Privacy Policy

(Adopted from Stackoverflow privacy policy - Jan 12 2022)

The RISC-V Developer Network (also referred to herein as “RVDN” or “Network”) is a set of related Internet sites and other applications for asynchronous collaboration and sharing knowledge.

RVDN welcomes you to the Network, the largest community of developers and technologists in the world, and invites you to participate in the community by sharing knowledge with your peers and colleagues.

WE DO NOT AND WILL NOT SELL YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION.

INTRODUCTION TO OUR PRIVACY POLICY

RVDN’s products, services and websites can be accessed by users across various locations including in jurisdictions which have specific privacy requirements.

This privacy policy and our related Privacy Notices (see below) describe how we collect, use, protect, share and transfer information about you that we collect when you use any of our products and services, our websites, or apps or otherwise interact with us or with our Network (Services). It also includes information about how we handle information on California residents under the CCPA.

“Personal data” in this policy, includes “personal information,” as it is defined under the CCPA.

Personal data is any information about you by which you can be identified or be identifiable (either on its own or when combined with other information). This can include information such as: your name, email address and username; information about your device (e.g., IP address); and information relating to how you use and interact with our sites, apps and services.

We have set out below an overview of how our privacy notices work. Depending on how you interact with us, we will collect and process your personal information as shown below.

This Privacy Notice applies where you interact with us through the Network, or use any of our products and services.
If you’re an employee, our Employee Privacy Notice will be applicable.

GENERAL PRIVACY NOTICE FOR RVDN

This Privacy Notice is applicable to you, including when you participate in our Public Community Platform for Questions and Answers by interacting with us through RVDN’s Public Network (“Public Network”), or when you otherwise interact with us, e.g., when you purchase or use our Advertising or Teams or Collectives or other products (“Products”) or when you contact our Customer Service, Sales or other teams for assistance or inquiries (“Services”).

The Public Network allows individual users to engage in a community to share their knowledge and expertise, and to acquire knowledge and expertise. It is community-moderated, and the content in the Public Network is public and therefore visible for anyone to see and is subject to our Public Network Terms of Use.

Below you will find details about the personal information we collect about you when you use the Public Network or our Products and Services and interact with us; how and why we collect it, how we use it, and how we keep it secure.

This Privacy Notice also tells you about your rights, how you can exercise those rights, and how the law protects you.

RVDN is the Controller responsible for your personal data collected on the Public Network or directly by us for RVDN’s operational purposes. In connection with certain Products and Services, RVDN is the Processor for the organizations who provide your data to us or use our Products and Services.

If you interact with RVDN through your organization, please refer to the specific privacy notices applicable to those Products.

If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice or the way in which we use your personal data, please contact us at privacy@rvdn.net

WHAT INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?

This section sets out the categories and details of personal information that we collect across our Products and Services.

We collect and process your personal information in order to offer the Network, and to offer you our Products and Services.

If you decline to provide us with personal information when we ask you, you may not be able to access all or some of our services, and you may not be able to use the Network or certain Products and Services. For example, if you do not provide us with your email address or other information required for account registration, we will not be able to register you for certain account services.

We collect:

Identity Data

We collect information such as your username, password, email address, IP address (collected at each site visit). This information is also used to identify individual users to the Public Network and to award activities and attribute them to you. Your username and additional content you provide, including your profile picture, question and answer content, and your reputation, are visible publicly. We or our community moderators may delete a question, an answer, a comment, or all of them and after deletion such information is only available to certain community members or RVDN employees.

Contact Data

Including delivery address, email address, and telephone numbers for operational purposes, including providing Services and Products.

Technical Data

Including internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, traffic data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system, and platform and other communication data which gives us information about how you accessed our website. Other account information and usage information including your IP address and browser data may be used for diagnosis, security, and Product and Service optimization.

Account registration information

When you register for a RVDN account, we collect your name and email address, your username and any additional information you provide. We will generate a unique identification number that we will use to recognize you when you are signed in. We need to collect your personal information for account registration purposes. Although the Network provides for anonymous and pseudonymous participation, in some instances in order to use certain Products or Services, we require account registration. This requires a name associated with your account, an email address at which we can contact you, and in some cases, additional information, including a contact address, a billing address, and a password to help secure your personal information.

