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Internet Privacy Policy

OUR COMMITMENT TO OUR DONORS, MEMBERS, & WEBSITE VISITORS

The Knights of Columbus (“K of C”) is committed to protecting the privacy of our donors, members, and visitors to our websites.  We maintain a high level of confidentiality through staff training and strict policies, and through oversight of any outside companies who help us administer our insurance or charitable work, and we will not sell, trade, or otherwise share your name or personal information with any other unaffiliated companies.

WHAT INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?

When you interact with us for business and charitable purposes (the “Services,”) we collect information from or about you that alone or in combination may be used to identify you (“Personal Data”), as described below:

Personal Data That You Provide: In order to provide the Services to you, the K of C may collect personal data from you such as your full name, address, date of birth, social security number, telephone number, email address, occupation, preferred method of contact, type of inquire or areas of interest, membership number, council and council number.  We may also collect certain information related to your financial transactions such as policy numbers, credit card information, account balances, and payment history.

WHAT OTHER INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?

Automatically Collected Data: When you interact with us, we receive and store certain data automatically.  We may store such data or it may be included in databases owned and maintained by our affiliates, agents, or service providers.  We may use automatically collected data and pool it with other information to track, for example, the total number of visitors to our Services, the number of visitors to each page of our website, and the domain names of our visitors’ Internet Service Providers.

In operating the Services, we and third parties that help operate our services may use a technology called "cookies.”  A cookie is a piece of information that the computer that hosts our Services gives to your browser when you access the Site.  Our cookies help operate the Services and analyze Site usage more accurately.  For additional information on our Cookie Policy, please click here.  On most web browsers, you will find a “help” section on the toolbar.

Please refer to this section for information on how to receive a notification when you are receiving a new cookie and how to turn cookies off.  We recommend that you leave cookies turned on because they allow you to take advantage of some of our Services’ features.

Our third party vendors may use technologies such as cookies to gather information about your activities on this Site and other sites in order to provide you advertising regarding our Services based upon your browsing activities and interests.  The only way to completely “opt out” of the collection of any information through cookies or other tracking technology is to actively manage the settings on your browser or mobile device.

Please refer to your browser’s or mobile device’s technical information for instructions on how to delete and disable cookies, and other tracking/recording tools (to learn more about cookies, clear gifs/web beacons, and related technologies.  You may not be able to control tracking technologies through if you access our Sites or Services on your mobile device.  You may wish to visit http://www.allaboutcookies.org and/or the Network Advertising Initiative’s online resources, at http://www.networkadvertising.org.  You will continue to receive generic ads.  The Privacy Policy does not apply to, and we cannot control the activities of, third-party ad servers and ad networks.

Please contact or consult the respective privacy policies of such ad servers or ad networks for more information.

Aggregated Personal Data: We may aggregate data, including Personal Data, and use such aggregated data to provide our Services.

HOW DO WE USE THE INFORMATION WE COLLECT?

We use your information to:

  • provide the Services;
  • send you emails or newsletters that you signed-up for;
  • promote our products and services, and those of our affiliates;
  • improve our Services;
  • analyze website usage; and • process charitable donations.

K of C and our affiliates may use your personal or other information to contact you in the future to promote our products and services and the products and services of our affiliates that we believe will be of interest to you.  If we do so, each promotional communication we send you will contain instructions permitting you to "opt-out" of receiving future promotional information.  In addition, if at any time, you wish not to receive any future communications or you wish to have your name deleted from our mailing lists, please contact us at privacy.officer@kofc.org.  Please note that we will continue to contact you via email to respond to requests and provide our Services.

WITH WHOM DO WE SHARE YOUR INFORMATION?

In addition to sharing data with our affiliates and insurance agents, the Knights of Columbus may share some or all of your Personal Data with certain third parties, as set forth below:

  • Business Transfers: Should we ever be involved in a merger, acquisition, financing due diligence, reorganization, bankruptcy, receivership, sale of company assets, or transition of service to another provider, your information may be transferred to a successor or affiliate alone or as part of that transaction along with other assets.
  • Vendors and Service Providers: We engage third-party vendors and service providers to perform certain functions on our behalf, e.g., in connection with sending marketing emails and/or newsletters to you, among other functions.
  • Legal Requirements: We may disclose your Personal Data if required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to (i) comply with a legal obligation, (ii) protect and defend the rights or property of K of C, (iii) act in urgent circumstances to protect the personal safety of users of the Services or the public, or (iv) protect against legal liability.

