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Privacy Policy

Last Updated: February 3rd, 2023

This CarAnswers Privacy Policy (“Privacy Policy”) describes our policies and procedures on the collection, use, disclosure, and sharing of your personal information when you use the CarAnswers Platform. Capitalized terms that are not defined in this Privacy Policy have the meaning given to them in our Terms of Service. CarAnswers is the data controller of your personal information and is responsible for providing you with this Privacy Policy.

Information We Collect

We collect information directly from you, from third parties, and automatically through your use of the CarAnswers Platform.

  • Account and Profile Data. When you create an account and profile on the CarAnswers Platform, we collect your name, email address, and other information you provide, such as topics that you know about or find interesting. You can choose to add your photo, country of residence, place of employment, education history, and any other information to your public-facing profile. Once you create a profile, others will be able to see certain information about your activity on the CarAnswers Platform, such as the questions and answers you post, your followers and who you follow, topics of interest to you, and your credentials.
  • Your Content. We collect the information and content that you post to the CarAnswers Platform, including your questions, answers, comments, photos, and the edit history to your content. Unless you have posted certain content anonymously, your content, date and time stamps, and all associated comments are publicly viewable on the CarAnswers Platform. Your content may be indexed by search engines and be republished elsewhere on the Internet in accordance with our Terms of Service.
  • Communication Records. We maintain a record when you communicate with us via email, through the CarAnswers Platform, or otherwise. The CarAnswers Platform also provides a “Messages” feature that allows you to send direct messages through the CarAnswers Platform to other users. We store these communications and information related to these messages, such as the date of the communication and to whom it was sent.
  • Third Party Application Login. You can log into your CarAnswers account using third party applications (e.g., Facebook, Google, and Apple). When you log in using this method, we collect your name and email address associated with that third party application for authentication and identity verification purposes. You can also choose to import your contacts to your CarAnswers account to connect with your friends on the CarAnswers Platform.
  • Cookies and Similar Technologies. We and our third party providers use cookies, log files, pixel tags, local storage objects, and other similar technologies to automatically collect information about your activities, such as your searches, page views, date and time of your visit, and other information about your use of the CarAnswers Platform. We also collect information about your web browser or mobile device in connection with your use of the CarAnswers Platform such as your browser type, type of computer or mobile device, browser language, IP address, mobile carrier, unique device identifier, and requested and referring URLs. We also receive information when you view content on or otherwise interact with the CarAnswers Platform, even if you have not created an account.
  • Platform Engagement Data. We collect platform engagement and browsing information, such as IP address, date and time stamp, user agent, CarAnswers cookie ID, URLs visited, unique advertising identifiers (including mobile device advertising identifiers) or content identifiers (if applicable), time zone, and other information about your activity on the CarAnswers Platform. We also collect this information from third-party sites and services that have embedded our CarAnswers pixels (“Pixels”), widgets, plug-ins, buttons, or related technologies. We may also receive these types of information about you from third parties, such as our partners (including ad partners) or CarAnswers affiliates.
  • Data From Advertisers. Third party advertisers who use our Ad Services may also provide us with information about you as part of their ad campaigns (e.g., email addresses) to create custom audiences for personalizing their ad campaigns or for measuring the effectiveness of their ads. 

How We Use Your Information and Legal Basis for Processing

We process the information we collect for the following purposes, and under the following legal basis. You may decline to submit personal information through the CarAnswers Platform, in which case we may not be able to provide certain services to you.

