PRIVACY POLICY
1. Introduction
At How To Draw School (“HTDS” or “we”), your privacy is highly prized, and we are committed to ensuring that it remains secure by adhering closely to this policy. This Privacy Policy (our “Privacy Policy”) describes the types of information you may provide when visiting our website www.howtodrawschool.com (the “Website”)Additionally, this document will explain how we gather, utilize, protect and share the collected data.
Our policy extends further than our website; it applies to any electronic messages sent between you and us, such as emails, texts or other forms of communication.
Our privacy policy does not cover information that is acquired offline, through other websites operated by HTDS or a third party (including affiliates), related to employment opportunities with us or any of our affiliates, applications and content including advertising accessible from the Website.
We urge you to thoroughly read this policy as it outlines our policies and practices regarding your information. If you don’t agree with them, we welcome you not to use our Website; however, if decide to use either of these, then it is assumed that have accepted all the terms herein. We may periodically update this Privacy Policy, so please make sure to review it from time to time in case there are any changes.
2. Personal Data
HDTS is fully responsible for the Personal Data collected on its Website. At present, HDTS has chosen not to appoint a Data Protection Officer or EU representative as it is not obligated to do so.
3. Children Under the Age of 13
We explicitly prohibit children under 13 from providing any information to or on our Website. We also do not intentionally collect personal data from young kids in this age range. Therefore, we kindly ask that those aged 12 and younger refrain from engaging with us digitally.
If you are under 13, it is imperative that you do not provide any personal information on our Website. This includes your name, address, phone number, email address and other screen names or user names. Moreover, never undertake any activities such as registering for an account or making purchases through the website. In the event that we discover Personal Data has been collected or received from a child under 13 without verification of parental consent, it will be promptly deleted. If you have reason to believe How To Draw School may possess information pertaining to an individual below the age of thirteen, kindly contact us at support@howtodrawschool.com for further assistance.
4. Information collection
– We collect a range of user data (“Personal Data”) from our Website that can identify you, such as your name, address, email address, phone number, credit card details, date of birth or other online/offline contact information. Additionally, we may also keep track of social media account info such as usernames and profile pictures for website biographies.
– We collect data about you and your visit to our Website such as traffic, location, logs, referring/exit pages, date & time of your visit along with communication details like clickstreams.
– We also note the technology used to access our Website including usage information related to internet connection equipment.
Through various sources, we gather this information:
– Directly from you when you willingly give it to us;
– Automatically as users browse our Website; and From third-party vendors.
– Our Website collects data in two ways: firstly, information that you submit when registering for our services, subscribing to an instructor’s content/services or submitting a User Contribution as outlined below. Secondly, we may ask for additional details from you if you enter any of our promotional activities or report a problem on the site.
– We will keep a record of all communications (including email addresses) if you reach out to us.
– Before placing an order for lessons or learning materials on our Website, you may be asked to supply us with financial information. We will keep track of all the transactions resulting from your orders in order to ensure their successful completion.
– Our interactive services are designed to maximize user experience, allowing for a variety of engaging features such as message boards, chat rooms, and direct messaging without limitation. Additionally, users can create their own web pages and profiles by utilizing our rating or review system. For those who prefer one-on-one video training or challenges/competitions between other members, we offer the perfect platform!
– Your answers to surveys that we may request of you for research objectives.
Obtaining Information Automatically With Data Collection Technologies
As you travel and engage with our Website, we may utilize automatic data collection tools to collect certain specifics about your equipment, browsing activities, and patterns like:
– We collect data from your visits to our Website, such as usage details, IP addresses, and information through cookies, web beacons, or other tracking technologies.
– We collect details about your activities on the Website, such as how much of each video you watch, progress through lessons, upvoting/downvoting history, critiquing artwork or providing critiques to others – all in order to provide you points and calculate your User Level when this feature becomes available. Your comments’ popularity is also taken into consideration so we can reward users who make valuable contributions!
– Our Website analyzes the meta-data stored in pictures, audio files, and videos that you upload.
– Your computer and internet connection data, such as your IP address, operating system type, and web browser version are all important for us to know.
By collecting data, either automatically or from third parties, we’re able to create a more personalized experience for our customers. This helps us improve our Website by enabling us to:
– Gauge our target audience size and usage habits.
– We store information regarding your preferences to allow us to customize our Website specifically tailored to your interests.
– Accelerate your searches with lightning-fast speed!
– When you come back to our Website, we will recognize you so that your login information stays secure;
Cookies (or browser cookies) are small files, stored securely on the hard drive of your computer. You can grant or revoke consent to place these cookies at any time by clicking on the “cookies” link located at the bottom of our home page. Make sure that you have control over which data is collected and retained – with just one click! You can choose to reject or be alerted about browser cookies by adjusting your settings on your web browser. However, if you do turn off this setting, certain parts of our Website may become unavailable. Unless you have turned the cookie feature off in your browser’s settings, it will still issue them when trying to access our content.
