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PRIVACY POLICY

Effective Date:  January 1, 2020

Scope of this Privacy Policy

Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney PC and Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney LLP (collectively, “Buchanan” "we," "our," or "us") have adopted this Privacy Policy to guide how we collect, use, and disclose personal information.

Personal information we obtain in the course of representing our clients may be subject to or protected in ways not covered by this Privacy Policy, including the attorneys’ professional duty of confidentiality, the attorney-client privilege, the attorney work product doctrine, judicial protective orders, and other legal privileges or protections. These professional rules and obligations may override an individual’s ability to learn about the personal information we may have about them.

Please read this Policy carefully before you use our website www.bipc.com, and blog sites, (collectively, the “Website”), communicate with us, or visit our offices. By accessing the Website, communicating with us online or offline, or visiting our offices, you are accepting the terms of this Policy, which may be updated and amended from time to time.

Your review and acceptance of this Privacy Policy does not establish an attorney-client relationship with Buchanan.

Personal Information We Collect

The term “personal information” as used in this Privacy Policy refers to information that identifies, relates to, describes, or is reasonably capable of being associated, directly or indirectly, with an individual. It does not include information that has been modified in a substantial way so that it no longer can reasonably identify or be linked to an individual.

The categories and types of personal information we may collect from or about you will depend on the source and context in which we acquire your personal information.

Client information.  We collect the full name, email address, postal address, phone number, and other identification and contact data from our clients. Depending on the nature and scope of the representation, we may also obtain sensitive personal information including (but not limited to): personal identifiers such as your Social Security Number; data of birth; driver’s license, passport and other government-issued numbers; financial and credit information including account numbers, salary, and other income; health and medical information including insurance; education; employment and professional information; and legally protected information such as genetic information, disability marital status, national origin, ethnicity, religion, race, gender, and gender identity.

Information about others relating to the representation of our clients.  In the course of representing our clients we may obtain extensive personal information about parties, witnesses, family members, and other individuals related to a matter in which we represent our clients including (but not limited to) the categories and specific types of information identified in the preceding section.

Information you provide.  We request your contact and other pertinent information when you sign up to receive our legal or legislative advisories, alerts, and publications, register for a seminar or event, post a comment on a Buchanan blog site, use the Contact Form found on our Website, apply for a job, or otherwise communicate with us, subscribe.

Records of communications.  Our systems routinely log and retain records of incoming and outgoing phone calls, voicemails, emails, faxes, and text messages, as well as originals and electronic copies of letters and documents.

Online activity.  We authorize third party data analytics and advertising services to use cookies, web beacons, and other internet technologies to collect information about usage of our Website and the general location and demographics of our visitors. See the section titled “Cookies and Other Internet Technologies” for information about how we use and how you can restrict this automated collection of data about your online activity.

Office visits.  When you visit our offices, we may collect your name, the date and times you visited, and who you were here to see. We may also use security cameras and other technologies to protect the physical security of our offices. If you use our guest wireless network, we may also log information about your use of that service for network administration, analysis, troubleshooting, and other operational purposes.

Payment data.  We collect data necessary to process payments for legal services or event registrations. Payment card data are stored by a third party payment processing service.

Other sources.  We may receive information about you from professional referrals, industry sources, and marketing research.

How We Use Personal Information

Buchanan may use the personal information described above for multiple purposes, including:

  • Representing our clients;
  • Responding to requests for information;
  • Sending legal and legislative advisory emails, alerts, and publications you requested or that we believe may be of interest to you based on our communications with you;
  • Inviting you to seminars, conferences, and other events hosted or sponsored by Buchanan;
  • Conducting business operations including billing, auditing, and recordkeeping;
  • Reviewing job applications;
  • Operating the Website, including testing, usage analytics and market research, troubleshooting, and improving;
  • Protecting the Website and operations against fraud, unauthorized access attempts, identity theft, or other unlawful activities;
  • Defending, protecting, and enforcing our rights, interests, and property;
  • Protecting the rights of and interests of our clients, personnel; and others.
  • Maintaining the physical security of our offices;
  • Complying with applicable laws, regulations, and other legal requirements; and
  • Enforcing this Privacy Policy and our Website Terms of Use;

How We May Share Your Information

Buchanan does not sell personal information. In the course of providing legal services and managing our administrative operations, we may disclose personal information or personal information may be accessible to the following categories of third parties:

Service Providers: Third party service providers we engage to perform administrative and technology functions on our behalf may have access to personal information in order perform their functions, but they are not permitted to use personal information for their own commercial purposes. Examples include:

  • Online applications (SaaS) including document management, e-discovery, time tracking, expense tracking; billing services; and job application processing;
  • IT helpdesk and other technology support;
  • E-mail services operation and management and filtering;
  • Data center housing of our servers;
  • Office services and maintenance
  • Office and building security;
  • Physical records duplication and storage; and
  • Web hosting, contact management, and e-mail distribution of informational messages and other marketing services.

