Privacy Policy of bizTOnet

1.1. Overview

To achieve our mission, bizTOnet makes services available through our website and mobile application to help you in sharing commercial information and developing your commercial visibility.

We operate as a professional social network and online platform. Individuals utilize our Services to discover and be discovered for business opportunities, establish connections, and acquire information.

Our registered users disclose their professional identities, interact with their connections, exchange business opportunities and leads, post and access pertinent content, and develop their business and network. Some of our Services' content and data are accessible to non-members.

Our Privacy Policy applies to all Members and Visitors. Fundamental to this objective is our dedication to being transparent about the information we gather about you, its utilization, and the parties with whom it is shared.

1.2. Services

1.3. Changes to This Policy

If the changes are significant, or if required by applicable law, we will contact you (based on your selected preferences for communications from us) and all our registered users with the new details and links to the updated or changed policy.

If required by law, we will get your permission or allow you to opt in to or opt out of, as applicable, any new uses of your personal information.

2.1. Data Provided by You

“Voluntarily provided” information refers to any information you knowingly and actively provide us when using our app and its associated services.

“Automatically collected” information refers to any information automatically sent by your device in the course of accessing our app and its associated services.

We may collect personal information from you when you do any of the following on our website:

• Register for an account
• Enter any of our competitions, contests, sweepstakes, and surveys
• Sign up to receive updates from us via email or social media channels
• Use a mobile device or web browser to access our content
• Contact us via email, social media, or on any similar technologies
• When you mention us on social media

Registration

Profile

Posting and Uploading

While it's not required to post or upload personal information, not doing so may limit your ability to develop and engage with your network on our Services.

Login Data

Additionally, when you encounter certain errors while using the app, we automatically collect data about the error and the circumstances surrounding its occurrence. This data may include technical details about your device, what you were trying to do when the error happened, and other technical information relating to the problem. You may or may not receive notice of such errors, even at the moment they occur, that they have occurred, or what the nature of the error is.

Please be aware that while this information may not be personally identifying by itself, it may be possible to combine it with other data to personally identify individual persons.

Device Data

Our app may access and collect data via your device's in-built tools, such as:

• Your identity
• Location data
• Camera
• Microphone
• Contacts
• Phone/SMS
• Storage, photos, and/or media
• Notifications
• Background data refresh
• Mobile data
• Device/app history
• Bluetooth

When you install the app or use your device’s tools within the app, we request permission to access this information. The specific data we collect can depend on the individual settings of your device and the permissions you grant when you install and use the app.

2.2. Data Provided by Others

2.3. Use of Cookies

Our privacy policy covers the use of cookies between your device and our servers. A cookie is a small piece of data that an app may store on your device, typically containing a unique identifier that allows the app servers to recognize your device when you use the app; information about your account, session, and/or device; additional data that serves the purpose of the cookie, and any self-maintenance information about the cookie itself.

We use cookies to give your device access to core features of our app, to track app usage and performance on your device, to tailor your experience of our app based on your preferences, and to serve advertising to your device. Any communication of cookie data between your device and our servers occurs within a secure environment.

Please refer to our Cookie Policy for more information.

2.4. Messages

2.5. Information Provided by Employers and Educational Institutions

2.6. How Long We Keep Your Personal Information

We keep your personal information only for as long as we need to. This time period may depend on what we are using your information for, in accordance with this privacy policy. For example, if you have provided us with personal information such as an email address when contacting us about a specific enquiry, we may retain this information for the duration of your enquiry remaining open as well as for our own records so we may effectively address similar enquiries in future. If your personal information is no longer required for this purpose, we will delete it or make it anonymous by removing all details that identify you.

However, if necessary, we may retain your personal information for our compliance with a legal, accounting, or reporting obligation or for archiving purposes in the public interest, scientific, or historical research purposes or statistical purposes.

