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The following is Paypal's privacy policy
Privacy Policy
This Policy was last modified on 20 July 2006.
Overview
In order to operate the PayPal service and to reduce the risk of fraud, PayPal (Europe) Ltd ("PayPal" or "we") must ask you to provide us information about yourself and your credit or debit card and/or bank account. This Privacy Policy describes the information we collect and how we use that information. If you apply for a PayPal GE credit card, you authorise PayPal and GE Capital Global Consumer Finance Limited (“GE”) (who is the issuer of the PayPal GE credit card) to exchange the information you provide in the application form. If you are approved for a PayPal GE credit card, your credit account will be governed by the GE Privacy Policy. PayPal takes the privacy of your personal information very seriously and will use your information only in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Policy. We will not sell or rent your personally identifiable information or a list of our customers to third parties. However, as described in more detail in Part C below, there are limited circumstances in which some of your information will be shared with third parties, under strict restrictions, so it is important for you to review this Privacy Policy. This Privacy Policy applies to all services that are hosted on the PayPal website, whether the services are offered by PayPal or by its subsidiaries.
Your privacy is important to us. By accepting the Privacy Policy and User Agreement in registration, you expressly consent to our use and disclosure of your personal information in the manner described in this Privacy Policy. This Privacy Policy is incorporated into and subject to the terms of the PayPal User Agreement.
Please note that your personally identifiable information will be stored and processed on our parent company's (PayPal Inc) computers in the United States. The laws on holding personal data in the United States may be less stringent than the UK laws but as we explain below, we will hold and transmit your personal information in a safe, confidential and secure environment. If you object to your personal information being transferred or used as described in this Privacy Policy, please do not register for the PayPal service.
Notification of Changes
This policy may be revised over time as new features are added to the PayPal service or as we incorporate suggestions from our customers. If we are going to use or disclose your personally identifiable information in a manner materially different from that stated at the time we collected the information, you will have a choice as to whether or not we use or disclose your information in this new manner. Any material changes will be effective only after we provide you by email with at least 30 days' notice of the amended Privacy Policy (if you have closed your PayPal account, you will not be contacted to notify you of the amended Policy and your personal information will not be used or disclosed in this new manner).
We will post the amended Privacy Policy prominently on our Website so that you can always review what information we gather, how we might use that information, and whether we will disclose it to anyone. Please check the PayPal website at https://www.paypal.com/uk/ at any time for the most current version of our Privacy Policy.
Some pages on the PayPal website include links to third party websites. These sites are governed by their own privacy statements, and PayPal is not responsible for their operations, including but not limited to their information practices. Users submitting information to or through these third party Websites should review the privacy statement of these sites before providing them with personally identifiable information.
A Special Note About Children. Children are not eligible to use our service and we ask that minors (under the age of 18) do not submit any personal information to us or use the service.
Information We Collect
Required Information
To open a PayPal account, you must provide your name, address, phone number,
and email address. In order to make payments through PayPal, you must provide
credit card, debit card or bank account information (account information
is required as soon as your total payments sent reach £1,000.00 GBP).
We also ask you to choose two different security questions to answer (such
as your city of birth or your pet's name) This required information is necessary
for us to process transactions, issue a new password if you forget or lose
your password, protect you against credit card fraud and current account
fraud, and to contact you should the need arise in administering your account.
We will also require your national insurance number if you send or receive certain high-value transactions or high overall payment volumes through PayPal. If you choose to register or apply for certain optional features or products offered through PayPal websites (including, without limitation the PayPal GE credit card), you will be required to provide additional information to establish that you qualify for such features or products.
Transaction Information
When you use PayPal to send money to someone else or request money from
someone else, we ask you to provide information related to each transaction,
including the amount of the transaction, the type of transaction (purchase
of goods, purchase of services, or simple money transfer ("quasi-cash"))
and the e-mail address or phone number of the third party. We retain this
information for each of your transactions through PayPal. We also collect
the Internet address (IP address) of the computer or device you use to access
your PayPal account, in order to help detect possible instances of unauthorized
transactions.
Information About You From Third Parties
In order to protect all our customers against potential fraud, we verify
with third parties the information you provide. In the course of such verification,
we receive personally identifiable information about you from such services.
In particular, if you register a credit card or debit card with PayPal,
we will use card authorisation and fraud screening services to verify that
your card information and address match the information that you supplied
to PayPal, and that the card has not been reported as lost or stolen.