Billing information

For Products and Services requiring payment, we collect a billing name, phone number, and email address. We also collect a billing and shipping address for invoicing purposes. If you elect to pay by credit card, RVDN may engage a third party to securely process your payment. All payment processing is done through a PCI DSS compliant third party. If customers are paying by a credit card, their card details are vaulted through a third-party payment gateway. RVDN will store an encrypted token along with the last four digits of the credit card and the expiration month and year of the card and will not store or retain any other billing information about you.

Profile information

When completing a public “profile”, whether it is for use with the Network or our Products and Services, we may require you to share certain personally identifying information in required and optional profile fields. The name associated with your account, which you may review and change in your account settings, as well as reputation points are publicly displayed and connected to your activity on the RVDN Network and via certain Products and Services. Moderators, who have elevated access privileges, may access non-public user profile data, as well as content in posts and other public data. For more information about moderators and their role in the RISC-V Developer Network, please email support@rvdn.net.

Other profile information may also be publicly displayed if you choose to complete certain elective components of the Account Registration options, including e.g., your Developer Story, display picture, affiliated role and company, your location, and your preferred technologies (javascript, swift, sql-server, etc.), and some information is publicly displayed and required, such as how long you have been a member.

Similarly, you may elect to share additional information that is not required, but this will be displayed publicly if you so choose to share it.

If you are using the private Network (e.g., RVDN for Teams), your account settings, including name, affiliated role and company, and other information may be shared with your private Network Team members designated as authorized users of your private Network account. While some of the public and private Network profile information is required, much of it is within your control as we describe herein and can be modified, updated, and restricted by you in your settings.

Information we use to identify and authenticate you

We need this information to be able to recognize you, for example, when you access your accounts. It also helps us to protect your details and keep them secure. We may also use this information for fraud detection and prevention.

Analytics information

RVDN uses data analytics to ensure site functionality and to optimize our Product and Service offerings to you. We use web browser and mobile analytics to allow us to understand Network and Apps functionality. In doing so, we record information including, for example, how often you visit the Network, how often you contribute content, Network and Apps performance data, errors and debugging information, and the type of activity you engage in while on the Network or in your use of our Products and Services. We may on occasion share this information with third parties with whom we have contracts for products and services to assist RVDN.

Information from Developer surveys, questionnaires, research and feedback programs

We collect information through questionnaires, surveys and feedback programs to help improve our products and give us insights. We may also conduct similar research for advertisers and our marketing partners. We ask you for your consent to use this information when you participate in these programs and events.

Marketing and sales information

We collect details of the services you receive and your preferences; information about your device or the software you use, e.g., its IP address, technical specification and uniquely identifying data; cookies and similar technologies we use to recognize you, remember your preferences and tailor the content we provide to you – our cookie policy contains more details about how we use cookies.

Device and browser information received automatically

When you visit the Network or use our Forum, RVDN automatically receives and records information from your browser or mobile device, such as your Internet Protocol (IP) address or unique device identifier. Cookies and data about which pages you visit on our Network allow us to operate and optimize the Products and Services we provide to you. This information is stored in secure logs and is collected automatically.

We may combine this browser information with other information we collect about you. This information is used to keep the Products and Services secure, to analyze and understand how our Products and Services are used, optimize such usage, provide advertising across the Network as well as certain Products and Services to personalize your experience, and to help connect you with potential job opportunities in the case of our recruiting Products and Services.

Location information

When you use the RVDN Network, and certain of our Products and Services, we collect location information about you, including your IP address, your location, browser information, and how you came to the RVDN. This is the case for individuals who have registered for an account, and non-members who engage with RVDN by visiting our website(s), but who have not completed an account registration.

This information is collected for various purposes, including advertising, analytics and to serve content as it relates to certain Products or Services (e.g., Talent), as well as to provide you with localized content, recommendations, and marketing. You may revoke our permission to collect some of this data, including your location and browser information through your Account Settings, but this may limit functionality in some cases. Certain location information we collect is required for security and site functionality. We share this information with certain third-parties (e.g., talent recruiters, payment processors, and advertising providers) in order to provide you with our Products and Services.

You should not include any financial information or other information that you do not wish to make public when using our Public Network, which is a public website. We do not collect such information. It is your responsibility to keep such information safe and secure.

Can I revoke permissions once I have put information on the Public Network?

Please be aware that when using the Public Question and Answer Network, you cannot revoke permission for RVDN to publish and to allow others to have derivative rights to such public content once it is made public.

The content you contribute on the public network is public, in perpetuity, and RVDN loses direct control over such content when it is published on the open internet. This also means that if you post personal information about yourself, you do so at your own risk, including the risk of abandoning any privacy rights you had in such information. However, we can work with users to remove any personal data that has been posted in error or which a user wishes to remove.

