This Privacy Policy applies to the information you give us, our service providers and our affiliates use, e.g., your name, address, e-mail address ("Personal Information") which we obtain both directly from you, via our Web Sites and from external organizations, including and credit reference agencies.

Apress may request Personal Information about you in connection with your use of, or participation in our Web Sites, including on our forums, registration forms, content submissions, chat rooms, bulletin boards, discussion groups, suggestions, or requests for additional information, or in connection with other services or resources provided on one of our  Web Sites.

We may occasionally contact you by telephone or send you information by post, fax or e-mail about goods, services, offers or competitions which we think may interest you ('Apress'). We will not do so, however, if you have indicated either by contacting us (our details are at the end of this Privacy Policy) or by indicating user preferences on the Preferences Screen of one of our Web sites if that page exists, that you do not wish to receive Apress information. Assuming you have not told us that you do not wish to receive information from Apress We may use information you have provided us to.

• Send information to you about Apress or promotional material from either us, our partners or companies that have a significant investment in Apress either directly or indirectly in Apress;
• Introduce a product or service that we think might be of interest to you;
• Keep in touch with you when necessary;
• Respond to your questions or comments.
• Administer the provision of goods and/or services requested;
• Inform users of our Web Site of technical /functional improvements to our Web Sites;
• Administer competition entries;
• Deal with inquiries and complaints;
• Make credit decisions;
• Protect Web Site security and prevent and detect crime;
• Comply with legal obligations, including for taxation purposes, and any valid legal process, including a search warrant, subpoena, statute or court order.
• Conduct market research and analysis including to improve our products, our Web Sites and the services which we offer;

We will disclose your Personal Information to external individuals or organizations if:

• It is with your consent or at your request;
• We are required to do so by the Courts or to comply with other legal, statutory and/or regulatory obligations including accounting and taxation requirements;
• It is to protect security and/or to prevent and/or detect crime;
• It is for credit reference purposes. Please note that a record of our credit search will remain on your credit file
• That external organization has a significant ownership interest either directly or indirectly in Apress
• It is in connection with a transfer of all or part of Apress's assets or stock (whether a merger, acquisition, reorganization or otherwise).

We urge you to be careful about giving out your Personal Information in messages posted or sent on one of our Web Sites, for example in a chat room or bulletin board. Any user of the Web Site may view information that you provide in a chat room, on a bulletin board or other publicly available area of our Web Site. If you make information available in these forums, it is available publicly and we are not able to protect the privacy of such information. Your disclosure of such information is at your own risk.

The password protected portions of our Web Site are intended to be for your benefit, however, please be aware that you are responsible for taking all reasonable steps to ensure that no unauthorized person shall have access to your password or account. It is your sole responsibility to (1) control the dissemination and use of activation codes and passwords; (2) authorize, monitor, and control access to and use of your account and password; (3) promptly inform us of any need to deactivate a password. You grant to us and all other persons or entities involved in the operation of one of our Web Sites the right to receive, transmit, monitor, retrieve, store and use your Personal Information, including information which may be privileged and confidential under applicable state and federal laws, in connection with the operation of the password protected area of the Web Site. We cannot and do not assume any responsibility or liability for any information you submit to such area of the Web Site or your or third parties' use or misuse of information transmitted or received using such area of the Web Site.

We may occasionally share your contact details with other companies, external organizations and/or individuals so that they can contact you with details of goods and/or services which they think may interest you. We will not do so, however, if you indicate to us, either by writing us or on a  Registration Screen if appropriate that you would prefer not to receive such information.

If you would like further details in relation to the above, please contact us at Apress, Inc., 2855 Telegraph Avenue, Suite 600, Berkeley, CA 94705-1128 or email us at .

We may sometimes need to transfer your Personal Information abroad, including to countries where there may be a lower degree of protection for your Personal Information. Apress may use Personal Information to conduct market surveys and subsequent marketing to assist the development of new products and services. Unless you inform us to the contrary, your consent to the terms of this Privacy Policy will include your consent to transfer your Personal Information to those countries.

We are committed to protecting the privacy of children. Our web sites are not intended to or designed to attract children under the age of 13. We do not intentionally collect Personal Information from any person we actually know is a child under the age of 13.

Apress will usually uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) software to encrypt the Personal Information that you submit to us through our web sites. When we confirm the receipt of a payment from you, we disclose only the last five digits of your credit card number, although we transmit the entire card number to the credit card company when processing the transaction.

As you may be aware, no data transmission over the Internet can be entirely secure. As a result, while we will always use reasonable endeavors to protect your Personal Information, we cannot guarantee the security of your Personal Information and the use of our Web Site (including the e-mail facilities) is at your own risk.

We may provide hyperlinks from this Web Site to Web sites of other organizations including Web Sites of Group Companies. Please note that this Privacy Policy applies only to this Web Site and that Apress will not liable for the contents of linked Web sites or any transactions carried out with organizations operating those Web sites.

A Cookie is a piece of text which attaches to your hard drive and from which it can store and sometimes track information on how you make use of a Web site. Please note that the Web sites to which this Web Site may be linked may make use of their own Cookies to collect information from you.

Apress uses Cookies because they store and recall data that you have previously provided on our Web Site, which saves you from retyping that data every time you enter the Web Site. We also use the data gathered by Cookies to improve the quality of the Web Site and our services to you and to provide a more interactive and personalized experience.

We may share this aggregate statistical information with our partners, suppliers and other third parties, but we will not, without your consent, share any individual names, personal navigational information or other Personal Information. If we advertise, some of our advertisers may display ads on our sites, which solicit or contain technology to collect information about our users for the advertisers, but we will not permit such advertisers to collect any Personal Information from our users within our Web Site.

Most browsers are set to accept cookies, however you can set your browser to refuse cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. If you do so, please note that some parts of the Web Site may not be accessible or function properly. For example, you must accept a cookie in order to make a purchase from the Web Site.

Please note that if you communicate with us electronically, including by e-mail, telephone, fax, or SMS these communications may be monitored and/or recorded to protect the interests of our business, our employees, customers and service providers. Any such monitoring will be performed for one or more of the following purposes: maintaining customer services standards, detection and/or prevention of crime and to ensure that Apress employees comply with legal obligations and Apress polices and procedures.

We are happy to provide you with details of the Personal Information that we process about you or retain in our database. To protect your Personal Information, we follow strict storage and disclosure procedures, which means that we will require proof of identity from you prior to disclosing such information. We may charge a small administration fee in relation to any requests for access to Personal Information. Please direct any such request to Apress, Inc., 2855 Telegraph Avenue, Suite 600, Berkeley, CA 94705-1128.

Please help us to keep your Personal Information current by letting us know if your Personal Information is or becomes inaccurate and/or out-of-date.