Payment Processors.  We may use a third-party payment service to process credit card payments. The personal information needed to process these transactions is collected by the payment processor—not by us—and will be subject to the processor’s privacy policy, rather than this Privacy Policy. Payment processors are not permitted to use personal information for their own business purposes.

Data Analytics and Online Ad Services.  We may authorize third-party data analytics and online advertising services to collect data about visitors to our Website. See the section titled “Personal Information Collected Using Cookies and Other Internet Technologies” for information about how we use and you can restrict the collection of data about your online activity.

Professional associates.  We may share personal information with our auditors, other law firms, and professional service organizations.

Government entities, courts, and liability insurers.  We may share personal information with government regulators and courts to comply with any law, regulation, legal process, governmental request, or where we have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation, or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary:

  • To enforce agreements;
  • In connection with claims, disputes, or litigation;
  • To protect our rights or interests, property or safety or that of others; and
  • To protect users of our Website and others from fraudulent, abusive, or unlawful use of such services;
  • In case of an emergency.

Transaction parties. Subject to applicable laws and the Rules of Professional Conduct, we may share personal information in connection with due diligence or conduct of a transaction such as a practice merger or acquisition.

Personal Information Collected Using Cookies and Other Internet Technologies

Online Data Collection. When you use our Website, third party services we authorize including Google Analytics and online advertising services, collect data about you and your online activities using cookies and similar technologies. These data may include personal information, for example, your location when you access our Website, the type of device, operating system, and browser you use, and the sites you visit before and after our Website. We do not receive Internet Protocol (IP) or mobile device identifiers that may be known to the service provider.

We use this information for analytics purposes to create statistical reports about, for example, new and returning visitors to our Website, the pages they access, the websites they visited before and after our Website, general geographic location, the dates and times of their visits, and Website pages accessed. These reports help us understand how our Website is used and performs. We do not use any of this information to directly identify visitors.

We also use this information to deliver marketing messages to relevant users by means of third party online advertising services that direct ad placement and provide ad response analytics.

The data analytics and online advertising providers may combine and use data collected through your use of our Website with data they collect over time and across different websites for their own purposes. You can learn about how Google collects and processes data at https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites. You can learn about the controls Google offers to manage the collection and use of your information at https://policies.google.com/privacy.  We recommend that you review these other entities’ privacy policies or notices at the links provided above.

How You Can Manage Online Data Collection.  You can restrict the use of cookies and other internet technologies to track and log data about your online activity and to deliver personalized advertisements to you by:

  • Managing the settings on your browser and device to limit how your content information and preferences are stored. See allaboutcookies.org for information.
  • Communicating directly with third parties that we may authorize to collect data on our Website as explained at:
  • Purchasing a utility from an independent software provider that you install on your computer browsers to limit tracking of your browsing activity;
  • Visiting http://optout.aboutads.info to learn more about personalized advertising and how to opt-out of personalized advertising on your web browser and mobile applications by companies participating in the Digital Advertising Alliance

If you restrict the use of cookies and other technologies, some of our services cannot be fully utilized.  If you chose to restrict personalized advertising, you will still receive ads, but they will not be personalized based on your browsing activity.

Our Website does not respond to Do Not Track signals.

How You Can Opt-Out of Informational Emails

You may direct us to stop sending legal advisory and other informational emails to you by following the "unsubscribe" instructions located near the bottom of each email we send.  Please note that opt-out requests may take up to ten days to be effective. If you unsubscribe from receiving informational emails, you will still receive communications related to our professional services or business relationship.

Social Media Communications

You may use social media sites, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook to submit comments, questions, and communications to Buchanan. This Privacy Policy only applies to the information we collect. Buchanan is not responsible for the information, images, or other content posted on your social media account or how others may use that content. The information on your social media account is governed by the privacy policy or notice of the third party social media service. If you connect with any of the social media features available on our Website, such as the Facebook "Like" button and “retweet” on Twitter, the social media service will controls these activities, not Buchanan.

If you give Buchanan permission to access elements of your social media account, the information shared with us will depend upon the privacy settings in your social media account and the privacy policy or notice of the social media service you use.