2.7. Third-Party Websites and Services

We may disclose personal information to:

• a parent, subsidiary, or affiliate of our company
• third-party service providers to enable them to provide their services, including (without limitation) IT service providers, data storage, hosting and server providers, ad networks, analytics, error loggers, debt collectors, maintenance or problem-solving providers, marketing or advertising providers, professional advisors, and payment systems operators
• our employees, contractors, and/or related entities
• our existing or potential agents or business partners
• sponsors or promoters of any competition, sweepstakes, or promotion we run
• credit reporting agencies, courts, tribunals, and regulatory authorities, in the event you fail to pay for goods or services we have provided to you
• courts, tribunals, regulatory authorities, and law enforcement officers, as required by law, in connection with any actual or prospective legal proceedings, or to establish, exercise, or defend our legal rights
• third parties, including agents or sub-contractors, who assist us in providing information, products, services, or direct marketing to you
• third parties to collect and process data
• an entity that buys, or to which we transfer all or substantially all of our assets and business

Third parties we currently use include:

• Google Analytics
• MailChimp
• Aweber
• Getresponse
• Google Adsense
• Stripe

3.1. International Transfers of Personal Information

The countries to which we store, process, or transfer your personal information may not have the same data protection laws as the country in which you initially provided the information. If we transfer your personal information to third parties in other countries: (i) we will perform those transfers by the requirements of applicable law, and (ii) we will protect the transferred personal information by this privacy policy

3.2. Additional Considerations

As our Services are dynamic, we frequently introduce new functionalities, which may necessitate the collection of additional information. If we gather substantially different personal data or significantly alter the way we collect, utilize, or share your data, we will inform you and may also update this Privacy Policy accordingly.

4.1. Services

4.2. Advertisements

We aim and assess the effectiveness of advertisements at users, visitors, and others both on and off our platform, either directly or through various partners, employing the following data, individually or in combination:

• Information from advertising partners, vendors, and publishers;
• Data inferred from the information described above (e.g., deducing industry, seniority, and compensation range from job titles in a profile; estimating age from graduation dates or determining gender from first names or pronoun usage; deducing your interests from your feed activity; or identifying you as a user through device data);
• User-provided data (e.g., profile, contact details, title, and industry);
• Data from your usage of our services (e.g., search history, feed, content you engage with, whom you follow or who follows you, connections, group participation, page visits, videos you watch, ad interactions, etc.); and
• Data from advertising technologies on and off our platform, pixels, ad tags, cookies, and device identifiers.

We will provide you with sponsored content that resembles non-sponsored content, except it is labeled as advertising (e.g., “ad” or “sponsored”). If you engage with these ads through social actions (such as liking, commenting, or sharing), your actions will be linked to your name and visible to others, including the advertiser. Based on your settings, if you perform a social action on the platform, that action may be mentioned alongside related ads. For instance, when you like a company, we may include your name and photo when their sponsored content is displayed.

4.3. Correspondence

We will reach out to you through various channels, including email, mobile phone, notices on our websites or apps, messages to your bizTOnet inbox, and other means via our platform, such as text messages and push notifications. We will send you messages regarding our service availability, security, or other service-related topics. We also deliver messages about utilizing our services, network updates, reminders, products suggestions, and promotional communications from us and our partners. You can modify your communication preferences at any time. Please note that you cannot opt out of receiving essential service messages from us, including security and legal notifications.

4.4. Marketing

Besides advertising our services, we use user data and content for sending invitations and communications that encourage membership growth, engagement, and utilization of our services, such as displaying to your connections that you have employed a feature on our platform.

4.5. Service Development and Research

We may collect, hold, use, and disclose information for the following purposes, and personal information will not be further processed in a manner that is incompatible with these purposes:

• to provide you with our app and platform's core features and services
• to enable you to customize or personalize your experience of our website
• to deliver products and/or services to you
• to contact and communicate with you
• for analytics, market research, and business development, including operating and improving our app, associated applications, and associated social media platforms
• for advertising and marketing, including sending you promotional information about our products and services and information about third parties that we consider may be of interest to you
• to consider your employment application
• to enable you to access and use our app, associated platforms, and associated social media channels
• for internal record-keeping and administrative purposes
• to run competitions, sweepstakes, and/or offer additional benefits to you
• to comply with our legal obligations and resolve any disputes that we may have
• to attribute any content (e.g. posts and comments) you submit that we publish on our website
• for security and fraud prevention, and to ensure that our sites and apps are safe, secure, and used in line with our terms of use
• for technical assessment, including operating and improving our app, associated applications, and associated social media platforms

We may combine voluntarily provided and automatically collected personal information with general information or research data we receive from other trusted sources. For example, If you consent to us accessing your social media profiles, we may combine information sourced from those profiles with information received from you directly to provide you with an enhanced experience of our app and services.

