform you of significant changes to this Privacy Policy. We may also use this information to send you e-mails with special promotions or newsletters or other information that we think may be of interest to you. If you indicate that we may do so, we also may contact you by phone. You can always opt-out of receiving such e-mails or unsubscribe to newsletters by sending us an e-mail requesting that we stop sending you these items. This Privacy Policy does not protect you when you send business information, ideas, concepts, or inventions to Hythiam by e-mail. If you want to keep business information, ideas, concepts, or inventions private or proprietary, do not send them in an e-mail to Hythiam. We try to answer every e-mail in a timely manner, but are not always able to do so.
General Use of Site
You may use our website without registering or submitting any Personal Information. In that case, the only information we collect will be non-personal information collected through the use of cookies (see details below).
Cookies
We also collect anonymous, non-personal information about your use of our site through the use of "Cookies," which are small computer files that we transfer to your computer's hard drive that allow us to know how often someone visits our site and the activities they conduct while on our site (such as the pages you visited, etc.). Every computer is assigned a different cookie by Hythiam. The information collected by cookies helps us dynamically generate advertising and content on web pages specifically designed for you and also allows us to statistically monitor how many people are using our site and for what purpose. We may use cookie information to target certain advertisements to your browser or to determine the popularity of certain content. Hythiam does not store any personally identifiable information in any cookies on your computer.
Your browser software can be set to reject all cookies. Most browsers offer instructions on how to reset the browser to reject cookies in the "Help" section of the toolbar. If you reject our cookie, certain of the functions and conveniences of our site may not work properly but you do not have to accept our cookie in order to productively use our site. While it may be possible to link non-personal cookie information to Personal Information collected in other ways, we want you to know that if you accept our cookie we will not, without your consent, link the cookie information we collect to Personal Information you provide to us through e-mails from our site.
Sponsors, advertisers or other third parties may also use their own cookies when you click on their advertisement or link to their site or service, or even if an advertisement simply appears on a page that you are viewing. Some advertisers use companies other than Hythiam to serve their ads and these companies ("Ad Servers") may also collect non-personal information through the use of cookies on our website. We do not control these third parties' use of Cookies, or how they manage the non-personal information they gather through them. However, we do require sponsors, advertisers, and Ad Servers who collect cookie information through our website to agree that they will not collect any Personal Information from our site without your consent. They have promised us they will not link any non-personal cookie information collected by them on our site to Personal Information they or others collect in other ways or from other sites. You should review the privacy policy of other sites you visit or link to from our site to understand how these other sites use cookies and how they use the information they collect through the use of cookies on their own sites.
Web Beacons
Web beacons are tiny graphic image files embedded in a web page or e-mail that provide a presence on the web page or e-mail and send back to its home server information from your browser. The information collected by web beacons allows websites to statistically monitor how many people are using the site and selected sponsors' and advertisers' sites, or opening e-mails sent from the site or from sponsors or advertisers, and sometimes to track your activity across websites generally. Hythiam does not use web beacons on our site.
Children
We are committed to protecting the privacy of children. This website is not designed or intended to attract children under the age of 13. We do not collect Personal Information from any person we actually know is under the age of 13.
Part Two -
Disclosure of Your Information
Except as set forth in this Privacy Policy or as specifically agreed to by you, Hythiam will not disclose any Personal Information you submit through our site. We may release Personal Information to third parties: (1) to comply with valid legal requirements such as a law, regulation, search warrant, subpoena or court order; or (2) in special cases, such as a physical threat to you or others. In the event that we are legally compelled to disclose your Personal Information to a third party, we will notify you unless doing so would violate the law or court order.
Disclosure to Hythiam Subsidiaries
Hythiam may disclose Personal Information to its corporate subsidiaries. Any Personal Information provided to subsidiaries of Hythiam will be treated by those subsidiaries in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Policy.
