OurFaves Privacy Policy

Who we are and our commitment to privacy: OurFaves.com (“OurFaves”) is a website owned and operated by Torstar Digital, a division of Toronto Star Newspaper Limited. Its offices are located at 70 Peter Street, Toronto, Ontario M5V 2G5. It is an online application that helps people find great places to go by people providing information about their favourite things and places. Our users create “faves” that are posted to the OurFaves site. A “fave” is a combination of a thing, place, reason (optional) and name of user. These “faves” can then be accessed and read by other OurFaves users. They can also be shared with your friends – people with whom you have expressly invited to share your “faves”. We know that protecting the privacy and confidentiality of your personal information is important to you. Collection, use and disclosure of personal information by OurFaves are governed by the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (the “Act”) and any applicable provincial legislation. This Privacy Policy explains what personal information is collected from its users and how it is used. It also explains how you can ask questions, make suggestions and contact us should you have any questions or comments about our privacy practices.

By using this site, you agree that you permit the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as outlined in this Privacy Policy. By submitting your personal information to OurFaves, you signify your agreement to the terms and conditions of this Privacy Policy and the OurFaves Terms of Use. From time to time, we may make changes to our Privacy Policy and you should review it periodically for any changes. Your continued use of this site following the effective date of any changes to these terms shall mean that you have accepted those changes, subject to your continuing right to notify us at any time as to how you would like us to treat your personal information.

What personal information do we collect and why?

OurFaves collects personal information for specific, limited purposes. Information is collected by fair and lawful means.

We collect your name and email address to identify you and send you notifications related to the use of the service. You are able to opt out of any notifications from the site, by clicking "Edit Profile", then "Edit Notifications". We may also use this information to send you an email newsletter, which may contain offers or information from us, our affiliates and from selected sponsors or advertisers (“Marketing Offers”). If you do not wish to receive Marketing Offers after providing your consent, you may unsubscribe at any time.
We collect user voluntarily submitted name, birthdate, sex, and marital status, tagline, the neighborhoods you live, work and play in and profile picture.
We also collect user voluntarily submitted tags under the headings – About Me, What I do to make Moolah, What I do to Have Fun and All-time Faves. Tags are words that are links and display other people who share the same links. This information allows people to better understand who you are and whether or not they like your “faves.”
We may collect user submitted mobile phone numbers so you can receive notifications or access this site from your mobile phone.
We collect user submitted “faves” to post on this site. When you voluntarily disclose information on the public forums of this site, your personal and other information disclosed in your communication shall become public information and can be collected and used by outside parties. Such activities are beyond the control of OurFaves;
If you enter a contest or other promotion, we use your personal contact information to administer the contest or promotion, including contacting, announcing and promoting prizewinners.
If you use this website, we may assign an internet cookie or web beacon. An internet cookie is a small text file that a website stores on your internet browser and that can collect and store information relating to your interest in and use of the various areas of the site. We use cookies to better understand how our users use this website and to improve the performance of this website. If you are concerned about cookies, it is possible to turn them off in your web browser preferences. However, please be aware that by disabling cookies, you may not be able to use all portions of this site, particularly pages requiring registration. Web beacons allow us to count users who have visited our pages and to deliver co-branded services. They are used to compile aggregate, non-personal information about website usage.
We may place advertising or other links on this site which originate from third party advertisers. If you view these ads, the advertisers may assign a cookie or a web beacon. OurFaves does not control these cookies or web beacons, nor is it responsible for any marketing or other use of your personal information by these advertisers.
Other than as permitted or required by law, purposes for the collection, use or disclosure of personal information, which are not set out in the Privacy Policy, will be set out at the time of collection. You will be given a reasonable opportunity to consent to any additional purposes no later than the time of collection.

To whom does OurFaves disclose personal information and why?

OurFaves may disclose your personal information under the following circumstances:

Your username, profile, photo and any personally identifiable information you have included in your “faves” will be posted on this site for users to see.
Your username and email address may also be used and disclosed to your friends when you use this site to send an email to your friends to share your “faves” with them. If your friends use this site to contact you, we will use your name and email address to contact you on behalf of your friends.
OurFaves may transfer your personal information to affiliates and service providers acting on its behalf for internal audit, management, administrative and other purposes or in order to perform processing and other specialized services, such as prize fulfillment of our contests.
OurFaves will disclose your personal information to governmental or judicial authorities or law enforcement agencies or to other individuals or entities in response to subpoenas, court orders or other legal processes. We also reserve the right to use and disclose your personal information where required or permitted by law or if we have reasonable grounds to believe the information could be useful when investigating a contravention of a federal, provincial or foreign law, in order to protect or defend our legal interests, or to comply with applicable laws and lawful governmental requests.
OurFaves may disclose your personal information to parties connected with the contemplated or actual financing, insuring, sale, assignment or other disposal of all or part of our business or assets, including for the purposes of determining whether to proceed or continue with such transaction or business relationship or fulfilling any records or other reporting requirements to such parties. We will require such parties to treat your personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy and to use and disclose only for the purposes for which it was collected.

Non-Personal Information: Non-personal or aggregated information is information that cannot be associated with or traced back to a specific person. When you browse this site and are not logged in, for example, we do not collect any personally identifiable information about you, but we do gather information about the number of people viewing each page so that we can learn what features are the most popular. We disclose aggregated information about this website to third parties.

Online Policy Regarding Privacy of Children: We do not believe that this website appeals directly to individuals under the age of 18 and we do not knowingly collect information from individuals under this age. Please do not use this site if you are under the age of 18. OurFaves urges all parents to supervise their children’s exploration of the Internet and any online services and to teach their children about protecting their personal information online.

Consent and Opt-Out Policy: In general, OurFaves seeks consent to use your personal information in accordance with our opt-out policy. If you do not wish to receive notifications, you can disable them in the "Edit Notifications" tab under "Edit Profile" or by following the instructions at the bottom of any email. If you do not wish to receive e-mail newsletters and Marketing Offers from OurFaves, you can choose to do so by opting-out You can opt-out at any time by following the instructions at the bottom of any email or by going to the notification settings found under the “Edit Profile” tab of the website.

Generally, by providing us with your personal information, we will assume that you consent to our collection, use and disclosure of such information for the purposes identified or described in this Privacy Policy. We reserve the right to collect, use and disclose your personal information without consent where required or permitted by law.

Safeguards: OurFaves takes technical, contractual, administrative and physical security measures to protect your personal information. Please be aware that email is not a secure medium and any personal information you send to us by email could be intercepted. Materials posted to online forums such as your “faves”, comments, bulletin boards or chat rooms are public, not secure and may be viewed by anyone. Any personal information you post may be collected and used by anyone and may result in unsolicited messages from other internet users. Please be aware that this website may contain links to other websites provided and maintained exclusively by third parties not subject to this Privacy Policy. Please review the privacy polices of any external websites to determine their information handling practices. We do not bear any responsibility for any actions or policies of third parties.

How to Access and Modify Your Personal Information: OurFaves provides you with the means to access and modify your personal information by accessing the “Edit Profile” section of this site. Also, upon your request, OurFaves will remove your personal information from this site. If you are a registered user and wish to close your account, you can do so by contacting admin@ourfaves.com. We will give you access to the information we retain about you within a reasonable time, upon written request to the Privacy Officer, satisfactory identification and proof of entitlement.

Contact Information: If you have any questions or comments about OurFaves Privacy Policy or our information handling practices, you can contact the Privacy Officer at privacy@ourfaves.com.