Privacy Policy
Privacy Policy
Effective Date: May 18, 2018 Last Modified: September 19, 2024
The Humane League (“The Humane League”, “THL”, “we”, or “us”) is committed to protecting the privacy of our supporters and the Personal Information provided to or collected by us. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect information from you, how it is used, and with whom it may be shared. It also identifies the security procedures in place to protect your Personal Information and the choices available regarding the collection, use, and/or deletion of your data. For purposes of this Privacy Policy, “Personal Information” shall mean any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person. Personal Information does not include information that has been anonymized or de-identified provided that it cannot be linked with other information to identify an individual.
This Privacy Policy applies to THL websites, including https://thehumaneleague.org, https://openwingalliance.org, https://animalpolicyalliance.org, and to all associated subdomains, online services, and applications, such as THL’s Fast Action Network, that link to this Privacy Policy (collectively, the "Site"). Each time you use our Site, the current version of this Privacy Policy will apply.
Accordingly, whenever you use our Site, you should check the date of this Privacy Policy (which appears at the top) and review any changes since the last version. This Privacy Policy applies to Personal Information we collect from Site visitors and users.
If you have any concerns that aren’t addressed in this Privacy Policy, please reach out to us by emailing privacy@thehumaneleague.org.
Information We Collect and How We Collect It
When you use or access the Site, we may collect Personal Information. The types of Personal Information we collect may depend on the context of your interactions with us, your choices, and when other sources provide it to us, as described below. This information falls within the following three categories: (a) information you provide directly, (b) information gathered automatically by the Site, and (c) information we collect from other sources as set forth below.
Categories of Personal Information We Collect As set forth in more detail in the “How We Collect Your Personal Information” section below, the information we collect from you directly or from third parties with whom we work, may include:
- Name
- Home address
- Telephone number
- Social media URLs
- Professional information like organization title
- Date of birth
- Pronouns
- Financial information, such as credit card or banking information
- Email address
When you visit the Site, we may also collect the following information automatically:
- IP address
- General location information derived from IP address
- Unique device identifiers
- Browser type and plug-in details
- Device type (e.g., Desktop, laptop, tablet, phone, etc.)
- Operating system
- The websites you visited before coming to our website or through which you were referred to our website
- How you interact with the website, including dates and times of website visits, information on actions taken by you on our website, and website pages you accessed
- Details relating to whether you engage with our emails, such as whether you opened the email
Information You Provide
If you choose to provide it, we collect Personal Information from you directly when you do things like complete an online form (such as subscribing to receive our email updates, registering for our Fast Action Network, or RSVPing for an event), make a donation, order merchandise, sign a petition, sign up to be a volunteer, apply for a grant or membership through the Open Wing Alliance (“OWA”) or the Animal Policy Alliance (“APA”), enter a giveaway, or request information about veg eating. This Personal Information may include your name, phone number, email address, mailing address, social media URLs, and financial information. The Humane League partners with NGP VAN, Inc., formerly operating under the name EveryAction, also operating under Bonterra, a customer relationship management platform, to store and process much of this information. More about Bonterra’s privacy policy can be found on their website. We may also manually collect Personal Information, such as Personal Information obtained during an in-person meeting.
The Humane League does not see, store, or retain full credit card numbers submitted online, which are processed directly through our payment processor partners (DirectConnect, Stripe, WePay/Classy, Paragon, Shopify, and PayPal).
Some THL forms, such as donation forms or petitions, utilize Bonterra/NGP VAN/EveryAction’s FastAction function (not to be confused with THL’s Fast Action Network application). You can learn more about how to opt-out of NGP VAN/EveryAction’s FastAction function here.
Information Gathered by the Site
The Humane League and its service providers may collect other information in a variety of ways, including:
Logging
We use several services to log visitor activity on our Site and servers, including information about a visitor’s IP address, general location, device identifiers, the pages visited as well as the time and date of the visit, and the information that referred the visitor to our Site. To best serve our supporters, we must be able to easily search server logs when debugging issues. This information is also used to improve website flow and usability.
Cookies
We may store cookies in your web browser when you use and access our Site.
Cookies are small pieces of text sent to your web browser by a website you visit. A cookie file is stored in your web browser and allows the Site or a third party to recognize you, making your next visit easier and the Site more useful.
How The Humane League Uses Cookies
The Humane League uses cookies to help us monitor traffic, collect information about the use of our Site, and provide targeted advertising outside of our Sites and determine the effectiveness of our advertising.. We also use cookies to enable certain functions of our Site, to provide analytics, and to store your preferences.
