Privacy Policy

(Last Updated: October 2023)

ABHW (“ABHW,” “we,” or “us”) respects your concerns about privacy and values the relationship we have with you. This Privacy Statement describes the types of information we collect about you, how we use the information, with whom we share it, the choices available to you regarding our use of the information, and how you can contact us about our privacy practices. Here at ABHW, we know how much you value privacy, and we realize that you care about what happens to the information you provide to us through our website and other sources (our “Website”). 

1. What Information Does This Privacy Statement Apply to?
   This Privacy Statement applies to the collection, use, and disclosure of personal information from and about you by ABHW on the Stamp Out Stigma website and through email communications. In this Privacy Statement, “personal information” means any information that is linked or reasonably linkable to an identified or identifiable individual.
   
   This Privacy Statement does not apply to any third party websites, which may be accessible through hyperlinks on the Website. Websites run by a third party may have its own privacy practices that we encourage you to review.
   

   Linking to a third party site does not mean that we endorse the site, any products or services described on the site, or any other material contained in a third party site. To the extent any linked websites you visit are not owned or controlled by us, we are not responsible for the sites’ content, any use of the sites, or the privacy practices of the sites. Please review the privacy statement on those other websites to see how they handle your information.

   If you choose to use our Website in any way, such as browsing or interacting, you agree with the terms of our current Privacy Statement as posted here. If you do not agree with this Privacy Statement, you should not use our Website. We may update or modify this Privacy Statement from time to time at our sole discretion and will note the date of last update on the top of this page. If we do so, we may also notify you if required by applicable law. We encourage you to visit this area frequently to stay informed, as your continued use of our Website following the posting of changes to these terms means that you consent to such changes.

2. What Information Does ABHW Collect?
   We may obtain information about you from various sources. We may collect this personal information when you provide it on our website, through external social media platforms, in telephone or email communication, in connection with social networking, or at one of our events. When you visit the Website, we may also collect certain information about your device or usage by automated means or by using technologies such as cookies, web server logs, and web beacons, as described below.

   Personal information That You or Others Provide

   You may choose to provide personal information to us in a number of ways, such as when you Take the Pledge, when you Share Your Story, and when you contact us. The types of information you may provide to us include:

• • Personal identifiers provided when Taking the Pledge such as first and last name and email address
  • Personal identifiers provided when you Share Your Story such as the text of your story, your first and last name, your Twitter handle, your email address, and any photographs, videos, reviews, articles, comments, or any other information you provide to us in the text of the story
  • Any other personal information you choose to provide such as racial or ethnic origin, religious or philosophical beliefs, sexual orientation, gender identity, information related to your health, etc. 

In addition, we may collect personal information about you that is provided to us by other Website users and other third parties as well as from external social networks such as your name, profile picture, likes, location, and friend list.

Personal Information Collected Automatically

When you visit this Website or open an email that we send you, we may collect information about your usage or device by automated means or by using technologies such as cookies, web server logs, and web beacons. As set forth in more detail below, we may also collect information about your usage and browsing habits using various web-based technologies.

• • Cookies: Cookies are small text files that websites send to your computer or other Internet-connected device to uniquely identify your browser or to store information or settings in your browser. Your browser may tell you how to be notified when you receive certain types of cookies and how to restrict or disable certain cookies. Some cookies may exist for only a single session, and some are persistent for multiple sessions over time. We may use cookies that are managed by ABHW or by third parties for the purposes provided in this Privacy Statement, including for session management, authentication, user preference storage, Website performance and personalization, Website analytics, content management, search, and social media integration.
  • Web server logs: In conjunction with obtaining information through cookies, our web servers may log details regarding your device, operating system, or information about your Website usage.
  • Web beacons & pixels: To control which web servers collect the information described above, we may place tags on our Website or in emails called “web beacons” or “pixels.” These are computer instructions that link web pages to particular web servers and their cookies. Web beacons and pixels can be used to track the pages you view, links that you click, or other online behavior. These tools may also be used to measure the effectiveness of our email campaigns by identifying the individuals who open or act upon an email message, when an email message is opened, how many times an email message is forwarded, the type of software, device, operating system and browser used to deliver the email, and any URL accessed through our email message.
  • Other: We may use other technology to collect information for the purposes described in this Privacy Statement.

Such technologies may permit the collection of data elements such as demographic data, browser type, MAC address, and other device information, operating system type and settings, domain, the address of the web page that linked you to our Website, IP address, pages visited, whether you have visited us before or are new to the Website, activities conducted on the page such as search queries, and the day and time of your visit.

At this time, we do not honor “do not track” signals from website browsers. However, you may refuse or delete cookies. If you refuse or delete cookies, some of the functionality of our Websites may be impaired. If you turn off cookies, Web beacon and other technologies will still detect visits to our Websites, but the information they generate cannot be associated with other non-identifiable cookie information and is disregarded. Please refer to your browser Help instructions to learn more about how to manage cookies and the use of similar technologies.

