Privacy Policy

SmarterTools, Inc. (SmarterTools) is committed to safeguarding the privacy of our website visitors, license holders, customers, and service users. This policy applies where we are acting as a data controller with respect to the personal data of our website visitors, license holders, customers, and service users; in other words, where we determine the purposes and means of the processing of the personal data we collect. You will find our contact information at the end of this privacy policy.

From whom do we collect personal data?

We collect personal data from visitors to our website, license holders, customers, and users of our services.

What personal data do we collect and for what purposes? What is the legal basis for data processing?

We collect your personal data because we ask you to provide them when doing business with us or using our services and/or because you provide them yourself.

We process the following personal data:

• Your name
• Your pseudonym or display name
• Email address
• IP-address
• Phone number
• Credit card details
• Testimonials, case studies and/or white papers

We process your personal data for the following purposes:

• To process your transactions, including purchases of goods and/or services
• To communicate with you to provide our services, including maintenance notifications
• Marketing purposes
• Sending e-mail notifications

We process personal data on the following legal basis:

In principle, SmarterTools will process your personal data because this is necessary for the performance of a contract with you, for the establishment, exercise, and substantiation of legal claims, or based on consent granted by you. Any permission granted may be withdrawn at any time. SmarterTools may also be obliged to process your personal data based on a legal obligation, for example to demonstrate compliance with the rules of the GDPR. Furthermore, SmarterTools may process personal data on the grounds of its legitimate interest or that of a third party, such as direct marketing.

SmarterTools may occasionally send existing customers and/or those who have consented thereto information by e-mail about products and services of ours that we think you might like.

You have the right at any time to stop SmarterTools from contacting you for marketing purposes.

If you no longer wish to be contacted for marketing purposes, you can easily opt out by either clicking the “Unsubscribe” link at the bottom of any marketing email we send out, or by changing your Email Preferences in your SmarterTools account.

Sharing with third parties

Except as described below, SmarterTools does not share your personal data with third parties, unless with your express consent, or when this is necessary for the execution of our agreement with you, to comply with a legal obligation or where this is necessary for the establishment, exercise, or defense of legal claims.

We do not share information regarding license verification or validation services to registered partners of SmarterTools or to any other third parties.

The same holds true regarding information shared with any SmarterTools vendors. We do offer licensed products and/or services as optional add-ons for our products, and as part of our association with these vendors we may have to pay licensing and/or Intellectual Property royalties to them for use of their products and/or services. However, in reporting to these companies we do not share any personal information about who has purchased or otherwise uses these products and/or services.

From time to time, SmarterTools may contact customers to gauge satisfaction with our products and/or services or to gather statements about SmarterTools or our products and services for marketing and promotional purposes. (E.g., white papers, case studies, testimonials.) This information will be shared on the SmarterTools website and, potentially, on other public-facing websites. Such statements will not be used without the customer's express consent. In addition, SmarterTools itself will contact, collect, and process this information -- we do not use any third parties for this type of contact.

Financial transactions relating to our website and/or services are handled by our payment services providers. We will share transaction data with our payment services providers only to the extent necessary for the purposes of processing your payments, refunding such payments, and dealing with complaints and inquiries relating to such payments and refunds.

How do we protect your personal data?

As stated, SmarterTools is committed to protecting the security of your personal data. We employ appropriate security measures to protect the loss, misuse, unauthorized access, unwanted disclosure, and unauthorized alteration of personal data we collect. For example, we store the personal information you provide on computer systems with limited access, which are in controlled facilities. When we transmit highly confidential information (such as a credit card number) over the internet we protect it using encryption, such as the Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocol. In addition, your access to such information is similarly protected. While on a secure page, site visitors will notice a security icon in the visitor's browser, the location of which is dependent upon the browser used.

How long do we store your personal data?

Personal data shall not be kept for longer than is strictly necessary for the purposes mentioned in this privacy policy or for a legitimate interest of SmarterTools.

What are your data protection rights?

