Privacy Policy
of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology

This page is used to inform website visitors of our policies with the collection, use, and disclosure of Personal Information if anyone decided to use our Service, the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology website at https://mvz.berkeley.edu.

If you choose to use our Service, then you agree to the collection and use of information in relation with this policy. The Personal Information that we collect are used for providing and improving the Service. We will not use or share your information with anyone except as described in this Privacy Policy.

Who we are & how to contact

The Museum of Vertebrate Zoology (MVZ) can be contacted via email at: mvz@berkeley.edu

Compliance

We comply with the Privacy Policy of the University of California, Berkeley.

What personal data we collect and why we collect it

Comments

If visitors leave comments on the site, we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.

An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.

Contact forms

We may have embedded or linked forms for specific purposes which will be clearly stated. You may be asked to provide your contact information (e.g., email, name, etc) which will be used only for follow-up direct contact purposes and will not be shared beyond the stated purpose.

Cookies

If you leave a comment on our site you may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.

For Contributors and Authors: If you visit our login page, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.

When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.

If you edit or publish an article, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser. This cookie includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited. It expires after 1 day.

These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

Analytics

This website uses Google Analytics to capture and analyze web statistics. We use this information to guide our website content and improve our service. Google Analytics is a cookie-based analytics program that uses cookies to track website activity. Google Analytics typically collects, at least temporarily, the following information: Network Location; Hostname; web pages requested; referring web page; browser used; screen resolution; date and time. No personal information is stored within cookies. Cookies can be disabled within a browser’s preference or option menu.

For more information about Google Analytics, see Google Privacy Center – Privacy Policy.

Who we share your data with

We do not share nor will disclose any personally identifiable data without your clear consent. Any personally identifiable information will not be distributed or sold to third-party organizations.

How long we retain your data

If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognize and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.

For users that register on our website (if any), we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.

What rights you have over your data

If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.

Where we send your data

Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.

Links to or embedded content from other websites

We link to other Web sites of organizations not directly affiliated with the MVZ or the University of California. Web pages on this site may include embedded content (e.g., videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website. Please be aware that the University of California is not responsible for the information practices of external organizations. We recommend you review the privacy statements of each external Web site that collects personal information.

Policy changes

First posted on 14 September 2020, we may need to revise our policy from time to time. Any future updates to this policy will be posted at this URL.