– To ensure proper authentication, our services employ session cookies containing encrypted information. Every time you access the service, a unique identifier linked to your account is automatically placed on your internet browser. These session cookies allow us to verify who you are while utilizing our product and also facilitate data transactions with ease. Without these essential session cookies, it would be impossible for us to provide an appropriate level of security in order for customers like yourself to use our services safely and conveniently.
– Our Website may contain miniscule electronic files, otherwise known as web beacons (also referred to as clear gifs, pixel tags, or single-pixel gifs). These enable HTDS to track the number of visitors who have accessed those pages. In addition, they provide data such as recording the popularity of certain website content and verifying system and server integrity.
Third-Party Use of Cookies and other Tracking
The Website contain certain content provided by third parties, such as advertisers, ad networks and servers, content providers, and application providers. To track your usage of our Website when you access them to provide this information to these third-parties may use cookies along with web beacons or other tracking technologies. They may monitor your personal information and collect data about your online activities across different websites, which could be used to serve you targeted content based on interests or behavior.We are not responsible for the way third parties use their tracking technologies. If you have any questions regarding targeted ads or content, please contact the provider directly. Here is a list of some of these providers with links to their privacy policies:
– YouTube is an efficient tool to host videos. To learn more about how YouTube and its parent Google use data when a video from the platform is watched, please refer to https://policies.google.com/privacy for further information on their privacy policies.
– To add to your viewing pleasure, we are proud to announce that Vimeo is now hosting certain videos. Get the details about how Vimeo collects data when you watch its hosted videos by visiting https://vimeo.com/privacy and be enlightened!
In order to give you the best possible experience with our Website, we employ third-party services that help us manage, maintain, improve them all while providing us with invaluable insights into our users.
– We may deploy Google Analytics or other analytics providers to gain insight into how people use our Website. These services take advantage of cookies, as discussed earlier. Would you like to find out more about what personal data is collected through the website? Then check out “How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services” at www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners!
If you want to find out how you can avoid being targeted with ads, please check our Choices About How We Use and Disclose Your Information page. It will provide all the details regarding opting out of this type of marketing from multiple sources.5. Lawful Basis for Processing Your Personal Data.
5. Legitimate Reason for Collecting Your Personal Data
In the European Union, processing your Personal Data is only valid under a Lawful Basis as described by data protection laws. For our activities to be considered lawful, we must follow each of these bases – exceptions apply and are outlined below:
– By navigating our Website, you are agreeing to the collection, usage and sharing of your personal data as outlined in this Privacy Notice. If you do not consent to what has been laid out here, please refrain from accessing either the website.
– Legitimate Interests: We will use your Personal Data when it is necessary to further our legitimate interests. Although we may have an interest in processing this data, we make sure that your rights and freedoms are always upheld by ensuring that they do not exceed the weight of our interests. If ever there is a conflict between what we want to achieve versus what you would prefer, then the latter will take precedence without fail. To ensure your satisfaction, our goal is to enable communication between HTDS and you in a secure manner; debug our Website; protect both our IT infrastructure as well as intellectual property; detect and forestall frauds or other illegal activities; advertising for the success of our enterprise; inspect credit ratings accurately; plus conceive new product features.
– To meet our contractual commitments to you, we process your personal data in line with our agreement. This allows us to supply the goods and services that were promised under the contract.
– We are legally obligated to process your Personal Data in certain circumstances. This may include complying with any applicable regulations, government inspections and audits; responding to legal processes such as subpoenas; or protecting our interests by preventing fraud, criminal activities and tortious acts against us. Additionally, we use this data when managing complaints or claims that have been filed against us.
6. Unique Datasets
At HTDS, we are committed to protecting your privacy and absolutely never request or collect any sensitive data from you.
7. Automated Decisions Making
HTDS is committed to protecting your privacy and does not engage in automated decision-making processes, such as profiling or any other activity that could potentially produce legal repercussions or significantly affect you.
8. How We Use Your Information
HTDS is committed to protecting your privacy and does not engage in automated decision-making processes, such as profiling or any other activity that could potentially produce legal repercussions or significantly affect you.
By collecting and utilizing your Personal Data, we effectively provide our services to you:
– To showcase our Website with its contents to you;
– To better serve you, we strive to supply the necessary information, products or services (paid and free art education materials accessible through our Website) that are requested from us.
– to serve any other purpose that you have provided.
– to keep you informed of your account status and any classes that you take, including expiration dates and renewal reminders.
