PRIVACY STATEMENT

The Consumer Opinion Center (“COC”) respects your concerns about privacy. This Privacy Statement describes the types of personal information we collect on consumeropinioncenter.com (the “Site”), how we use the information and with whom we may share it. We also describe the measures we take to safeguard the information and how to contact us about our privacy practices.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT

When you visit our Site, you may choose to provide us with personal information, such as:

• Contact information (ex: name, address, telephone number and email address)
• Identifiers such as an online ID, account name, or participant ID
• Demographic information (ex: age, gender, marital status, date of birth, race/ethnicity, employment status, name of employer, education level, income level, car ownership, food allergies, menthol allergies, tobacco usage, and product preferences)
• Login credentials (ex: username and password)
• Inferences about preferences, tobacco usage, and product usage
• Communication preferences
• Prior engagement or activities with COC
• Other personal information you choose to submit on the Site

In addition, when you visit the Site, we may obtain certain information by automated means, such as cookies and web beacons. The information collected in this manner may include IP addresses, dates and times of visits, duration of visits, specific pages visited, referring site, operating system type, browser type, domain and other system settings.

“Cookies” are text files that websites send to a visitor’s computer or other Internet-connected device to uniquely identify the visitor’s browser or to store information or settings in the browser. A “web beacon,” also known as an Internet tag, pixel tag or clear GIF, links web pages to web servers and their cookies and may be used to transmit information collected through cookies back to a web server. Your browser may tell you how to be notified when you receive certain types of cookies or how to restrict or disable certain types of cookies. Please note, however, that without cookies you may not be able to use all of the features of our website.

We may use third-party web analytics services on our Site, such as those of Google Analytics. This service provider uses technologies, such as cookies and web beacons, to help us analyze how users use the Site and which links they clicked on to arrive at the Site. The information collected by the cookies and web beacons (including your IP address) will be disclosed to this service provider, who uses the information to evaluate your use of the Site. To learn about opting out of Google Analytics, you may visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.

HOW WE USE THE INFORMATION WE OBTAIN

We may use the information you provide to:

• Create and manage your online profile and participant account
• Send you notifications or other communications, and administer your participation in, special events, programs, surveys, contests, sweepstakes, and other offers or promotions
• Verify your identity, age and eligibility for studies
• Issue participation incentive payments and tax reporting documentation
• Provide tax reporting documentation to the Internal Revenue Service
• Manage our participant information databases
• Operate, evaluate and improve our business
• Comply with applicable legal requirements, industry standards and our own policies and terms

We may use information collected through automated means for purposes such as (i) customizing our users’ visits to the Site, (ii) delivering content tailored to our users’ interests and the manner in which our users browse our Site and (iii) managing our Site and other aspects of our business.

DISCLOSURE OF INFORMATION

We may disclose all the information we collect about you. We generally disclose your information with companies who need it in order to provide us a service—such as verifying your age, analyzing survey results, communicating with you, or handling any research stipends. We also may disclose your information with others as legally required, such as providing details to the Internal Revenue Service on payments we provide you. Sometimes we may disclose your information or for other purposes we find in our business interests—such as defending ourselves against legal claims,

YOUR CHOICES

We offer you certain choices about how we communicate with you and what information we obtain from you. To update your information, ask us to remove you from our mailing lists, or submit a request, please contact us as indicated in the “How to Contact Us” section of this Privacy Statement.

HOW WE PROTECT PERSONAL INFORMATION

We maintain administrative, technical and physical safeguards designed to protect the personal information you provide on our Site against accidental, unlawful or unauthorized destruction, loss, alteration, access, disclosure or use.

LINKS TO OTHER WEBSITES

Our Site may contain links to other websites for your convenience and information. These websites may be operated by companies not affiliated with us. Linked websites, including those operated by COC or Altria Group, may have their own privacy policies or notices, which we strongly suggest you review if you visit any linked websites. We are not responsible for the content of any websites that we do not control, any use of those websites, or the privacy practices of those websites.

UPDATES TO OUR PRIVACY STATEMENT

This Privacy Statement may be updated periodically and without prior notice to you to reflect changes in our personal information practices or relevant laws. We will post a notice on the Site to notify you of any significant changes to our Privacy Statement and indicate at the bottom of the Privacy Statement when it was most recently updated.

HOW TO CONTACT US

If you have any questions or comments about this Privacy Statement, please contact us by email at info@consumeropinioncenter.com or by phone at 1-800-9267-COC (1-800-926-7262).

You also may write to us at:

Consumer Opinion Center
9750 West Broad Street
Glen Allen, VA 23060

Effective Date:  January 1, 2023