3. How Does ABHW Use My Information?

We collect, maintain, and use your information for the following purposes:

• • • Maintaining a list of supporters who Take the Pledge;
    • Contacting you about your stories shared through the Share Your Story function;
    • Editing, publishing, and tagging stories shared through the Share Your Story function;
    • Analyzing and improving our Website including developing new services; improving safety; managing our communications; performing market research; performing data analytics; and performing accounting, auditing and other internal functions;
    • Responding to your inquiries or comments, or sending you emails related to the Stamp Out Stigma initiative;
    • Operating and communicating with you about or through external social networking platforms;
    • Maintaining the security and integrity of our systems, including maintaining internal records;
    • Conforming to legal requirements or industry standards, complying with legal processes, detecting and preventing fraud or misuse, defending our legal rights, or protecting others;
    • As part of a merger, acquisition, bankruptcy, transfer, sale, corporate change, or any other transaction involving all or a portion of ABHW’s assets

All information we collect may be aggregated and merged or enhanced with data from other sources, such as third parties or our mobile application. We may also collect and store information locally on your device using mechanisms such as browser web storage (including HTML 5) and application data caches.

4. How Does ABHW Share My Information?

We may disclose your information to our affiliates and to third parties who help us with our business functions, such as service providers or suppliers. Examples of these service providers include entities that provide web hosting or analytics services. These service providers may be located around the world and in countries where privacy rules are different or less stringent than rules in the country where you reside.

If you choose to provide a story through the Share Your Story function, we will use that story to help raise awareness about mental illness and substance use disorders. ABHW may contact you about the story over email, edit the story, publish the story on our blog; Facebook, Twitter, and other Stamp Out Stigma social media channels; and tag it to your social media accounts.

In addition, we may share your personal information if necessary to protect the safety, property, or other rights of us, our customers, or employees, or when otherwise required by law. We may also share your personal information with your consent in certain circumstances.

We reserve the right to transfer information we have about you in the event we sell, transfer, or engage in another transaction involving all or a portion of our business or assets, or undertake another form of corporate change, including bankruptcy.

Following such a sale, transfer, transaction, or corporate change, you may contact the entity to which we transferred your information with any inquiries concerning the processing of that information.

Your personal information may be stored in databases maintained by ABHW including local storage or third parties, and may be disclosed to third parties for the purposes stated in this Privacy Statement that are located within and outside the United States, including countries where privacy rules differ and may be less stringent than those of the country in which you reside. 

5. What About ABHW’s Social Media Platforms?

Our Websites may embed plugs-ins, widgets, or other apps of various social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, Linkedln, Pinterest, Instagram, and YouTube. An example of such a plug-in is Facebook’s “Like” button. When you encounter those embedded objects, your internet browser may make a direct connection to the social media platform’s service and may share with the social media platforms information such as which of our Websites you have visited. Please note that although the functions appear on our Websites, the data collected in response to your interaction will be governed by the external third party’s privacy statement. 

6. Is My Information Secure?

ABHW will take reasonable precautions to protect your personal information from loss, misuse, or alteration. Please be aware, however, that no transmissions sent through the Internet is completely secure and we therefore cannot guarantee the absolute safety of your personal information. 

7. Does ABHW Collect Information From Children?

ABHW does not intentionally collect information from children under 13 years of age, and children under age 13 should not submit any information to us. If we become aware that a child has provided us with information without parental consent, or a parent or guardian of a child contacts us through the contact information provided below, we will use reasonable efforts to delete the child’s information from our databases.

8. What Choices Do I Have?

We want to communicate with you, but only in the ways that you agree to hear from us. You may “opt-out” or unsubscribe from any emails we send you by following the unsubscribe instructions in any email or other communication you receive from us. After doing so, you will not receive future emails unless you sign up to receive future emails and provide your email address. Please allow up to two weeks to process your request.

We store data for as long as it is necessary to provide the services described in this Privacy Statement and for our internal business purposes. If you would like us to delete information, you may contact us using the information below and we will make reasonable efforts to delete your information from our records, but may need to keep a copy for administrative purposes such as documenting that a transaction occurred.

9. I Live in California – What About My California Privacy Rights?

As described in this Privacy Statement, we do not share your personal information with third parties for third party marketing purposes. However, you are welcome to contact us about our privacy practices at info@abhw.org.

10. How Can I Contact ABHW?

ABHW is committed to working with you to obtain a fair and rapid resolution of any queries, complaints, or disputes about privacy. If you have submitted information to ABHW and you would like to have it deleted from our databases or corrected, or if you have any other questions or comments regarding our privacy practices, please email us at info@abhw.org for more information.