Last Updated: December 6, 2023

The Giving Pledge (“Giving Pledge,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) is committed to the lawful, fair, and transparent collection and use of personal data. This notice is intended to help you understand how we collect and use your personal data, as well as how we share, store, and protect that data. If at any time you have questions about this notice, please let us know by contacting us at the information listed below in the section titled, “How to contact us.”

We may update this notice and any supplemental privacy notices to reflect changes in our practices and applicable law. We will post a notice of any material updates on our website.

When this notice applies

This notice applies to personal data we collect, including through the Giving Pledge website, other Giving Pledge registrations, online portals, community sites, surveys, events and other interactions, and any other channel used to support philanthropic giving (collectively, the “sites”). In most instances, Giving Pledge is the controller responsible for your personal data.

Supplemental privacy notices

This notice may be supplemented by additional privacy notices applicable to particular interactions with us, which may be either embedded in this notice or made available to you separately. We will tell you when a supplemental privacy notice applies. Additional purposes for using your personal data may be described in a supplemental privacy notice.

Links to third-party websites

This notice does not apply to any third-party websites that may link to, or be accessible from, our sites. We are not responsible for any of the content, features, functionality, or privacy practices of other linked websites or services. The data collection and use practices of any linked third-party website will be governed by that third party’s applicable privacy notice, statement, or policy, and its terms of use. We encourage you to read them.

Data Collection

What data we collect about you

We may collect the following personal data when you voluntarily provide it to us through your interactions with us or through your access to our sites. This personal data may include:

• Information that is personal to you, such as name, e-mail address, address, phone number, company/organization name, professional title and, in some cases, gender, age, photograph, and/or pledge eligibility information (which may include giving history or other background information);
• Information that is personal to others such as your family members;
• Any other information you choose to provide (including, but not limited to, at events and engagements, discussed further below, and through member surveys); and
• Information about your internet connection, the equipment you use to access our sites, and usage details.

It is your choice whether you provide us with personal data. However, some personal data must be provided to participate in certain programs, activities, communications, or events, so the decision not to provide information might limit or eliminate such functions of our sites or your ability to participate in such programs, activities, communications or events. Please do not disclose more personal data than is requested.

We may also receive the above categories of personal data about you from other sources to better support the Giving Pledge community and facilitate philanthropic giving, including your company/organization, professional references, publicly available sources, or third-party analytics providers. For example, we may receive your personal data if: someone at your company/organization designates you as a contact person for that company/organization; another member of the Giving Pledge community recommends you as a contact; another visitor includes it in any feedback, comments, photos, videos, or other information submitted via online portals, electronic forms, surveys, interactive portions of our sites, or participates in one of our events.

Data collected at events and engagements

In addition to certain information detailed under “What data we collect about you,” when you register to participate in a Giving Pledge event or other engagement, we may ask you to provide us with the following: dietary or disability-based accommodations, marital status, date of birth, emergency contact information, passport information, frequent flyer number, global entry number, flight information, and other travel-related information or preferences. In addition to the purposes identified below, we may use the information you provide to arrange the following service(s) or carry out the transaction(s) you have requested or authorized: specifically, facilitate your registration and participation in the event, make hotel reservations, facilitate security onsite, support special requests, and provide transportation. We also work with local private airports (FBOs) to facilitate the arrival/departure process. If you are speaking at an event and we reimburse your expenses, we may ask you to provide personal data required to transfer funds to you. Please note, the Giving Pledge will never solicit donations or request any type of administrative or handling charges. If you receive this kind of request, please notify us immediately using the Contact Us Form.

Giving Pledge may engage third party service providers to provide services on its behalf. We will only provide those service providers with the personal data they need to deliver the service. They are required to maintain the confidentiality of such personal data.

Please use our Contact Us Form if you have any questions about why certain data is required.