– To fulfill our contractual duties to you, such as delivering lessons;
– To protect our interests stemming from any agreements with you, we may utilize your Personal Data if necessary. For instance, if there is a violation of our Terms of Use, it will help us in the dispute resolution process.
– To ensure that you pay for the products and services you purchase from us, we will bill and process payments on your behalf. Should any overdue amounts remain unpaid, we may resort to sharing your Personal Data with collection agencies in order to recover these fees.
– To keep you informed when we make alterations to our Website, or any of the products and services that are provided through them;
– to grant you access to our Website’s engaging features.
– To deliver you valuable insight and opinions on the artwork that you post to our Website;.
– To reward you for your activity on the Website, we offer exclusive incentives.
– To sharpen our AI algorithms and help you to hone your artistic skills, we utilize them so that you may amplify the quality of your artwork.
– In any conceivable way we may express when you supply the data.
With your permission, we may even use your data to inform you about our services which could be of interest for you. If you’ve been sent a promotional email from us, then simply click the unsubscribe link located at the bottom of that email or send us an email stating your request at support@howtodrawschool.com and we’ll stop sending such emails immediately! To know more information regarding this topic, please refer to the Choices About How We Use and Disclose Your Information section on our website.
By using the data we have collected from you, we can showcase ads to our advertisers’ target audiences. Though your Personal Data is never disclosed without your permission, if an advertisement gets clicked or interacted with in any other way, the advertiser may assume that you meet their criteria of a perfect viewer/customer.
9. Information Disclosure
We will always keep your Personal Data secure and confidential. We won’t use any of it for purposes that aren’t outlined in this Privacy Policy, but we might share aggregated information with others if it doesn’t identify you as an individual.
In accordance with this Privacy Policy, we may need to share certain of your Personal Data that has been collected or provided by you:
– To our affiliates, instructors providing instruction on our Website with whom you contract, as well as third parties that review your artwork such as instructors, approved critiquers or other students – we extend a warm welcome.
– To further our business, we may share your personal info with other users of the Website if you utilize their interactive features. Additionally, contractors, service providers and third parties who aid us may also have access to said information.
– If HTDS is the subject of a planned or actual merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution, or sale of some or all assets in bankruptcy liquidation proceedings – which includes Personal Data held by us about our Website’s users amongst those transferred assets – we reserve the right to transfer such data to potential buyers or other successors.
– We may share your information with other companies for marketing purposes unless you have explicitly opted out.
– We only use your information to satisfy the purpose you specified when providing it. Take, for instance, if you register for a course with an instructor – we may distribute your contact details exclusively to that instructor and any other stated purpose revealed by us while getting this info from you.
We may also disclose your Personal Data:
– To adhere to any judicial order, statute or legal procedure, in addition to responding timely and accurately to any governmental or administrative request.
– To ensure the enforcement and application of our terms of use, as well as any other agreements pertaining to billing and collection.
– If we detect that divulging information will safeguard the rights, assets, or security of HTDS customers and other people involved, then we will proceed with disclosure.
Furthermore, your activity on the Website can be depicted through Activity Points and User Levels which will be publicly visible.
10. Information disclosure choice
Third parties, as detailed in our Disclosure of Your Information policy, may collect and use information about you. We do not have control over how they collect or utilize your data; however, we require these businesses to maintain the confidentiality of this information through contractual obligations whenever possible. They also might merge the details that they gather from us with other customers’ records for their personal purposes.
Furthermore, we are committed to equipping you with the power of choice when it comes to your Personal Data. Consequently, we have crafted mechanisms that will enable you to take control and customize the way in which your Personal data is used:
– Tracking Technologies and Advertising. You have the choice to reject or accept all or some browser cookies, and you will be alerted when they are sent. If you’d like to learn how to manage your Flash cookie settings, please visit Adobe’s website for more information. However, if disabling these is necessary, it could, unfortunately, impair certain parts of our Website from functioning correctly; making them inaccessible in the process.
– Promotional Offers from HTDS. With your permission, we will only use the personal data you provide to let you know about our own products and services or those of third parties. To grant consent for this purpose, send us an email with your request to support@howtodrawschool.com .
If you’ve received a promotional email from us, simply click the unsubscribe link at the bottom of that message to opt-out of future mailings. However, this does not apply for communications sent in connection with product purchase or warranty registration, service experiences and other transactions.
11. Your Information access rights
Depending on your applicable data protection laws, you may have certain legal rights regarding our processing of your personal information.
– Access and Update. To keep your Personal Data accurate and up to date, log in to the Website, visit your “Settings” page, and make changes as necessary. Furthermore, if you notice any errors or want us to update anything about you for completeness’ sake – don’t hesitate! Reach out through our Contact Information outlined below. However please note that we may not be able to fulfill all requests due to legal restrictions or inaccuracies it could cause.