We use both “session” and “persistent” cookies on our Site and we use different types of cookies:
- Essential Cookies. These cookies are required to allow us to offer and provide our services. Essential cookies are strictly necessary for the Site and services to function. They are required for you to navigate through the Site and to benefit from the available functions. These cookies cannot be switched off in our system. You can set your browser to block or alter you about these cookies, but some parts of our Site or services may not work for you if you do so.
- Personalization Cookies These cookies allow our Site to remember choices you make when you use our Site, such as dismissing a pop-up or displaying certain content. Additionally, some of our Personalization Cookies include those from our customer management platform, Bonterra/NGP VAN/EveryAction, to remember choices you make when you use their services, such as pre-filling a form from data from previous sign-ups. The purpose of these cookies is to provide you with a more personal experience and to avoid you having to re-enter your information every time you fill out a form on our Site. You can find out more about NGP VAN/EveryAction’s cookies here, including how to opt-out of NGP VAN/EveryAction’s FastAction function.
- Analytics Cookies. These cookies are used to collect information about traffic to our Site and how users use our Site. The information gathered does not identify any individual visitor. The information is aggregated and anonymous. It includes the number of visitors to our Site, the websites that referred them to our Site, the pages they visited on our Site, what time of day they visited our Site, whether they have visited our Site before, and other similar information. We use this information to help operate our Site more efficiently, to gather broad demographic information, and to monitor the level of activity on our Site. We use Google Analytics for this purpose. The Humane League also uses Google Analytics Demographics and Interest Reporting. Google Analytics uses its own cookies. It is only used to improve how our services work. For more information on Google Analytics, including how Google Analytics collects, uses, and discloses information, refer to the following page: https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites.
- Targeted Advertising Cookies. Third party advertisers use these cookies to serve you with advertisements that may be relevant or of interest to you when browsing the internet. When you visit our Sites or services, the third-party providers identified in our consent management platform may place cookies to collect information about your visits to the Site, as well as your interests and preferences. They may use this information to serve you with “interest-based advertising,” which means relevant advertisements for products and services tailored to your interests. These advertisements may be targeted to you based on your use of our website and your activities elsewhere on the internet, and may make use of web beacons, cookies, or pixels that third-party advertising companies use to collect information about your use of our website and your activities on other websites and online services. These third parties may also employ technology used to measure advertisements' effectiveness. You may be able to turn off cookies used for these purposes as described herein, however even if you do so you may still receive advertisements which are not specifically tailored to you.
Disabling Cookies
You can typically remove or reject cookies via your browser settings. To do this, follow the instructions provided by your browser (usually located within the “settings”, “help”, “tools”, or “edit” facility). Many browsers are set to accept cookies until you change your settings. You may opt out of Google's use of cookies by visiting the Network Advertising Initiative’s Ads Settings at any time.
For further information about cookies, including seeing what cookies have been set on your computer or mobile device and how to manage and delete them, visit www.allaboutcookies.org and https://www.cookiesandyou.com/.
If you do not accept our cookies, you may experience some inconvenience in using our Site. For example, we may not be able to recognize your computer or mobile device, and you may need to log in every time you visit our Site. For additional information about your choices with respect to the placement of cookies, please see Digital Advertising and Analytics, below.
Pixel Tags and Related Communications Tracking Technology
We may also use pixel tags (also known as web beacons and clear GIFs) on our Site to track the actions of users. Unlike cookies, which are stored on the hard drive of your computer or mobile device by a website, pixel tags are embedded invisibly on webpages. Pixel tags measure the success of our campaigns and compile statistics about Site usage, so that we can manage our content more effectively. The information we collect using pixel tags is anonymous and is not linked to our users’ Personal Information.
Our marketing related communications may contain other similar tracking technologies so that we can tailor the content of our marketing-related communications more closely to the personalized needs of recipients. These tracking technologies may include, for instance, miniature graphics embedded in an e-mail sent in HTML format that enable analysis of whether and when the relevant e-mail was opened, and which links contained in the e-mail were followed. The information we collect using tracking pixels is stored by us and statistically analyzed to optimize the marketing-related communications service.
Information We Collect From Third Parties
We may obtain Personal Information from third parties for marketing and business purposes. If we obtain Personal Information from third parties for any of these purposes, we will require that any third parties from whom we may obtain such Personal Information represent to us that they have acquired the Personal Information in compliance with all applicable laws and have the right to provide us such Personal Information for our marketing purposes. We may also collect Personal Information from publicly available sources.
