This privacy policy (the “Privacy Policy”) governs the use of sharedestinations.com (the “Site“) and all related social media, websites, software, mobile apps,  and other services that we provide (together, the “Service”). This Service is owned and operated by Techno Code enterprise (hereafter referred to as “Techno Code”, “Share Destinations”, “we” or “us”), a sole proprietorship enterprise registered in Quebec, Canada.

We are committed to protecting your privacy and ensuring the security of your personal information. This Privacy Policy covers the use of the Service and outlines our privacy practices, including how we collect, store, use, and disclose your personal data.

By visiting, accessing, or using the Service, you are agreeing to the policies and practices described in this Privacy Policy. Please take the time to read this Privacy Policy carefully. If you find any of our policies or practices unacceptable, we kindly request that you refrain from visiting, accessing, or using the Services. If you still have any questions or concerns, please contact us at support@sharedestinations.com

This Privacy Policy applies in addition to the terms and conditions of our Service.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Privacy Policy Amendments
2. The Information We Collect
3. How We Use the Information We Collect
4. Legal Bases to Process Users’ Information
5. How, When, and with Whom We Share the Information We Collect
6. How We Protect Your Information Security
7. How Long We Store the Collected Information
8. The Rights Regarding Your Personal Information
9. How to Review, Update, and Delete Your Collected Information
10. Information Transfer
11. Third-party Websites and Services
12. Children’s Privacy
13. Contact Us

1. Privacy Policy Amendments

This Privacy Policy may be amended from time to time in order to maintain compliance with the law and to reflect any changes to our information collection process. When we amend this Privacy Policy we will update the “Effective Date” of the Privacy Policy. You can always find the latest version of the Privacy Policy here on this page. We recommend that our users periodically review our Privacy Policy to ensure that they are notified of any updates. If necessary, we may notify users by email or notification of changes to this Privacy Policy and/or by posting a notice of such changes. By visiting, accessing, or using the Service after any changes to this Privacy Policy, you are indicating your acceptance of those changes. If you do not agree to be bound by this Privacy Policy, you should not visit, access, or use the Service.

2. The Information We Collect

(2.A.) Personal information you disclose to us

We collect personal information that you willingly provide to us when you register for the Service, express an interest in obtaining information about us or our Service, when you participate in activities on the Service, or otherwise when you contact us. We may collect your personal information in the following cases:

• Account profile: When you register and create an account on the Site, we may collect your: first name, last name, username, email, country of residence, gender, password, Instagram profile link, user role, subscribe to newsletter, business name, business website link, business phone number, and business address. When you submit a location (post) for review, we may collect the post’s related information including title, address, Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates (latitude, longitude) through pinning on the map, Instagram post’s link, contest participation, image, notify on publish, your name, and your email.
• Device Information: Information that is automatically collected about your device, such as hardware, operating system, browser, etc.
• Correspondence: Information that you send to us in correspondence, such as when you submit questions or inquiries and with respect to ongoing customer support. The information submitted through the contact form or the messaging system (only for members) may include first name, last name, username, email, subject, and message. For verification purposes, you may send us your username by direct message from your registered Instagram account to the affiliated Instagram account of the Site, which is “share.destinations”.
• Payment information: We may collect data necessary to process your payment if you make purchases, such as your credit/debit card number, expiration, security code, address, phone, and note associated with your payment instrument. We use WooPayments plugin for payments through credit cards on the Site. WooPayments is built in partnership with Stripe. Read more about it here: https://woocommerce.com/document/woopayments/account-management/partnership-with-stripe . You may find WooPayments Policies here: https://woocommerce.com/document/woopayments/our-policies and WooPayments Terms of Service here: https://wordpress.com/tos  . Also, you may find Stripe’s privacy policy here: https://stripe.com/en-ca/privacy

All personal information that you provide to us must be true, complete, and accurate, and you must notify us of any changes to such personal information.

Sensitive Information. We do not collect sensitive information.

(2.B.) Information automatically collected

We automatically collect certain information as you visit, use, or navigate the Service. This information does not disclose your specific identity (such as your name or contact information) but may include device and usage information, such as your Internet Protocol (IP) address, browser and device characteristics, operating system, language preferences, referring URLs, device name, country, location, information about how and when you use our Service, and other technical information. This information is primarily needed to maintain the security and operation of our Service and for our internal analytics and reporting purposes.