Links to Other Websites

Buchanan is responsible for our Website, the Buchanan blog sites, and other sites we specifically identify as Buchanan sites. For your convenience and information, we may provide links to third party sites and online resources. These linked sites operate independently from our Website and should have their own privacy policies or notices, which we recommend you review if you visit any linked websites. To the extent any linked websites you visit are not part of this Website or do not display this Privacy Policy, we are not responsible for their content, your use of those sites, or the privacy practices of any of those sites.

How We Protect and How Long We Retain Personal Information

We maintain reasonable security procedures and practices appropriate to the nature of the categories and types of personal information we collect to protect against loss, misuse, unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, or destruction.

We retain personal information for the appropriate time period to achieve the purposes identified in this Privacy Policy, taking into account the applicable statutes of limitation periods and records retention requirements under applicable laws and regulations

United States Law Applies

Buchanan provides legal services and processes personal information accordance with the applicable state and Federal laws of the United States. If you reside or are located in a different country, the data protection laws of that country may differ from the laws of the United States in the ways that your personal information is protected. We want you to understand that when you provide your personal information to us, or we obtain it through our legal services or other means, your information will be transferred to the United States and processed in accordance with the laws of the United States and the guidelines of this Privacy Policy. When you provide or acknowledge our collection of your personal information, you agree to the collection, transfer, and processing of your personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

Changes to Our Privacy Policy

Buchanan reserves the right to amend this Privacy Policy at our discretion and at any time. When we make changes to this privacy notice, we will post the updated Privacy Policy on this Website and update its effective date. Your continued use of our Privacy Policy following the posting of changes constitutes your acceptance of those changes.

Contact Information

If you have any questions or comments about this Privacy Policy or your personal information, please do not hesitate to contact us at:

Website:
https://www.bipc.com/ 

Email:
privacy-inquiries@bipc.com

Notices and Rights for California Consumers

California Consumer Privacy Act

This section of our Privacy Policy supplements our Privacy Policy and provides additional information under the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018, as amended (“CCPA”), and applies only to consumers who reside in the State of California (“California Consumers”). This section does not apply to Buchanan personnel, job applicants, or California residents whose information we obtain in business-to-business interactions.

Note that the Right to Know and Right to Delete described below may be subject to the attorneys’ professional duty of confidentiality, the attorney-client privilege, the attorney work product doctrine, judicial protective orders, and other legal privileges or protections. These professional rules and obligations may override an individual’s ability to learn about or obtain deletion of the personal information we obtained about them in the course of representing clients or otherwise fulfilling our legal or professional responsibilities.

Notice at Collection of Personal Information

The categories of personal information collected about California Consumers during the past twelve (12) months, the purposes for which these categories are used, and the third parties to whom these categories are disclosed for a business purposes are described in the following sections of our Privacy Policy and in the table below.

Personal Information We May Collect
How We Use Personal Information
How You Can Opt-Out of Informational Emails

 

Purposes for Collecting Personal Information

Categories (as defined in the CCPA) of Personal Information Collected

Categories of Third Parties—Personal Information Disclosed for a Business Purpose

Client services; document and e-mail management; time and expense tracking

  • Personal identifiers [1]
  • Other consumer identifiable data (subject to Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.80) [2]
  • Commercial activity [3]
  • Protected classifications [4]
  • Biometric information
  • Education information not publicly available
  • Professional/employment
  • Service providers
  • Professional associates
  • Government entities
  • Data analytics services

Firm administration and operations including human resources, billing and payment processing, recordkeeping; auditing; legal matters and compliance

  • Other consumer identifiable data (subject to Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.80)
  • Commercial activity
  • Education
  • Professional/employment
  • Service providers
  • Professional associates
  • Government entities

Responding to requests for information; distribution of legal advisories; marketing and advertising; conducting seminars and events

  • Personal identifiers
  • Online Activity [5]
  • Education
  • Employment
  • Service providers
  • Professional associates

 

Operation and protection of Website and facilities

  • Personal identifiers
  • Online activity
  • Biometric
  • Service providers
  • Data analytics services

Website analytics

  • Online activity
  • Service providers
  • Data analytics services

[1] Personal identifiers include real name, alias, postal address, email address, telephone number, IP address, device address, account name, Social Security, driver’s license, passport, customer or other unique personal identifier.

[2] Other consumer identifiable data include signature, physical characteristics or description, state identification card number, insurance policy number, education, bank account number, credit card number, debit card number, and other financial information, medical information, and health insurance information.   

[3] Protected Classifications refers to characteristics of protected classifications under California or federal law, such as race, color, national origin, religion, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, medical condition, ancestry, genetic information, disability, citizenship status, and military and veteran status.

[4] Commercial activity information includes records of personal property, products or services purchased or considered, and other purchasing histories.

