PRIVACY POLICY:
At House of Technology Company (“House of Technology”, “We” or “Our”), one of our most important responsibilities is protecting our users’ privacy. To that end We will not trade, sell, or disclose to any third party Your personally identifiable information without Your consent, including information derived from registration and use of any of the services available through our Sites, except as stated below. Please note that this privacy policy applies only to sites owned and operated by House of Technology, including our website, www.hotgroup.co.ke (collectively referred to herein as the “Sites”).
Acceptance of these Terms:
By registering or by using any of the Sites, You the user (“You” or “Your”) explicitly accept, without limitation or qualification, the collection, use and transfer of the personal information provided by You in the manner described in this Privacy Policy. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully as it affects Your rights and liabilities under law. If You disagree with the way We collect and process personal information from any of Our Sites, PLEASE DO NOT USE THEM.
Non-Personally Identifiable Information:
You may visit Our Sites without registering, however, many of the specific tools and services on Our Sites do require registration. If You use any of Our Sites without registering We will automatically collect certain non-personal information. The type of non-personal information We collect includes the areas of Our Sites that You visit, what services You access, and information about Your computer hardware and software including Your IP address, geolocation, browser and operating system type, domain names, access times and referring web site addresses. This information is used for analyzing the use of resources and improving our services.
Personally Identifiable Information:
If You choose to register with any of Our Sites We may require You to submit certain personally identifiable information such as name, address, date of birth and e-mail address. Depending on the tool or service You have selected to use within our Sites, We may also collect additional financial, health or other personally identifiable information. You are responsible for ensuring the accuracy of all personally identifiable information You submit to any of Our Sites. Inaccurate information will affect the information You receive when using our Sites and tools and Our ability to contact You as described in this Privacy Policy.
Registration Information is collected so that We can:
(i) Process Your registration and provide You with Your requested service;
(ii) Receive subscription payments;
(iii) Contact You if there is a problem in the future, and
(iv) Conduct market research. We may combine the information You submit during Your registration with information we obtain from third parties.
Cookies and Web Beacons:
“Cookies” are text files that may be placed on Your hard disk by a web page server that will uniquely identify Your browser. We may use cookies to store Your preferences and track certain trends. Using cookies allows us to improve the quality of the Sites by storing user preferences and tracking user trends. You can set Your browser to refuse or disable cookies, however, by doing so You may not be able to take advantage of certain features which are available to other users of the Sites.
We also utilize electronic images known as “web beacons” (sometimes called single-pixel gifs, clear gifs or action tags) that allow us to collect certain information about users’ visits to Our Sites, measure and improve the effectiveness of advertisements and other tools and services on Our Sites. Web beacons ARE NOT USED TO ACCESS YOUR PERSONALLY INDENTIFIABLE INFORMATION; they are a technique used to compile aggregated statistics about web site usage.
Web beacons collect only a limited set of information including a cookie number, time and date of page view and a description of the page on which the web beacon resides. This information may be shared with third party processors for processing on behalf of House of Technology, as well as with other third parties so that they can understand the kinds of visitors to Our Sites, how those visitors use those Sites, and the effectiveness of their advertisements. Because web beacons are the same as any other content request included in the recipe page, You cannot opt out or refuse them. However, they can be rendered ineffective by either opting out of cookies or changing the cookie setup in Your browser.
Disclosure of Information:
We consider the personally identifiable information contained in our records to be confidential. As such WE DO NOT LEASE, SELL OR SHARE Your personally identifiable information with third parties except:
(i) To provide You with products or services You have requested,
(ii) With Your permission or
(iii) Under the following circumstances:
- (a) We may use agents and contractors in order to help provide various services including but not limited to information processing, extending credit, fulfilling customer orders, delivering products to you, managing and enhancing customer data, providing customer service, assessing your interest in our products and services, and conducting customer research or satisfaction surveys. If such agents and contractors have access to Your personally identifiable information, they are required to protect this information in a manner that is consistent with this Privacy Policy and they shall not use the information for any purpose other than to carry out the specific services they are performing for House of Technology;
- (b) We may disclose Your personally identifiable information to law enforcement or other agencies which are investigating or taking action to prevent any of Our Sites and Our services from being used for illegal activities, including but not limited to fraud, harassment or in any other way which may violate our Terms and Conditions of Service. We may also disclose information about You if we determine that for purposes of national security, law enforcement, or other issues of public importance, disclosure is necessary or appropriate;
- (c) We may disclose Your personally identifiable information in response to summons, court orders or to otherwise exercise our legal rights; or
- (d) In the event that ownership of House of Technology changes as a result of a merger, acquisition or transfer to another company, Your personally identifiable information may also be transferred. If such a transfer results in a material change in the use of Your personally identifiable information, we will provide You with notice of such change and allow You to opt out of such transfer.