Interest-based advertising

We may use third-party service providers to serve our content across the Internet. These companies may use tracking technologies to collect information about your visits to our sites and other websites and your interaction with our content and other communications. Some content may be personalized, meaning that they are intended to be relevant to you based on information collected about your visits to our sites and elsewhere over time. Other companies may also use such technology to advertise on our sites.

You have the choice to tell us not to collect and use this information, and in some jurisdictions, we will only engage in interest-based advertising if you opt-in. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices concerning interest-based advertisements, visit:

http://www.networkadvertising.org/choices/

https://www.aboutads.info/choices

In Canada, please visit: http://youradchoices.ca/choices/

In the EU, please visit:  http://www.youronlinechoices.eu/

Data we collect automatically, including cookies, pixels, and similar technologies

We may collect some personal data automatically. For example, when you visit our sites, we may collect your Internet Protocol (“IP”) address, Internet service provider (“ISP”) information, and browser type and language. We also may use cookies, pixels, and similar technologies to collect data about your interaction with our sites, including, for example, referring webpage, pages visited on our sites, and crash data. In addition, we may link the information we collect automatically or the information from any cookie or pixel with the information you provide in other contexts on our sites (newsletters, etc.) to personalize, connect and streamline your experience when visiting our sites. For example, this may include connecting your use of our site from your desktop, mobile, or other device. Please see  Cookies & Similar Technologies  for more information, including how to manage cookies, pixels, and similar technologies.

Special categories of data

We may collect special categories of data under applicable law for one or more specified purposes but only as permitted or required by applicable law. Special categories of data include personal data (a) revealing racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, or trade union membership; or (b) concerning health or data concerning a natural person’s sex life or sexual orientation.

Minors

Our sites are not intended for minors (individuals under the age of 13, or equivalent minimum age depending on jurisdiction), and we do not knowingly collect personal data directly from minors.

How we use your data

Purposes

We may use your personal data to: send you information that you have expressly chosen to receive [with your consent]; review and respond to other information you submit via our sites [for our legitimate interests and/or to perform a contract with you]; administer and inform our program strategies, charitable activities used to support philanthropic giving and assess pledge eligibility [for our legitimate interests]; administer, safeguard, and improve our sites [for our legitimate interests]; protect our rights and the safety of others [for our legitimate interests]; contribute to our archive of information in the public interest [for our legitimate interests]; and/or comply with applicable law, court order, subpoena, or legal process served on us [to comply with legal obligations].

Legal bases under applicable data protection laws

Pursuant to applicable laws we will collect and use your personal data only if we have one or more legal bases for doing so. The legal bases depend on your interaction with us and our sites. This means we collect and use your personal data only where: you have given your consent for one or more specific purposes; it is necessary to perform a contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you; it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests; it is necessary to protect the vital interests of you or another natural person; or it is necessary to comply with a legal obligation. We will indicate the legal basis or bases on which we are relying for each purpose. Where we are relying on consent as the legal basis, we will notify you and seek additional consent before using your personal data for a new purpose that is inconsistent with the original purpose for which we collected it.

When we share your data

Employees, agents, affiliates, service providers, and partners

We may share your personal data with our employees, agents, and affiliates who have a business need to know, our services providers (including contingent workers, consultants, contractors, vendors, and out-sourced service providers) to process it in accordance with applicable law, and with partners that are collaborating with us to fund projects or host events. We do not share your personal data with any third party (including our service providers) for marketing purposes unless you have provided consent for us to do so. If you believe personal data you provided to us is being misused by a third party, please use our Contact Us Form to notify us right away.

Other visitors to our sites

If you submit feedback, comments, photos, videos, or other information to our sites, such submission may be made publicly available to anyone who is authorized to visit those sites. Other visitors may access, re-post, or use such submission. Even if you remove or delete your submission, copies may remain in cached or archived areas of our sites or retained by other visitors.

Law enforcement

We may share your personal data with law enforcement, other government agencies or authorities, or third parties as required by applicable law, court order, subpoena, or legal process served on us.