– Restrictions. You have the authority to restrict our control of your Personal Data in particular scenarios. For instance, you can request we pause its use if you question its accuracy, if processing it is determined as illegal activity, or if there’s no longer a need for us to process it but we still keep it due to legal procedures.
– Portability. If we process your Personal Data based on your consent, you can request for us to provide a copy of that data in an accessible and machine-readable format. For added convenience, if technically feasible, you have the right to ask us to directly transmit this Personal Data to another controller.
– Withdrawal of Consent. By closing your account, you may revoke the consent for our data processing activities at any time. However, if we have already processed some of your Personal Data based on previously given consent before its withdrawal, such lawful processing shall remain legal and valid. Furthermore, it won’t affect other grounds that make our further treatment of your personal information legitimate in accordance with the law.
– Right to be Forgotten. You are entitled to request the deletion of all your Personal Data. We cannot erase your information unless we, at the same time, delete your account. We will only do this when our processing of said data has run its course or if it has been determined that such data was acquired in an illegal manner. Unless prohibited by law or other legal requirements, we are willing to honour requests for the deletion of Personal Data. However, please note that some data may remain in our backups and cannot be completely removed due to the protocols included in our disaster recovery policies. The information retained will adhere strictly to the guidelines outlined within this policy. Although you may delete your User Contributions from the Website, copies of them could still be accessible in cached and archived pages, replicated by other users of the site.
– Complaints. You possess the power to submit a complaint to your country’s pertinent regulatory body if you feel that your rights under applicable data safety statutes have been violated. Nevertheless, we respectfully request that before taking this measure, you get in contact with us directly so we can cooperate and resolve any privacy-related issues together.
– How You May Exercise Your Rights. If you would like to exercise any of your rights as mentioned above, kindly contact us using the methods listed in our Contact Information section or access the “Settings” page on our Website. Please expect that we may ask for additional details to confirm your identity when you reach out. We reserve all right to reject or limit requests if we cannot adequately verify who you are, or if it conflicts with legal/business prerequisites. Please be aware that if you make excessive or unreasonable requests to access your Personal Data (as determined by our discretion), we may charge a fee in accordance with applicable law.
12. Data Security
To guarantee the safety of your confidential data, we’ve established protocols to secure it from any possible unauthorized access, use, alteration or disclosure. We have also provided you with a password for accessing certain areas on our Website; make sure not to share this information with anyone as its security is in your hands too!
Despite our best efforts, it is impossible to guarantee total security when sharing information online. As such, by transmitting your Personal Data on the Website you assume personal liability for any risks associated with its potential breach. We do not accept responsibility for circumventing of any privacy settings or safety measures incorporated into these platforms; hence we urge you to take caution before submitting sensitive data over the web.
13. Consent to Processing of Personal Data in the United States and in Other Countries
By using and accessing our Site, you agree to have your personal information transferred across international borders for processing on servers located in the United States or other countries. The standards of data protection may not be as stringent as those set by laws in your home country. Your data may be processed and stored in a country other than where you live, including the United States. Authorities of such countries (including US federal, state and local governments) could possibly obtain access to your information under their laws – even if it is done without notifying or involving you. By utilizing our Website, you affirm that you have read and comprehended the information listed above. Furthermore, through your usage of these tools, you agree to allow us to store and process any Personal Data submitted on our Website in both the United States and other countries.
14. Data Retention Periods
HTDS will safeguard your Personal Data as long as you maintain an open account with us. And even after you have closed the account, we may choose to keep some of your data on file:
– for as long a period needed to comply with any legal mandate;
– In an effort to ensure the safety and security of our data, we are committed to implementing comprehensive backup and disaster recovery systems in adherence with company policies.
– For as long as we deem necessary to safeguard our legal interests or exercise our rights and remedies.
– Any data that has been combined or otherwise made anonymous to the point where you are no longer identifiable will be kept indefinitely.
15. Changes to Our Privacy Policy
We reserve the right to revise this Privacy Policy at any time. Any modifications we make will be posted on this page, so feel free to check back periodically for updates. If there are substantial revisions in how we handle your Personal data, you’ll get a notification sent directly to your email address associated with your account or through an announcement displayed prominently on our home page.This Privacy Policy was last updated on the date indicated above. To remain informed of any changes, it is your responsibility to ensure we have an accurate email address as well as regularly visit our website for updates.
16. Contact Information
If you have any questions, concerns, complaints or suggestions regarding our Privacy Policy, have any requests related to your Personal Data pursuant to applicable laws, or otherwise need to contact us, you may contact us at the contact information: support@howtodrawschool.com