Privacy Policy

Defensive Driving School Online Course – Class Privacy Policy

Defensive Driver OnLine, Ltd., and its affiliated companies (“DDOL”) has made the commitment to take all reasonable measures to protect your privacy online. Please read the following policy to understand how your personal information will be treated as you use our services to learn more about driving safety. This policy may change from time to time so please check back periodically.

This policy will let you know:

What personally identifiable information is collected from you;
What cookies are and how they are used;
How your information is used;
Who is collecting your information;
With whom may your information be shared;
What choices are available to you regarding collection, use, and distribution of your information;
The kind of security precautions that are in place to protect the loss, misuse, or alteration of your information;
How DDOL protects children’s privacy; and
What else you should know about your online privacy.
Use of Pixels.
Additional sources of information regarding privacy issues.

What personally identifiable information does DDOL collect from me?

DDOL currently collects personally identifiable information from our web sites only when expressly given to DDOL by users in the form of registrations, e-mails and similar devices. For example, some personal information is gathered when you register. During registration for our driver’s safety course, DDOL asks for your name, email address, birth date, mailing address and valid driver’s license number. This information is necessary to verify your identity prior to taking the DDOL Course, and is a requirement of the rules and regulations of a state agency.

In addition to registration for the driver’s safety course, we may ask you for personal information at other times, including (but not limited to) when you submit a listing for a web site; and when you report a problem with one of our sites or services. If you contact DDOL, we may keep a record of that correspondence. DDOL also occasionally asks users to complete surveys that we use for research purposes. Wherever DDOL collects personal information we make an effort to include a link to this Privacy Policy on that page.

What are cookies and how does DDOL use them?

As part of offering and providing our services, DDOL uses cookies to store and sometimes track non-personal information about users who visit our site. A cookie is a small amount of data that is sent to your browser from a web server and stored on your computer’s hard drive. All sites on DDOL where you are prompted to provide a user name other than the driving safety course log-in require that you accept cookies. (See “What choices are available to you regarding collection, use and distribution of your information?” for more information on cookies.)

Generally, we use cookies to:

(1) Remind us of who you are and to access your account information (stored on our computers) in order to deliver to you a better and more personalized service. This cookie is set when you register or “Sign In” and is modified when you “Sign Out” of our services.

(2) Estimate our audience size. Each browser accessing DDOL is given a unique cookie which is then used to determine the extent of repeat usage, usage by a registered user versus by an unregistered user, and to help target advertisements based on user interests and behavior.

(3) Measure certain traffic patterns, which areas of our web site you have visited, and your aggregate visiting patterns. We use this research to understand how our users’ habits are similar or different from one another so that we can make each visit to DDOL more useful. We may use this information to better personalize the content, banners, and promotions that you and other users will see on our sites.

Advertising networks that serve ads onto DDOL may also use their own cookies.

DDOL also collects IP addresses for system administration and to report aggregate information to our advertisers.
Who is collecting information?

When you are on a DDOL site and are asked for personal information, you are sharing that information with DDOL and its contractors alone, unless it is specifically stated otherwise. If data is being collected and/or maintained by any company other than DDOL, for instance, if DDOL should enter into a co-branding arrangement with a partner company, you will be notified prior to the time of the data collection or transfer. If you do not want your data to be shared, you can choose not to allow the transfer by not using that particular service. Additionally, DDOL, for itself or another company, may run promotions from time to time.

Some or all data collected during a promotion may be shared with the sponsor. If data will be shared, you will be notified prior to the time of data collection or transfer. You can decide not to participate in the promotion if you don’t want your data to be shared. Currently, any DDOL promotions will be limited to US residents.

Please be aware that DDOL advertisers or web sites that have links on our site may collect personally identifiable information about you. The information practices of those web sites linked to DDOL are not covered by this privacy statement.

With whom does DDOL share my information?

As a general rule, DDOL will not disclose any of your personally identifiable information except when we have your permission or under special circumstances, such as when we believe in good faith that the law requires it or under the circumstances described below. Please see the Terms of Use and Terms of Access Agreements for our products and services for more detailed information about how your personal information may be shared. The following describes some of the ways that your information may be disclosed.

Business Partners & Sponsors: DDOL may disclose your personal information to business partners or sponsors, but this is specifically described to you prior to data collection or prior to transferring the data. Details of shared use can be found in specific Terms of Use or Terms of Access Agreements, and promotions rules. Some or all data collected during a DDOL promotion may be shared with a sponsor. If personally identifying data about you will be shared, we will tell you before we collect or transfer the data.

Promotions may offer opportunities to request additional information from sponsors. By requesting more information, you give DDOL permission to transfer your personal information to the sponsor so they can fulfill your request. In many instances, only your email address will be shared. If more information will be shared with the sponsor, you will be notified prior to the transfer.