The information we collect includes:

• Location Information: Information that is automatically collected via analytics systems providers to determine your location, including your Internet Protocol (IP) address and/or domain name, and/or browser and device characteristics, and any external page that referred you to us.
• Server Log and usage Information: Log and usage data is service-related, diagnostic, usage, and performance information our servers automatically collect when you access or use our Service and which we record in log files. Depending on how you interact with us, this log data may include but is not limited to, your Internet Protocol (IP) address, location information, device information, browser type, and settings and information about your activity in the Service (such as the date/time stamps associated with your usage, pages and files viewed, searches, and other actions you take such as which features you use), device event information (such as system activity, error reports (sometimes called “crash dumps”), and hardware settings).

(2.C.) Information collected from other sources

To verify your disclosed information, such as your Instagram profile and post links, your registration and posts information, your business information, etc., and to enhance our ability to provide you with relevant marketing, offers, and services, as well as to keep our records up to date, we may acquire information about you from other sources, such as public databases, joint marketing partners, affiliate programs, data providers, social media platforms, and from other third parties. This information may include, but is not limited to, Instagram profile and post links, business information, mailing addresses, job titles, email addresses, phone numbers, intent data (or user behavior data), Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, social media profiles, social media URLs, and custom profiles, for purposes of verification, targeted advertising and event promotion. If you interact with us on a social media platform using your social media account (e.g., Facebook or Twitter), we receive personal information about you such as your name, email address, and gender. Any personal information that we collect from your social media account depends on your social media account’s privacy settings.

3. How We Use the Information We Collect

We handle your information for several purposes, all aimed at enhancing our Service, maintaining communication with you, ensuring security and fraud prevention, and adhering to legal requirements. In addition, we may use your information for other specific purposes, subject to your consent.

The processing of your personal information serves various objectives, depending on your interactions with our Service, which include:

• To facilitate creating and verifying accounts and to oversee user account management. We may employ your information to enable you to establish and access your account, while also ensuring the continued functionality of your account.
• To provide and facilitate the delivery of Service to the users. We may use your information to provide you with the Service.
• To address users inquiries and provide support to users. Your information may be used to respond to your inquiries and address any potential concerns related to the requested service.
• To both communicate administrative information and share content we believe may be of interest to you, such as updates about our products and services, changes to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, and related information.
• To fulfill and manage your orders. We may use your information to fulfill and manage your orders, payments, returns, refunds, and exchanges made via the Service.
• To enable user-to-user interactions. Your information may be used if you opt to utilize any of our features that enable communication with other users.
• To request feedback from users. Your information may be used as needed to seek feedback and get in touch with you regarding your use of our Service.
• To send marketing and promotional messages to you. We may handle the personal information you provide to us for our marketing endeavors, aligning with your marketing preferences. You have the option to unsubscribe from our marketing emails at any point. For further details, please refer to the section titled “The Rights Regarding Your Personal Information” below.
• To provide you with customized advertising. Your information may be used to create and display personalized content and advertisements tailored to your preferences, location, and other relevant factors.
• To protect and monitor the usage of our Service. We may use your information in our efforts to ensure the safety and security of our Service. This includes activities such as fraud monitoring, detection and prevention, as well as the monitoring of Service usage through both automated and manual security assessments.
• To identify usage trends and preferences. We may use data regarding statistics and your use of our Service to enable us gain insights into how our Service is used, facilitating improvements based on a better understanding of user trends and preferences.
• To determine the effectiveness of our marketing and promotional campaigns, we may use your information with the aim of gaining a deeper understanding of how to deliver campaigns that are highly pertinent to your interests.
• To save or protect an individual’s vital interest. Your information may be used when deemed necessary to save or protect the vital interests of an individual, such as preventing harm.
• To optimize and enhance the Service, including the creation of new products, services, features, and functionalitie
• To create aggregated and anonymized reporting data about the Service.
• To investigate legal claims.
• To carry out such purposes for which we may periodically obtain consent.
• To carry out any other purposes as allowed or mandated by applicable laws and regulations.

4. Legal Bases to Process Users’ Information

We only process your personal information when we believe it’s necessary and have a valid legal basis to do so under applicable laws. These legal bases may include obtaining your consent, complying with laws, fulfilling contractual obligations, protecting your rights, or pursuing our legitimate business interests.

