World Youth Alliance

Privacy Policy

 

World Youth Alliance (WYA) understands that your privacy is important. This policy explains how we acquire, store, and use your data. It also explains what options you have for how we use your data.

 

About This Policy

This policy applies to web sites owned and operated by WYA, including old.wya.net.

References to “WYA” mean WYA Foundation, Inc. and World Youth Alliance.  “WYA web sites” include any site that WYA owns or controls. WYA may share information among its subsidiaries or sites that it owns or controls, but this is always protected under the terms of this Privacy Policy.

WYA web sites may contain links to other sites. WYA does not control the use of data at those other sites and this Privacy Policy does not apply to those sites.  We encourage you to read the privacy policy of every web site you visit.

 

Who We Are

World Youth Alliance (WYA) is a global coalition of young people dedicated to the promotion and defense of human dignity. We have members around the world who share our mission and vision. WYA has six regional offices, and a headquarters in the United States. WYA gathers information from members for purposes described below.  

Our contact information is

WYA Foundation, Inc.
228 E. 71st St.
New York, New York 10021
United States of America

WYA has appointed a data protection officer in line with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation. You can contact that officer by emailing dpo@wya.net. WYA’s EU representative can also be contacted via that email address.

Because WYA is headquartered in the United States, the information we collect will be transmitted to and managed from the United States.

 

Why WYA Collects Information

WYA collects personal information from members, friends, and supporters to communicate with them, offer opportunities to engage with WYA’s mission in various ways, and keep you up to date on our work. WYA also tracks member and supporter participation in various activities, events, and programs.

 

WYA’s Retention of Your Information

WYA keeps basic personal information, such as your name, birthday, and contact information, and records of your engagement with WYA. WYA will retain this information for the duration of your relationship with WYA or at least six years, as described below. If you would like us to delete your information, please contact our Data Protection Officer at dpo@wya.net.

 

You and Your Information

WYA recognizes that privacy is an important concern for many people. In relation to your information, you can:

  • Request a copy of the data held about you
  • Request that your data be transferred to a third party of your choosing in a readable format
  • Contact WYA to correct incorrect, inaccurate, or incomplete personal data
  • Request that your data be erased
  • Change your mind about receiving emails or other contact from us by updating your subscriber preferences or emailing us.
  • Request restriction of how your data is processed.

WYA’s records are generally comprised of basic personal and contact information and notes on your engagement in WYA programs. WYA does not make decisions based on automated processing at this time, but if it does, you will have the right to request that decisions regarding you are made by natural persons only and contest any decision made.

 

What Data WYA Collects and How It Is Used

WYA collects both personal and non-personal information via its website.  Anyone can access public areas of the website without registration. If you use our web site without registering, the only information we collect will be Non-Personal Information through the use of Cookies or Web Beacons. If you choose to register with our Web site for certain Interactive Tools or other services, we require you to submit Personally Identifiable Information.

Non-Personal Information

Even if you do not register with WYA, we collect Non-Personal Information about your use of our Web site, special promotions, and newsletters. 

  1. Cookies

We collect Non-Personal Information about your use of our website and your use of the websites of selected sponsors and advertisers through the use of Cookies. Every computer that accesses a WYA web site is assigned a different Cookie by WYA. The information collected by Cookies (i) helps us dynamically generate advertising and content on web pages or in newsletters, (ii) allows us to statistically monitor how many people are using our website and selected sponsors’ and advertisers’ sites, (iii) how many people open our emails, and (iv) for what purposes these actions are being taken. We may use Cookie information to target certain advertisements to your browser or to determine the popularity of certain content or advertisements. Cookies are also used to facilitate a user’s log-in, as navigation aids and as session timers. Cookies used by WYA may also be used to restrict underage use of the tools.

Most browser software can be set to reject all Cookies. Most browsers offer instructions on how to reset the browser to reject Cookies in the “Help” section of the toolbar. If you reject our Cookies, certain functions and conveniences of our Web site may not work properly. However, users who register with our site to use our tools and view our educational materials are required to accept our Cookies for proper operation. We do not link Non-Personal Information from Cookies to Personally Identifiable Information without your permission.

  1. Web Beacons

We also may use Web Beacons to collect Non-Personal Information about your use of our website and the websites of selected sponsors and advertisers, and your use of special promotions or newsletters. The information collected by Web Beacons (i) allows us to statistically monitor how many people are using our website and selected sponsors’ and advertisers’ sites, (ii) how many people open our emails, and (iii) for what purposes these actions are being taken. Our Web Beacons are not used to track your activity outside of our websites or those of our sponsors’. We do not link Non-Personal Information from Web Beacons to Personally Identifiable Information without your permission.

