Here's a breakdown of what information we collect and store about you and why and how we might process it. Newgrounds is an American company, all data processing takes part in the U.S. "Site" is in most cases a reference to newgrounds.com where used below.
Personal Information - User Accounts
All user accounts, as a bare minimum, store your email address. You create a username unique to Newgrounds.
You are able to enter further information, such as your first and last name, although this is not publicly available on the site UNLESS you enable the option to display it publicly.
Most further information is not required UNLESS you enter into one of our revenue programs, at which point we collect your full name and postal address, together with any information required for taxation purposes.
You are able to enter other publicly available information via your public profile page and can change or withdraw this information at any time.
Information Sharing
We do not share your personal information with any third parties, with the exception of any direct and credible requests from enforcement agencies in order to comply with any law, regulation or legal process. In rare cases, we may also volunteer your information to law enforcement agencies if we receive a subpoena or feel you or actions you make on Newgrounds pose a risk to us or to others.
We may share information you have provided publicly in order to promote work you have done, or to publicize something you have participated in. For example, if you have uploaded a game, animation, piece of art or audio, we may promote that work. Similarly, if you have written an interesting blog article, we may choose to talk about that publicly in our own news posts.
You may opt in or out of email subscriptions at any time via your email subscriptions page.
Cookie Policy
We use cookies to store login tokens and minimal information that helps us identify progress or preferences across the site. For example, the forums store a timestamp of when you last visited. When you return to the site at a later date, the cookie containing that timestamp is used to identify new posts that you might not have read.
Older flash based games may store flash cookies on your computer to save your game progress, preferences or high scores.
Newer games may also store some of their resources on third party websites. You may be asked to create accounts outside of Newgrounds to enhance your experience when playing these games. You should familiarize yourself with the privacy policies of those websites if you choose to sign up to services of this type.
None of the data collected through web beacons, cookies, Flash cookies or web log data provides us with any personal information about you. We use this data on an aggregated basis to analyze how our users are interacting with the site and to customize your experience. If you are logged in to the site, we could associate information about your site usage that is collected by cookies with your user account. However, we don't do this on an individual basis other than in cases of suspected abuse or illegal behavior.
On the web, you can opt out of participating companies by visiting the following sites:
http://optout.networkadvertising.org/
To opt out of CPMStar's tracking cookies please visit this address:
http://server.cpmstar.com/optout.aspx
IP Addresses
We collect your IP address in areas like registration, sign ins and any information you might post on the site (like forum posts). This helps us distinguish between users, find common patterns in our moderation systems and to give us an idea as to whether or not multiple account names might actually belong to the same person.
If you're a registered user, IP Addresses are also used to show you rough location estimates in your account login section, so you can potentially spot any suspicious activity on your account. We also use IP Addresses for non logged in users to display content that they may not have already seen.
Device Information
We collect generic information about the device you're using on Newgrounds in order to determine how best to serve the content to you. For example, if you are using a mobile device, we will attempt to render a mobile version of the site for you wherever possible. Again, logged in users will see these devices in the logged in sessions section of their account.
Security
We follow industry standards to store and protect data we collect and utilize encryption where appropriate.
Retention
We retain any personal information you have included in your account for as long as you have an account with us. We may retain information like IP address logs indefinitely to help us better understand patterns across the site or as a partial means of identifying return problematic users.
If you have unpublished or deleted a project you created on Newgrounds, files related to that project may continue to exist on our servers for as long as your account continues to exist. If you ever have a specific file that needs removal from our servers, contact support@newgrounds.com with an explanation and link to the file.
Data may persist in copies made for backup purposes beyond an initial account deletion.
Children
Our services are for people aged 13 and over and we do not knowingly allow or collection information from children under the age of 13. If you are a parent or guardian of a child under the age of 13 and believe he or she has disclosed personal information, please contact us via support@newgrounds.com.
Anyone under the age of 18 must have explicit consent from a parent or guardian to use Newgrounds. If you are under 18, we also ask that you not include any personal information in your user profile (such as your name or city) or in your posts on the site.
This site DOES NOT MEET the Online Privacy Protection Act guidelines. Whilst we make efforts to provide age guidelines for content, this site has links that are unsuitable for children.
Third Party Advertising
We outsource advertising space on the site to third party companies. They may collect their own information about you based on your IP address and the equipment you are using to view the website, but we do not disclose any of your personal details with these advertisers.
Third Party Resources
Some of the site's assets are hosted elsewhere. We use a content delivery network from cloudflare.com, hosted libraries from jquery.com and fontawesome.com.
Links to External Sites
This privacy policy is only applicable to Newgrounds and we are not responsible for the actions or policies of any other websites we link to.
Additional Information for California Residents
This section provides information organized in accordance with the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) for residents of California about how we handle certain personal information we have collected over the past 12 months.
Categories of Personal Information. This Privacy Policy discloses the categories of personal information that we collect, use, and disclose in order to operate our business over the past 12 months.
Collect. This Privacy Policy discloses the categories of personal information that we collect, which include your account and profile information, your content, your communications with us, information about your activity on Newgrounds, and how you engage with Newgrounds.
Use. This Privacy Policy discloses that the categories of personal information we collect are used to provide our services, for personalization, to comply with law, and to prevent misuse of Newgrounds.
Disclose. The section above entitled Information Sharing discloses how we share your information.
We do not share or sell your personal information to third parties. As described in our Cookie Policy, we may work with third parties such as advertisers to serve ads on Newgrounds. These third parties may use cookies, JavaScript, web beacons (including clear GIFs), Flash LSOs and other tracking technologies to measure the effectiveness of their ads and to personalize advertising content to you. Options to opt out are available above in the Cookie Policy.
Requests for Deletion, Copy and Right to Know Your Information. California consumers have the right to make the following requests, which we endeavor to honor from non-California residents as well:
Deletion. You have the right to request deletion of personal information that we have collected about you.
Copy and Right to Know. You have the right to request a copy of the specific pieces of personal information that we have collected about you over the past 12 months, however the only information we have that is not available under your profile and account options would be your IP address(es).
Designated Agent. You may designate an agent to make a request on your behalf. That agent must have access to your account in order for us to verify the request.
You can also submit a deletion, copy and right to know request by emailing us at support@newgrounds.com. You will need access to the email account associated with your Newgrounds account in order to verify your identity and complete this process.
Non-Discrimination. Newgrounds will not discriminate against you, including by denying or providing a different level or quality of goods or services should you choose to exercise your options under the CCPA.
Your California Privacy Rights under California’s Shine-the-Light Law. California law permits users who are California residents to request and obtain from us once a year, free of charge, a list of the third parties to whom we have disclosed their personal information (if any) for their direct marketing purposes in the prior calendar year, as well as the types of personal information disclosed to those parties. If you are a California resident and would like to request this information, please submit your request in an email to support@newgrounds.com. Spoiler alert: We aren't sharing your information with any third parties.
Changes To This Policy
We may periodically revise or update this privacy policy at any time without prior notice. Please return to this page regularly to keep up to date, particularly before providing any further personal information to us.
Contacting Us
If you have any questions about this privacy policy, the practices of this site, or your dealings with this Web site, please contact us at support@newgrounds.com.