(4.A.) For users located in the European Union (EU) or United Kingdom (UK), this section applies

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and UK GDPR mandate that we clarify the valid legal bases upon which we depend to process your personal information. Consequently, we may rely on the subsequent legal bases for collecting and processing your personal information:

• Consent: We may process your information if you have given us permission (i.e., consent) to use your personal information for one or more specific purposes. You can withdraw your consent at any time. If you withdraw your consent, it will not make processing which we completed before you withdrew your consent unlawful.
• Performance of a Contract. We may process your personal information when we believe it is necessary to fulfill our contractual obligations to you, including providing our Service or meeting your pre-contractual requests.
• Legitimate Interests. We may process your information when we believe it is reasonably necessary to achieve our legitimate business interests and those interests do not outweigh your interests and fundamental rights and freedoms. For example, we may process your personal information for some of the purposes as mentioned below:

– Send information to users about special offers and discounts on our products and services;

– Create and show personalized and relevant advertising content for our users;

– Analyze the utilization of our Service to enhance user engagement and retention;

– Support our marketing activities;

– Identify issues and/or prevent fraudulent activities;

– Understand how our users use our products and services to enhance the overall user experience.

• Legal Obligations. We may process your information when we believe it is essential to comply with our legal obligations, such as to cooperate with a law enforcement body or regulatory agency, exercise or defend our legal rights, or disclose your information as evidence in litigation cases in which we are engaged.
• Vital Interests. We may process your information when we believe it is necessary to protect your vital interests or those of a third party, such as situations involving potential threats to an individual’s safety.

(4.B.) For users located in Canada, this section applies

We may process your information if you have granted us specific permission (i.e., express consent) to use your personal information for one or more specific purposes, or in situations where your permission can be inferred (i.e., implied consent). You can withdraw your consent at any time. If you withdraw your consent, it will not make processing which we completed before you withdrew your consent unlawful.

In rare instances, we may be legally permitted under applicable law to process your information without your consent. This may include situations such as:

• If collection is clearly in the interests of an individual and obtaining consent promptly is unfeasible
• For investigations and fraud detection and prevention
• In the case of business transactions, subject to specific conditions being met
• If it is included in a witness statement and the collection is necessary to assess, process, or settle an insurance claim
• To identify individuals who are injured, ill, or deceased and communicating with next of kin
• In cases we have reasonable grounds to believe an individual has been, is, or may be victim of financial abuse
• If it is reasonable to expect that collection and use with consent of information would compromise the availability or the accuracy of the information and the collection is reasonable for purposes related to investigating a breach of an agreement or a contravention of the laws of Canada or a province
• If disclosure is required to comply with a subpoena, warrant, court order, or rules of the court relating to the production of records
• If it was produced by an individual during the course of their employment, business, or profession and the collection is consistent with the purposes for which the information was produced
• If the collection is solely for journalistic, artistic, or literary purposes
• If the information is publicly available and is specified by the regulations

5. How, When, and with Whom We Share the Information We Collect

We may share information in specific situations outlined in this section and/or with the following third parties.

• We may disclose your personal information to law enforcement and governmental entities when required by law, if it is required for any legal proceeding, or in the good-faith belief that such action is necessary to comply with applicable laws. This includes instances of responding to a facially valid court order, judicial or other government subpoena or warrant, participating in cooperation with law enforcement or other government agencies.
• We may share your information with third-party vendors, service providers, contractors, or agents who provide services to us or act on our behalf and need access to this information to perform their respective tasks. These services may include, but are not limited to, identity verification, detection of fraud or security threats, telephone or technical support, payment card processing, web and mobile analytics, hosting services, and data storage or processing. Third party service providers have access to and may collect personal information only required to fulfill their functions. They are strictly prohibited from sharing or using the information for any other purposes.
• We may share or transfer your personal information to a third party in connection with, or during negotiations of any potential or completed reorganization, merger, sale, financing, joint venture, assignment, transfer or other disposition of all or any portion of our business.
• We may share your personal information to prove or protect our legal rights.
• We may share user information to any member of our organization who reasonably needs access to user information to achieve the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy.

If you click on links from our Service to another websites or services, please be aware that we are not responsible for and have no control over their privacy policies and practices.

6. How We Protect Your Information Security

To protect the security of any personal information we process and protecting your personal information from loss or theft, unauthorized access, disclosure, copying, use or modification, we have implemented appropriate and reasonable technical and organizational security measures designed. Also, we use the strongest available browser encryption and store all our data on servers in secure facilities. We encrypt the Site with Secure Sockets Layer (SSL).

We restrict access to your information on a basis of legitimate need to access for our employees, contractors, and agents who are subject to strict contractual confidentiality obligations and any failure to adhere to these obligations may result in disciplinary actions or termination.

Our third-party payment plugin is WooPayments, which is built in partnership with Stripe. Stripe encrypts your credit card information and stores it in a secure location. Read more about it here: https://stripe.com/docs/security

However, despite our safeguards and efforts outlined above to secure your information, no electronic transmission over the Internet or information storage technology can be guaranteed to be 100% secure or error free and there always remains the risk of harm. So we unfortunately cannot promise or guarantee absolute security and we cannot guarantee that hackers, cybercriminals, or other unauthorized third parties will not be able to defeat our security and improperly collect, access, steal, or modify your information. Although we will do our best to protect your personal information, transmission of personal information to and from our Service is at your own risk. You should only access the Service within a secure environment. If you have any concern regarding the security of any information you provided to us, please contact us immediately (see “Contact Us” section below). 

7. How Long We Store the Collected Information

We will only use, disclose, or keep your personal information for as long as it is necessary to fulfill the purposes the information was collected, unless a longer retention period is required or permitted by law (such as tax, accounting, or other legal requirements).

Once there is no longer a legitimate business need for us to process your personal information, we will either delete or anonymize such information, or, if this is not possible (such as when your information is stored in backup archives), then we will securely store your personal information and isolate it from any additional processing until it can be permanently deleted.

8. The Rights Regarding User Information

In some regions (like the European Economic Area (EEA), United Kingdom (UK), Switzerland, and Canada), under certain circumstances and in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or other applicable data protection laws, you may have the following rights:

• Access: You may ask us if we are processing information and, if we are, request access and obtain a copy of your personal information. This allows you to obtain a copy of the personal data we possess, along with specific additional details pertaining to you.
• Rectification: You may request to rectify (correct) any incomplete or inaccurate personal information about you that we hold.
• Erasure: You can request the deletion or removal of your personal information in specific situations. Please note that there are specific situations where we might decline an erasure request, such as when the personal information is necessary for compliance with law or related to legal claims.
• Restriction: You may request us to restrict the processing of your personal information, for any reason, such as establishing its accuracy.
• Transfer: You may request us to transfer certain personal information to another party.
• Automated decisions: You may request us not to be subject to automated decision-making or challenge any automated decision made where it has a legal or similar significant effect and request it to be reconsidered.
• Objection: In certain circumstances, you may have the right to object to the processing of your personal information based on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) or for direct marketing purposes. To make such a request, contact us by using the contact details provided in the section “Contact Us”. However, we may be entitled to continue processing information in certain circumstances.
• Consent: If we are using your consent, whether it’s express or implied, as the basis for processing your personal information depending on the applicable law, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. For this purpose, you may contact us through the contact information provided in the “Contact Us” section below or modify your preferences. However, please consider that this will not affect the lawfulness of the processing before its withdrawal nor when applicable law allows, will it affect the processing of your personal information conducted in reliance on lawful processing grounds other than consent.
• Marketing and promotional communications: Subject to applicable laws and regulations, we may send direct marketing materials promoting services, products, facilities, or activities to you from time to time using information collected from you. If you no longer wish to receive marketing communications from us, you can opt-out by clicking the “unsubscribe” link found at the bottom of the emails you receive from us or by contacting us using the details provided in the section “Contact Us”. You can opt-out of the use of your personal information for newsletter emails by unchecking the “Subscribe to newsletter” option on your “Profile settings” page or by contacting us using the details provided in the section “Contact Us”. We will make every effort to promptly address your opt-out request, but we kindly ask for your understanding as we may require a reasonable amount of time to process your request. However, we may continue to get in touch with you. This may include sending you essential Service-related notifications required for administration and account management, responding to Service inquiries, or addressing matters unrelated to marketing subject to applicable laws and regulations.

We will consider and act upon any request in accordance with applicable data protection laws.

You also have a right to make a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority, in the country where you normally reside, where we are based or where an alleged infringement of data protection law has taken place.

If you are located in the EEA or UK and you believe we are unlawfully processing your personal information, you also have the right to complain to your Member State data protection authority at: https://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/bodies/authorities/index_en.htm or UK data protection authority at https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/data-protection-complaints/data-protection-complaints .

If you are located in Switzerland, you may contact the Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner at https://www.edoeb.admin.ch/edoeb/en/home.html .

9. How to Review, Update, and Delete Your Collected Information

You have the right to request access to the personal information we collect from you, change that information, or delete it. To review, update, or delete your personal information, please visit: https://www.sharedestinations.com/account/  or contact us using the contact information provided at “Contact Us” section.

If you would like to terminate your account at any time, you can:

• Log in to your account settings and delete your user account.
• Contact us using the contact information provided at “Contact Us” section.

When we receive your request to terminate your account, we will deactivate or delete your account and information from our active databases. However, we may retain some information in our files to prevent fraud, troubleshoot problems, assist with any investigations, enforce our legal terms and/or comply with applicable legal requirements.

10. Information Transfer

Your personal information may be stored and processed in various locations, including any country, province or where we have facilities or in which we engage third party service providers. Our servers are located in Canada. If you are accessing our Service from a location outside Canada, please be aware that your information may be transferred to, stored, and processed by us in our facilities and by those third parties with whom we may share your personal information in Canada, and other countries.

Therefore, your personal information may be transferred to countries outside your country of residence, which may have different data protection rules than in your country. While such information is outside of your country, it is subject to the laws of the country in which it is held, and may be subject to disclosure to the governments, courts or law enforcement or regulatory agencies of such other country, pursuant to the laws of such country. If you are a resident in the European Economic Area (EEA), United Kingdom (UK), or Switzerland, then it’s important to note that these countries may not necessarily have data protection laws or other similar laws as comprehensive as those in your country.

However, we are committed to taking all necessary measures to protect your personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy and applicable law. If applicable, we will comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requirements of providing adequate protection for transferring of personal information from the EU/EEA to other countries.

11. Third-party Websites and Services

The Service may link to third-party websites, online services, or mobile applications and/or may also display advertisements from third parties not affiliated with us and which may link to other websites, services, or applications. Consequently, we do not make any guarantee regarding any such third parties, and we will not be liable for any loss or damage resulting from the use of such third-party websites, services, or applications. The inclusion of a link towards a third-party website, service, or application does not imply an endorsement by us. We cannot guarantee the safety and privacy of any data you provide to third parties. Any data collected by third parties is not covered by this Privacy Policy. We are not responsible for the content or privacy and security practices and policies of any third parties, including other websites, services, or applications that may be linked to or from the Service. We encourage you to review all third party privacy policies prior to using third parties websites or products or services and reach out to them directly to respond to your questions.

12. Children’s Privacy

The Service is not intended to children. The minimum age to use our Service is 16 if you live in the European Economic Area (EEA) or 13 in the US, and UK. All users who are minors in the jurisdiction in which they reside (generally under the age of 18) must have the permission of, and be directly supervised by, their parent or guardian to use the Service. If you are a minor, you must have your parent or guardian read and agree to this Privacy Policy prior to you using the Service.

We do not knowingly collect personal information from children without obtaining their parent or guardian’s consent. If we learn that personal information has been collected on the Service from individuals who are underage and without verifiable parental or guardian consent, then we will take appropriate measures to remove this information. If you are a parent or guardian and discover that your underage child has provided personal information, then you can inform us by following the instructions provided in the “Contact Us” section and request that we delete that child’s personal information from our systems.

13. Contact Us

If you have any questions, concerns, or comments about this Privacy Policy or your personal information, to request access or correction, to exercise any applicable rights, to make a complaint, or to obtain information about our policies and practices with respect to any service providers outside Canada, you can reach us by:

______________________________________

Email: support@sharedestinations.com

______________________________________

Mailing Address: Techno Code Enterprise, 50 Rue Rabelais Saint-Constant, Quebec, Canada J5A 0J5

______________________________________

Contact form: https://www.sharedestinations.com/contact

______________________________________

Messaging system (only for members): https://www.sharedestinations.com/messages

Version 1 – Effective date: September 25, 2023