I was watching this documentary online from Dutch television, which is English. It was of Terms and Conditions we agree with, privacy policies we agree with and often aren't even aware yet. As I have followed a marketing course, I was not too surprised social media and search engines distribute information to third parties. However, it made me wonder about Second Life nonetheless. Alas, I thought I would share it would you guys here!

The documentary I spoke of can be found here: http://www.uitzendinggemist.nl/afleveringen/1373500

The Privacy Policy can be found here:

http://lindenlab.com/privacy

1. Types of Information We Collect

We collect two basic types of information personal information and anonymous information and we may use personal and anonymous information to create a third type of information, aggregate information. Personal Information means information that identifies (whether directly or indirectly) a particular individual, such as the individuals first and last name, postal address, e-mail address and/or telephone number. Anonymous Information means information that does not directly or indirectly identify, and cannot reasonably be used to identify, an individual (including an individuals computing device). Aggregate Information means information about groups or categories of individuals which does not identify and cannot reasonably be used to identify an individual. We may share Aggregate and Anonymous Information with other parties without restriction.

We collect the following categories of information:

• Registration information you provide when you create an account, which may include your first name and surname, country of residence, gender, date of birth, e-mail address, username and password.
• Transaction information you provide when you request information or purchase a product or service from us, whether on our sites or through our applications, including your postal address, telephone number and payment information. If you conduct transactions (for instance, on Second Lifes LindeX), we may collect and retain some or all of the information related to these transactions, including transaction amount(s), parties involved, time and manner of exchange, and other transaction circumstances.
• Information you provide in public forums on our Service. Please note that our sites and applications may offer chat, forums, community environments (including multiplayer gameplay) or other tools that do not have a restricted audience. If you provide Personal Information when you use any of these features, that Personal Information may be publicly posted and otherwise disclosed without limitation as to its use by us or by a third party. We have no obligation to keep private personally identifiable information that you have made available to other users or the public using these functions. To request removal of your Personal Information from a public forum on one of our sites or applications, please contact Customer Support .
• Information sent either one-to-one or within a limited group using our message, chat, post or similar functionality, where we are permitted by law to collect this information.
• Information you provide to us when you use our sites and applications, our applications on third-party sites or platforms (such as social networking sites), or link your profile from a third-party site or platform to your registered account.
• Location information when you visit our sites or use our applications, including location information either provided by a mobile device interacting with one of our sites or applications, or associated with your IP address, where we are permitted by law to process this information.
• Usage, viewing and technical data, including your device identifier or IP address, when you visit our sites, use our applications on third-party sites or platforms, or open e-mails that we send.

Additionally there are a few special circumstances to note:

• Intellectual Property Claim Notices: If you notify us of an intellectual property claim, the information in your claim notice may be shared with other parties to the disagreement or third parties in our discretion and as required by law.
• Beta Service User: If you volunteer to serve as a beta participant for our pre-commercial content, we may track bug reports and individual system performance in an effort to test our technology rigorously before it is deployed.
• Former Customer: If you discontinue your use of our Service, we may keep your registration file in our database for use in the event that you elect to renew your use of our Service, as well as for anti-fraud and other such protective measures.
• Job Postings or Unsolicited Communications: Please note that information we receive in reference to a job posting or by unsolicited communications does not fall within the terms outlined in this Privacy Policy, however information from your resume will be used solely for the purpose of evaluating your candidacy for employment.

2. How We Collect Your Information

We collect information you provide to us when you request products, services or information from us, register with us, participate in public forums or other activities on our sites and applications, respond to customer inquiries or surveys, or otherwise interact with us.

• We collect information through technology, such as cookies and other technologies (such as web beacons and pixel tags), including when you visit our sites and applications or use our applications on third-party sites or platforms. A cookie is a small string of data which often includes an anonymous unique identifier sent to your Internet browser from a websites computers, which is stored on your computers hard drive and is used to customize your use of a product or online site, keep records of your access to an online site or product, or store information needed by you on a regular basis (e.g. password retention functionality). Linden Lab (itself or through third parties acting on our behalf) use cookies for a number of purposes relating to our websites, applications and services, including to access your account information where you login to our websites, forums or other areas and to keep track of your website session data. You can configure your browser to accept all cookies, reject all cookies, or notify you when a cookie is set. Each browser is different, so consult the Help menu of your browser to learn how you change your cookie preferences. Please note that if you reject all cookies, you may not be able to use certain of our (or other companies) web pages.
• We participate in ad and/or affiliate networks operated by various third party companies. These companies collect and may use certain anonymous information about your visits to our Service as a function of referring Internet traffic to our Service. We do not permit these companies to collect any Personal Information about you; however these companies may collect your IP address. These companies may set and use cookies, web beacons, pixels and other technologies to collect anonymous information about your visits to our Service, and may otherwise aggregate, analyze and anonymize that data. If you would like to learn more about these specialized advertising technologies, the Network Advertising Initiative offers useful information about Internet advertising companies, including information about how to opt-out of certain information collection.
• We acquire information from other trusted sources to update or supplement the information you provided or we collected automatically. Local law may require that you authorize the third party to share your information with us before we can acquire it.