SmarterTools would like to make sure you are fully aware of your data protection rights. You are entitled to the following, if and insofar as the restrictions arising from the GDPR do not prevent it:

• The right of access
• The right to rectification (modification or addition) or erasure of your personal data
• The right to restriction of processing
• The right to object to processing
• The right to data portability

If you want to know which personal data SmarterTools processes, you can submit a request for access. Does it turn out that your details are incorrect, incomplete, or irrelevant? If so, you may submit an additional request to have the data amended or supplemented. Additionally, you are able to monitor and maintain any information SmarterTools has about you via the account you set up.

In addition, the data may be deleted at your request, insofar as this does not impede the performance of the current agreement with SmarterTools or a legitimate interest of SmarterTools and insofar as no legal obligation prevents this.

You can send a request for access, correction, deletion, data transfer of your personal data or request for cancellation of your consent or objection to the processing of your personal data to legal@smartertools.com To ensure the request has been made by you, we may ask you to send a copy of your ID or to identify yourself by other means. SmarterTools will respond to your request within four weeks.

The right to complain to a supervisory authority

You also have the right to file a complaint with the Dutch regulator, the Personal Data Authority, in case of faulty data processing. You can do this via the following link: Een tip of klacht indienen bij de AP | Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens

Data transfer outside EEA

SmarterTools stores personal data in the United States. Whenever we transfer personal data to the U.S., we do so in compliance with the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (EU-U.S. DPF). SmarterTools complies with the EU-U.S. DPF DPF as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce.  SmarterTools has certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (EU-U.S. DPF Principles) with regard to the processing of personal data received from the European Union in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF.  If there is any conflict between the terms in this privacy policy and the EU-U.S. DPF Principles, the Principles shall govern.  To learn more about the Data Privacy Framework (DPF) program, and to view our certification, please visit the Data Privacy Framework website.

In compliance with the EU-US Data Privacy Framework Program’s Principles, SmarterTools commits to resolve complaints about your privacy and our collection or use of your personal information transferred to the United States pursuant to the DPF Principles.  European Union individuals with DPF inquiries or complaints should first contact SmarterTools using the contact information shown below.

SmarterTools has further committed to refer unresolved privacy complaints under the DPF Principles to an independent dispute resolution mechanism, Data Privacy Framework Services, operated by BBB National Programs. If you do not receive timely acknowledgment of your complaint, or if your complaint is not satisfactorily addressed, please visit the BBB National Programs website for more information and to file a complaint. This service is provided free of charge to you.

If your DPF complaint cannot be resolved through the above channels, under certain conditions, you may invoke binding arbitration for some residual claims not resolved by other redress mechanisms.  See the Data Privacy website for more information.

What are cookies and how do we use them?

"Cookies" are files that contain an identifier -- generally a string of letters and numbers -- that are sent by a web server to a web browser, and then stored by that web browser. Every time the web browser requests a page from that web server, that identifier is sent to the web server to perform some function. "Persistent" cookies are stored for a set period based on the cookie's expiration date (or if the cookie is deleted by the user) whereas "Session" cookies expire at the end of a user's session, which is generally until the web browser is closed. We use both first-party session and persistent cookies to assist visitors to our website in performing legitimate interest tasks. This includes actions such as purchasing products or services from us, getting assistance from us via our help desk, etc. Typically, the cookies we use do not contain any information that is personally identifiable. In cases where such information may be present, we have done everything possible to keep such information obfuscated, such as the use of anonymization.

Our website uses the following types of cookies:

For further information, visit allaboutcookies.org.

How to manage cookies

You can set your browser not to accept cookies, and the above website tells you how to remove cookies from your browser. However, in a few cases, some of our website features may not function as a result.

Privacy policies of other websites

The SmarterTools website contains links to other websites. Our privacy policy applies only to our website, so if you click on a link to another website, you should read their privacy policy.

Changes to our privacy policy

SmarterTools keeps its privacy policy under regular review and places any updates on this web page. SmarterTools therefore advises you to consult this privacy policy regularly. This privacy policy was last updated on 25 April 2024.

How to contact us

Should you wish to contact us relating to any of the above, or to exercise your rights regarding our processing of personal data, you may contact us:

Email us at: legal@smartertools.com

Or write to us at:

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