Privacy Policy

The National Capital Area Council (NCAC) is a licensee of the TRUSTe Children's Privacy Program. TRUSTe is an independent, non-profit organization whose mission is to enable individuals and organizations to establish trusting relationships based on respect for personal identity and information by promoting the use of fair information practices.  This privacy statement covers the site www.boyscouts-ncac.org. Because this Website wants to demonstrate its commitment to our users' privacy, it has agreed to disclose its information practices and have its privacy practices reviewed for compliance by TRUSTe. 

1. What personally identifiable information NCAC collects.
2. What personally identifiable information third parties collect through the Web site.
3. What organization collects the information.
4. How NCAC uses the information.
5. With whom NCAC may share user information.
6. What choices are available to users regarding collection, use and distribution of the information.
7. What types of security procedures are in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of information under NCAC control.
8. How users can correct any inaccuracies in the information.

If users have questions or concerns regarding this statement, they should first contact Privacy, 9190 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, MD 20814 or email cpruett@boyscouts-ncac.org.  If they do not receive acknowledgment of their inquiry or their inquiry is not satisfactorily addressed, they should then contact TRUSTe through the TRUSTe Watchdog Dispute Resolution Process  at http://www.truste.org/consumers/watchdog_complaint.php. TRUSTe will serve as a liaison with the Website to resolve users concerns.

The TRUSTe program covers only information that is collected through this Website, and does not cover information that may be collected through software downloaded from the site. By displaying the TRUSTe trustmark, NCAC has agreed to notify users of:

INFORMATION COLLECTION AND USE
NCAC is the sole owner of the information collected on www.boyscouts-ncac.org. NCAC collects information from our users at several different points on our Website.

Registration
In order to register for Scouting events a user must first complete the registration form.  During registration a user gives contact information (such as name and email address). We use this information to contact the user about events on our site for which he/she has expressed interest. 

The Sign Up for Scouting form is used to collect contact and Cub Scout information from the parents.  We collect the parent's name and address, email, day and evening phone numbers, the city closest to their location, the school the child attends (this information helps locate a nearby unit) and the age of the child.  The information is forwarded to the appropriate District Executive who will contact the parent with information about joining the Scouting program.  This information is collected to follow up with the parent. NCAC will not contact the child directly.  A child's participation or access to an activity will not be conditioned on giving out more personal information than what is considered reasonably necessary for that activity.

Order and Donations
We request information from the user on our order and online donation forms. A user must provide contact information (such as name, email, and shipping address) and financial information (such as credit card number, expiration date).  This information is used for billing purposes, to fill customer's orders, and to process donations.  If we have trouble processing an order, the information is used to contact the user. The donor is not contacted further by NCAC other than to receive a Thank You letter.  All credit card transactions are processed through a secure server.  Credit card numbers are not seen by any NCAC staff, they are only seen by the financial institution that approves the transaction.

Newsletter
If a user wishes to subscribe to any of our newsletters, we ask for contact information such as name and email address.  Out of respect for our users privacy we provide a way to opt-out of these communications.  Please see the Choice/Opt-out section.

Cookies
A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user's computer tied to information about the user.  Usage of a cookie is in no way linked to any personally identifiable information while on our site.  We use session ID cookies.  For the session ID cookie, once users close the browser, the cookie simply terminates.  A persistent cookie is a small text file stored on the user's hard drive for an extended period of time. Persistent cookies can be removed by following Internet browser help file directions. Perisistent cookies are used on our site to keep track of shopping cart registrants. 

By setting a cookie on our site, users do not have to log in more than once, thereby saving time while on our site. If users reject the cookie, they may still use our site.  The only drawback to this is that the user will need to provide all their contact information again if they chose to purchase more store items in subsequent visits to the site.

Log Files
Like most standard Web site servers we use log files.  This includes internet protocol (IP) 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.  IP addresses, etc. are not linked to personally identifiable information. We use a tracking utility called GoogleAnalytics that uses log files to analyze user movement.

SHARING

Legal Disclaimer
Though we make every effort to preserve user privacy, we may need to disclose personal information when required by law wherein we have a good-faith belief that such action is necessary to comply with a current judicial proceeding, a court order or legal process served on our Web site.

Aggregate Information (non-personally identifiable)
We do not share aggregated demographic information.

Third Party Advertisers
We do not share any information obtained through our Web site with third party advertisers.

