Privacy Policy

The following Privacy Policy covers all of the websites of The Rut Media LLC. This policy does not, however, apply to entities that The Rut Media LLC does not own or control, such as applications and websites using Facebook Platform. Please read this policy. If you have any questions or suggestions regarding our privacy policy, please contact us.

By using the Websites, you understand and agree that The Rut Media LLC is providing a platform for you to post content, photos, comments and other materials to the Websites and to share User Submissions publicly. This means that other users may search for, see, use, or share any of your User Submissions that you make publicly available through the Websites, consistent with the terms and conditions of this Privacy Policy and The Rut Media LLC’s Terms of Use.

Collection and Use of Aggregated Information

The Rut Media LLC creates aggregate reports on user demographics and traffic patterns. These aggregated statistics are used internally to better provide services to users of the Websites. They may also be provided to advertisers, sponsors, and partners; however, they contain no individual personal information and cannot be used to gather such information. This allows The Rut Media LLC’s advertisers, partners, and sponsors to advertise more effectively, as well as allows our users to receive advertisements that are pertinent to their needs.

Ownership of Information

The Rut Media LLC is the sole owner of the information collected on the Websites. This includes:

  1. Your username, password and e-mail address when you register for an account on a Websites.
  2. Profile information that you provide for your user profile (e.g., first and last name, picture, phone number). This information allows The Rut Media LLC to help others find your profile on the Websites.
  3. User Submissions that you post to the Website.
  4. Communications between you and The Rut Media LLC.

The Rut Media LLC may offer certain services that are available via a mobile device or app, including (1) the ability to upload User Submissions to the Websites via a mobile device, (2) the ability to browse the Websites from a mobile device and (3) the ability to access certain features through an application downloaded and installed on a mobile device (collectively, “Mobile Services”). If you use Mobile Services, The Rut Media LLC may store information regarding your mobile device, including your device type and operating system, the advertising ID of your mobile device, location services (if you grant permission), or in other applications as permitted by the functionality of such mobile device.

In addition, The Rut Media LLC may access, collect, monitor, store on your device, and/or remotely store one or more “device identifiers.” Device identifiers are small data files or similar data structures stored on or associated with your mobile device that uniquely identify it. A device identifier may be data stored in connection with the device hardware, data stored in connection with the device’s operating system or other software, or data sent to the device by The Rut Media LLC. A device identifier may deliver information to The Rut Media LLC or to a third-party partner about how a user browses the Websites and may help The Rut Media LLC or a partner provide user reports, personalized content or targeted ads. Some features of the Websites may not function properly if use or availability of device identifiers is impaired or disabled.

How We Use Your Information

The Rut Media LLC uses the information you provide, or that we collect, to provide services and features to you; to operate, maintain, and enhance its Websites; to provide users with customer support; as well as to track user-generated content and users to comply as a service provider with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”) and other applicable laws. The Rut Media LLC also uses information to prevent potentially illegal activities. These efforts may, on occasion, result in a temporary or permanent suspension or termination of some functions for some users.

The Rut Media LLC may also contact you with announcements related to the Websites from time to time. You may opt out of all communications, except essential updates on your account.

The Rut Media LLC does not share your information with advertisers without your consent. The Rut Media LLC allows advertisers to choose the characteristics of users who will see their advertisements and The Rut Media LLC may use any of the non-personally identifiable attributes it has collected (including information you may have decided not to show to other users, such as your birth year or other sensitive personal information or preferences) to select the appropriate audience for those advertisements.

Even though The Rut Media LLC does not share your information with advertisers without your consent, when you click on or otherwise interact with an advertisement, there is a possibility the advertiser may place a cookie in your browser or the advertising ID for the Mobile Services and note that it meets the criteria they selected.

The Rut Media LLC may share User Submissions and your information (including but not limited to, information from cookies, log files, device identifiers, location data, and usage data) with businesses that are legally part of the same group of companies that The Rut Media LLC is part of, or that become part of that group (“Affiliates”). Affiliates may use this information to help provide, understand, and improve the Websites and Affiliates’ own services; however, these Affiliates will honor the choices you make about who can and cannot see your photos.

In addition to other information described in this policy, we may collect and share precise location information, through methods such as mobile “SDKs”. This location information may be used by itself, aggregated, or combined with mobile identifiers (such as IDFAs and Android IDs), and shared with third parties, for purposes related to advertising, attribution (e.g., measuring ad performance) analytics and research. You can remove your consent to having your location data collected by changing the settings on your device. (Certain services may lose functionality as a result.) You can opt-out from any interest-based advertising through your device settings. When you have opted out using this setting on a device, advertisers will not use in-app information collected from that device to infer your interests or serve ads to that device that are targeted based on your inferred interests.

Content and Metadata

The Websites are intended to share text, graphics, photos, sounds, music, videos, audiovisual combinations, and other materials (collectively “Content”) you may view on, access through, or contribute to the Websites.  If you do not want us to store metadata associated with the Content you share on the Websites, please remove the metadata before uploading the Content.