Open Discussions and Other Public Forums:
Our Sites feature several areas that allow for You to post questions, comments or other information in an open forum that can be accessed by other users of Our Sites. This includes but is not limited to our Live Chat platform.
Any information You share in any online community area like a chat room, discussion blog, Ask Our Expert posting or any other online discussion is by design open to other users of Our Sites and is not private. What You post can be seen, disclosed to or collected by third parties and may be used by others in ways We cannot control.
Disclosure to Third Party Websites:
This privacy policy only applies to Our Sites.
If You access other sites, including those which may be linked to Our Sites, You do so at YOUR OWN RISK. Certain content and services offered to You through our Sites are provided through websites hosted and operated by companies other than House of Technology (“Third Party Contractor Sites”). We do not disclose Your personally identifiable information to these Third Party Contractor Sites without Your consent. Please be aware that any information You disclose once You access these Third Party Contractor Sites is not subject to this privacy policy. House of Technology does not endorse and is not responsible for the privacy practices of these Third Party Contractor Sites. We urge You to review and understand the privacy policy that governs each Third Party Contractor Site You decide to access.
In addition to the Third Party Contractor Sites described above, for Your convenience there are links to other third party websites that are operated by companies that are not affiliated with House of Technology and that do not have contracts to provide content or services through one of Our Sites. These links may be found in advertisements, referenced within content, or placed beside the names or logos of sponsors.
We do not disclose Your personal information to these third party websites without obtaining Your consent. Please be aware that any information You disclose once You access these third party websites is not subject to this privacy policy. House of Technology does not endorse and is not responsible for the privacy practices of these third party websites. We urge You to review and understand the privacy policy that governs each of the third party websites that You decide to access.
Disclosure of Aggregate Information:
House of Technology may provide aggregate information to third parties. For example, we might inform third parties regarding the number of users that visit our Sites and the activities they conduct while on Our Sites.
Information Security:
All personally identifiable information that We gather is stored and maintained in secure facilities that restrict access to authorized personnel only. All personally identifiable information is protected in transit via HTTPS and SSL security. A system of encryptions and decryptions is also deployed. Despite our best efforts, no security system is impenetrable and therefore We cannot absolutely guarantee the security of Your personal information.
Children:
We care about the safety and privacy of children online, so We always comply with The Children Act Chapter 141 and other relevant pieces of legislation. We do not knowingly contact or collect personal information from children under 13 without prior parental consent. We would remind parents that they have a duty to supervise the internet activities of their children. It is possible that by fraud or deception We may receive information pertaining to children under 13 years old. If We are notified of this, as soon as We verify the information, We will immediately obtain parental consent or otherwise delete the information from Our servers. If You want to notify Us of Our receipt of information by children under 13, please do so by contacting Us through direct calls or our live chat platform.
Enforcement of this Privacy Statement:
We regularly review Our compliance with this Policy. Please feel free to direct any questions or concerns regarding this Privacy Policy or House of Technology’s treatment of personal information by contacting us through direct calls or our live chat platform.
Opt Out Policy:
If We propose to use Your personal information for any purposes other than those described in this privacy policy, We will offer You an effective way to opt out of the use of personal information for those other purposes. We will not collect or use sensitive information for purposes other than those described in this privacy policy unless We have obtained Your prior consent. You can decline to submit any personal information, in which case, however, We may not be able to provide You with the services You desire.
Changes to this Privacy Policy:
Please note that this Privacy Policy may change from time to time. We will inform You by either posting a notice on Our Sites or e-mailing You directly, if a material change is made to the Privacy Policy, which means a change that expands the allowed uses or disclosures of Your personally identifiable information. Your continued use of any of Our Sites will indicate acceptance of the changes. You may of course choose to opt-out of continuing to use Our Sites.
PLEASE EXIT THIS SITE IMMEDIATELY IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS PRIVACY POLICY OR ANY REVISED PRIVACY POLICY. We reserve the right to make non-material changes to the Privacy Policy that do not affect Your personally identifiable information without notifying You.