Additionally, from time to time, RVDN makes such public content available via our RVDN Network API, compilation via the Creative Commons Data Dump and by providing public content to the RVDN Network. You should be aware that such content, once public, cannot often be removed from public view even if it is removed from the RVDN network and our servers.

HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA

This section explains how we use your information and what we need it for (purposes). We use your personal data only when we have a valid reason and the legal grounds to do so. We determine the legal grounds based on the purposes for which we have collected your personal data. More information is provided below:

Purposes for collecting and using personal information

We use the above categories of personal information for the following purposes:

To verify your identity and enable you to access your products and services when you contact us or access our services.
To protect you from fraud and for fraud prevention and detection.
To provide commercial quotes to you, e.g., when you inquire about a product or service.
For statistical analysis (e.g., on the use of our websites).
To operate and improve our websites and services.
To notify you of any changes to our websites or our services and products that may affect you.
To provide you with technical and customer support.
To ask your opinion or feedback on our services or surveys.
To communicate with you about other RVDN products or services, events, offers, promotions and other information or news that we think may be of interest to you. Whenever we communicate with you in this way, we will give you an opportunity to opt out of receiving future messages.
To enforce our legal rights or comply with legal requirements.
To provide improved website and product experience and communications informed by your product subscriptions and/or data collected.

Our legal grounds for using your personal data

We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. We will use your

personal data in the following circumstances:

Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you. For example, where you have purchased a product or service or requested a service from us.
Where we have your consent. For example, where you have provided your consent to receive marketing emails from us or where you have given your consent to be contacted by a third party sponsor for an event you have participated in. You can withdraw your consent at any time. In the case of marketing emails, you can withdraw your consent by clicking on the “unsubscribe” link in the email you received.
Where we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation.
Where it is in our legitimate interests, including our commercial interests or a third party’s legitimate interest in using the personal information. Examples include when we analyze what content has been viewed on our Network and apps, so that we can understand how they are used and improve our content; carrying out marketing analyses to better understand your interests and preferences so that we can make our marketing more relevant to your interests and preferences. This includes when we promote our own products and services.

Whenever we rely on legitimate interests for processing, we ensure that we consider and balance our interests against the individual’s interests before processing. We do not use your personal data on the basis of legitimate interest for activities where individuals’ interests override our interests.

MORE DETAILS ABOUT HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA

Cookies and Similar Technologies

When you visit our Network and sites or when you use our apps, we may collect personal data from you automatically using cookies or similar technologies. A cookie is a small file that can be placed on your device that allows us to recognize and remember you. We may place cookies on your device (with your consent, where applicable), as well as partner with third parties, including advertising partners, who may use cookies or other similar technologies to provide you with advertising based on your browsing activities and interests. Please see our cookie policy for additional information on how we use cookies and what third party cookies we permit.

Tracking

RVDN emails use Javascript for email tracking of opens, clicks, and unsubscribes or may contain a small, invisible, one pixel image which can be used to let us know when the email is opened or forwarded. If the email recipient has images enabled on their device, when the email is opened, a message (an automatic request) is sent to RVDN’s server requesting the image. That request is logged by RVDN and tells us that the email has been opened. A similar process may be used in relation to links or attachments in the email, with a request being sent to RVDN for the content that is accessible via the links or attachments, thus telling RVDN that the link or attachment has been accessed.

Developer Survey

As the world’s largest developer community, RVDN publishes an annual Developer Survey to provide key insights into the developer community, as well as other surveys from time to time, some of which include demographic (e.g., gender, race, age, etc.) and certain personal information. Your participation in the Developer Survey as well as any other RVDN survey is entirely voluntary. In order to provide meaningful insights into the developer community, RVDN may collect sensitive data about you, including, but not limited to your gender, race, sexual orientation, immigration status, and your location. We consider this data to be among our most sensitive and have taken elevated measures to protect such data as well as to de-identify your name and other personal information from such data. We restrict such data within RVDN on a privileged basis to only those that need to see it and while we may share your personal information with our third party providers for our research, we do so only after imposing contractual obligations of confidentiality on such third parties and only where necessary for limited research purposes.

When we publish our surveys, they are published as a compilation of anonymized data. We may ask for your consent to contact you following completion of the surveys.

If you have any questions concerning the Developer Survey or other survey and our security measures to protect your sensitive personal data, please contact us at: privacy@rvdn.net.

