This privacy statement covers the site buzzardnews.com. Since we value your privacy, we have provided this statement to inform you in how we use any information that you provide us, or that we may gather from you during your visit to our web site. This statement covers the following concerns with respect to your privacy.

1. What personally identifiable information BuzzardNews.Com collects.
   
   
2. What personally identifiable information third parties collect through the Web site.
   
   
3. What organization collects the information.
   
   
4. How BuzzardNews.Com uses the information.
   
   
5. With whom BuzzardNews.Com may share user information.
   
   
6. What choices are available to users regarding collection, use and distribution of the information.
   
   
7. What types of security procedures are in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of information under the control of BuzzardNews.Com.
   
   
8. How users can correct any inaccuracies in the information.
   

If users have questions or concerns regarding this statement, they should contact the BuzzardNews.Com Customer Support Department by emailing support@buzzardnews.com.

This statement covers only information that is collected through this Web site, and does not cover information that may be collected through software downloaded from the site.

Information Collection and Use

Information Collection
BuzzardNews.Com is the sole owner of the information collected on buzzardnews.com. We collect information from our users at several different points on our Web site.
Registration
In order to use this Web site, a user must first complete the registration form. During registration a user is required to give contact information (such as name and email address). We use this information to contact the user about services on our site for which he has expressed interest. It is optional for the user to provide demographic information (such as income level and gender), but encouraged so we can provide a more personalized experience on our site.

Order
We request information from the user on our order form. A user must provide contact information (such as name, email, and shipping address) and financial information (such as credit card number, expiration date). This information is used for billing purposes and to fill customer's orders. If we have trouble processing an order, the information is used to contact the user.

Information Use
BuzzardNews.Com uses information gathered from users on its site to provide the primary services of access to Usenet Newsgroups. We also aggregate non-personal information such as the number of times a visitor has been to our website, how long they stayed, what type of browser they used, etc. This aggregated information is used by us to better understand our customers and to help us in identifying market strategies. We never sell, lease or rent any personal information about our users.
Profile
We store information that we collect through cookies, log files, clear gifs, and/or third parties to create a profile of our users. A profile is stored information that we keep on individual users that details their viewing preferences. Consequently, collected information is tied to the users personally identifiable information to provide offers and improve the content of the site for the user. This profile is used to tailor a user's visit to our Web site, and to direct pertinent marketing promotions to them. We do not share your profile with other third parties. We do not tie information regarding which Usenet Newsgroups a user accesses to their personal information.

Cookies
A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user's computer tied to information about the user. We use both session ID cookies and persistent cookies. For the session ID cookie, once users close the browser, the cookie simply terminates. A persistent cookie is a small text file stored on the user's hard drive for an extended period of time. Persistent cookies can be removed by following Internet browser help file directions. Cookies cannot be used to run programs or deliver viruses to your computer. Cookies are uniquely assigned to you, and can only be read by a web server in the domain that issued the cookie to you.

This site uses cookies to provide a more customized and pleasurable experience. Using cookies gives us the ability to allow you to only enter you username and password once when you enter the site and to remember whom you are when you return to our site. We do not store personal information in any cookie, generally our cookies contain your user id number, username and IP address, and other information that we use to determine what areas of our site you have access to.

Some of our business partners use cookies on our site (for example, advertisers). However, we have no access to or control over these cookies, once we have given permission for them to set cookies for advertising.

This privacy statement covers the use of cookies by buzzardnews.com only and does not cover the use of cookies by any advertisers.

Third Party Advertising
The ads appearing on this Web site are delivered to users by our Web advertising partners. Information about users' visit to this site, such as number of times they have viewed an ad and pages they have visited (but not user name, address, or other personal information), is used to serve ads to users on this site.

Log Files
Like most standard Web site servers we use log files. This includes internet protocol (IP) addresses, browser type, internet service provider (ISP), referring/exit pages, platform type, date/time stamp, and number of clicks to analyze trends, administer the site, track user's movement in the aggregate, and gather broad demographic information for aggregate use. IP addresses are tied to personally identifiable information in our databases to enable our Web-based service. We also use a tracking utility that uses log files to analyze user movement.

Clear Gifs (Web Beacons/Web Bugs)
We may employ, or our third party advertising company may employ a software technology called clear gifs (a.k.a. Web Beacons/Web Bugs), that help us better manage content on our site by informing us what content is effective. Clear gifs are tiny graphics with a unique identifier, similar in function to cookies, and are used to track the online movements of Web users. The main difference between the two is that clear gifs are invisible on the page and are much smaller, about the size of the period at the end of this sentence. BuzzardNews.com does not tie clear gifs to users' personally identifiable information.

Clear Gifs can "work with" existing cookies on a computer if they are both from the same Web site or advertising company. That means, for example, that if a person visited 'www.companyZ.com', which uses an advertising company's clear gif, the Web site [or advertising company] would match the clear gif's identifier and the advertising company's cookie ID number, to show the past online behavior for that computer. This collected information would then be given to the advertising company [or Web site].

In addition, we may use clear gifs in our HTML-based emails to let us know which emails have been opened by the recipients. This allows us to gauge the effectiveness of certain communications and the effectiveness of our marketing campaigns. If users would like to opt-out of these emails, please see the Opt-out section.

Special Offers and Updates
We send all new members a welcoming email to verify password and username. Established members will occasionally receive information on products, services, special deals, and a newsletter. Out of respect for the privacy of our users we present the option do not send these types of communications unless the user has opted-in to receive them. Please see the Choice and Opt-in sections. We occasionally send out emails to former customers regarding changes in our service that we feel they may be interested in.