4.6. Customer Service

We utilize data (including your communications) to investigate, address, and resolve complaints and service-related issues (e.g., bugs).

4.7. Security and Inquiry

We use your data (including your communications) for security reasons or to prevent or investigate potential fraud or other breaches of our User Agreement, as well as attempts to harm our users, visitors, or others.

4.8. Anonymous Insights

We employ your data to create and share insights that do not reveal your identity. For instance, we might use your data to generate statistics about our users, their professions, or industries, calculate ad impressions served or interacted with, publish visitor demographics for a service, or develop demographic workforce insights.

5.1. Our Services

5.2. Communication Archiving

Certain Members (or their employers) may need to archive their communications and social media activity for legal or professional compliance purposes and may use third-party services to provide these archival services. We enable the archiving of messages by and to these Members outside of our Services. For example, a financial advisor may need to archive communications with her clients through our Services to maintain her professional financial advisor license.

5.3. Third-Party Services

Based on your settings, other services may access your profile. When you choose to connect your account to external services, your personal data becomes available to them. The sharing and use of this personal data will be outlined or linked to a consent screen when connecting the accounts. For example, you may link your Twitter or Facebook account to share content from our Services to these platforms, or your email provider may allow you to import your contacts into its service. Third-party services maintain their privacy policies, and you might be permitting them to use your data in ways we would not permit. You can revoke the connection with such accounts

Subject to your settings, portions of your profile may appear on other services (e.g., search engine results, mail and calendar applications showing limited profile data for users they interact with, social media aggregators, talent, and lead managers). “Old” profile information remains on these services until they refresh their data cache with updates you made to your profile.

5.4. Your Rights and Controlling Your Personal Information

Your choice: By providing personal information to us, you understand we will collect, hold, use, and disclose your personal information through this privacy policy. You do not have to provide personal information to us, however, if you do not, it may affect your use of our app or the products and/or services offered on or through it

Information from third parties: If we receive personal information about you from a third party, we will protect it as set out in this privacy policy. If you are a third party providing personal information about somebody else, you represent and warrant that you have such a person’s consent to provide the personal information to us.

Marketing permission: If you have previously agreed to us using your personal information for direct marketing purposes, you may change your mind at any time by contacting us using the details below.

Access: You may request details of the personal information that we hold about you

Correction: If you believe that any information we hold about you is inaccurate, out of date, incomplete, irrelevant, or misleading, please contact us using the details provided in this privacy policy. We will take reasonable steps to correct any information found to be inaccurate, incomplete, misleading, or out of date.

Non-discrimination: We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of your rights over your personal information. Unless your personal information is required to provide you with a particular service or offer (for example serving particular content to your device), we will not deny you goods or services and/or charge you different prices or rates for goods or services, including through granting discounts or other benefits or imposing penalties, or provide you with a different level or quality of goods or services.

Notification of data breaches: We will comply with laws applicable to us in respect of any data breach.

Complaints: If you believe that we have breached a relevant data protection law and wish to make a complaint, please contact us using the details below and provide us with full details of the alleged breach. We will promptly investigate your complaint and respond to you, in writing, setting out the outcome of our investigation and the steps we will take to deal with your complaint. You also have the right to contact a regulatory body or data protection authority about your complaint

Unsubscribe: To unsubscribe from our email database or opt out of communications (including marketing communications), please contact us using the details provided in this privacy policy, or opt out using the opt-out facilities provided in the communication. We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity.

5.5. Close Account

If you choose to close your bizTOnet account, your personal data will generally stop being visible to others on our Services within 48 hours. We generally delete closed account information within 30 days of account closure, except as noted below.

