Your privacy on the Internet is of the utmost importance to us. Because we gather certain types of information about the users of Ardent Citylink Services's network of sites and services, we feel you should fully understand the terms and conditions surrounding the capture and use of that information. This privacy statement discloses what information we gather, how we use it, and how to correct or change it.
Ardent Citylink Services gathers three types of information about users: data that users provide through optional, voluntary registrations on several of our sites and in certain contests; and data Ardent Citylink Services gathers through aggregating tracking information derived mainly by tallying page views throughout our sites and click through on our newsletters. Such information enables us to better tailor our content to readers' needs and to help our advertisers better understand the demographics of our audience. Because Ardent Citylink Services derives its revenue mainly from advertising, providing such aggregated demographic data is essential to keeping our service free to users. The only situation in which Ardent Citylink Services divulges information about an individual user to a third party is with certain contests and sweepstakes--and then, only with the user's express consent.
Ardent Citylink Services gathers user information in the following processes:
Several Ardent Citylink Services sites offer free, voluntary registration to users: HamaraShehar.com, MeraShehar.com, ApnaShehar.com and HamaraShahar.com. By registering, users can take advantage of personalization (the ability to select content and look and feel according to a user-supplied profile).
During registration the user is required to supply a title, username, password, first name, last name/ surname and email address and optionally answer questions about mother tongue, current location they are living, geographical time zone. The user has the option to subscribe to electronic newsletters.
Several Ardent Citylink Services sites offer interactive polls to users so they can easily share their opinions with other users and see what the Ardent Citylink Services audience thinks about important issues. Ardent Citylink Services uses a system to "tag" users after they have voted, so they can vote only once on a particular question. This tag is not correlated with information about individual users.
In order to post messages in Discussion Groups, users must register as specified in ‘Optional Registration’ section, (free of charge), although they need not register to visit the site. When they post a message, their full name is displayed in the Discussion Groups.
All the Ardent Citylink Services sites offer a free electronic newsletter to users. Ardent Citylink Services gathers the email addresses of users who voluntarily subscribe from the ‘Personalise’ page. Users may remove themselves from this mailing list through the ‘Personalise’ page.
Ardent Citylink Services delivers newsletters, marketing and product offerings via email to only registered recipients from our subscription center. The email tracking system recognizes the URL that was clicked, and records some information about you and your computer, such as the email address that you provided to us, the browser, operating system and IP address.
While aggregate counts of click through behaviour are provided to advertisers, an advertiser will never know that a specific user clicked their ad. Ardent Citylink Services does not target advertising against specific user information. Ardent Citylink Services will not provide specific user information to any third party company.
A reader can choose to electronically forward a news story to someone else by clicking the link at the top of that story. The user must provide their email address, as well as that of the recipient. This information is used only in the case of transmission errors and, of course, to let the recipient know who sent the story. The information is not used for any other purpose.
Occasionally Ardent Citylink Services conducts user surveys to better target our content to our audience. We sometimes share the aggregated demographic information in these surveys with our advertisers and partners. We never share any of this information about specific individuals with any third party.
Ardent Citylink Services offers contests and sweepstakes in which we request certain personal information. At a minimum, the required information includes name and email address; in some cases, the user must answer mandatory survey questions about a range of other personal data. The information gathered in the entry form is used to verify the entrant's identity, to send the entrant an email notification that their entry has been received, and to contact winners and/or prize recipients. There are two situations in which Ardent Citylink Services will divulge this information to a third party--provided the user gives express consent:
Because the rules and terms of each contest can vary, all information about each contest is clearly posted during the event. All contests are conducted in full accordance with Indian central and state laws.
Ardent Citylink Services tracks user traffic patterns throughout all of our sites. Ardent Citylink Services sometimes tracks and catalogs the search terms that users enter, but this tracking is never associated with individual users.
Ardent Citylink Services do NOT use cookies at this time.
Registration: when you register, Ardent Citylink Services uses a computer algorithm to generate a user ID. We use this ID to identify you in our database and to track the pages you visit on our site. We encrypt the user ID for added security.
Ardent Citylink Services uses any information voluntarily given by our users to enhance their experience in our network of sites, whether to provide interactive or personalized elements on the sites or to better prepare future content based on the interests of our users.
Ardent Citylink Services uses the above-described information to tailor our content to suit your needs and help our advertisers better understand our audience's demographics. This is essential to keeping our service free. We do not share information about individual users with any third party. Ardent Citylink Services does not control the practices of our advertisers. If you have questions about how one of our advertisers uses information about you when you click their ad and go to their content, please contact them directly. (Ardent Citylink Services will divulge information only as necessary to comply with state and central laws.)
Ardent Citylink Services gives users options wherever necessary and practical. Such choices include:
Ardent Citylink Services offers users the ability to correct or change the information collected during registration for any site (see above). The instructions for doing this can be found in our ‘Personalise’ page which displays after a user successfully signs-in. Users may change this information at any time and as often as necessary. Users who are experiencing problems or who have any questions about how our services work can contact us at [email protected].
Users may unsubscribe to any of our electronic newsletters at any time by following the instructions contained at the end of every newsletter.
Currently, Ardent Citylink Services does not offer users a means by which to completely delete personal information established at the time of registration for any site.