Service Announcements
On rare occasions it is necessary to send out a strictly service related announcement. For instance, if our service is temporarily suspended for maintenance we might send users an email. Generally, users may not opt-out of these communications, though they can deactivate their account. However, these communications are not promotional in nature.

Customer Service
We communicate with users on a regular basis to provide requested services and in regards to issues relating to their account we reply via email or phone, in accordance with the users wishes.

Legal Disclaimer
Though we make every effort to preserve user privacy, we may need to disclose personal information when required by law wherein we have a good-faith belief that such action is necessary to comply with a current judicial proceeding, a court order or legal process served on our Web site.

Aggregate Information (non-personally identifiable)
Currently we do not share aggregated demographic information with our partners and advertisers.

Third Party Advertisers
BuzzardNews.Com may share Web site usage information with a reputable third party for the purpose of targeting our Internet banner advertisements on this site and other sites.

These are the instances in which we will share users' personal information:
We DO NOT Share Personal Information with Third Parties except to complete business transactions initiated by the user, such as credit card and other financial transactions.

Third Party Intermediaries
We currently use VeriSign, Inc. to process our credit card transactions. Their privacy policy statement can be viewed at http://www.verisign.com/truste/index.html. We also use Authorize.Net. to offer our customers another secure method of payment. The Authorize.Net privacy policy can be viewed at http://www.authorize.net/company/privacy/.

Business Transitions
In the event BuzzardNews.Com goes through a business transition, such as a merger, being acquired by another company, or selling a portion of its assets, users' personal information will, in most instances, be part of the assets transferred. Users will be notified via prominent notice on our Web site for 30 days prior to a change of ownership or control of their personal information. If as a result of the business transition, the users' personally identifiable information will be used in a manner different from that stated at the time of collection they will be given choice consistent with our notification of changes section.

Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletter and promotional communications may opt-out of receiving these communications by replying to unsubscribe in the subject line in the email or email us at support@buzzardnews.com. If the user has opted in for any item or even we also offer an opt-out mechanism on the Account Manager page, or the user may contact us at support@buzzardnews.com to opt-out.

Users of our site are always notified when their information is being collected by any outside parties. We do this so our users can make an informed choice as to whether or not they should proceed with services that require an outside party.

Links
This Web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that we, BuzzardNews.Com, are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every Web site that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this Web site.

Surveys [& Contests]
From time-to-time our site requests information from users via surveys or contests. Participation in these surveys or contests is completely voluntary and the user therefore has a choice whether or not to disclose this information. The requested information typically includes contact information (such as name and shipping address), and demographic information (such as zip code). Contact information will be used or shared with the [contest / survey] sponsors to notify the winners and award prizes. Survey information will be used for purposes of monitoring or improving the use and satisfaction of this site. Users' personally identifiable information is not shared with third parties unless we give prior notice and choice. Though we may use an intermediary to conduct these surveys or contests, they may not use users' personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes.

Security
This Web site takes every precaution to protect our users' information. When users submit sensitive information via the Web site, their information is protected both online and off-line.

When our registration/order form asks users to enter sensitive information (such as credit card number and/or social security number), that information is encrypted and is protected with the best encryption software in the industry - SSL. While on a secure page, such as our order form, the lock icon on the bottom of Web browsers such as Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer becomes locked, as opposed to un-locked, or open, when users are just "surfing".

While we use SSL encryption to protect sensitive information online, we also do everything in our power to protect user-information off-line. All of our users' information, not just the sensitive information mentioned above, is restricted in our offices. Only employees who need the information to perform a specific job (for example, our billing clerk or a customer service representative) are granted access to personally identifiable information. Our employees must use password-protected screen-savers when they leave their desk. When they return, they must re-enter their password to re-gain access to user information. Furthermore, ALL employees that have any access to personal information are kept up-to-date on our security and privacy practices. Every quarter, as well as any time new policies are added, our employees are notified and/or reminded about the importance we place on privacy, and what they can do to ensure our users' information is protected. Finally, the servers that store personally identifiable information are in a secure environment, in a locked facility.

If users have any questions about the security at our Web site, users can send an email to support@buzzardnews.com.

Supplementation of Information
In order for this Web site to properly fulfill its obligation to users it is necessary for us to supplement the information we receive with information from 3rd party sources.

Credit Check
For example, to determine if users qualify for one of our credit cards, we use their name and social security number to request a credit report. Once we determine a user's credit-worthiness, this document is destroyed.

Address Verification
We use 3rd party companies to process credit card transactions, software provided by these 3rd party companies may be used to verify a user's identity and or address to complete these transactions.

Enhancement of Marketing Profile
We purchase third party marketing data and add it to our existing user database to better target our advertising and provide pertinent offers we think our users would be interested in. We use this information to enhance or overlay the 'profile' of individual users. This aggregate marketing data is therefore tied to the users' personally identifiable information. See also the 'Profile'.

Notification of Changes
If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, the homepage, and other places we deem appropriate so our users are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it. We will use information in accordance with the privacy policy under which the information was collected.

If, however, we are going to use users' personally identifiable information in a manner different from that stated at the time of collection we will notify users via email. Users will have a choice as to whether or not we use their information in this different manner. However, if users have opted out of all communication with the site, or deleted/deactivated their account, then they will not be contacted, nor will their personal information be used in this new manner. In addition, if we make any material changes in our privacy practices that do not affect user information already stored in our database, we will post a prominent notice on our Web site notifying users of the change. In some cases where we post a notice we will also email users, who have opted to receive communications from us, notifying them of the changes in our privacy practices.