GeoCommunicator Privacy and Security Policy

Thank you for visiting the GeoCommunicator web site and reviewing our privacy and security policy. Our privacy policy is clear: We will collect no personal information about you when you visit our web site unless you choose to provide that information to us. The Privacy Policy outlines the information we collect via the GeoCommunicator web site and how we use that information.

Information Collected and Stored Automatically

If you do nothing during your visit but browse through the web site, read pages, or search for information, we will gather and store certain information about your visit automatically. This information does not identify you personally. We automatically collect and store only the following information about your visit:

1. The Internet domain name (for example, "xcompany.com" if you use a private Internet access account, or "yourschool.edu" if you connect from a university's domain) and IP address (an IP address is a number that is automatically assigned to your computer whenever you are surfing the Web) from which you access our web site;
2. The type of browser and operating system used to access our site;
3. The date and time you access our site;
4. The pages you visit; and
5. If you linked to the GeoCommunicator web site from another web site, the address of that web site.

We use this information to help us make the site more useful to visitors -- to learn about the number of visitors to our site and the types of technology our visitors use.

If You Send Us Personal Information

If you choose to provide us with personal information -- by filling out a form with your personal information and submitting it to us through the web site -- we use that information to respond to your message, to help us get you the information you have requested, and to notify visitors about updates to our web site. Moreover, we do not create individual profiles with the information you provide. GeoCommunicator does not collect information for commercial marketing.

Information we may place automatically on your computer's hard drive

GeoCommunicator stores some information on your computer in the form of a "cookie". These are used to store information you provide to prevent you from having to enter the same information repeatedly. For access to publishing, stored favorites, and forums a user account may be established. The user account requires a user name and password. If the user opts for the “remember me” functionality, a permanent cookie is stored on the user’s machine. If the user does not select the “remember me” functionality, the cookie will be a session cookie. The session cookie is removed when you leave GeoCommunicator. The permanent cookie remains on the users machine.

We use a semi-persistent cookie that contains a Map Parameter ID that resides on your computer. The cookie is set when you use the GeoCommunicator Map Explorer feature.

The Map Explorer feature allows you to search anywhere in the United States (U.S.) by using a graphical selection tool displayed on a map of the U.S. This tool allows you to refine your search area, each time redisplaying the map back to your browser. Once the selection has been refined to the desired "Area of Interest" the system uses the graphical map information to search the database for geographical matches. This graphical selection, redrawing, and searching feature requires the use of a semi-persistent cookie to give you adequate performance and display capabilities.

The semi-persistent cookie sits on your machine for up to 1 hour after you have ended your GeoCommunicator session, or for 1 hour after you have had no interaction with the GeoCom Map Explorer tool. The semi-persistent cookie is removed as indicated above or when the browser is closed.

Cookies are not used to collect personal information about you, to collect information from your files, or to damage to your files.

For more information on cookies.

Site Security

1. For site security purposes and to ensure that this service remains available to all users, this government computer system employs commercial software programs to monitor network traffic to identify unauthorized attempts to upload or change information, or otherwise cause damage.
2. Except for authorized law enforcement investigations, no other attempts are made to identify individual users or their usage habits. Raw data logs are used for no other purposes and are scheduled for regular destruction.
3. Unauthorized attempts to upload information or change information on this service are strictly prohibited and may be punishable under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and the National Information Infrastructure Protection Act.

Links to Other Sites

This web site offers links to hundreds of GIS-related Web sites. Once you link to another site, you are subject to the privacy policy of the new site. The federal government assumes no responsibility for the information practices of these sites, and these links do not imply affiliation or endorsement of the linked sites. The federal government does not control and cannot guarantee the relevance, timeliness, or accuracy of the outside materials.

We want to be very clear: We are not collecting personally identifying information about you when you visit our site, unless you choose to provide such information to us. Except as might be required by law, we do not share any information we receive with outside parties.