Third Party Data & Data in the Aggregate: Under confidentiality agreements, DDOL may match user information with third party data. Also, DDOL discloses aggregated user statistics (for example, 45% of our users are female) in order to describe our services to prospective partners, advertisers, and other third parties, and for other lawful purposes.

Other: DDOL may also disclose account information in special cases when we have reason to believe that disclosing this information is necessary to identify, contact or bring legal action against someone who may be violating DDOL’s Terms of Service or may be causing injury to or interference with (either intentionally or unintentionally) DDOL’s rights or property, other DDOL users, or anyone else that could be harmed by such activities. DDOL may disclose or access account information when we believe in good faith that the law requires it and for administrative and other purposes that we deem necessary to maintain, service, and improve our products and services.

What are my choices regarding collection, use, and distribution of my information?

DDOL may, from time to time, send you email regarding our products and services. In addition, if unless you indicated upon registration that you are not interested in receiving offers or information from DDOL and our partners, we may occasionally send you direct mail about products and services that we feel may be of interest to you. Only DDOL (or agents and contractors working on behalf of DDOL and under confidentiality agreements) will send you these direct mailings and only if you do not indicated that you do not object to these offers. If you do not want to receive such mailings, simply tell us when you give us your personal information. Or, at any time you can send us an E-mail indicating your desire to change your choice regarding your desire to receive information about such products or services.

For any promotions made by DDOL or its partners, we will ask for your email address in order to update you on your score, entries, and status in prize drawings. When you participate in these types of promotions, you automatically receive promotion-related email, unless you choose the no-email option that some promotions offer. Occasionally these promotion-related email messages may include targeted advertisements.

You also have choices with respect to cookies. By modifying your browser preferences, you have the choice to accept all cookies, to be notified when a cookie is set, or to reject all cookies. If you choose to reject all cookies you will be unable to use certain DDOL services that require registration in order to participate except for taking the DDOL Course.

DDOL does not sell or rent user information to anyone without notifying you through our web site first. We will notify you at the time of data collection or transfer if your data will be shared with a third party and you will always have the option of not permitting the transfer. If you do not wish to allow your data to be shared, you can choose not to use a particular service or not to participate in certain promotions or contests.
What security precautions are in place to protect the loss, misuse, or alteration of my information?

Your DDOL Account Information is password-protected so that you and only you have access to this personal information. You may edit your DDOL Account Information by using your DDOL ID and password.

We recommend that you do not divulge your password to anyone. DDOL will never ask you for your password in an unsolicited phone call or in an unsolicited email. Also remember to sign out of your DDOL account and close your browser window when you have finished your work. This is to ensure that others cannot access your personal information and correspondence if you share a computer with someone else or are using a computer in a public place like a library or Internet cafe.

Unfortunately, no data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, DDOL cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us or from our online products or services, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your transmission, we make all reasonable efforts consistent with those practices in the OnLine industry to ensure its security on our systems.
What about children’s privacy?

Naturally, the safety of children is very important to us. The DDOL Course is, naturally, only directed towards licensed drivers. As of December 20, 1999, the minimum age for a person to hold a Texas driver’s license, without hardship permission, is 16 years old. The minimum driving age in other states may vary. As a consequence, the DDOL Course and other content on or accessible through the DDOL Web site is not directed to young children. It is DDOL’s intention to never collect personal information from anyone under the legal driving age. Furthermore, anyone who holds a valid driver’s license but is under the age of 18 should only access our web site or take the DDOL Course with the express approval of the parent or legal guardian.

Use of Pixels
DefensiveDriving.com and TxDriving.com use pixels (or transparent GIF files) to manage the effectiveness of various advertising campaigns. The information we collect is anonymous and not personally identifiable (it does NOT contain your name, address, telephone number, or e mail address).

SMS Privacy
No mobile information will be shared with third parties/affiliates for marketing/promotional purposes. All the above categories exclude text messaging originator opt-in data and consent; this information will not be shared with any third parties.

What else should I know about my privacy?

Please keep in mind that whenever you voluntarily disclose personal information online – for example on message boards, through email, or in chat areas – that information can be collected and used by others. In short, if you post personal information online that is accessible to the public, you may receive unsolicited messages from other parties in return.

Ultimately, you are solely responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your passwords and/or any account information. Please be careful and responsible whenever you’re online.
Additional Information

Questions regarding this statement should be directed to [email protected] .

Also see…

Electronic Frontier Foundation – a civil liberties organization working to protect your rights online.

Electronic Privacy Information Center – established to focus public attention on emerging civil liberties issues relating to the National Information Infrastructure.

Privacy Issues Page – from the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT).

The EPIC Cookies Page – definitions, links, and news.

How to Protect Your Privacy – information from the Federal Trade Commission.