California's Online Privacy Protection Act
The California Online Privacy Protection Act protects your right to visit our Site anonymously. If you want to opt out of Google Analytics, try this browser add-on: Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.
Children's Privacy
The Humane League does not knowingly collect or solicit any information from anyone under the age of 16 without the written consent of a parent or legal guardian. You can provide written consent for your minor by contacting us. If we discover that Personal Information has been collected from a child under 16 and their parent or legal guardian has not provided written consent, the Personal Information will be deleted from our system as quickly as possible. If you believe we have this type of Personal Information on file, please contact us immediately.
How Your Information Is Used
We may use the information we collect for any lawful purpose, including the following:
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Contact you regarding updates and important information about The Humane League;
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Contact you regarding winning social media giveaways;
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Process your donations and pledges;
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Fulfill merchandise orders;
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Manage membership in, and award grants through our Alliances (OWA, APA);
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Track your activity with THL, such as volunteering, event attendance, and donations;
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Respond to any inquiries you share with THL;
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Provide you with personalized marketing, targeted messaging, and invitations based on your interests, activities, and/or locality;
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Provide you with invitations based on your interests, activities, and/or locality;
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Operate, personalize, and improve the Site and our services, including for analytics purposes;
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Perform anonymized research;
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Communicate with companies and their employees about improvements to animal welfare, such as petitions;
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Comply with the law and to maintain the security of our Site; or
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With your consent, or as otherwise disclosed at the time information is collected.
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) imposes additional requirements upon companies to strengthen the security around and enhance the protection of personal information of residents of the European Economic Area (EEA). Other countries, such as Switzerland, India, Mexico, and the UK have similar laws. When we process your Personal information as a data controller under the General Data Protection Regulation or a similar data protection law, our use of your personal data is justified on the following legal bases:
- The use of personal information is necessary to perform a contract with you or to take steps to enter into a contract at your request (i.e., because you have purchased something from us or requested information about your interests);
- The use of your personal information is necessary for us to comply with a relevant legal obligation;
- The use of your personal information is in our legitimate interests, subject to your interests and fundamental rights, and notably our legitimate interest in using applicable data to conduct and develop our business activities (such as certain direct marketing activities); or
- You have consented to the use.
We use the personal information we collect to:
- Conduct and develop our business with you and with others, including to further our mission; and
- Fulfill the purposes set forth above in this section.
Opting In and Opting Out of THL Communications
You may opt in to receiving emails from The Humane League via forms on our Site. These forms will always clearly state if they are linked to an email subscription list, and/or will offer you the choice to subscribe to receive email updates on submission. Emails sent from THL may include campaign updates, action alerts, fundraising opportunities, and other ways to help animals. We aim to tailor our email content and frequency based on the interests of our supporters. All subscription-based emails sent from The Humane League include a ‘Manage your Subscriptions’ and ‘Unsubscribe’ link at the bottom that allows you to customize the electronic communication you receive from us, including the option to unsubscribe from all emails. You are also welcome to use the Self Service Portal, email us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org , or call us at 888-211-5241 with unsubscribe requests. To request closure or deletion of a Bonterra/NGP VAN/EveryAction FastAction (also known as ActionID) profile, you should email Bonterra at privacy@bonterratech.com.
If you want to opt out of receiving physical mail from us, please contact us via email or phone at 888-211-5341 and include your full name and mailing address so we may update our system with your preferences.
If you want to opt out of receiving SMS (texts) from THL, you may reply “STOP” to any text message you receive from us, or use the above-mentioned contact points to request that your phone number not be sent text updates from us. When you receive text messages from The Humane League, we will always clearly identify ourselves as the sender.
When Your Information May Be Shared
We may share the information we collect with other parties, including the following:
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With third parties, including third-party coalition and funding partners, affiliated and unaffiliated third parties, and any joint venture partners we may have in the future.