How we store and protect your data

Storage and transfers

Your personal data may be stored in your region or in any other country where we or our service providers have facilities. We may also allow employees and service providers located around the world to access personal data as provided in this notice. We will ensure your legal rights and protections travel with any such “transfer” of your personal data as required by applicable law. We will also comply with similar applicable laws regarding the storage and transfer of personal data in other jurisdictions where your personal data may be collected or provided.

Storage period

We will store your personal data until it is no longer needed to fulfill the purpose(s) for which it was collected or as otherwise required or permitted by law. After such time, we will either delete or anonymize your personal data or, if this is not possible, we will securely store your personal data and isolate it from any further use until deletion is possible. We may dispose of any data in our discretion without notice, subject to applicable law. Please use our Contact Us Form if you would like more details regarding our retention periods for different categories of personal data.

Data Security

As the transmission of data via the internet is not completely secure, we cannot guarantee the security of your information transmitted to our sites and any such transmission is at your own risk. However, we maintain appropriate technical and organizational measures, including performing regular self-assessments, to prevent unauthorized disclosure of, or access to, personal data. We limit access to personal data and require that employees authorized to access personal data maintain the confidentiality of that data. We hold our service providers to at least the same data privacy and security standards to which we hold ourselves.

How you can access and control your data

Access and control

Generally, newsletters, auto-generated emails, and other communications from us will include links to access, correct, or delete your personal data and to manage any subscriptions directly. If you wish to obtain confirmation that we hold personal data about you, access, correct, or delete your personal data, withdraw any consent you previously provided to us, or object to or restrict our processing of your personal data in any other context, please use our  Contact Us Form. We will respond to all legitimate requests within 30 days.

If you do not wish to receive promotional communications from us, you can opt-out by following the instructions contained in the messages you receive. Even if you opt-out of receiving these promotional communications, we reserve the right to send you certain communications relating to our sites, including administrative messages. We do not offer you the opportunity to opt-out of receiving those communications. For more information about interest-based advertising, including how you can manage advertising, please see above “Interest-based advertising.”

Your Rights and Choices

Under applicable law, you may have specific rights regarding your personal data. This section describes your rights and explains how to exercise those rights. As an overview, you may have the following rights:

• The right to require free of charge (i) confirmation of whether we process your personal data and (ii) access to a copy of the personal data retained;
• The right to request proper rectification, removal or restriction of your personal data;
• Where processing of your personal data is either based on your consent or necessary for the performance of a contract with you and processing is carried out by automated means, the right to receive the personal data concerning you in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format or to have your personal data transmitted directly to another company, where technically feasible (data portability);
• Where the processing of your personal data is based on your consent, the right to withdraw your consent at any time without impact to data processing activities that have taken place before such withdrawal or to any other existing legal justification of the processing activity in question;
• The right not to be subject to any automatic individual decisions which produces legal effects on you or similarly significantly affects you; and
• The right to take legal actions in relation to any breach of your rights regarding the processing of the personal data, as well as to lodge complaints before the competent data protection regulators.

As far as we process your personal data on the basis of our legitimate interests, you can object to processing at any time. You can find a detailed description of our processing activities and the legal basis in the sections above. If you object to such processing, we ask you to state the grounds of your objection in order for us to examine the processing of your personal data and decide whether to adjust the processing accordingly.

Other rights

To the extent provided by applicable laws, you also may have the right to lodge a complaint with the applicable data protection authority. If you reside in South Africa, you have the right to submit a complaint to the Information Regulator here: JD House, 27 Stiemens Street, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2001 or via email at complaints.IR@justice.gov.za.

To exercise any of these rights that you are not able to do directly, please submit your request using our Contact Us Form.

How to contact us

Please use our Contact Us Form for questions, concerns and requests.

GIVING PLEDGE COOKIES & SIMILAR TECHNOLOGIES

This notice describes the different types of cookies and similar technologies we may use in connection with our sites. Unless you have adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies, cookies may be issued when you visit our sites.

