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Amazon.com Privacy Notice
Last updated: April 3, 2003
Amazon.com knows that you care how information about you is used and shared, and we appreciate
your trust that we will do so carefully and sensibly. This notice describes our privacy policy.
By
visiting Amazon.com, you are accepting the practices described in this Privacy Notice.
What Personal Information About Customers Does Amazon.com Gather?
The information we learn from customers helps us personalize and continually improve your shopping
experience at Amazon.com. Here are the types of information we gather.
l
Information You Give Us:
We receive and store any information you enter on our Web site or
give us in any other way. Click here to see examples of what we collect. You can choose not to
provide certain information, but then you might not be able to take advantage of many of our
features. We use the information that you provide for such purposes as responding to your
requests, customizing future shopping for you, improving our stores, and communicating with
you.
l Automatic Information:
We receive and store certain types of information whenever you
interact with us. For example, like many Web sites, we use "cookies," and we obtain certain
types of information when your Web browser accesses Amazon.com. Click here to see examples
of the information we receive. A number of companies offer utilities designed to help you visit
Web sites anonymously. Although we will not be able to provide you with a personalized
experience at Amazon.com if we cannot recognize you, we want you to be aware that these tools
exist.
l
E-mail Communications:
To help us make e-
mails more useful and interesting, we often receive
a confirmation when you open e-mail from Amazon.com if your computer supports such
capabilities. We also compare our customer list to lists received from other companies, in an
effort to avoid sending unnecessary messages to our customers. If you do not want to receive e-
mail or other mail from us, please adjust your Customer Communication Preferences.
l Information from Other Sources:
We might receive information about you from other sources
and add it to our account information. Click here to see examples of the information we receive.
What About Cookies?
l
Cookies are alphanumeric identifiers that we transfer to your computer's hard drive through your
Web browser to enable our systems to recognize your browser and to provide features such as 1-
Click purchasing, New for You, personalized Amazon Honor System greetings, and storage of
items in your Shopping Cart between visits.
l The Help portion of the toolbar on most browsers will tell you how to prevent your browser from
accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or
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how to disable cookies altogether. However, cookies allow you to take full advantage of some of
Amazon.com's coolest features, and we recommend that you leave them turned on.
Does Amazon.com Share the Information It Receives?
Information about our customers is an important part of our business, and we are not in the business of
selling it to others. We share customer information only as described below and with subsidiaries
Amazon.com, Inc. controls that either are subject to this Privacy Notice or follow practices at least as
protective as those described in this Privacy Notice.
l Affiliated Businesses We Do Not Control:
We work closely with our affiliated businesses. In
some cases, such as Marketplace, zShops, and Auctions sellers, these businesses operate stores at
Amazon.com or sell offerings to you at Amazon.com. In other cases, we operate stores, provide
services, or sell product lines jointly with these businesses. Click here for some examples of co-
branded and joint offerings. You can tell when a third party is involved in your transactions, and
we share customer information related to those transactions with that third party.
l Agents:
We employ other companies and individuals to perform functions on our behalf.
Examples include fulfilling orders, delivering packages, sending postal mail and e-mail,
removing repetitive information from customer lists, analyzing data, providing marketing
assistance, providing search results and links (including paid listings and links), processing credit
card payments, and providing customer service. They have access to personal information needed
to perform their functions, but may not use it for other purposes.
l Promotional Offers:
Sometimes we send offers to selected groups of Amazon.com customers
on behalf of other businesses. When we do this, we do not give that business your name and
address. If you do not want to receive such offers, please adjust your Customer Communication
Preferences.
l
Business Transfers:
As we continue to develop our business, we might sell or buy stores,
subsidiaries, or business units. In such transactions, customer information generally is one of the
transferred business assets but remains subject to the promises made in any pre-existing Privacy
Notice (unless, of course, the customer consents otherwise). Also, in the unlikely event that
Amazon.com, Inc., or substantially all of its assets are acquired, customer information will of
course be one of the transferred assets.
l
Protection of Amazon.com and Others:
We release account and other personal information
when we believe release is appropriate to comply with the law; enforce or apply our Conditions
of Use and other agreements; or protect the rights, property, or safety of Amazon.com, our users,
or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for
fraud protection and credit risk reduction. Obviously, however, this does not include selling,
renting, sharing, or otherwise disclosing personally identifiable information from customers for
commercial purposes in violation of the commitments set forth in this Privacy Notice.
l
With Your Consent:
Other than as set out above, you will receive notice when information
about you might go to third parties, and you will have an opportunity to choose not to share the
information.