WHO DO WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL DATA WITH?

We share personal data with:

Companies within the RVDN network.
Third parties who provide professional services, including but not limited to accountants; banking, insurance and insurance broking services for us.
Third parties we use to help deliver our products and services to you, e.g., payment service providers, payment processors, warehouses and delivery companies; cloud service providers, e.g., AWS, service providers that help us carry out certain tasks, including order fulfillment, customer service providers, maintaining technology and related infrastructure, serving and targeting ads, measuring performance, managing and analyzing research, email distribution, managing marketing, promotions and surveys.
Additionally, to improve user experience, we offer single sign-on solutions for account login and these third parties (including Facebook and Google) may receive information from these services when you elect to use them.
When RVDN shares your personal information and other collected information with third party service providers, we require that they use your information only for the purpose of providing services to us and consistent with this privacy policy.
Third parties that we partner with to deliver products and services, including certain marketing and features to you.
Event sponsors and partners – we may share your personal data with sponsors of RVDN events and partners whom we hold events with for marketing purposes when you have given your permission for us to do so.
Other third parties approved by you, e.g., third parties that run our Developer Survey, social media sites you choose to link your account to or third party payment providers.
We may make available APIs to enable users to download publicly available information from our websites.
Authorities who require reporting of processing activities in certain circumstances, for example, for anti-money laundering, sanctions and other regulatory obligations. We will not disclose your personal information to legal authorities except where such disclosure is by lawful request, including to meet legitimate national security or law enforcement demands (including a subpoena, court order, or other lawful legal demand by a legal authority with lawful jurisdiction) or in the public interest in compliance with applicable laws. In some cases, we may also release your personal information to defend our legal interests.
If we choose to sell, transfer, or merge parts of our business or our assets, your personal data would be shared with such third parties as part of such a transaction. Alternatively, we may seek to acquire other businesses or merge with them. If a change happens to our business, then the new owners may use your personal data in the same way as set out in this privacy notice.

We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with contractual obligations which ensure adequate protection for your personal data.

HOW LONG DO WE RETAIN YOUR PERSONAL DATA?

We will keep your personal data only for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this privacy notice and to fulfill our legal obligations. We will not keep more data than we need. While you remain a user of the Public Network or a customer, we will retain your data in order to keep providing services to you.

We are required to keep some basic information about our customers for a longer period in accordance with applicable tax and other laws. In some circumstances, you can ask us to delete your data.

Your choices - how to access and control your personal data

You can make choices about the collection and use of your data by RVDN in the various ways set out below.

You may change or correct your account settings and choose not to share certain information by creating a pseudonymous account.
You may also remove certain optional information that you no longer wish to be publicly displayed, such as your photo, or job history.
You can also control your personal data that RVDN has collected and exercise your data protection rights as set out in the section below, or by using the tools described below. Please be aware that in some cases, your ability to access or control your personal data will be limited under applicable law.

Promotional emails, SMS messages, telephone calls and postal mail from RVDN

When we send promotional emails and texts, we will give you an ‘unsubscribe’ option to opt out of receiving such messages. You can opt out of receiving telephone calls. Occasionally, we may send promotional mail, you can let us know if you do not wish to receive mail by contacting us. You can also opt out in your Profile Settings.

YOUR RIGHTS

You have a number of rights in relation to your personal data, and you can contact us if you want to exercise any of these.

Your rights include:

Access

The right to be provided with a copy of your personal data also known as a "data subject access request"

Rectification

The right to require us to correct any mistakes in your personal data

Erasure

The right to require us to delete your personal data—in certain situations

Restriction of processing

The right to require us to restrict processing of your personal data in certain circumstances, e.g., if you contest the accuracy of the data

Data portability

The right to receive the personal data you provided to us, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and/or transmit that data to a third party—in certain situations

To object

The right to object:

at any time to your personal data being processed for direct marketing (including profiling);
in certain other situations to our continued processing of your personal data, e.g., processing carried out for the purpose of our legitimate interests.

If you would like to exercise any of these rights, please email privacy@rvdn.net.

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity before we can deal with your request. We will respond to your request within one month. If your request is complicated, it may take us longer. We will let you know if we need longer than one month to respond.

You also have the right to take your concerns at any time to the UK or EU

Supervisory Authority, depending on your location.

Where we process your information (locations)

RVDN will process your information through, or on behalf of its entities located in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Economic Area (EEA). We may transfer your information to companies working on our behalf and to other third parties and agents located outside the European Economic Area.