We use strictly necessary cookies to make our site work. We and our partners also use additional cookies and similar technologies to collect information when you interact with our site to improve your experience including, to provide you with tailored content, personalized experience, and analyze site usage.

If the site has a “Manage Cookies” button, you can view, change and manage your cookie settings at any time. By clicking “Accept All,” you consent to the placement of these additional cookies and similar technologies.

If the site does not have a “Manage Cookies” button, your continued use of the site represents your consent to the relevant cookies and similar technologies being placed on your computer or device.

For more information, please see “Managing cookies and similar technologies” section below.

Cookies and similar technologies we use

Cookies

Our sites may use cookies, which are small text files stored on your computer or device when you access a website. More information about cookies is available at https://www.aboutcookies.org . We may use cookies to: (1) allow you to use our sites without having to re-enter your user name and password; (2) understand how you engage with our sites and to enhance or personalize your experience, including across devices; (3) monitor our sites’ usage; (4) manage our sites; and (5) improve our sites and services, including providing you with interest-based ads. For more information on our advertising, see above: “Interest-based advertising.”

We may also use web beacons on our sites, in our emails, and in our advertisements on other websites. Web beacons are tiny graphic images that are used to collect information about your visit to our sites, such as the pages you view and the features you use, as well as information about whether you open and/or act upon one of our emails or advertisements. We may also collect the URL of the website you visited immediately before coming to our sites. Web beacons help us analyze our site visitors’ behavior and measure the effectiveness of our sites and our advertising. We may work with service providers that help us track, collect and analyze this information.

Click-through URLs

If you “opt in” to receive newsletters, updates, or other information from us, our emails may use a “click-through URL” linked to content on our sites. When you click one of these URLs, they pass through a separate web server before arriving at the destination page on our sites. We use this click-through data to help us understand how recipients respond to, or interact with, our emails.

Third-party cookies and similar technologies

Third-party analytics services

We use third-party analytics services, including Google Analytics and others, to automatically collect information on how you use our sites. This information does not identify you. We collect this information in order to:

• Better understand our site visitors;
• More efficiently operate our organization;
• Promote our programs and other charitable initiatives; and
• Improve the quality of our sites.

You can learn about Google’s practices by going to https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners . Google Analytics and other third-party analytics services use cookies and similar technologies to collect information about use of our sites and to report website trends to us, without identifying individuals to us. We use this information to see the overall patterns of usage on our sites, help us record any difficulties you have with our sites, and tell us whether our communication efforts are effective. We may also link the information provided by third party analytics services with the information we collect, or you provide in other contexts on our site (newsletters, etc.), to personalize, connect and streamline your experience when visiting our sites.

Social media and video websites

If you choose to share our digital content with friends through social networks or to watch a video posted to a third-party media website (such as YouTube), you may be sent cookies from these third-party websites. We do not control the setting of these cookies, so please check the third-party websites for more information about their cookies and how to manage them.

Managing cookies and similar technologies

Cookies

You do not need to have cookies enabled to browse our sites unless you want us to remember you and your preferences when you return. If you prefer not to allow cookies, most cookies can be managed or blocked through your browser. However, if your browser is set to reject cookies or you manually delete cookies, you may have some trouble accessing and using some of the pages and features that are currently on our sites, or that we may put on our sites in the future. Note that browser-management tools for cookies are outside of our control and we cannot guarantee their effectiveness. More information about managing cookies is available at the following links:

• Adobe Flash
• Android Browser
• Google Chrome
• Internet Explorer
• Mozilla Firefox
• Safari (Desktop)
• Safari (Mobile)

Click-through URLs

If you prefer not to be tracked in this way, please do not click text or graphic links in emails you receive from us.