If you send or receive high overall payment volumes through PayPal, in some circumstances we will conduct a background check on your business by obtaining information about you and your business from a credit bureau or a business information service such as Dun & Bradstreet. If you incur a debt to PayPal, we will generally conduct a credit check on you by obtaining additional information about you from a credit bureau, to the extent permitted by law. PayPal, at its sole discretion, also reserves the right periodically to retrieve and review a business and / or consumer credit report for any account, and reserves the right to close an account based on information obtained during this credit review process.
Additional Verification
If we cannot verify the information that you provide, or if you request
a withdrawal by cheque to an address other than your verified credit card
billing address, we ask you to send us additional information by fax (such
as your driving licence, credit card statement, and/or a recent utility
bill or other information linking you to the applicable address), or to
answer additional questions online to help verify your information.
Website Traffic Information
Because of the way that World Wide Web communication standards work, when
you arrive at or leave the PayPal website, we automatically receive the
Web address of the site that you came from or are going to. We also collect
information on which pages of our Website you visit while you are on the
PayPal site, the type of browser you use and the times you access our Website.
We use this information only to try to understand our customers' preferences
better and to manage the load on our servers, so as to improve our service
and your experience with PayPal. We do not track the Websites that you visit
before or after you leave the PayPal site.
Our Use of "Cookies"
"Cookies" are small files of data that reside on your computer
and allow us to recognise you as a PayPal customer if you return to the
PayPal site using the same computer and browser. We send a "session
cookie" to your computer if and when you log in to your PayPal account
by entering your email address and password. These cookies allow us to recognise
you if you visit multiple pages in our site during the same session, so
that you don't need to re-enter your password multiple times. Once you log
out or close your browser, these session cookies expire and no longer have
any effect.
We also use longer-lasting cookies to display your email address on our sign-in form, so that you don't have to retype the email address each time when you log in to your PayPal account. In addition, we use cookies to process our referral programme, described in Section C below. Our cookie files are encoded so that your email address and other information can only be interpreted by PayPal. We may, however, share cookie information regarding whether or not a certain user is already registered with PayPal with certain merchants with whom we have an official co-marketing relationship.
Customer Service Correspondence
If you send us correspondence, including emails and faxes, we retain such
information in the records of your account. We will also retain customer
service correspondence and other correspondence from PayPal to you. We retain
these records in order to measure and improve our customer service, and
to investigate potential fraud and violations of our User Agreement. We
may, over time, delete these records if permitted by law.
Questionnaires, Surveys and Profile Data
From time to time, we offer optional questionnaires and surveys to our users
for such purposes as collecting demographic information or assessing users'
interests and needs. The use of the information collected will be explained
in detail in the survey itself. If we collect personally identifiable information
from our users in these questionnaires and surveys, the users will be given
notice of how the information will be used prior to their participation
in the survey or questionnaire.
Non-member Recipients and Requests
When a member either sends a payment to, or requests a payment from, an
individual who is not a registered member of PayPal, we will retain the
information that the member submits to us, including, for example, the other
party's email address and/or name, for the benefit of the member who is
attempting to contact the non-member, so that the member can see a complete
record of his or her transactions, including uncompleted transactions. Although
this information is stored indefinitely, we will not market to the non-member
in any way at any time. Additionally, these non-members have the same rights
to access and correct information about themselves (assuming that their
email addresses were correct enough to reach them) as anyone else who uses
PayPal.
Our Use and Disclosure of Information
Internal Uses
We collect, store and process your personal information on servers located
in the United States and operated by our parent company, PayPal Inc. We
use the information we collect about you in order 1) to provide our services
and process your transactions, 2) to provide customer service, 3) to determine
your eligibility to receive offers for special features or products, such
as the PayPal GE credit card, and 4) to improve our products and services.
At your option (as indicated in your PayPal Profile settings), we use the
information you provide to access specific third party services on your
behalf and perform the actions that you request us to perform, such as invoicing
winning bidders on behalf of auction sellers.
We give access to individually identifiable information about our users only to those employees who require it to fulfil customer service requests.
Disclosure to Other PayPal Customers
If you are a registered PayPal user, your name, e-mail address, phone number
(if applicable) date of sign-up, and whether you have verified control of
a bank account are displayed to other PayPal customers whom you have paid
or who are attempting to pay you through PayPal. If you are a Business account
holder, we will also display to other PayPal customers the Web site address
(URL) and customer service contact information that you provide us. However,
your credit card number, bank account and other financial information will
NEVER be revealed to anyone whom you have paid or who has paid you through
PayPal, except with your express permission or if we are required to do
so pursuant to a subpoena or other legal process.
