This Privacy Policy applies to information that we collect about you when you use:
- Our websites (pf-balance.in, including blogger.com, automattic.com, wordpress.com, vip.wordpress.com, jetpack.com, gravatar.com, intensedebate.com, vaultpress.com, and akismet.com);
- Our mobile applications (including the WordPress mobile app for Android and iOS); and
- Other products and services that are available on or through our websites (including WordPress.com plans, WordPress.com VIP, Jetpack, Gravatar, the IntenseDebate comment management system, and Akismet plans).
Throughout this Privacy Policy we’ll refer to our website, mobile applications and other products and services collectively as “Services.”
Below we explain how we collect, use, and share information about you, along with the choices that you have with respect to that information.
Please note that this Privacy Policy does not apply to any of our products or services that have a separate privacy policy.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us.
Information We Collect
We only collect information about you if we have a reason to do so–for example, to provide our Services, to communicate with you, or to make our Services better.
We collect information in three ways: if and when you provide information to us, automatically through operating our services, and from outside sources. Let’s go over the information that we collect.
Information You Provide to Us
It’s probably no surprise that we collect information that you provide to us. The amount and type of information depends on the context and how we use the information. Here are some examples:
Basic Account Information: We ask for basic information from you in order to set up your account. For example, we require individuals who sign up for a WordPress.com account to provide a username and email address–and that’s it. You may provide us with more information–like your name–but we don’t require that information to create your account.
Public Profile Information: If you have an account with us, we collect the information that you provide for your public profile. For example, if you have a WordPress.com or Blogger.com account, your username is part of that public profile, along with any other information you put into your public profile. Your public profile is just that–public–so please keep that in mind when deciding what information you would like to include.
Transaction and Billing Information: If you buy something from us–a subscription to a WordPress.com plan, a premium theme, or a custom domain, for example–you will provide additional personal and payment information that is required to process the transaction and your payment, such as your name, credit card information, and contact information.
Content Information: Depending on the Services you use, you may also provide us with information about you in the draft and published content for your website. For example, if you write a blog post that includes biographic information about you, we will have that information, and so will anyone with access to the Internet, if you choose to publish the post publicly. This might be obvious to you…but it’s not to everyone!
Credentials: Depending on the Services you use, you may provide us with credentials for your website (like SSH, FTP, and SFTP username and password). For example, Jetpack and VaultPress users may provide us with these credentials in order to use our one-click restore feature if there is a problem with their site, or to allow us to troubleshoot problems on their site more quickly.
Communications with Us (Hi There!): You may also provide us information when you respond to surveys, communicate with our Happiness Engineers about a support question, or post a question about your site in our public forums.
Information We Collect Automatically
We also collect some information automatically:
Log Information: Like most online service providers, we collect information that web browsers, mobile devices, and servers typically make available, such as the browser type, IP address, unique device identifiers, language preference, referring site, the date and time of access, operating system, and mobile network information. We collect log information when you use our Services–for example, when you create or make changes to your website on WordPress.com.
Usage Information: We collect information about your usage of our Services. For example, we collect information about the actions that site administrators and users perform on a site–in other words, who did what, when and to what thing on a site (e.g., [WordPress.com username] deleted “[title of post]” at [time/date]). We also collect information about what happens when you use our Services (e.g., page views, support document searches at en.support.wordpress.com, button clicks) along with information about your device (e.g., mobile screen size, name of cellular network, and mobile device manufacturer). We use this information to, for example, provide our Services to you, as well as get insights on how people use our Services, so we can make our Services better.
Location Information: We may determine the approximate location of your device from your IP address. We collect and use this information to, for example, calculate how many people visit our Services from certain geographic regions. We may also collect information about your precise location via our mobile apps (when, for example, you post a photograph with location information) if you allow us to do so through your mobile device operating system’s permissions.
Stored Information: We may access information stored on your mobile device via our mobile app. We access this stored information through your device operating system’s permissions. For example, if you give us permission to access the photographs on your mobile device’s camera roll, our Services may access the photos stored on your device when you upload a really amazing photograph of the sunrise to your website.
Information from Cookies & Other Technologies: A cookie is a string of information that a website stores on a visitor’s computer, and that the visitor’s browser provides to the website each time the visitor returns. Pixel tags (also called web beacons) are small blocks of code placed on websites and e-mails. Automattic uses cookies and other technologies like pixel tags to help us identify and track visitors, usage, and access preferences for our Services, as well as track and understand e-mail campaign effectiveness and to deliver targeted ads. For more information about our use of cookies and other technologies for tracking, including how you can control the use of cookies, please see here for information on WordPress.com and here for information on Jetpack.
Information We Collect from Other Sources
We may also get information about you from other sources. For example, if you create or log into your WordPress.com account through another service (like Google) or if you connect your website or account to a social media service (like Twitter) through our Publicize feature, we will receive information from that service (such as your username, basic profile information, and friends list) via the authorization procedures used by that service. The information we receive depends on which services you authorize and any options that are available.
We may also get information from third party services about individuals who are not yet our users (…but we hope will be!), which we may use, for example, for marketing and advertising purposes.