We retain your personal data even after you have closed your account if reasonably necessary to comply with our legal obligations (including law enforcement requests), meet regulatory requirements, resolve disputes, maintain security, prevent fraud and abuse (e.g., if we have restricted your account for breach of our Professional Conducts Policies), enforce our User Agreement, or fulfill your request to "unsubscribe" from further messages from us. We will retain de-personalized information after your account has been closed.

Information you have shared with others (e.g., through messages, updates or club posts) will remain visible after you close your account or delete the information from your own profile or mailbox, and we do not control data that other Members have copied out of our Services. Clubs content and ratings or review content associated with closed accounts will show an unknown user as the source. Your profile may continue to be displayed in the services of others (e.g., search engine results) until they refresh their cache

6.1. Change to 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 and professional information, or to the Privacy Policy, we will provide notice to you on the Service or by some other means, such as email. Please review the changes carefully. If you agree to the changes, simply continue to use our Service. If you object to any of the changes to our terms and you no longer wish to use bizTOnet, you may close your account. Unless stated otherwise, our current Privacy Policy applies to all information that bizTOnet has about you and your account. Using bizTOnet after a notice of changes has been communicated to you or published on our Service shall constitute consent to the changed terms or practices.

6.2. Security

We 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 and professional information that you provide in accordance with industry standards. Access to your data on bizTOnet 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 bizTOnet Services. We also offer secure https access to the website. To protect any data you store on our servers, we also regularly monitor our system for possible vulnerabilities and attacks. However, since the Internet is not a 100% secure environment, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information that you transmit to bizTOnet. 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 bizTOnet 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.

6.3. International Data Transfers

We process data both inside and outside of Europe and rely on legally-provided mechanisms to lawfully transfer data across borders. Countries where we process data may have laws which are different from, and potentially not as protective as, the laws of your own country.

International Transfers of Personal Information

Where the disclosure of your personal information is solely subject to Australian privacy laws, you acknowledge that some third parties may not be regulated by the Privacy Act and the Australian Privacy Principles in the Privacy Act. You acknowledge that if any such third party engages in any act or practice that contravenes the Australian Privacy Principles, it would not be accountable under the Privacy Act, and you will not be able to seek redress under the Privacy Act.

Data Controller / Data Processor

The GDPR distinguishes between organizations that process personal information for their purposes (known as “data controllers”) and organizations that process personal information on behalf of other organizations (known as “data processors”). We, bizTOnet, located at the address provided in our Contact Us section, are a Data Controller and/or Processor concerning the personal information you provide to us.

Legal Bases for Processing Your Personal Information

We will only collect and use your personal information when we have a legal right to do so. In this case, we will collect and use your personal information lawfully, fairly, and in a transparent manner. If we seek your consent to process your personal information, and you are under 16 years of age, we will seek your parent or legal guardian’s consent to process your personal information for that specific purpose.

Our lawful bases depend on the services you use and how you use them. This means we only collect and use your information on the following grounds:

Consent From You

Where you give us consent to collect and use your personal information for a specific purpose. You may withdraw your consent at any time using the facilities we provide; however, this will not affect any use of your information that has already taken place. You may consent to provide your name and contact details to enter a giveaway or promotion. While you may withdraw your entry at any time, this will not affect any selection or judging that has already taken place. If you have any further inquiries about how to withdraw your consent, please feel free to enquire using the details provided in the Contact Us section of this privacy policy.

Performance of a Contract or Transaction

Where you have entered into a contract or transaction with us, or to take preparatory steps before our entering into a contract or transaction with you. For example, we need technical information about your device to provide the essential features of our app.

Our Legitimate Interests

Where we assess whether it is necessary for our legitimate interests, such as for us to provide, operate, improve, and communicate our services. For example, we collect technical information about your device to improve and personalize your experience with our app. We consider our legitimate interests to include research and development, understanding our audience, marketing and promoting our services, measures taken to operate our services efficiently, marketing analysis, and measures taken to protect our legal rights and interests.

Compliance with Law

In some cases, we may have a legal obligation to use or keep your personal information. Such cases may include (but are not limited to) court orders, criminal investigations, government requests, and regulatory obligations. If you have any further inquiries about how we retain personal information to comply with the law, please feel free to enquire using the details provided in the Contact Us section of this privacy policy.