How Secure Is Information About Me?
l We work to protect the security of your information during transmission by using Secure Sockets
Layer (SSL) software, which encrypts information you input.
l
We reveal only the last five digits of your credit card numbers when confirming an order. Of
course, we transmit the entire credit card number to the appropriate credit card company during
order processing.
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l It is important for you to protect against unauthorized access to your password and to your
computer. Be sure to sign off when finished using a shared computer. Click here for more
information on how to sign off.
Which Information Can I Access?
Amazon.com gives you access to a broad range of information about your account and your
interactions with Amazon.com for the limited purpose of viewing and, in certain cases, updating that
information. Click here to see some examples, the list of which will change as our Web site evolves.
What Choices Do I Have?
l
As discussed above, you can always choose not to provide information, even though it might be
needed to make a purchase or to take advantage of such Amazon.com features as Your About
You Area, Wish Lists, and Customer Reviews.
l You can add or update certain information on pages such as those listed in the "Which
Information Can I Access?" section above. When you update information, we usually keep a
copy of the prior version for our records.
l
If you do not want to receive e-mail or other mail from us, please adjust your Customer
Communication Preferences. (If you do not want to receive Conditions of Use and other legal
notices from us, such as this Privacy Notice, those notices will still govern your use of
Amazon.com, and it is your responsibility to review them for changes.)
l The Help portion of the toolbar on most browsers will tell you how to prevent your browser from
accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or
how to disable cookies altogether. However, you will not be able to use such important features
as 1-Click ordering and New for You if you do not use cookies.
l Click here to explore products that offer anonymous browsing. In addition, the Federal Trade
Commission provides useful information about online privacy on its own Web site, Site Seeing
on the Internet.
Children
Amazon.com does not sell products for purchase by children. We sell children's products for purchase
by adults. If you are under 18, you may use Amazon.com only with the involvement of a parent or
guardian.
Safe Harbor
Amazon.com is a participant in the Safe Harbor program developed by the U.S. Department of
Commerce and the European Union. We have certified that we adhere to the Safe Harbor Privacy
Principles agreed upon by the U.S. and the E.U. For more information about the Safe Harbor and to
view our certification, visit the U.S. Department of Commerce's Safe Harbor Web site. If you would
like to contact Amazon.com directly about the Safe Harbor program, please send an e-mail to
Conditions of Use, Notices, and Revisions
If you choose to visit Amazon.com, your visit and any dispute over privacy is subject to this Notice and
our Conditions of Use, including limitations on damages, arbitration of disputes, and application of the
law of the state of Washington. If you have any concern about privacy at Amazon.com, please send us
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a thorough description to [email protected], and we will try to resolve it.
Our business changes constantly, and our Privacy Notice and the Conditions of Use will change also.
We may e-mail periodic reminders of our notices and conditions, unless you have instructed us not to,
but you should check our Web site frequently to see recent changes. Unless stated otherwise, our
current Privacy Notice applies to all information that we have about you and your account. We stand
behind the promises we make, however, and will never materially change our policies and practices to
make them less protective of customer information collected in the past without the consent of affected
customers.