[5] Online Activity refers to internet and other electronic network activity information including browsing history, search history, and interactions with websites, applications, or advertisements.


No Sales of Personal Information

Buchanan does not sell personal information. Likewise, Buchanan does not offer financial incentives for the collection of personal information.

Right to Know about Personal Information We Collect, Disclose, or Sell

California Consumers have the right to request any of the following information from a business regarding personal information collected about the consumer or the consumer’s household during the last twelve (12) months (“Right to Know”):

  1. The categories of personal information we collected.
  2. The categories of sources from which the personal information is collected.
  3. The business or commercial purpose for collecting or selling personal information.
  4. For personal information sold or exchanged for value with a third party: categories of personal information and categories of third parties.
  5. For personal information disclosed to a third party for a business purpose: categories of personal information; and categories third parties.
  6. The specific pieces of personal information collected about you (except for very sensitive personally identifiable information, which we will describe but not transmit).

The process by which we verify and respond to your requests is explained below under “How to Make a Verifiable California Consumer Request” and “How We Will Respond to a California Consumer Request.” You may submit a Right to Know request here.

Right to Deletion of Personal Information

California Consumers have the right to request that Buchanan delete any personal information about the consumer that we have collected, subject to a range of exclusions permitted by law (“Right to Delete”).  For example, we are not required to delete personal information if it is necessary (among other exclusions) to complete a transaction, is reasonably used for an ongoing business relationship, is necessary to comply with a legal obligation, or is used internally in a lawful manner that is compatible with the context in which the consumer provided the information.

Once we receive and verify your request, we will separately confirm your request and follow appropriate procedures to verify the identity and authority of the person submitting the request. If the Right to Delete request is confirmed and verified, we will delete (and direct our service providers to delete) the requested personal information from our records, unless an exclusion applies. If we are unable to fulfill all or part of your request, we will let you know why (for example, if we have a permitted reason to retain certain information if the identity of the requesting person cannot be verified).

The process by which we verify and respond to your requests is explained below under “How to Make a Verifiable California Consumer Request” and “How We Will Respond to a California Consumer Request.” You may submit a Right to Delete request here

Right to Designate an Authorized Agent

California consumers have the right to designate an authorized agent to act on their behalf to submit a Right to Know or Right to Delete request, or exercise other rights on the consumer’s behalf. An authorized agent may be a natural person or a business entity registered with the Secretary of State. An authorized agent must also submit to the Company written proof of their authorization to act on the consumer’s behalf.

How to Make a Verifiable California Consumer Request

California Consumers may submit a request to exercise any of their rights described above using any of the following methods:

By toll-free phone:
833-702-0488

By email:
privacy-inquiries@bipc.com

By postal mail:
Union Trust Building,
501 Grant Street, Suite 200
Pittsburgh, PA 15219-4413

Please note that in order for us to verify certain requests (including verification of your identity, California residency, and – for requests made on behalf of someone else – your relationship with the individual on whose behalf the request is being made), you may be required to confirm information that we have on file for you; including email address, phone number, full name, address and other personal information.  We reserve the right to deny a consumer request if the identity or authority of the requesting party cannot be confirmed.

How We Will Respond to a California Consumer Request

We will confirm receipt of your Right to Know or Right to Delete request within ten days and may request additional information necessary to verify that you are permitted to make the request. We will respond to any verifiable consumer request within 45 days of receiving it, subject to delays and exclusions permitted by law.  If we require more time to respond, we will let you know the reason why and the extension period in writing.  If you have a password-protected online account with us, we will respond via that account.  If you do not have an online account, we will use the email address or U.S. Postal address you provided to us when making the request.

For a Right to Know request, our response will cover the 12 month period preceding our receipt of the request.  If we cannot comply with all or part of your request, we will explain the reasons why.  For data portability requests, we will select a format to provide your personal information that is readily useable and should allow you to transmit the information readily from one entity to another entity.

We do not charge a fee to process or respond to your verifiable consumer request unless it is excessive, repetitive, or manifestly unfounded.  If we determine that the request warrants a fee, we will tell you why we made that decision and provide you with a cost estimate before completing your request.

Protection from Discrimination for Exercising California Consumer Rights

We will not discriminate against a California Consumer for exercising any of the rights described in this section.  This means that except as legally permitted we will not:

  1. Deny you goods or services.
  2. Charge you different prices or rates for goods or services, including through granting discounts or other benefits, or imposing penalties.
  3. Provide you a different level or quality of goods or services.
  4. Suggest that you may receive a different price or rate for goods or services or a different level or quality of goods or services.