Your Rights and Controlling Your Personal Information

Restrict: You have the right to request that we restrict the processing of your personal information if (i) you are concerned about the accuracy of your personal information; (ii) you believe your personal information has been unlawfully processed; (iii) you need us to maintain the personal information solely for the purpose of a legal claim; or (iv) we are in the process of considering your objection in relation to processing based on legitimate interests.

Objecting to processing: You have the right to object to the processing of your personal information that is based on our legitimate interests or public interest. If this is done, we must provide compelling legitimate grounds for the processing which overrides your interests, rights, and freedoms, to proceed with the processing of your personal information.

Data portability: You may have the right to request a copy of the personal information we hold about you. Where possible, we will provide this information in CSV format or other easily readable machine formats. You may also have the right to request that we transfer this personal information to a third party.

Deletion: You may have a right to request that we delete the personal information we hold about you at any time, and we will take reasonable steps to delete your personal information from our current records. If you ask us to delete your personal information, we will let you know how the deletion affects your use of our app, website, or products and services. There may be exceptions to this right for specific legal reasons which, if applicable, we will set out for you in response to your request. If you terminate or delete your account, we will delete your personal information within 30 days of the deletion of your account. Please be aware that search engines and similar third parties may still retain copies of your personal information that has been made public at least once, like certain profile information and public comments, even after you have deleted the information from our services or deactivated your account.

Do Not Track

Some browsers have a “Do Not Track” feature that lets you tell websites that you do not want to have your online activities tracked. At this time, we do not respond to browser “Do Not Track” signals.

We adhere to the standards outlined in this privacy policy, ensuring we collect and process personal information lawfully, fairly, transparently, and with legitimate, legal reasons for doing so.

Cookies and Pixels

At all times, you may decline cookies from our site if your browser permits. Most browsers allow you to activate settings on your browser to refuse the setting of all or some cookies. Accordingly, your ability to limit cookies is based only on your browser’s capabilities. Please refer to the Cookies section of this privacy policy for more information.

CCPA-permitted financial incentives

By your right to non-discrimination, we may offer you certain financial incentives permitted by the CCPA that can result in different prices, rates, or quality levels for the goods or services we provide.

Any CCPA-permitted financial incentive we offer will reasonably relate to the value of your personal information, and we will provide written terms that describe clearly the nature of such an offer. Participation in a financial incentive program requires your prior opt-in consent, which you may revoke at any time.

California Notice of Collection

In the past 12 months, we have collected the following categories of personal information enumerated in the California Consumer Privacy Act:

• Identifiers, such as name, email address, phone number account name, IP address, and an ID or number assigned to your account.
• Customer records, such as billing and shipping address, and credit or debit card data.
• Commercial information, such as products or services history and purchases.
• Internet activity, such as your interactions with our service.
• Audio or visual data, such as photos or videos you share with us or post on the service
• Geolocation data.
• Employment and education data, such as data you provide when you apply for a job with us.
• Inferences, such as information about your interests, preferences, and favorites.

For more information on the information we collect, including the sources we receive information from, review the “Information We Collect” section. We collect and use these categories of personal information for the business purposes described in the “Collection and Use of Information” section, including to provide and manage our Service.

Right to Know and Delete

If you are a California resident, you have the right to delete the personal information we collected and know certain information about our data practices in the preceding 12 months. In particular, you have the right to request the following from us:

• The categories of personal information we have collected about you;
• The categories of sources from which the personal information was collected;
• The categories of personal information about you we disclosed for a business purpose or sold;
• The categories of third parties to whom the personal information was disclosed for a business purpose or sold;
• The business or commercial purpose for collecting or selling the personal information; and
• The specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us using the details provided in this privacy policy.

Shine the Light

If you are a California resident, in addition to the rights discussed above, you have the right to request information from us regarding how we share certain personal information as defined by California’s “Shine the Light” with third parties and affiliates for their own direct marketing purposes.

To receive this information, send us a request using the contact details provided in this privacy policy. Requests must include “California Privacy Rights Request” in the first line of the description and include your name, street address, city, state, and ZIP code.