Related Practices and Information
l Conditions of Use
l
Amazon.com Bill of Rights
l
Web-Based Discussion Service Terms of Agreement
l
Amazon.com Marketplace, Auctions, and zShops Participation Agreement
l Marketplace, Auctions and zShops Account and Community Guide
l Help department
l Shared Purchases
l Amazon.com Friends & Favorites Guidelines
Information You Give Us
You provide most such information when you search, buy, bid, post, participate in a contest or
questionnaire, or communicate with customer service. For example, you provide information when you
search for a product; place an order through Amazon.com or one of our third-party sellers; make an
Auction bid or purchase; provide information in Your Account (and you might have more than one if
you have used more than one e-mail address when shopping with us) or About You; communicate with
us by phone, e-mail, or otherwise; complete a questionnaire or a contest entry form; compile Wish Lists
or other gift registries; provide employer information when opening a corporate account; participate in
Discussion Boards or Amazon.com Chat; provide and rate Reviews; specify a Special Occasion
Reminder or a favorite charity in Charity Links; share information with Amazon Friends; and employ
other Personal Notification Services, such as Amazon Delivers and Amazon.com Alerts. As a result of
those actions, you might supply us with such information as your name, address, and phone numbers;
credit card information; people to whom purchases have been shipped, including addresses and phone
number; people (with addresses and phone numbers) listed in 1-Click settings; e-mail addresses of
Amazon Friends and other people; content of reviews and e-mails to us; personal description and
photograph in About You; and financial information, including Social Security and driver's license
numbers.
Automatic Information
Examples of the information we collect and analyze include the Internet protocol (IP) address used to
connect your computer to the Internet; login; e-mail address; password; computer and connection
information such as browser type and version, operating system, and platform; purchase history, which
we sometimes aggregate with similar information from other customers to create features such as
Purchase Circles, Top Sellers, and Just Like You; the full Uniform Resource Locator (URL)
clickstream to, through, and from our Web site, including date and time; cookie number; products you
viewed or searched for; zShops you visited; your Auction history; and the phone number you used to
call our 800 number. During some visits we may use software tools such as JavaScript to measure and
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Did this help? Continue shopping.
Still have questions? Search help or contact us.
collect session information, including page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain
pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs), and methods used to
browse away from the page.
Information from Other Sources
Examples of information we receive from other sources include updated delivery and address
information from our carriers or other third parties, which we use to correct our records and deliver
your next purchase or communication more easily; account information, purchase or redemption
information, and page-view information from some merchants with which we operate co-branded
businesses (such as drugstore.com) or for which we provide technical, fulfillment, advertising, or other
services (such as Target.com); search term and search result information from some searches conducted
through the Web search features offered by our subsidiary, Alexa Internet; search results and links,
including paid listings (such as Sponsored Links from Google); and credit history information from
credit bureaus, which we use to help prevent and detect fraud and to offer certain credit or financial
services to some customers.
Information You Can Access
Examples of information you can access easily at Amazon.com include up-to-date information
regarding recent orders; personally identifiable information (including name, e-mail, password,
communications preferences, address book, and 1-Click settings); payment settings (including credit
card information and gift certificate, gift card, and check balances); e-mail notification settings
(including Alerts, Available to Order notifications, Delivers, New for You, Share the Love, Special
Occasion Reminders, Weekly Movie Showtimes, and newsletters); recommendations (including recent
product view history, prior order history, and Favorites); shopping lists and gift registries (including
Wish Lists and Baby and Wedding Registries); Auctions, zShops, and Marketplace seller accounts; and
your About You area (including your product Reviews, Requests, and Recommendations, Listmania
lists, "So You'd Like to…" guides, personal profile, favorite people, and Amazon Friends).
Co-branded and Joint Offerings
Examples of businesses with which we offer joint or co-branded products and other offerings include
Toysrus.com, Babiesrus.com, Imaginarium.com, Target, Marshall Field's, Circuit City, Borders,
Waldenbooks, AT&T Wireless, Sprint, T-Mobile, CarsDirect.com, Hotwire, drugstore.com, The
Vacation Store, Ofoto.com, Office Depot, J&R, Virginmega.com, Nordstrom, Eddie Bauer, Gap, Old
Navy, and other apparel stores.
Where's My Stuff?
• Track your recent orders.
• View or change your orders
in Your Account.
• See our animated demo!
Shipping & Returns
• See our shipping rates &
policies.
• Return an item (here's our
Returns Policy).
Need Help?
• New customer? Click here to
learn about searching,
browsing, and shopping at
Amazon.com.
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