  1. Third Parties Collecting Non-Personal Information on WYA’s Behalf

Third parties under contract with WYA may use Cookies or Web Beacons to collect Non-Personal Information about your usage of WYA’s sites. These third parties may use this information, on our behalf, to help WYA target our advertising on their sites within their network, and WYA may further tailor the advertising on these third party sites based on your geographic location, gender, and/or age range to the extent known by these third parties. These third parties have agreed not to use Non-Personal Information they collect from our sites except to deliver advertisements on our behalf. If your browser is set to reject cookies, the Non-Personal Information will not be sent to these third parties.

  1. Physical Location

WYA obtains your consent (via an opt-in) before using information from pin-pointing technology like GPS or cell tower information. You can withdraw your consent (opt-out) for the use of “location” by WYA at any time by changing your location services in the “Settings” function on your mobile device.

Personally Identifiable Information Collection

We may ask you to provide Personally Identifiable Information, like your name, email address, date of birth, and gender, when you register as a member of WYA and/or when you update your member profile. We use the Personally Identifiable Information that you provide to respond to your questions, provide you the specific services you select, send you emails about website maintenance and updates, and inform you of significant changes to this Privacy Policy.

  1. Newsletters and Emails

As of May 25, 2018, all new WYA members and supporters will be asked to consent to receive emails such as newsletters from us. Members and supporters who joined previous to that have the option to update their email preferences to not receive emails. In line with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), citizens of the E.U. who were on our mailing list without GDPR consent to data use prior to the regulation coming into effect will have to opt in to continue receiving emails. You can become a member without agreeing to receive emails, although we encourage you to consent to receive emails from us, as it is a primary method of learning about our work, programs, and opportunities.

In order to subscribe to WYA newsletters via email, we need your contact information, like name and email address. You can unsubscribe from the newsletters by simply following the directions included at the bottom of each email newsletter you receive from WYA.

If you have difficulties with our unsubscribe or subscribe service, please email us at marketing@old.wya.net. We will manually unsubscribe you from that newsletter in two to three business days. When you sign up for our email newsletters or at any time, you may be offered the choice to opt in to receiving additional promotional emails from WYA or our Sponsors. You may also unsubscribe from these at any time.

In some cases, when you click on a link or an advertisement on our site, in an email or in a newsletter, your browser may be momentarily directed to the website of a third party which, acting on behalf of WYA, notes or “counts” your response to the email or newsletter before re-directing your browser to your selected destination; this re-direction process may not be apparent to you.

  1. Emails You Send to WYA

This Privacy Policy does not apply to content, business information, ideas, concepts, or inventions that you send to WYA by email. If you want to keep content or business information, ideas, concepts, or inventions private or proprietary, do not send them in an email to WYA.

  1. Email a Friend

If you use our Email a Friend service to tell a friend about our site or newsletter, we will ask you for your name, your email address, and your friend’s email address. We will automatically send your friend a one-time email inviting him or her to visit the site using your name and email address as the “from” email address. WYA does not use your name, your email address, or your friend’s email information for any other purpose. We will only use the information you provide to send the email you request.

  1. Community, Blogs, and other Public Forums

WYA’s web site and social media accounts may feature public areas where users share information, get to know one another, and support one another. Our public areas are open to the public and should not be considered private.

Any information you share in any online community area (including Personally Identifiable) like a chat room, forum posting, or online discussion is by design open to the public and is not private. You should think carefully before posting any Personally Identifiable in any public forum. What you post can be seen, disclosed to or collected by third parties and may be used by others in ways we cannot control or predict, including to contact you for unauthorized purposes. As with any public forum on any site, the information you post may also show up in third-party search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN, Bing, etc.

  1. Website Registration and Interactive Tools on WYA

After you have registered as a member of WYA, you may choose to use certain WYA interactive content, tools, and services that may ask you to voluntarily provide other types of information about yourself. Some of the tools do not retain your personal information, while others store it in accordance with the authorization you provide at the time you use the tool.

  1. Protecting Children

We are committed to protecting the privacy of children. WYA does not sell or share your information or the information of minor children. Children as young as 10 are allowed to become members of WYA through signing the WYA Charter. WYA now requires consent from parents/guardians for children under 18 to become a member on our website and receive our emails and other communications.  Parents can revoke this consent and request data be deleted as described elsewhere in this policy.

  1. Market Research

From time to time the WYA market research department, or its operations contractors acting on its behalf, conducts online research surveys through email invitations, pop-up surveys, and online focus groups. When participating in a survey, we may ask you to submit Personally Identifiable Information. This Personally Identifiable Information is used for research purposes, and is not used for sales solicitations. When a survey is sponsored by a third party, Aggregate Information of the survey results is reported to the sponsor. Personally Identifiable Information collected through market research will be used only by WYA and its service providers and contractors and will not be given or sold to any other third party without your consent or as otherwise permitted by this Privacy Policy. For market research surveys we will not knowingly accept survey responses from or conduct interviews with any person under the age of 18. Some surveys may provide remuneration to participants such as a small cash fee for your time or an entry into a sweepstakes for a larger prize. Each survey will disclose whether or not it is a paid survey. In addition to collecting survey responses from our members, Cookies may be used to authenticate respondents or to help you pick up where you left off in a survey. If you have Cookies disabled you may not be able to participate in some studies. Cookies may be used to connect survey data with WYA site usage characteristics. You will be notified when we would like to use Cookies in this way and your consent will be requested for these Cookies.