  • Provide our Services. To provide you the services we offer on the CarAnswers Platform and make the CarAnswers Platform available to the public, communicate with you about your use of the CarAnswers Platform, respond to your inquiries, provide troubleshooting, and for other customer service purposes. This is so we can comply with our contractual obligations to you.
  • Personalization. To tailor the content and information that we or our third party content publishers or advertisers may send or display to you in the CarAnswers Platform. We also use your information to suggest followers and content, to help others find your profile, to offer location customization, and personalized help and instructions, and to otherwise personalize your experiences while using the CarAnswers Platform. It is in our legitimate business interests to provide you with a customized experience.
  • Advertising. To display interest-based advertising to you in the CarAnswers Platform, to improve our advertising and measurement systems so we can show you relevant ads and to measure the effectiveness and reach of ads and services. It is in our legitimate business interests to provide advertising. Where necessary, we will obtain your consent before engaging in this processing.
  • Marketing and Promotions. For marketing and promotional purposes, such as to send you news, special offers, promotions, or to otherwise contact you about products or information we think may interest you, including information about third-party products and services. It is in our legitimate interest to provide more relevant and interesting marketing and promotions messages. Where applicable, we obtain your consent before sending such marketing communications and you can unsubscribe anytime.
  • Enable Communications. To facilitate communications you send to us or to other users on the CarAnswers Platform. We process information about who you have communicated with to better understand the use of our services. This processing is necessary to comply with our contractual obligations to you.
  • Analytics. To gather analytics and metrics to better understand how users use the CarAnswers Platform. We also use analytics data to evaluate and improve the CarAnswers Platform, including the Ad Services and personalization, and to develop new products and services. It is in our legitimate business interests to make informed decisions about product development.
  • Comply with Law. To comply with legal obligations, as part of our general business operations, and for other business administration purposes. This processing is necessary to comply with legal obligations and to serve our legitimate business interests in complying with the laws to which we are subject.
  • Prevent Fraud and Misuse. To investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the safety of any person or violations of our Terms of Service or this Privacy Policy. This processing is necessary to comply with legal obligations and to serve our legitimate interest in preventing misuse of the CarAnswers platform, including through illegal activities and fraud.

How We Share Your Information

We share your information as outlined below, and where users have asked us to do so or otherwise consented:

Service Providers. We share your information with third-party service providers who use this information to perform services for us, such as payment processors, hosting providers, auditors, advisors, consultants, customer service providers, as well as service providers who assist us in providing the Ad Services.

Business Transfers. We may disclose or transfer your information as part of any merger, sale, and transfer of our assets, acquisition or restructuring of all or part of our business, bankruptcy, or similar event.

Protection of Rights and When Legally Required. We may disclose information where we are required to do so by law, where we believe it necessary to respond to claims asserted against us or, comply with legal process (e.g., subpoenas or warrants), enforce or administer our agreements and terms, for fraud prevention, risk assessment, investigation, and protect the rights, property, or safety of CarAnswers, its users, or others.

Your Content and Public Information. Your content, including your name, profile picture, profile information, and certain associated activity information is available to other users of the CarAnswers Platform and may also be viewed publicly by non users. Public viewing includes availability to non-registered visitors and users may share your content across other sites. In addition, your content may be indexed by search engines. See the section below about Your Choices and Settings for information about how to control what information is shared or viewed by others.

Platform Engagement Information. We share with our advertisers and publishers aggregate statistics, metrics, and reports about the performance of their ads in the CarAnswers Platform. This aggregated data may include the number of unique user views, demographics about the users who saw their ads or content, and conversion rates. Certain features allow you to share your personal information with advertisers on our platform if you choose to do so.

Research. We share aggregated or anonymized information with third parties for market research, reporting, and analytics. The information we share in this context cannot be used to identify individual users.

How We Secure and Store Your Information

Security. CarAnswers maintains appropriate technical, administrative, and physical safeguards to protect the information we collect from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, destruction, and altercation.

Retention. We keep your personal information for as long as we have a relationship with you. Once our relationship with you has come to an end, we will retain your personal information for a period of time that enables us to maintain business records for audit purposes, comply with record retention requirements under the law, and defend or bring any existing or potential legal claims.

Your Privacy Rights

Depending on where you live and the local laws, you may have certain rights regarding your personal information. These may include rights to:

  • Access your personal information
  • Rectify the personal information we hold about you
  • Erase your personal information
  • Restrict our use of your personal information
  • Object to our use of your personal information
  • Data portability
  • Withdraw consent you have given at any time
  • Lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority

Your Choices and Settings

You can update your privacy settings, control the types of notifications and communications we send, and limit the information shared within the CarAnswers Platform anytime. Here is further information about your choices and settings.

Your Content. You may edit or delete the answers that you post at any time. Any questions you have posted may remain on the CarAnswers Platform. Other CarAnswers users will be able to see the history of your content edits in your profile activity. Any deleted content will be removed from third-party sites from which it has been shared via CarAnswers’s standard sharing features. However, we have no control over deletions or changes to your content if it has been shared manually by others.