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With organizations, campaigns, groups, or causes that we believe have similar principles and objectives and with organizations that facilitate communications and information sharing among such groups;
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With third-party consultants, vendors, and service providers who process information on our behalf, such as payment processors, data hosting services, and relationship management tools;
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If your organization submits information for the purposes of applying for a grant or membership through the OWA or the APA, we may share your information with third-party coalition and funding partners;
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The Humane League may share your Personal Information with third parties, as required by law or subpoena, or if we reasonably believe that such action is necessary to (a) comply with the law and the reasonable requests of law enforcement; (b) enforce our Terms of Use or to protect the security or integrity of the The Humane League Sites; and/or (c) exercise or protect the rights, property, or personal safety of the The Humane League, our supporters, or others. If we are required by law to disclose the Personal Information you have submitted, we will attempt to provide you with prior notice (unless we are prohibited or it would be futile) that a request for your Personal Information has been made in order to give you an opportunity to object to the disclosure. We will attempt to provide this notice by email, if you have given us an email address, or by postal mail if you have entered a postal address. If you do not challenge the disclosure request, we may be legally required to turn over your Personal Information. In addition, we will independently object to requests for access to information about users of our Site that we believe to be improper;
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As part of a corporate sale, merger, or acquisition, or other transfer of all or part of our assets, including as part of a bankruptcy proceeding;
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With your consent as otherwise disclosed at the time information is collected; and
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We may share information that has been anonymized or aggregated without limitation.
Digital Advertising & Analytics
We may partner with ad networks and other ad serving providers (“Advertising Providers”) that serve ads on behalf of us and others on non-affiliated platforms. Some of those ads may be personalized, meaning that they are intended to be relevant to you based on information Advertising Providers collect about your use of the Site and other sites or apps over time, including information about relationships among different browsers and devices. This type of advertising is known as interest-based advertising. If you reside in the EEA or another jurisdiction with laws similar to GDPR, we will only provide such interest-based advertising with your express consent and where permitted by law.
You may visit the DAA Webchoices tool at www.aboutads.info to learn more about this type of advertising and how to opt out of this advertising on websites by companies participating in the DAA self-regulatory program. If you delete your cookies or use a different browser or mobile device, you may need to renew your opt-out choices exercised through the DAA Webchoices tool. Note that electing to opt out will not stop advertising from appearing in your browser or applications. It may make the ads you see less relevant to your interests.
We may also work with third parties that collect data about your use of the Site and other sites or apps over time for non-advertising purposes. THL uses Google Analytics and other third-party services to improve the performance of the Site and for analytics and marketing purposes. For more information about how Google Analytics collects and uses data when you use our Site, visit www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners, and to opt out of Google Analytics, visit tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout. You can typically remove or reject cookies via your browser settings. In order to do this, follow the instructions provided by your browser.
You may also be able to decide whether to accept or reject cookies by setting your preferences in our cookie consent manager. The cookie consent manager lets you select which categories of cookies you accept or reject. Essential cookies cannot be rejected as they are strictly necessary to provide you with services. Depending on your jurisdiction, we may only place non-essential cookies with your consent or may provide options for opting out of non-essential cookies. The cookie consent manager can be accessed by clicking the “Cookie Preferences” button in our website footer.
If you do not accept our cookies, you may experience some inconvenience in your use of our Site, as access to some functionalities and areas of our Site may be restricted. For example, we may not be able to recognize your computer or mobile device and you may need to log in every time you visit our Site.
Information Security and Storage
We take the security of your Personal Information very seriously and utilize industry-standard security systems, software, and encryption technologies designed to protect the Personal Information collected through our Site, including when transferring and storing Personal Information. We also use payment card processors. Your payment data is delivered directly from the browser to payment card processors, who handle your payment card data subject to industry standards regarding security.
Please note, although we use appropriate security measures once we have received your Personal Information, the transmission of information over the internet is never completely secure, and we cannot guarantee that your Personal Information will remain secure at all times.
Transfer of Personal Information and International Users
We are headquartered in the United States. The Personal Information about you that we collect, process, and/or use is controlled by The Humane League, and is stored on servers located in the United States. If you are visiting our Site from outside the United States, be aware that your Personal Information may be transferred to, stored, and processed in the United States where our servers are located, and our central database is located. By using our Site, you consent to any transfer of this Personal Information. For EEA, Swiss, or UK visitors, your information will be transferred pursuant to the EU-US Data Protection Framework (DPF) and/or appropriate Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs), if no adequacy decision exists.
How Long We Keep Your Personal Information
We keep your Personal Information, in a form which permits us to identify you, for no longer than is necessary for the purposes for which it was collected as described in this Privacy Policy. Retention periods can vary significantly based on the type of Personal Information and how it is used, and in some circumstances we may retain Personal Information for other periods of time, including based on criteria that include legally mandated retention periods, pending or potential litigation, our intellectual property or ownership rights, contract requirements, operational directives or needs, and historical archiving. When we no longer need to use your Personal Information and there is no need for us to keep it to comply with our legal or regulatory obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements, we will either remove it from our systems or depersonalize it so that it can’t identify you.