 

Information Collected by Third Parties Not Acting on WYA’s Behalf

Sponsors or advertisers on WYA may use their own Cookies, Web Beacons, or other online tracking technologies in the banner advertisements served on WYA and in emails, special promotions, or newsletters we send you. Some advertisers use companies other than WYA to serve their ads and to monitor users’ responses to ads, and these companies (“Ad Servers”) may also collect Non-Personal Information through the use of Cookies or Web Beacons on our Web site. In certain situations, information collection may be facilitated by momentarily directing your browser to the Web site of an Ad Server or other third party acting on behalf of the sponsor, partner, or advertiser before re-directing your browser to its selected destination (e.g., back to WYA to show the ad, or to the advertiser’s website); this re-direction process will not be apparent to you.

We do not control these third parties’ use of Cookies or Web Beacons, or how they manage the Non-Personal Information they gather through them. However, we do require sponsors, advertisers, and Ad Servers who collect cookie or web beacon information through our Web site to agree that they will not collect any Personally Identifiable Information from our site without your consent. They have promised us they will not link any non-personal Cookie or Web Beacon information collected by them on our site to Personally Identifiable Information they or others collect in other ways or from other sites except as may be described in connection with a particular program. For example, in connection with “Ad links” furnished by Yahoo, non-personal information sent by your browser to Yahoo when you click on a sponsored link or submit a query may be used by Yahoo as described in its privacy policy. In addition, WYA’s Advertising Policy is posted on our Web site and will provide additional detail about our relationship with advertisers and the companies that serve ads. You should review the privacy policy of other sites you visit or link to from our site to understand how these other sites use Cookies and how they use the information they collect through the use of Cookies or Web Beacons on their own sites. Certain Ad Servers allow you to prevent them from collecting data through the use of Cookies. In order to do so, you must opt out of such data collection with each individual site. Currently, you can opt out of Cookies for several Ad Servers by visiting the Network Advertising Initiative gateway opt-out site. This website will also allow you to review the Ad Server’s privacy policies. You can find additional information and resources about how to opt out of advertising and related cookies by visiting the World Privacy Forum’s Site.

WYA does not knowingly engage in business with any company that uses Spyware or Maleware. We do not provide users with downloadable software that collects or uses any Personally Identifiable Information without full disclosure and opt-in consent.

 

Disclosure of Your Information

Except as described in this Privacy Policy or as specifically agreed to by you, WYA will not disclose any Personally Identifiable it gathers from you on our website. We may only release Personally Identifiable to third parties: (1) to comply with valid legal requirements such as a law, regulation, search warrant, subpoena, or court order; or (2) in special cases, such as in response to a physical threat to you or others, to protect property or defend or assert legal rights. In the event that we are legally compelled to disclose your Personally Identifiable to a third party, we will attempt to notify you unless doing so would violate the law or court order. In addition, we may disclose Personal Information as described below.

  1. Disclosure to WYA Operations and Maintenance Contractor

WYA operations and maintenance contractors sometimes have limited access to your Personally Identifiable Information in the course of providing products or services to WYA. These contractors include vendors and suppliers that provide us with technology, services, and/or content for the operation and maintenance of our Web site. Unless you have opted out of receiving emails and newsletters from WYA, these contractors also may have access to your email address to send newsletters or special promotions to you on our behalf or to send emails to you for purposes such as conducting market research on our behalf. Access to your Personally Identifiable Information by these contractors is limited to the information reasonably necessary for the contractor to perform its limited function for WYA. We also contractually require that our operations and maintenance contractors 1) protect the privacy of your Personally Identifiable Information consistent with this Privacy Policy, and 2) not use or disclose your Personally Identifiable Information for any purpose other than providing us with products and services as required by law.

  1. Disclosure to Third Party Contractor Websites

Certain content and services offered to you through our website are served on Web sites hosted and operated by a company other than WYA (“Third Party Contractor Web sites”). WYA does not disclose your Personally Identifiable Information to these Third Party Contractor Web sites without your consent, but you should be aware that any information you disclose once you access these other Web sites is not subject to this Privacy Policy. WYA does not endorse and is not responsible for the privacy practices of these Third Party Contractor Web sites. You should review the privacy policy posted on the other Web site to understand how that Third Party Contractor Website collects and uses your Personally Identifiable Information. WYA makes an effort to make it obvious to you when you leave our website and enter a Third Party Contractor Web site, either by requiring you to click on a link or by notifying you on the site before you visit the third party site. In addition, if you see a phrase such as “Powered by” or “in association with” followed by the name of a company other than WYA, then you are on a Web site hosted by a company other than WYA.