Emails and Notifications. When you create a CarAnswers profile you will receive email digests containing content from the CarAnswers Platform that we believe may match your interests. You may also receive notices about other content from the CarAnswers Platform that may be of interest to you, such as Spaces that you follow. In addition, users may be able to send communications and invites to their imported contacts through their CarAnswers account, by email, text, or phone. You can opt out of receiving emails or other notifications from us by configuring your Emails and Notifications settings, but we will still send you transactional emails about your account.

Interactions with Other Users. You can adjust your settings to restrict who can send you messages on the CarAnswers Platform or comment on your answers and posts.

Profile Discoverability. You can adjust your settings to block others from discovering your account by searching for your name or using your contact information.

Credentials. You can change your credentials (e.g., education history, place of employment) that are displayed in your profile or in connection with a specific answer.

Indexed Search. You can control whether your profile is indexed by search engines.

Deleted or Deactivated Account. If you choose “Delete Account” in your profile’s settings, then all your content will be removed from public visibility on the CarAnswers Platform, and it may not be restored by us. If you choose “Deactivate Account,” then you will no longer receive any communications from us, and users will not be able to interact with you; however, your content will remain on the CarAnswers Platform. You can reactivate your account at any time by logging in.

Children’s Privacy

We do not knowingly collect or solicit personal information from anyone under the age of 13 or knowingly allow such persons to create a CarAnswers account. If we become aware that we have collected personal information from a child under 13 we take steps to delete that account.

Additional Information for California Residents

This section provides information organized in accordance with the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) for residents of California about how we handle personal information. This Privacy Policy discloses the categories of personal information that we collect, use, and disclose in order to operate our business over the past 12 months.

  • Collect. As we describe in more detail in the section above titled The Information We Collect, we collect personal information directly from consumers, automatically when consumers use the CarAnswers Platform, and from other sources (such as from other users, partners, including ad partners, or our affiliated companies) and have collected the following categories of personal information in the past 12 months:
    • Identifiers, such as your name, email address, or IP address
    • Internet or other similar network activity, such as browsing or search history related to your use of the CarAnswers Platform
    • Photos or visual Information, such as your profile photo
    • Geolocation data, such as approximate location data (we don’t collect precise geolocation, but can infer general location from your IP address)
    • Employment information, such as employment details you add to your profile
    • Education information, such as education details you add to your profile
    • Inferences drawn from other personal information
    • Commercial Information, such as billing address and purchase history
  • Use. The section above titled How We Use Your Information discloses that the categories of personal information we collect are used to provide our services, for personalization, for billing and payment, to provide advertising, to promote our services to you, to enable communications with other users, to analyze how our services are used, to comply with law, and to prevent misuse of the CarAnswers Platform.
  • Disclose. As we describe in more detail in the section above titled How We Share Your Information, we may disclose the following categories of personal information for business purposes with service providers, affiliates, law enforcement authorities, in the context of a merger or acquisition, as required by law, for the protection of rights, and as directed by you: (1) identifiers, (2) protected classification characteristics, (3) Internet or other similar network activity, (4) geolocation data, (5) photos or visual information, (6) employment information, (7) education information, and (8) inferences.
  • We Do Not Sell Your Personal Information. We do not sell your personal information to third parties, nor do we sell personal information from users under 16 years old. For more information, please refer to the How We Share Your Information section above.

California Privacy Rights

California consumers have the right to make the following requests:

  • Deletion. You have the right to request deletion of personal information that we have collected about you.
  • Copy and Right to Know. You have the right to request a copy of the specific pieces of personal information that we have collected about you over the past 12 months. You also have a right to request a disclosure about the categories of information, sources, and purposes of collection, as well as categories of third parties we have shared it with over the past 12 months.
  • Designated Agent. You may designate an agent to make a request on your behalf. That agent must have access to your CarAnswers account for us to verify the request. The agent must also provide proof that you gave the agent signed permission to submit the request on your behalf.

Non-Discrimination. CarAnswers will not discriminate against you, including by denying or providing a different level or quality of services if you choose to exercise your privacy rights.

Contact Us

If you have any questions about our practices or this Privacy Policy, please contact us using our Contact page.

Privacy Policy Updates

We may occasionally update this Privacy Policy to reflect changes in our privacy practices or relevant data protection laws. We will notify you if we make any material changes and will revise the “Last Updated” date at the top of this Privacy Policy.