Third-Party Websites
You may be able to access third-party websites directly from The Humane League’s Site. This Privacy Policy does not apply when you leave THL’s Site in order to access third-party websites. You should carefully review the privacy policy of any third-party website you visit before using it or disclosing personal information to its provider.
The Site also includes integrated social media tools or “plug-ins,” such as social networking tools offered by third parties. If you use these tools to share personal information or you otherwise interact with these features on the Site, those companies may collect information about you and may use and share such information in accordance with your account settings, including by sharing such information with the general public.
Your interactions with third-party companies and your use of their features are governed by the privacy policies of the companies that provide those features. We encourage you to carefully read the privacy policies of any accounts you create and use.
Your Rights
Right to request access, correction, update, or deletion. If you wish to access, correct (including to have incomplete personal information completed), update, or request deletion of your Personal Information, you can do so at any time by emailing us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org.
- Right to object to or request restriction of processing. In addition, you can object to the processing of your Personal Information or ask us to restrict processing of your Personal Information. Again, you can exercise these rights by emailing us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org.
- Right to opt out of communications. You have the right to opt-out of email, phone, postal mail, and text communications we send you at any time. You can exercise this right by clicking on the "unsubscribe" or "opt-out" link in the emails we send you. You can also update the types of messages you would like to receive from us by clicking on the “Manage your Subscriptions” link in the emails we send you. To opt-out of other forms of marketing (such as postal marketing, text messages, and phone calls), you may email us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org.
- Right to withdraw consent. Similarly, if we have collected and processed your Personal Information with your consent, you can withdraw your consent at any time. Withdrawing your consent will not affect the lawfulness of any processing we conducted prior to your withdrawal, nor will it affect processing of your Personal Information conducted in reliance on lawful processing grounds other than consent.
- Right to data portability. When we justify our processing on the basis of your consent or the performance of a contract with you, you have the right to port your data in a machine-readable format to a third party (or to you).
You may also have the right to obtain, or see a copy of the appropriate safeguards under which your personal information is transferred to a third country or international organization. You may, subject to applicable law, also have the right to object at any time to any processing of your personal information for direct marketing purposes, including profiling for marketing purposes. You may, subject to applicable law, also have the right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority for data protection.
If you are based on the UK or EEA and believe that we have not complied with data protection laws, you can complain to the UK ICO (www.ico.org) or your local EEA supervisory authority. The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) makes a list of EEA data protection authorities available at https://edpb.europa.eu/about-edpb/members_en. Depending upon your jurisdiction, you may have a similar right to the supervisory authority in your jurisdiction.
In relation to these rights, please contact us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org. Please note that we may request proof of identity, including your name, domicile, email address, and/or an appropriate form of identification, along with a description of the rights you intend to exercise. We will endeavor to respond to your request within all applicable timeframes.
Updates
If you have updates for us:
If you would like to update any of the Personal Information we have on file for you, including your contact preferences, please use the self-service portal where you can manage your email subscriptions yourself anytime, or contact us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org to let us know and we will make those changes for you. Additionally, if you prefer not to receive messages from us, please let us know by clicking on the unsubscribe link within any message that you receive, or by sending a message to us at privacy@thehumaneleague.org. Please note that this request must be made for every email address, mailing address, and telephone number that The Humane League has on record for you.
We respond to all requests we receive from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with applicable data protection laws. However, we reserve the right to keep any Personal Information in our archives that we deem necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.
Please note that to request closure or deletion of an ActionID or Bonterra/ NGP VAN/EveryAction FastAction profile, you will need to email Bonterra at privacy@bonterratech.com.
If we have updates for you:
If we make changes to our Privacy Policy, we will post those changes on our privacy policy page so you will always be aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances we disclose it. If at any point we decide to use Personal Information in a manner that is materially different from that stated at the time it was collected, we will notify you via email. You will then have a choice as to whether or not we may use your Personal Information in this manner.
Contact Information
The Humane League P.O. Box 10476 Rockville, MD 20849 Phone: 888-211-5241 Email: privacy@thehumaneleague.org
EU Representative Osano International Compliance Services Limited ATTN: QDMX 3 Dublin Landings North Wall Quay Dublin 1 D01C4E0
UK Representative Osano UK Compliance LTD ATTN: QDMX 42-46 Fountain Street Belfast Antrim BT1-5EF
Summary of Substantial Changes in this Policy
- We updated the entire policy to comply with GDPR requirements and clarify our practices. No material changes were made to the policy or our practices; we simply added more disclosures and information for Site visitors to reference.