WYA also provides links to sites provided by Third Party Contractor Websites that have business arrangements with WYA to pay commissions based on sales of products or services generated through WYA. An example of this would be “Ad links” from Yahoo on our Search pages.

  1. Disclosure to Linked Sites

In addition to the Third Party Contractor Web sites that you may access as described above, for your convenience there are links to Third Party Web sites operated by companies that are not affiliated with the WYA web site and that do not have contracts to provide content or services through the WYA web site. These links may be found in advertisements, referenced within content, or placed beside the names or logos of sponsors. WYA does not disclose your Personal Information to these Third Party Websites without obtaining your consent. WYA does not endorse and is not responsible for the privacy practices of these sites. If you choose to link to one of these Third Party Web sites, you should review the privacy policy posted on this other website to understand how that Third Party Web site collects and uses your Personally Identifiable Information.

 

How WYA Handles Privacy and Security Internally

Here are some of the security procedures that WYA uses to protect your privacy:

  • Requires both a personal username (log-in name) and a password in order for users to access their Personally Identifiable Information in any private areas.
  • Requires a public ‘nickname’ different from the username and password, used for any public forums.
  • Uses firewalls to protect information held in our servers.
  • Utilizes Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption in transmitting Personally Identifiable Information to our servers. In order to take advantage of encryption technology, you must have an Internet browser which supports 128-bit encryption.
  • Closely monitors the limited number of WYA employees who have potential access to your Personally Identifiable Information.
  • Requires all WYA employees to abide by our Privacy Policy and to be subject to disciplinary action if they violate it.
  • Backs-up our systems to protect the integrity of your Personally Identifiable Information.
  • Has a Data Protection Officer tasked with ensuring that users’ data is respected.

Despite WYA’s efforts to protect your Personally Identifiable Information, there is always some risk that an unauthorized third party may find a way around our security systems or that transmissions of your information over the Internet may be intercepted.

 

Updating Your Information and Contacting WYA

  1. Updating Your Personally Identifiable Information

WYA tools that collect and store self-reported data allow you to correct, update, or review information you have submitted by going back to the specific tool, logging in, and making the desired changes. WYA may store user submitted data (Personally Identifiable Information) in an active database for a period of six (6) months. After six (6) months, user submitted data, including Personally Identifiable Information will be held in an active database or on an inactive back-up medium for a period of not less than six (6) years.

  1. Removing your Personal Information

If you have a complaint or problem, please contact us at dpo@old.wya.net. Our Data Protection Officer will take appropriate steps for a response or resolution. We try to answer every email within 48 business hours, but may not always be able to do so.

  1. Limitations on Removing or Changing Information

Upon your request, we will delete your Personally Identifiable from our active databases and where feasible from our back-up media. You should be aware that it is not technologically possible to remove each and every record of the information you have provided to WYA from our servers.

  1. Changes to This Privacy Policy

Personally Identifiable Information: We will inform you if a material change is made to the Privacy Policy, which means a change that expands the permissible uses or disclosures of Personally Identifiable Information allowed by the prior version of the Privacy Policy. Your continued use of the WYA web site will indicate acceptance of the changes. You may of course choose to opt out of continuing to use the WYA web site. Please exit the site immediately if you do not agree to the terms of this Privacy Policy or any revised policy.

Non-Significant Changes: WYA may make non-significant changes to the Privacy Policy that do not affect Personally Identifiable Information. For these instances, WYA may not notify you of such non-significant changes.

If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, the home page, and other places appropriate throughout our site so that you are aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it. 

We reserve the right to modify this privacy statement at any time, so please review it frequently. If we make material changes to this policy, we will notify you here, by email, and by means of a notice on our home page.

  1. Contacting Us

If you have any questions about our privacy policy, please contact us at the following:

WYA Foundation, Inc.
228 East 71st Street
New York, NY 10021
dpo@wya.net

 

Glossary

Non-Personal Information: Information that is not traceable back to any individual and cannot be used to identify an individual. For example, information such as gender, age, city and state when not linked with other Personally Identifiable Information is Non-Personal Information.

Personally Identifiable Information (PII): (also called Personal Information): Information that can be traced back to an individual (contrast with Non-Personal Information and Aggregate Information). Examples of Personally Identifiable Information include your name, home address, telephone number, email address, and Social Security number.

If other pieces of information are linked to Personally Identifiable Information, they also become Personally Identifiable Information. For example, if you use a nickname to chat online and give out your real name while chatting, your nickname becomes Personally Identifiable Information when linked with other Personally Identifiable Information.