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What, How, Why, and When?

There are two types of information that we may obtain about you or your visit to our website:

1. Personal Information: The only personal information that we obtain about you is that which you decide to give us by placing an order for our Catalog, ordering publications from our Catalog, or sending us an e-mail comment or question. To complete these transactions, you may supply the following types of information: name, mailing address, telephone number, credit card number, e-mail address, and publication preferences. We use this information to fulfill your order/request.

   When we receive your order, it is processed through the same secure systems we use to process the thousands of mail orders we receive each day. A copy of your order, with payment information, will be retained at our Pueblo distribution facility so that we can track and resolve any problems that may occur. On a regular basis, once the order is processed, we delete any payment information you've provided from our electronic records. We will retain your name and address so we can mail you a new Catalog in the future.

2. Visit Information: We use logfiles and "cookies" to gather information for two purposes:
   
   

   1. When you enter our site we collect and store in a logfile the following information about your visit:

      • the name of the domain from which you access the Internet (i.e., aol.com, if you are connecting from an America Online account);
      • the date and time you access our site; and
      • the address of the web site from which you linked to our site.

      This information is used to determine site usage and to determine how we can improve the services provided. We use this information to create summary statistics, which are used for web site planning and maintenance and to analyze system performance. This information tells us the number of visitors to the different sections of our site and helps us understand if our site is meeting the needs of our visitors. It contains no personal information and is used for statistical purposes only.

   2. The only other time that we use cookies to gather information is when you enter the shopping portion of our web site. The software we use for online ordering issues cookies to keep track of your order information while you move between different areas on our web site. This makes it possible for you to go to different categories and to view publications, either on or off our site, and the order information previously submitted will be retained for you to complete your publication order. This cookie is NOT written to your disk. It only resides in the memory in your computer and is discarded when you close your browser.

How long does a cookie last?

The web site issuing the cookie sets the expiration date, instructing your computer to hold on to it for a certain period of time.

The cookies issued for ordering purposes are not saved to disk, and are removed as soon as you close your browser. No cookie information about your shopping activity is saved. The next time you enter the shopping area, we’ll know nothing about you.

What Are Cookies?

A cookie is simply a small piece of information. They’re sent by a Web server, along with a Web page, to your browser when you access a Web site.

If your browser accepts the cookie, its data is usually stored in a file on your local hard drive. Then when you return to the site that issued the cookie, the Web server checks this file to determine if you’ve visited the site before.

Note: A Web server can only retrieve information from a cookie it created. It can’t look at other cookies to gather more information.

Cookies can serve several purposes:

• Show that you’ve previously visited a site;
• Be used by different programs (such as our shopping software) to increase the usefulness of features on the site;
• Present Web pages you customize.

Some people don’t like the idea of a Web site gathering information about them and/or writing data to their computer. You can set your browser to warn you when a cookie is requested, and decide whether or not to accept. Be aware, though, that by rejecting a cookie some or all of the features available on the site may not function properly.

Feedback

If you have questions or concerns about the Federal Citizen Information Center's privacy policy, please e-mail us at: catalog.pueblo@gsa.gov.