Exclusions

This Privacy Policy does not apply to any information collected by The Rut Media LLC other than information collected through the Websites and shall not apply to any unsolicited information you provide to The Rut Media LLC through the Websites or through any other means. This includes, but is not limited to, Content or other information posted to any public areas of the Websites, such as comments, any ideas for new products or modifications to existing products, and other unsolicited submissions (collectively, “Unsolicited Information”). All Unsolicited Information shall be deemed to be non-confidential and The Rut Media LLC shall be free to reproduce, use, disclose, distribute and exploit such Unsolicited Information without limitation or attribution.

Comments

In order to enhance their use of the Websites, users can choose to post comments on particular articles of interest. The Rut Media LLC does not endorse these comments, as they are opinions of users not associated with The Rut Media LLC or its employees.

Mailing List

The Rut Media LLC may launch an email mailing list for some or all of its Websites. In order to receive regular emails, newsletters and the like from a mailing list from one of the Websites, users must submit information including, without limitation, a valid email address and demographic information. This information will be used in anonymous, aggregate form only in order to assess general user interest in various internal and third-party products and services. Your personal contact information will not be passed to any other organization. Users who choose to sign up for a mailing list will receive regular emails from the site, including new articles added to the site as well as, from time to time, emails from third-party site sponsors. If you do not wish to receive emails from third-party advertisers, do not sign up for the mailing list.

Cookies

Some of The Rut Media LLC’s business partners may use cookies on the Websites or advertising IDs for the Mobile Services (collectively, “Cookies”). However, The Rut Media LLC has no access to or control over these Cookies; this Privacy Policy covers the use of Cookies by The Rut Media LLC only and does not cover the use of Cookies by any advertisers.

In addition, the Websites use Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (“Google”).  Google Analytics and The Rut Media LLC’s business partners use Cookies to help analyze how users use the Websites. The information generated by the Cookie about your use of the Websites will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States. Google and The Rut Media LLC’s business partners will use this information for the purpose of evaluating your use of the Websites, compiling reports on activity for operators and providing other services relating to internet usage.  Google and The Rut Media LLC’s business partners may also transfer this information to third parties when required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google’s or The Rut Media LLC’s business partners’ behalf. Google will not associate your IP address with any other data held by Google.

You may refuse the use of Cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your internet browser, or by enabling the Do Not Track settings in your browser. Please note, if you do this, you may not have full access to the Websites.  By using the Websites, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google and The Rut Media LLC’s business partners in the manner and for the purposes set out above.

Third Party Advertising

The ads appearing on Websites are delivered to users by third-party advertisers including Google, among others. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements on this site and other sites about goods and services that may be of interest to you.  If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, please click here. We use third-party companies to serve ads and collect non-personally identifiable information when you visit our Websites. These companies often use a Cookie or third-party web beacons to collect information. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here:  https://www.networkadvertising.org/choices/.  Additionally, The Rut Media LLC’s sites participate in the Digital Advertising Alliance’s (DAA) Self-Regulatory Program for Online Behavioral Advertising within advertising units that link to http://www.aboutads.info/choices/.

Log Files

Like most standard website servers, we use log files. This includes internet protocol addresses, browser type, internet service provider (ISP), referring/exit pages, platform type, date/time stamp, and number of clicks to analyze trends, administer the site, track user’s movement in the aggregate, and gather broad demographic information for aggregate use. We may use a tracking utility that uses log files to analyze user movement. This information is not linked to personally identifiable information.

Legal Disclosures

The Rut Media LLC may need to disclose personal information when required to do so by law or legal process.  The Rut Media LLC may also share information when it has a good-faith belief that such action is necessary:

  1. to comply with a current judicial proceeding,
  2. to obey a court order or legal process served on any of the Websites;
  3. to prevent fraud or other illegal activity;
  4. to prevent imminent bodily harm; or
  5. to protect The Rut Media LLC and users from people violating these Terms.

Business Transitions

In the event The Rut Media LLC goes through a business transition, such as a merger, acquisition by another company, or sale of a portion of its assets, or if The Rut Media LLC declares bankruptcy, The Rut Media LLC may transfer the aforementioned collected information as part of the assets transferred.

Links

The Websites contain links to other sites. Please be aware that The Rut Media LLC does not control and is not responsible for the privacy practices or content of other sites. We encourage users to be aware when they leave our Websites and to read the privacy statements of each and every website that collects personally identifiable information. This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by The Rut Media LLC.

Notification of Changes

Whenever The Rut Media LLC changes its Privacy Policy, we will post those changes to this privacy statement, and other places deemed appropriate.

Violations of this Policy

The Rut Media LLC may terminate your access to its Websites, if, under appropriate circumstances, The Rut Media LLC determines you violated this Privacy Policy.

California Privacy Rights

YOUR PRIVACY RIGHTS – California Civil Code Section 1798.83 permits members of the Websites who are California residents to request certain information regarding the disclosure of any personal information to third parties for their direct marketing purposes. To make such a request, e-mail info@therut.com.

How Should a User Contact The Rut Media LLC?

If you suspect that The Rut Media LLC has handled your information in a manner that does not comply with this Privacy Policy, please contact us at info@therut.com.

Updated: May 1, 2019.