Third-party analytics services

You can opt out of data collection or use by Google and other third-party analytics services we may use on some of our sites at the following links:

• Adjust: https://www.adjust.com/opt-out 
• AppsFlyer: https://www.appsflyer.com/optout 
• Clicktale: https://www.clicktale.net/disable.html 
• Google Analytics: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout (requires you to install a browser add-on) 
• Kissmetrics: https://kissmetrics.io/privacy 
• Mixpanel: https://mixpanel.com/optout 
• WebTrends: https://ondemand.webtrends.com/support/optout.asp 

Do-not-track requests

There is no standard for how online service should respond to “Do Not Track” signals or other mechanisms that may allow you to opt out of the collection of information across networks of websites and online services. Therefore, we do not honor “Do Not Track” signals. As standards develop, we will revisit this issue and update this notice if our practices change. More information about Do Not Track is available at  https://www.allaboutdnt.com.

The post Privacy & Cookies Notice appeared first on The Giving Pledge.

SEATTLE – April 28, 2011 – Today 10 more of America’s wealthiest families committed to giving the majority of their wealth to philanthropy by taking the Giving Pledge, bringing the total number of pledge signatories to 69. Launched by Warren Buffett and Bill and Melinda Gates in June of last year, the Giving Pledge is a long-term charitable initiative that aims to inspire conversations about philanthropy and increase charitable giving in the United States.

New pledge signatories announced today include Joyce and Bill Cummings, Ray and Barbara Dalio, John Paul DeJoria, Phillip and Patricia Frost, Harold and Sue Ann Hamm, Vinod and Neeru Khosla, Rich and Nancy Kinder, Edward W. and Deedie Potter Rose, Lynn Schusterman, and Annette and Harold Simmons.

“We are seeing great progress in less than a year,” said Warren Buffett, pledge co-founder and chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. “I am delighted that so many wealthy Americans are taking a public pledge that supports philanthropy. The continued energy and passion for this project, and the many philanthropy conversations it has sparked with families from all walks of life, are inspiring. We welcome our 10 new pledgers wholeheartedly.”

“At an early age, my mother shared with me the privilege of giving back and I experienced how good it feels to help someone in need. That stuck with me in my adult life,” said John Paul DeJoria, co-founder of John Paul Mitchell Systems, Patron Spirits Company, John Paul Pet and ROK. “I believe that we all have the responsibility to make the world a better place to live…its part of our rent for being here. My motto is ‘success unshared is failure,’ and that’s something I’ve passed on to my children too.”

Author and philanthropist Kevin Salwen is a firm believer in the power of multi-generational giving. Salwen’s book, “The Power of Half: One Family’s Decision to Stop Taking and Start Giving Back” co-authored with his 18 year-old daughter, Hannah, explores what happened when the family challenged themselves to downsize their lifestyle by half in order to give the remainder to a worthy charity.

“Our family applauds all of the Giving Pledge participants who are stepping out in their generosity,” said Salwen. “We believe that everyone has the ability to share their resources – whether it’s time, talent or treasure – with others on this planet who are in need. Can you think of a better reflection of the word philanthropy, which means love of mankind?”

About the Giving Pledge

The Giving Pledge is an effort to help address society’s most pressing problems by inviting the wealthiest American families and individuals to commit to giving more than half of their wealth to philanthropy or charitable causes. The pledge is a moral commitment to give, not a legal contract, and it does not involve pooling money or supporting a particular set of causes or organizations. While it is specifically focused on billionaires or those who would be billionaires if not for their giving, the idea takes its inspiration from other efforts that encourage and recognize givers of all financial means and backgrounds.

Both Buffett and the Gateses have also recently had conversations with wealthy families and business leaders in China and India, to learn about their philanthropy efforts and what has worked in their communities.

A full list of those taking the pledge and personal letters by many of these pledgers outlining their commitment to give are available online at www.givingpledge.org.

April 2011 Pledge Signatories (by State):

Excerpts from Select Pledge Letters

Joyce and Bill Cummings

Ray and Barbara Dalio

John Paul DeJoria

Harold and Sue Ann Hamm

Rich and Nancy Kinder

Lynn Schusterman

Annette and Harold Simmons

The post 10 more U.S. families commit to the Giving Pledge appeared first on The Giving Pledge.