WHERE ARE OUR SERVICES LOCATED?

The Services are operated in the United States of America (U.S.).  If you are located in another jurisdiction, please be aware that any Personal Data (defined below) you choose to provide may be transferred from your current location to the U.S. and will be subject to U.S. privacy laws.  U.S. privacy laws may differ from the privacy laws in your jurisdiction.  By using our Services or by voluntarily providing us with your Personal Data, you acknowledge and consent to your Personal Data being transferred to the U.S.  (If you are a citizen of the European Union (EU), please see our European Privacy Notice, which governs how we collect and process your personal data. The Knights of Columbus’s eMembership program is not currently available in the EU or any other jurisdiction outside the US and Canada.)

HOW DO WE PROTECT YOUR INFORMATION?

We take reasonable steps to protect the Personal Data provided via the Services from loss, misuse and unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, or destruction.  However, the Internet cannot be guaranteed to be fully secure and we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you provide to us.  We do not accept liability for unintentional disclosure.

WHAT DOES THIS PRIVACY POLICY APPLY TO?

This Privacy Policy applies to the Services and your usage of our websites (including but not limited to our “Insurance” and “Find an Agent” request contact forms, our “Find a Council” application, our customer service forms, our Member Portal, and our Knights of Columbus Charities donation form.)

This Privacy Policy applies only to the Knights of Columbus Services.  The Services may contain links to other websites not operated or controlled by us (the “Third Party Sites”).  The policies and procedures we describe here do not apply to the Third Party Sites.  The links from our Services do not imply that we endorse or have reviewed the Third Party Sites.  We suggest contacting those sites directly for information on their privacy policies.

Through our Services, you can choose to access certain social media websites and services that are owned and/or controlled by third parties (including, without limitation, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Spotify and YouTube — such websites and services, collectively, the “Social Media Services”).  When you elect to access and use the Social Media Services, you will be sharing your information (which will include Personal Data if you elect to share such information) with those Social Media Services.  When you interact with our pages on those Social Media Services, you will also be sharing your information with Knights of Columbus.  The information that you share with the Social Media Services and with us through those Services will be governed by the privacy policies and terms of service of the providers of each such Social Media Services and not by the K of C Privacy Policy and procedures we describe here.

WHAT ARE YOUR CHOICES AND HOW CAN YOU OPT OUT?

If, at any time, you prefer not to receive further email communications from K of C (except in connection with information, products or services that you specifically request), you may unsubscribe from such communications via a link provided in every promotional email that K of C sends to you.  If, at any time, you prefer not to receive any other form of communication from K of C, you may unsubscribe from such communications by contacting us at privacy.officer@kofc.org.

HOW OFTEN DO WE UPDATE OUR PRIVACY POLICY?

We may change this Privacy Policy at any time.  We will post all changes to this Privacy Policy on this page.  Your continued use of the Services constitutes your agreement to the Privacy Policy as changed.

ARE THERE ANY OTHER TERMS AND CONDITIONS?

Your access to and use of our Services is subject to the Terms of Use which is available here. 

ARE THERE ANY STATE SPECIFIC PRIVACY RIGHTS?

Applicable California privacy legislation permits visitors who are California residents to request certain information regarding our disclosure of personal information to third parties for their direct marketing purposes.  To make such a request to access such information, please email privacy.officer@kofc.org.  Within thirty (30) days of receiving such a request, we will provide a list of the categories of personal information disclosed to third parties for third-party direct marketing purposes during the immediately preceding calendar year, along with the names and addresses of these third parties.  This request may be made no more than once per calendar year. 

We reserve our right not to respond to requests submitted other than to the address specified in this paragraph.

WHOM SHOULD YOU CONTACT WITH QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIVACY POLICY?

If you have any questions about our Privacy Policy or the information practices of this Site, you may contact the Privacy Officer at: privacy.officer@kofc.org or

Knights of Columbus
1 Columbus Plaza
New Haven, CT 06510
Attn: Privacy Officer

Canadian Residents may also mail to:

Knights of Columbus
PO Box 220
Montreal QC H2Y9Z9
Attn: Privacy Officer

Updated April 3, 2019