Please be aware that the privacy laws and standards in certain countries outside the UK and the EEA, including the rights of authorities to access your personal information, may differ from those that apply in the country in which you reside. We will transfer personal information only to countries to which we are permitted by law to transfer personal information and we will continue to ensure that your personal information is appropriately safeguarded. More information on this is provided within the policy.

INTERNATIONAL DATA TRANSFERS

To deliver services to you, it is sometimes necessary for us to transfer or share your personal data outside the US:

with our offices or other companies within our group located outside the US;
with your and our service providers, e.g., cloud service providers, located outside the US;
if you are based outside the US;
where there is a European and/or international dimension to the services we are providing to you.

If applicable, we will only transfer or share your personal data outside the US:

to a country, territory or organization that has been assessed as providing an adequate level of protection for personal data ‘adequacy decision’ by the US;
under the guidance of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) , in addition to implementing appropriate supplementary measures to ensure the protection of the personal data.

By accessing the RVDN and engaging with our Products and Services, you acknowledge that your personal data may be collected and transferred from your local jurisdiction to the United States or other jurisdictions.

Our ongoing commitment to data security

Security is important to us and we know it is important to you. RVDN follows generally accepted standards to protect your personal information when processing, transferring, and storing your personal information including Transport Layer Security (“TLS”).

We have appropriate security measures to prevent personal data from being accidentally lost, or used or accessed unlawfully. We limit access to your personal data to those who have a genuine business need to access it and only as necessary to perform our legitimate business interests. We also have procedures in place to deal with any suspected data security breach. We will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are legally required to do so.

We also encourage you to protect yourself against unauthorized access to your personal information by choosing a password carefully and in accordance with industry best standards. Do not share your password with anyone you do not trust, and make sure your computer accesses RVDN via a secure network and that you do not leave your personal information vulnerable to hackers and other bad actors by leaving your computer unattended or by failing to logout of your account when you have ended your session activity.

How we may contact you

Service communications

From time to time, we may send you service emails, for example, how to use certain features of products you have bought or renewal reminders (if applicable).

Marketing and product communications and newsletters

From time to time, RVDN may communicate with you about commercial and other Product and Services offerings and to let you know how you can continue to share, learn, and build your knowledge within the RVDN community. You can opt-out of such messages at any time by changing your permissions in your Profile Settings. In some cases, e.g., third party offers, we will only send these if you have given us permission.

Direct marketing opt out

You may opt-out of receiving RVDN email marketing materials by using the unsubscribe link in these communications or by changing your Email Settings.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FOR CALIFORNIA CONSUMERS

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), we are required to notify California consumers about our collection, use, and disclosure of their personal information (whether collected through this website or offline).

RVDN does not sell (as the term is defined in the CCPA) the personal information we collect (and will not sell it without providing a right to opt out). Please note that we do use third-party cookies for our advertising purposes, as described in our cookie policy.

In the last 12 months, we collected the following categories of personal information from California consumers:

Identifiers, like your RVDN username, email address, IP address, and cookie information.
Commercial information, including information about transactions you undertake with us.
Internet or other electronic network activity information, such as information about your activity on our Services and limited information about your activity on the services of advertisers who use our advertising technology.
Geolocation information based on your IP address, or more specific location information if you authorize your device to provide it to us.
Audio and visual information submitted to RVDN.
Professional or employment-related information or demographic information, but only if you explicitly provide it to us, such as by applying for a job or filling out a survey.
Inferences we make based on other collected data, for purposes such as recommending content, advertising, and analytics.

You can find more information about (a) what we collect and sources of that information, (b) the business and commercial purposes for collecting that information, and (c) the categories of third parties with whom we share that information in the sections of our privacy statement above.

California consumers have additional rights under the CCPA (subject to certain limitations), including the right to request access to or deletion of your personal information, and information about our data practices, as well as the right not to be discriminated against for exercising your privacy rights.

These rights can be exercised by contacting us at privacy@rvdn.com.

We will verify your request using the information associated with your account, including email address. Government identification may be required. Consumers can also designate an authorized agent to exercise these rights on their behalf.

Children

The RVDN platform is not intended for children. We do not knowingly offer this or any other Product or Service to anyone under the age of 16.

We may amend or update this policy from time to time and will notify you of any material changes to this policy. Previous versions of this privacy policy are available upon request.

Privacy Officer

Privacy Officer, 1975 Hamilton Ave. #3, San Jose, CA 95125, privacy@rvdn.com