Privacy Policy

Scope of the Privacy Policy

This privacy policy covers Salem Lutheran Church’s treatment of personally identifiable information that may be collected while you are on Salem Lutheran Church’s website, app, when you make donations through the site or app, or that is shared with Salem Lutheran Church by its partners. This policy does not apply to the practices of companies not owned or controlled by Salem Lutheran Church or to people who Salem Lutheran Church does not employ or manage, nor does it address non-personally identifiable information. If, while using Salem Lutheran Church’s site or app, you should ever transfer or link to an outside party’s site or app, Salem Lutheran Church strongly encourages a review of the outside party’s privacy policy before you continue such use. Salem Lutheran Church’s Privacy Policy specifically addresses the following areas:

• What personally identifiable information is collected by Salem Lutheran Church or by any third party through our site
• How Salem Lutheran Church uses this information;
• With whom Salem Lutheran Church may share this information;
• What choices are available to you as a user of the site with respect to collection, use and distribution of the information;
• What types of security procedures are in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of information under our control; and
• How you can correct any inaccuracies in the information.

Information Collection and Use

Salem Lutheran Church is the sole owner of the information collected on its site and/or app. Salem Lutheran Church may collect information from you at two different stages. First, we collect anonymous, aggregate information from all visitors to the site. This information is never linked to any personally identifiable information and is only used to generate general statistical reports about the use of our site. Second, Salem Lutheran Church collects personally identifiable information when you create a Salem Lutheran Church account or utilize certain services. Online account creation may require you to submit the following personal information: name, address, company information, email address, and phone number. For purposes of billing for donations or other giving, you may need to provide your credit card type, number, expiration date and billing address for the credit card. When using other payment types, if available, other financial information may be required to include personal or business banking information. Certain personally identifiable information is required if you subscribe to a Salem Lutheran Church newsletter or sign up to participate in a promotion, event, survey or other gathering through the site. Salem Lutheran Church may also receive personally identifiable information from our partners. We strongly recommend that anyone under the age of 18 receive permission from their parent or legal guardian before providing any personal information to Salem Lutheran Church’s site or app. Salem Lutheran Church would request that nobody provides any personal information of another to its site or app without express permission to do so.

Your Disclosure to Third Parties

To the extent you include personal data in your submissions (such as your email address, phone number, images and/or video), third parties may be able to identify you, associate you with your user account, and contact you. Please do not include information in your submissions that you expect to keep private. Please also note that any personal messages you send or receive using any Salem Lutheran Church site or app messaging feature, if available, are only private to the extent that you and the sender keep them private. Salem Lutheran Church would have no control over whether a recipient of one of your personal messages publicly posts the contents of such a message. For all of the foregoing reasons, Salem Lutheran Church would again state that no personal information to include images or video of any other party should be provided without that party’s express consent.

Personal Information Not Collected From You

Salem Lutheran Church may have received your personal information to include images or video from other persons. Salem Lutheran Church may use your personal information to communicate with you. If you did not directly provide us with your personal information, please contact us using the contact information below if you would like your personal information removed.

Location Based Information

To understand the location of its users, Salem Lutheran Church may use, where available, GPS, IP addresses, Wi-Fi hotspot, cell tower, and other technologies to determine the location of the device used to access the site or app. Unless you provide consent, this location data is collected anonymously in a form that does not allow for identification of any specific individual.

Use of Your Personal Information

Salem Lutheran Church’s goal in collecting information from you is to provide you with a rewarding, educational, efficient, and customized Christ-centered experience while using our site and app. Salem Lutheran Church will never give your information to include images and video to, sell, or share your information with any third party not affiliated with, owned by, or under the control of Salem Lutheran Church, except as permitted or required by law. There will be no marketing usage of your personal data. Salem Lutheran Church does not use Google Analytics, Google AdSense, Facebook Pixel or other similar products tied to your personal data. Salem Lutheran Church will send personally identifiable information about you to other parties when:

• We have your consent to share the information to include images and video;
• We need to share your information to include images and video to provide services or products you have requested;
• We need to send the information to include images and video to another party who works on behalf of Salem Lutheran Church to provide a product or service to you.

In the event that Salem Lutheran Church should merge with or be acquired by another entity within the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, its site/app user’s personal information to include images and video may be part of that merger or acquisition.

Disclosure of Personal Information as Required by Law

Salem Lutheran Church will disclose personal information to include images and video when compelled or required to do so by law, or if a good faith belief exists that disclosure is necessary to (a) comply with judicial proceedings, a court order or other legal process, (b) protect and defend the rights of Salem Lutheran Church, or (c) protect the rights, property, and other interests of our users or others.

How is Your Data Stored

Website data, such as contact form information, would be stored on the web server (gotelink). Other data and storage are done through a third-party service, such as constantcontact, vanco, etc.

Collection and Use of Non-Personal Information

Salem Lutheran Church will also collect data in a form that does not, on its own, identify any specific individual. This information may be collected, used, transferred, and/or disclosed for purposes including but not limited to:

• Information including but not limited to zip code, area code, unique device identifier, URL, location, and/or time zone to better understand our user’s regional location and usage to improve the quality and usefulness of our site and app.
• Information regarding the materials and area accessed on our site and app to help us better understand our user’s needs and desired materials to assist in the ongoing effort to provide the most useful and quality product for our users.
• Information regarding services and queries may be gathered to improve the relevancy of results provided by our site and app.

If we do combine non-personal information with personal information, that combined information will be treated as personal information as long as it is combined and the use of that combined information will be governed by the policies regarding personal information.

Information Regarding Children

Salem Lutheran Church takes very seriously the safety and security of children and to that end requires extra precautions be taken to protect the safety of children as it relates to the use of its site and app. Children under the age of 18 are not allowed to create their own accounts or provide any personal information to include images and video, unless their parent or legal guardian has provided verifiable consent. Similarly, no photographs, videos or other identifiable items which may reveal personal information regarding a child under the age of 18 shall be provided to or used on Salem Lutheran Church site or app without verifiable consent by each child’s parent or legal guardian. Such consent should be obtained at the time of the photograph, image, video or other identifying item and retained for review or verification at any time during the use of the image, which may reveal personal information. If it is learned that Salem Lutheran Church has been provided or otherwise collected any personal information of a child under the age of 18, steps will be taken to remove the information or image as soon as possible. If at any time a parent or legal guardian needs to access, correct, or delete any such data please contact Salem Lutheran Church using the contact information below.

Profile

We store information that we collect through cookies, log files, and other means to create a profile of our site visitors. A profile is stored information detailing how individual visitors use the site. Collected information in a profile is tied to the user’s personally identifiable information to include images and video. However, your profile is used solely for internal purposes. Salem Lutheran Church does not share your profile with any third party.

Cookies

When you visit Salem Lutheran Church we may send cookies or other similar tracking technologies to your computer or to any device you may use when visiting our site/app. We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to track user preferences and to understand the user uses our service.

A cookie is a small text file stored on a user’s hard drive for an extended period of time. The internet browser you use should provide you with instructions as to how to remove these and other cookies should you choose. Allowing a cookie, as used by Salem Lutheran Church, to remain on your computer can make it easier for you to log in and/or use the site/app. For further information regarding the use of cookies you can visit allaboutcookies.org.

Log Files

Log files record internet protocol (IP) addresses, browser types, internet service provider (ISP) referring/exit pages, platform type, date/time stamp, and number of clicks to analyze trends, administer the site, track a user’s movement and gather broad demographic information for aggregate use. IP addresses, etc. are not linked to personally identifiable information.