Changes in Corporate Structure
If all or part of the company is sold, merged or otherwise transferred to another entity, the personal information you have provided at this site may be transferred as part of that transaction. However, Hythiam will take steps to assure that the personal information is used in a manner consistent with the Hythiam privacy policy under which it was collected
Disclosure to Hythiam Operations and Maintenance Contractors
Hythiam operations and maintenance contractors sometimes have limited access to your Personal Information in the course of providing products or services to Hythiam. These contractors include vendors and suppliers that provide us with technology, services, and/or content related to better operation and maintenance of our website. Unless you have opted out of receiving e-mails and newsletters from Hythiam, these contractors also may have access to your e-mail address to send newsletters to you on our behalf or to send e-mails to you for purposes such as conducting market research on our behalf. Access to your Personal Information by these contractors is limited to the information reasonably necessary in order for the contractor to perform its limited function for Hythiam. We also contractually require that our operations and maintenance contractors 1) protect the privacy of your Personal Information consistent with this Privacy Policy, and 2) not use or disclose your Personal Information for any purpose other than providing us with products and services.
Disclosure to Linked Sites
For your convenience Hythiam may provide links to websites operated by companies other than Hythiam ("Third Party Websites"). Hythiam does not disclose your Personal Information to these Third Party Websites and Hythiam does not endorse and is not responsible for the privacy practices of these sites. If you choose to link to one of these Third Party Websites, you should review the privacy policy posted on that site to understand how that Third Party Website collects and uses your Personal Information.
Disclosure of Aggregate Information
Hythiam may provide to third parties non-personal information about you that does not allow you to be identified or contacted and that is combined with the non-personal information of other users. For example, we might inform third parties regarding the number of users of our site and the activities they conduct while on our site. Depending on the circumstances, we may or may not charge third parties for this Aggregate Information. We also may not limit the third parties' use of the Aggregate Information, except that we do require third parties to whom we disclose Aggregate Information to agree that they will not attempt to make this information personally identifiable by combining it with other databases or otherwise.
Part Three -
How Hythiam Handles Privacy and Security Internally
Hythiam wants your Personal Information to remain as secure as possible. That is why we have a two-level security system at Hythiam that combines leading technical safeguards and a code of conduct for those employees that are permitted to access our customers' Personal Information.
(1)Hythiam uses Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption technology in transmitting the information in your e-mails to our servers to help ensure the integrity and privacy of the Personal Information you provide to us via the Internet. Encryption involves systematically scrambling numbers and letters, so that even if someone managed to intercept the information, they would not be able to make sense of it. In order to take advantage of this encryption technology, you need to have an Internet browser that will support 128-bit encryption, such as Netscape or Microsoft Explorer.
(2)Only a limited number of Hythiam employees are authorized to access your Personal Information. All Hythiam employees must abide by our Privacy Policy and those who violate our Privacy Policy are subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination. Although we will make every reasonable effort to protect your Personal Information from loss, misuse, or alteration by third parties, you should be aware that there is always some risk involved in transmitting information over the Internet. There is also some risk that thieves could find a way to thwart our security systems.
Part Four -
Your Privacy Choices
You are not required to submit any e-mails with any Personal Information to Hythiam—it is completely your choice. You may also opt out of receiving e-mails and newsletters at any time by sending Hythiam an e-mail that requests Hythiam not to contact you in the future (except for purposes such as notifying you of revisions to this privacy policy or otherwise as required by law or safety issues). This privacy statement applies only to the Hythiam website.Part Five
Updating Your Personal Information and Contacting Hythiam
You can always contact us in order to (1) delete your Personal Information from our systems, (2) update the Personal Information that you have provided to us, and (3) change your preferences with respect to marketing contacts or other activities, by e-mailing us at info@hythiam.com. Such changes will not have any effect on other information that Hythiam maintains.
You should be aware that it is not technologically possible to remove each and every record of the information you have provided to Hythiam from our servers. The need to back-up our systems to protect information from inadvertent loss means that a copy of your personal information may exist in a non-erasable form that will be difficult or impossible for us to locate. Nevertheless, we promise that upon receiving your request, all personal information stored in the databases we actively use for research and daily business activities, and other readily searchable media, will be deleted.
Privacy as it applies to the Internet is a dynamic, rapidly developing area. In the future, we may make significant changes to our privacy policy affecting the use of the Personal Information we collect. We will notify you by e-mail of any significant changes and obtain your "opt-in" consent to any significant new uses of your Personal Information, if it was collected from you prior to a significant change in this policy. We may also make non-significant changes to our Privacy Policy that generally will not affect our use of your Personal Information. You should also check this posted Privacy Policy for any future changes. If you do not agree to the terms of this Privacy Policy or any revised policy, please exit the site immediately.
This policy is effective as of April 2, 2004.