If you are buying goods or services and paying through PayPal, the seller of the goods or services may request that you provide a mailing address that PayPal has confirmed as matching the billing address in the credit card system. You do not have to provide this information. If you do not provide the information, however, the seller may choose not to accept your PayPal payment and not to complete the transaction.
We work with third party merchants to enable them to accept PayPal payments from you. Merchants who offer this service will share personally identifiable information you provide to them with PayPal to validate the status of your ability to pay with PayPal or the existence of your account. You permit PayPal to return verification results of the validity of the personally identifiable information passed to PayPal.
PayPal does not store the personally identifiable information provided by these merchants to validate the existence of your account.
PayPal will also disclose to other PayPal customers the number of payments you have received from Verified PayPal customers (as defined in the User Agreement on the PayPal website), or other aggregate measures that provide an indication of your reputation with other PayPal customers.
Disclosure to Third Parties Other Than PayPal Customers
PayPal will not sell or rent any of your personally identifiable information
to third parties. PayPal will not share any of your personally identifiable
information with third parties except in the limited circumstances described
below, or with your express permission (and to other PayPal customers as
described above). These third parties are limited by law or by contract
from using the information for secondary purposes beyond the purposes for
which the information is shared.
We share information with companies that help us process the transactions you request and protect our customers' transactions from fraud, such as sharing your credit card number with a service that screens for lost and stolen card numbers. See "Information About You From Third Parties" in Section B above. Additionally, if you create a negative balance and owe us money, we may share information with processing companies including collection agencies.
We disclose the information we collect, as described in Section B above, to companies that perform marketing services on our behalf, to other financial institutions with which we have joint marketing agreements, or to other third parties such as credit reference agencies, for example in order to determine whether you are pre-approved for the products that PayPal is jointly marketing with the third party (such as the PayPal GE credit card issued by GE). These companies are subject to confidentiality agreements with us and other legal restrictions that prohibit using the information except to market the specified PayPal-related products or services, unless you have affirmatively agreed or given your prior permission for other uses.
We disclose information that we in good faith believe is appropriate to cooperate in investigations of fraud or other illegal activity, or to conduct investigations of violations of our User Agreement. Specifically, this means that if we conduct a fraud investigation and conclude that one side has engaged in deceptive practices, we can give that person or entity's contact information (but not bank account or credit card information) to victims who request it.
We disclose information in response to requirements of civil or criminal legal process.
When a user signs up for a co-branded version of PayPal through links on our co-branded partner's website, PayPal will share with the co-branded partner that user's name, email address and physical address in order to provide enhanced integration between PayPal's services and the services of our co-branded partner. If a user does not want his or her information shared with PayPal's co-branded partner, he or she should not use this aspect of the site.
We disclose information to your agent or legal representative (such as the holder of a power of attorney that you grant, or a guardian appointed for you).
We share aggregated statistical data with our business partners or for public relations. For example, we may disclose that a specific percentage of our users live in Manchester. However, this aggregated information is not tied to personal information.
As with any other business, it is possible that PayPal in the future could merge with or be acquired by another company. If such an acquisition occurs, the successor company would have access to the information maintained by PayPal, including customer account information, but would continue to be bound by this Privacy Policy unless and until it is amended as described in Section A above.
We share your information with our parent, subsidiaries and joint ventures to help coordinate the services we provide to you, enforce our terms and conditions, and promote trust and safety.
Our Contacts with PayPal Customers
We communicate with users on a regular basis via email to provide requested
services, and we also communicate by phone to resolve customer complaints
or investigate suspicious transactions. We use your email address to confirm
your opening of a PayPal account, to send you notice of payments that you
send or receive through PayPal (including referral payments described below),
to send information about important changes to our products and services,
and to send notices and other disclosures required by law. Generally, users
cannot opt out of these communications, but they will be primarily informational
in nature rather than promotional.
We also use your email address to send you other types of communications that you can control, including the PayPal Periodical newsletter, auction tips, customer surveys and notice of special third-party promotions. You can choose whether to receive some, all or none of these communications when you complete the registration process, or at any time thereafter, by logging in to your account on the PayPal website and changing your preferences in the Profile page of the My Account tab. You can also change your choices at any time through the same procedure.
In connection with independent audits of our financial statements and operations, the auditors may seek to contact a sample of our customers to confirm that our records are accurate. However, these auditors cannot use personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes.
