BLOCKSTAR PRIVACY POLICY

Last Updated: August 2005

Blockstar is committed to protecting your privacy. Please read the Blockstar Privacy Policy below to learn more about our privacy practices.

1. What This Privacy Policy Covers

This Privacy Policy applies to data collected by Blockstar through any of our web sites, products and services (collectively, the "Service"). It describes our practices regarding the collection, maintenance, use, and sharing of such data.
This Privacy Policy does not apply to (a) any data that is posted by a user on the Service; or (b) the practices of any companies that Blockstar does not own or control or people that Blockstar does not employ or manage.
Our Service is not intended for use by children under the age of 13. Please do not use our Service if you are under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

2. Information We Gather

In order to register for Blockstar’s Service, you will be required to (a) provide some personal information, such as your first and last name, e-mail address, gender, birth date, country, and postal code; and (b) select a user name and password. You will also be asked, but not required, to provide your street address and telephone number.
To register for a paid subscription version of the Service, we will ask you to provide your credit card or other payment information.
We may ask you for personal information when you (a) request technical support or other information regarding the Service; (b) enter into promotions, sweepstakes, or e-commerce programs; (c) post messages or other content on our discussion boards or other public areas of the Service; or (d) fill out optional surveys or questionnaires. We will also collect any personal information that you voluntarily enter on our web site or Service.
Blockstar members can invite friends to join the Service by sending invitation e-mails via our automated invitation system. We store the names and e-mail addresses of any person invited to join the Service so that (a) the invited individual may be added to the “friend's list” of the member who sent the invitation; and (b) we can send reminders to invited individuals. We do not sell these names and e-mail addresses or use them to send any other communication besides invitations and invitation reminders. Individuals who are invited to join Blockstar may contact us to request the removal of their information from our database.
We also collect certain standard, non-personal information that your browser sends to every web site you visit, such as your IP address, browser type and language, access times and referring web site addresses.

3. How Your Information May Be Used

We collect and use your personal information to operate and enhance the Service and to deliver customized content and advertising.
We also use your personal information to communicate with you. For example, we may send certain mandatory service communications such as welcome letters, billing reminders, information on technical service issues, and security announcements. We may also send you periodic newsletters, product surveys, or promotional mailings, unless you have opted-out of any of these communications.
We may access your account information in the ordinary course of our business, such as when you request technical support.
We make chat rooms, guest books, discussion boards, and other means of online communication and collaboration available to our members. Please remember that any information that is disclosed in these areas becomes public information. You should exercise caution when deciding to disclose your personal information in such a public forum, or when you invite others to join your Blockstar web site or mailing list, or visa versa.
When you post a message or other content on a publicly-available section of our Service, your user name may be visible to other users of our Service. In some cases, you may choose to disclose other personal information as well.
We do not sell, rent or lease your personal information to third-parties, without your explicit consent. We may, from time to time, contact you on behalf of external business partners about a particular offering that may be of interest to you. In those cases, your personal information will not be transferred to the third party.
We do not use or disclose sensitive personal information, such as race, religion, or political affiliations, without your explicit consent.
We sometimes engage third-parties to provide certain services in connection with our Service. We only provide those service providers with the information about users that they need to deliver their service, and we use commercially reasonable efforts to obligate such service providers to comply with our Privacy Policy. Nevertheless, if you feel that any of our service providers is improperly collecting or using your information, please contact us at privacy@blockstar.com.
Most of the limited, non-personal information collected by us is used to operate, develop, and improve our Service. For example, we may use your IP address to diagnose technical problems with our Service. In addition, non-personal information may be used in aggregate form to, among other things, determine the total number of end-users who are using our Service, prepare utilization reports for our partners, determine amounts owed to such partners, help partners improve their services, diagnose and fix compatibility problems or other problems with our Service, and perform statistical analyses to enable us to build higher quality, more useful online services.
We may transfer information about you if Blockstar is acquired by or merged with another company. In this event, we will notify you before information about you is transferred and becomes subject to a different privacy policy.
We may access and/or disclose your personal information if required to do so by law or if we, in good faith, believe that such action is necessary to: (a) conform to the edicts of the law or comply with legal process served on us or the Service; (b) protect and defend our rights or property; or (c) protect the personal safety of our users or members of the public.
Personal information collected on this site may be stored and processed in the United States or any other country in which we or our affiliates, subsidiaries or agents maintain facilities, and by using this site, you consent to any such transfer of information outside of your country.

4. Control of Your Personal Information and Preferences

You may change your account or billing information, your opt-in status on any of our offerings, or any of your other settings or preferences by logging into your account and visiting the "Edit Your Account" section.

5. Security of Your Personal Information

We are committed to protecting the security of your personal information. We use a variety of security technologies and procedures to help protect your personal information from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. For example, we store the personal information you provide on computer systems with limited access, which are located in controlled facilities. When we transmit highly confidential information (such as a credit card number or password) over the Internet, we protect it through the use of encryption, such as the Secure Socket Layer (SSL) protocol. Nevertheless, no data transmissions over the Internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. Consequently, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us and you do so at your own risk.
Your Blockstar account is password-protected. Ultimately, you are responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your passwords and any account information. Remember to log out of your Blockstar account and close your browser window when you are done. This ensures that others cannot access your personal information if your computer is accessible to others.

6. Cookies and Web Beacons

A "cookie" is a small text file containing your preferences (and, often, an anonymous unique identifier) that is sent to your browser by our web site and is sent back each time your browser accesses our servers. Cookies cannot be used to run programs or deliver viruses to your computer.
We use cookies to improve the quality of our Service and to better understand how people interact with our Service. For example, we use cookies to:
- store your preferences and other information, thereby eliminating your need to repeatedly enter the same information;
- control who has access to any content you post on our Service;
- display personalized content and appropriate advertising each time you use our Service;
- require you to re-enter your password after a certain period of time has elapsed to protect against unauthorized access to your account by third-parties;
- estimate and report the total number of unique users of our Service and the amount and source of any traffic on our web site;
- troubleshoot problems with a user’s use of our Service; and
- conduct research to improve the content and services provided in connection with our Service.
Any information collected through the use of cookies may be matched with personal information.
Most browsers are initially set up to accept cookies. If you wish to control how and whether cookies will be accepted by your browser, you should refer to the documentation accompanying your browser. However, because our Service depends on the use of cookies, you will not be able to use our Service if you refuse our cookies.
Blockstar lets other entities that show advertisements on some of our web pages set and access their cookies on your computer. Other entities’ use of their cookies is subject to their own privacy policies, not this one. Advertisers or other companies do not have access to Blockstar’s cookies.
We may use web beacons to count users who visit a web page, determine whether emails have been opened or acted upon, and other similar uses.
We may also engage a web analytics company to gather and analyze data obtained through cookies, web beacons and other similar devices.

7.Changes to this Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy may change from time to time to reflect changes in our Service and customer feedback. To review any changes, you may link to our updated Privacy Policy from most pages on our web site or navigate directly to www.bockstar.com/privacy_policy.html. We encourage you to periodically review this Privacy Policy to be informed of how we are protecting your information. Your continued use of our Service after any such changes have been made will signify your assent to the changed Privacy Policy. If there are material changes to this Privacy Policy (as determined using our discretion), we will prominently post such changes on our web site prior to implementing them.

8. Contact Information

Questions regarding this Privacy Policy should be directed by e-mail to Blockstar at privacy@blockstar.com or, by U.S. mail, to 4707 41st Street #1C Sunnyside NY 11104, Attention: Blockstar Privacy Officer.