These are the instances in which we will share users' personal information:
We share registration information with our district and committee webmasters. They have completed training and are authorized to use this information only for the purposes of faciliting registration for Scouting events.

The district and committee webmasters are instructed to delete registration information from their computers after a Scouting event ends.  Webmasters who do not delete this informaton and use it for other purposes must resign from their position as webmaster.

Service Providers
We use www.doubleknot.com to provide online registration for NCAC conducted events on our site.  When you register and pay for one of these events, we will share with Doubleknot, Inc. only the amount of information required for the approval and processing of the credit card charged. 
This third party is prohibited from using your personally identifiable information for any other purpose.

Third Party Intermediaries
We do not use an outside shipping company to ship orders. We use a third-party vendor to authorize and process our credit cards.

Service Providers
We do not partner with other third parties to provide specific services.

Choice/Opt-out
We do not use any information provided to us from the our web site for purposes not directly related to our site.  However, if you do not wish to provide your name, address, phone or email over the web, then you may conduct your transaction in person at the Marriott Scout Service Center, 9190 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, MD 20814.

Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletter may opt-out of receiving these communications by replying to the email with the word  "unsubscribe" in the subject line.

Links
This Web site contains links to other sites. Please be aware that we, NCAC, are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other sites.  We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of each and every Web site that collects personally identifiable information.  This privacy statement applies solely to information collected by this Web site.

District Web pages can have links to outside web sites.  The District Webmaster is responsible for making the links that must be approved by the NCAC before they are posted.  Any webmaster who repeatedly creates a link for an unapproved site will be asked to resign.

Surveys
From time-to-time our site requests information from users via surveys.  Participation in these surveys is completely voluntary and the user therefore has a choice whether or not to disclose this information.  The requested information includes  whether they are an adult or youth and demographic information (such as zip code), but not any personally identifiable information. Survey information will be used for purposes of monitoring or improving the use and satisfaction of this site..

Users will not be contacted by NCAC as a result of their participation in the survey.  We will use the collected information to improve the functionality of the web site or to improve an event.   Users may email the webmaster directly if they have comments about the website.  If they request a response to their comment, they will receive one via email.

Security
This Web site takes every precaution to protect our users' information.  When users submit sensitive information via the Web site, their information is protected both online and off-line.

When our registration/order form asks users to enter sensitive information (such as credit card number), that information is encrypted and is protected with the best encryption software in the industry - SSL.  While on a secure page, such as our order form, the lock icon on the bottom of Web browsers such as Netscape Navigator and Microsoft Internet Explorer becomes locked, as opposed to un-locked, or open, when users are just �surfing'.

While we use SSL encryption to protect sensitive information online, we also do everything in our power to protect user-information off-line.  No one at NCAC sees credit card number information.  Credit cards are processed through Authorize.net.  All of our users' information, not just the sensitive information mentioned above, is restricted in our offices and select volunteers.  Only employees who need the registration information to perform a specific job (for example, our billing clerk or a volunteer webmaster) are granted access to personally identifiable information.

Our offices are secured and only authorized personnel are permitted in office areas.

Furthermore, ALL employees are kept up-to-date on our security and privacy practices.  Every six months, as well as any time new policies are added, our employees are notified and/or reminded about the importance we place on privacy, and what they can do to ensure our users' information is protected.  Finally, the servers that store personally identifiable information are in a secure environment offsite or behind password protected computers.

If users have any questions about the security at our Web site, users can write to PRIVACY, 9190 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, MD 20814  Attn: C. Pruett

Correcting/Updating/Deleting/Deactivating Personal Information
We do not store personally identifiable information (PII) on site for longer than 12 months.  If a user's personally identifiable information changes (such as zip code, phone, email or postal address), or if a user incorrectly entered information, the user can notify the contact person found at the bottom of every page where information is requested. If we collect PII about a child, parents have the right to request access and the right to prevent further use of their child's PII.

Notification of Changes
If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes to this privacy statement on the homepage, and other places we deem appropriate so our users are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it, and under what circumstances, if any, we disclose it.  We will use information in accordance with the privacy policy under which the information was collected. 

If we make any material changes in our privacy practices that affects user information already stored in our database, we will post a prominent notice on our Web site notifying users of the change.  NCAC does not collect  any information from Scouts under the age of 13. If NCAC decides to change this policy, we will obtain verifiable parental consent prior to the collection.  We will also advise users to a change of our privacy policy on the front page of our site.

Contact Information
If users have any questions or suggestions regarding our privacy policy, please contact us at: