العدد 5384 - السبت 03 يونيو 2017م الموافق 08 رمضان 1438هـ

Al-Wasat Privacy Policy

Keeping your info safe & sound

We take your privacy very seriously. And so should you.

So have a look around to see what we’re doing with your personal information and how we’re keeping it secure.

Overview

This privacy policy applies to anyone who uses any of Al-Wasat digital services. This privacy policy discloses how Al-Wasat collects and use your information. Collection, use, disclosure, and protection of personal information may be subject to different regulations outside Kingdom of Bahrain. Regardless, if you use Al-Wasat’s websites or Services, you agree to this policy. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THIS POLICY, DO NOT USE OUR SERVICE.

Al-Wasat reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to change these terms, at any time without any formality. It is your responsibility to check these terms periodically for changes and/or updates. Al-Wasat encourages you to periodically check back and review this statement so that you always will know what information it collects, how it is used and with whom it is shared. Your continued use of our Service following the posting of changes and/or updates will mean that you accept and agree fully and unequivocally to the changes.

Al-Wasat is committed to protecting its users’ personal information, which is collected during the use of its Websites, Online Services and Apps. Maintaining the utmost level of trustworthiness in our Network’s integrity and professionalism is paramount. We acknowledge that the personal information of our users is provided with their consent, and the respect of this mutual agreement governs our collection and use of personal information. This Privacy Policy relates to our use of any personal and non-personal information you provide to us through our Websites, Online Services, and Apps.

Information Collected by Al-Wasat

In some Al-Wasat digital services, you can submit content, vote in polls or otherwise express an opinion, subscribe to one of our services such as our online newsletters, or participate in one of our communities. In the course of these various offerings, we may collect from you various forms/types of personal information. Examples of the types of personally identifiable information that may be collected at these pages include: name, address, e-mail address, telephone number, and information about your interests in and use of various Al-Wasat services.

Personal Information

Registration Information. Registration for certain Al-Wasat digital services requires that you provide some personal information, including an email, address, phone number, and demographic information (age, gender, city, and country of residence) to register.

For some of our digital services, you may choose to log in through a third party online social service such as Facebook or Twitter. By logging in via this method, you are asking and consenting to the third party service (such as Facebook) to send us certain information from your online social profile, and you authorize us to collect, store, and use in accordance with this Privacy Policy any and all information available to us through the third party service. After you have connected to our services, the third party service also sends us additional information from your existing profile that allows us to display personal information (such as your name and picture) on the online services you are using.

User Generated Content and Public Activities. Al-Wasat offers you opportunities to engage in activities on Al-Wasat service that are open to the public. Such activities are any actions you take on Al-Wasat services that are designed to be visible to other users, including comments, recommendations, rating, or any other items you submit. Any information you disclose in your public activities, along with your name or ID, or any image or photo, becomes public and may be used by Al-Wasat for online and offline promotional or commercial uses in any and in all media. If you choose to engage in public activities, you should be aware that any personal information you submit there can be read, collected, shared or used by other users of these areas, and could be used to send you unsolicited messages. Your public activities may appear on other Web sites, blogs, or feeds.

When you share or recommend with or without adding your own comments any Al-Wasat articles or content to a third party social profile, that action is governed by the third party’s Privacy Policy. Al-Wasat tracks such comments and actions to enhance user experience.

Non-personal Information

Device Information. Al-Wasat may collect non-personal information about the computer, mobile device or other device you use to access Al-Wasat services, such as Internet Protocol (IP) address, geolocation information, unique device identifiers, browser type, browser language and other transactional information.

Cookies. In providing Al-Wasat services, Al-Wasat Network uses "cookies," Web Beacons and other similar technologies to recognize you and provide personalization. This information assists in understanding which pages Al-Wasat Network’s visitors are visiting and how much time they spend there.

Al-Wasat services transmits non-personally identifiable Web site usage information about visitors to the servers of a reputable third party for the purpose of service performance analytics and targeting our Internet banner advertisements on other sites. To do this, Al-Wasat Network uses Web Beacons in conjunction with cookies provided by our third-party ad server on this site.

Analytics Technologies. Al-Wasat Network has hired third parties to provide information, reports and analysis about the usage, browsing patterns of users of Al-Wasat services.

Third parties such as Google Analytics and Chartbeat tracks and analyzes non-personally identifiable usage and volume statistical information from our visitors and customers on Al-Wasat services.

IP Addresses. Al-Wasat logs (IP) addresses, or the location of your computer on the Internet, for systems administration and troubleshooting purposes. This information is used in an aggregate fashion to track access to our online services.

Log Files and Your Reading History. Al-Wasat automatically log certain usage information about your use of Al-Wasat services. This information includes a reading history of the pages you view, type of content you are browsing, and engagement with our online tools.

This information is used in order to provide you with customized recommendations of the Networks’ online services based on your reading history. Log files are also used in the aggregate to analyze usage of the Network’s online services.

Location Information. Some of the Network’s online applications can deliver content based on the users current location. Your current location will be stored locally on your device, which will then be used by the application. The application will collect or store, location information on our servers for analysis purposes.

Information Collected by Third Parties

Al-Wasat services uses Third party services to provide customized recommendations to the user, gather service performance analysis, and personalized advertisement. These Third party services may place or recognize cookies, web beacons or other technology to track certain non-personal information about users.

Al-Wasat does not have access to, nor control over, Third party service providers’ use of cookies or other tracking technologies or how they may be used.

How the Network Uses the Information

Al-Wasat uses the information gathered to enable your use of Al-Wasat services, fulfill your requests for certain products and services, such as sending out electronic newsletters and enabling you to participate in our services such as polls, and message boards.

Statistical Analysis. Al-Wasat performs statistical, demographic and marketing analyses of users of Al-Wasat services, and their subscribing patterns, for product development purposes and to generally inform advertisers about the nature of our subscriber base. This information is used for analysis purposes, including analysis to monitor our online service performance.

Customizing Your Experience. Al-Wasat uses the information that collected to allow advertising to be targeted to the users for whom such advertising is most pertinent. This information will be used to customize certain features of Al-Wasat services in order to provide an enhanced experience based on the type of device used to access the Network’s online services.

Further, the Network uses the non-personally identifiable information collected to improve the design and content of Al-Wasat’s online services, to deliver more relevant marketing messages and advertisements and to enable us to personalize your Internet experience.

International Transfer. Al-Wasat operates globally, therefore it is necessary to transfer your information internationally. In particular, your information is subject to transfer and be processed in Kingdom of Bahrain and in countries where our services operate. The data protection and other laws of other countries, such as United States of America, may not be as comprehensive as those in your country. Al-Wasat takes the necessary steps to ensure that your privacy is protected. By using this online service you consent to your information being collected, used and transferred as set forth in this privacy statement.

Storing your personal information

Al-Wasat will store your personal information for as long as is necessary
for the relevant activity. By canceling your Al-Wasat membership, this action does not guarantee that all your contributions to Al-Wasat and/or browsing history will be deleted.

User contributed material will generally be kept for as long as is reasonably required for the purpose(s) for which it was submitted.

Al-Wasat Facebook app privacy policy and permissions

Sharing your information with us and others on Facebook. When you access content within the app for the first time, for example by clicking on a link to an Al-Wasat article or watching an Al-Wasat video from your Facebook newsfeed, you will be presented with a permissions box, which will advise you about the information you will be sharing with both the app and other facebook users. You can then decide whether or not to share your Facebook information by using the app. If you decide not to grant permission you will not be able to use the app but you will be able to view the content on our website.

By granting permission you will be agreeing to share your Facebook user details (including your name, date of birth, location, profile picture, gender, networks, user ID and any other information you choose to share according to your facebook account settings) as well as the user details of your Facebook friends, and information about your use of the app, for example, the articles you are reading or the videos you are watching.

When installing the app, you can set your privacy settings on who will be able to see actions that get posted to your facebook timeline. Based on your privacy settings, the app will publish actions such as "read" or "watch", and other related actions to your timelime when you click on articles or videos within the application.

If you post content or other data on the app, for example, by commenting on an article or video, this can be accessed by all of your Facebook friends. If you decide not to share information with your Facebook friends about a particular article or video that you have accessed you can make your reading private by visiting your profile page and using the "remove from timeline" facility at the top of recent activity feed.

Unsubscribing from the facebook application. To unsubscribe click on "Remove this Application" on the right hand side of every page beneath the "Featured" article box. Alternatively, remove the App by accessing the application settings in your Facebook account settings.

Once you remove the app we will no longer have permission to access your facebook information and your data will be removed from the app.

Our Commitment to Security

Al-Wasat has put in place commercially reasonable physical, technical and administrative and managerial procedures to safeguard and help prevent unauthorized access, to maintain data security, and to use correctly the information collected online. Please note however that no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure.

How You Can Access your Information
Access to personally identifiable information that is collected from our sites and that the Network maintains may be available to you. For instance, if you created a password-protected account within the Network’s online service, you can access that account to review the information you provided.

Enforcement / Redress

If you feel that we have not followed our Privacy Policy, please let us know. Also, if you have any questions or concerns about our Privacy Policy, its implementation, or would like a written copy, please feel free to contact us at:

Al-Wasat Newspaper
P.O. Box 31110, Manama, Kingdom of Bahrain

Tel: +(973) 17596999
Fax:+(973) 17596908

Glossary of Terms

App(s) means software designed for and operational on Apple's iPhone®, iPad®, or iPod Touch® hardware or any Android enabled phone.
Personally Identifiable Information (PII) means any information that identifies or could be used to identify, contact or locate you.
Partner means a Al-Wasat vendor, customer or other entity with whom we have a business relationship.
User, You, and Your means an individual who has accessed our website or used our Service.
We and Our refers to Al-Wasat Digital Services

Page Updated on 7th February 2017