Internet Address Information
We use IP addresses, browser types and access times to analyse trends, administer
the site, improve site performance and gather broad demographic information
for aggregate use.
Your Use of Information and Our Services
In order to facilitate the transactions between PayPal members, our service
allows you limited access other users' contact or delivery information.
As a seller you may have access to the User ID, email address and other
contact or delivery information of the purchaser, and as a purchaser you
may have access to the User ID, email address and other contact information
of the seller.
By entering into our User Agreement, you agree that, with respect to other users' personally identifiable information that you obtain through the site or through a PayPal-related communication or PayPal-facilitated transaction, you will only use this information for: (a) PayPal-related communications that are not unsolicited commercial messages, (b) using services offered through PayPal (e.g. insurance, delivery and fraud complaints), and (c) any other purpose that such user expressly agrees to after adequate disclosure of the purpose(s).
In all cases, you must provide users with the opportunity to remove themselves from your database and review any information you have collected about them. In addition, under no circumstances, except as defined in this Section, can you disclose personally identifiable information about another PayPal user to any third party without our consent and the consent of such other user after adequate disclosure. Note that law enforcement personnel and other rights holders are given different rights with respect to information they access.
PayPal does not tolerate spam. Therefore, without limiting the foregoing, you may not add a PayPal user to your mail list (email or physical mail) without their express consent after adequate disclosure, even if said user has previously made a purchase from you. We strictly enforce our Anti-Spam Policy! To report PayPal-related spam to PayPal, please contact us.
Merchant Referral Programme
When you sign up for a PayPal account, you become eligible to participate
in our Merchant Referral Bonus programme. We provide you with a link on
the Merchant Referral Bonus page (available from the Referrals link in the
footer of any PayPal page) which identifies you as the referrer. If a merchant
uses that link to sign up for a Premier or Business PayPal account and completes
the bonus requirements, he is eligible for a referral bonus. If you use
a referral link to sign up, your business name (if you have a Business account)
or first and last name (if you have a Premier account) may be listed in
the referrer's PayPal account, along with the amount of bonus you have generated
for the referrer, which is calculated as a percentage of your transaction
volume, as described in the Merchant Referral Bonus Policy.
Please use our referral programme responsibly. We strictly enforce our Anti-Spam Policy! Read details on the Referral Bonus by going to the Referrals link in the footer of any PayPal page.
Information Security
PayPal is committed to handling your customer information with high standards
of information security. Your credit card and bank account information are
stored only in encrypted form on computers that are not connected to the
Internet. We restrict access to your personally identifiable information
to employees who need to know that information in order to provide products
or services to you. We maintain physical, electronic and procedural safeguards
that comply with regulations to guard your non public personal information.
We test our security systems regularly and also contract with outside companies
to audit our security systems and processes. For more information on PayPal's
security practices, please visit the PayPal Security Centre
The security of your PayPal account also relies on your protection of your PayPal password. You may not share your PayPal password with anyone. PayPal representatives will never ask you for your password, so any email or other communication requesting your password should be treated as unauthorised and suspicious. If you do share your PayPal password with a third party for any reason, including because the third party has promised to provide you additional services such as account aggregation, the third party will have access to your account and your personal information, and you may be responsible for actions taken using your password. If you believe someone else has obtained access to your password, please change it immediately by logging in to your account at www.paypal.com/uk/ and changing your Profile settings, and also contact us right away as described in Section 6 below.
Accessing and Changing Your Information
You can review the personal information you provided us and make any desired changes to such information, or to the settings for your PayPal account, at any time by logging in to your account on the PayPal website and changing your preferences in the Profile page of the "My Account" tab. You can also close your account through the PayPal website. If you close your PayPal account, we will mark your account in our database as "Closed," but will keep your account information in our database. This is necessary in order to deter fraud, by ensuring that persons who try to commit fraud will not be able to avoid detection simply by closing their account and opening a new account. However, if you close your account, your personally identifiable information will not be used by us for any further purposes, nor sold or shared with third parties, except as necessary to prevent fraud and assist law enforcement, or as required by law.
Accountability
Our privacy office is responsible for ensuring that our day-to-day procedures comply with this Privacy Policy. If you have any questions about this privacy statement, PayPal's information practices, or your dealings with PayPal, you can contact us using the contact form available from the footer of any PayPal page, call 0870 7307 191 or write us at PayPal (Europe) Ltd, Hotham House, 1 Heron Square, Richmond Upon Thames TW9 1EJ.
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