Please keep in mind that when you provide information to us on a third-party site or platform (for example, through our applications), the information you provide may be separately collected by the third-party site or platform. The information we collect is covered by this Privacy Policy and the information that the third-party site or platform collects is subject to the third-party site or platforms privacy practices. Privacy choices you have made on the third-party site or platform will not apply to our use of the information we have collected directly through our applications.

3. Use of Your Information by Linden Lab

Linden Research, Inc. (itself or in the capacity of a data processor for Linden Research UK, Ltd.)(collectively, Linden Lab) will be the data controller for your information. Linden Lab may have access to your information where it performs services on behalf of the data controller(s)(as a data processor) and, unless prohibited under applicable law, for use on its own behalf (as a data controller) for the following purposes:

• Provide you with the products and services you request
• Communicate with you about your account or transactions with us and send you information about features on our sites and applications or changes to our policies
• Consistent with local law and choices and controls that may be available to you:
  • Send you offers and promotions for our products and services or, as permitted, third-party products and services
  • Personalize content and experiences on our sites and applications
  • Provide you with advertising based on your activity on our sites and applications and on third-party sites and applications.
• Optimize or improve our products, services and operations
• Detect, investigate and prevent activities that may violate our policies or be illegal

Except under certain limited circumstances as set forth here and in our Terms of Service , Linden Lab does not disclose to third parties the Personal Information or other account-related information that you provide to us without your permission. You understand, however, that Linden Lab may disclose your Personal Information or other account-related information under the following circumstances:

• If we believe in good faith that such disclosure is necessary under applicable law, or to comply with legal process served on Linden Lab;
• In order to protect and defend the rights or interests of Linden Lab, its products and services, and/or the other users of such products and services;
• In order to report to law enforcement authorities, or assist in their investigation of suspected illegal or wrongful activity, or to report any instance in which we believe a person may be in danger;
• To service providers with whom we have contracted to assist us with the features or operations (such as anti-fraud functions, billing, collections, registration, customer support, e-mail delivery, age verification, or Second Lifes LindeX operations), to fulfill your service requests, offer new content or help us improve our products and/or services. Our contracts with these third parties prohibit them from using any of your Personal Information for purposes unrelated to the product or services they are providing;
• To other third parties (a) to provide you with services you have requested, (b) to offer you information about our products or services (e.g. events or features), or (c) to whom you explicitly ask us to send your information (or about whom you are otherwise explicitly notified and consent to when using a specific service). For instance, we may provide certain information to our payment processor, to credit card associations, banks or issuers (if you are using a credit card), to PayPal (if you are using a PayPal account), or to providers of other services you request. If you choose to use these third parties products or services, then their use of your information is governed by their privacy policies. You should evaluate the practices of third party providers before deciding to use their services; and
• To other business entities, should we plan to merge with or be acquired by that business entity.

4. Sharing Your Information with Other Companies

We will not share your Personal Information outside of Linden Lab except in limited circumstances, including:

• When you allow us to share your Personal Information with another company, such as:
  • Directing us to share your Personal Information with third-party sites or platforms, such as social networking sites
  • Please note that once we share your Personal Information with another company, the information received by the other company becomes subject to the other companys privacy practices.
• When companies perform services on our behalf; however, these companies are prohibited from using your Personal Information for purposes other than those requested by us or required by law.
• When we share Personal Information with third parties in connection with the sale of a business, to enforce our Terms of Service or rules, to ensure the safety and security of our users and third parties, to comply with legal process or in other cases if we believe in good faith that disclosure is required by law.

5. Your Controls and Choices

We provide you with the ability to exercise certain controls and choices regarding our collection, use and sharing of your information. In accordance with local law, your controls and choices may include:

• You may correct, update and/or delete your account registration
• You may change your choices for subscriptions, newsletters and alerts
• You may choose whether to receive offers and promotions from us for our products and services, or products and services that we think may be of interest to you
• You may choose whether to share your Personal Information with other companies so they can send you offers and promotions about their products and services
• You may choose whether to receive targeted advertising from many ad networks, data exchanges, marketing analytics and other service providers by following the directions set forth above in Section 2
• You may request access to the Personal Information we hold about you and that we amend or delete it and we request third parties with whom we have shared such information to do the same

You may exercise your controls and choices, or request access to your Personal Information, by modifying your selections at http://lindenmktg.p0.com/resubscribe.jsp , following instructions provided in communications we send to you, or sending correspondence regarding the publications or services you no longer wish to receive from us to the following address:

Linden Lab Privacy Policy
Attention: Opt-Out Administrator
945 Battery Street
San Francisco, CA 94111

Please be aware that if you do not allow us to collect Personal Information from you, we may not be able to deliver certain products and services to you, and some of our services may not be able to take account of your interests and preferences.

6. Childrens Privacy

We recognize the need to provide further privacy protections with respect to Personal Information that we may collect from children on our sites and applications. Some of the features on our sites and applications are not directed towards children, and we do not knowingly collect Personal Information from children in connection with those features. When we direct certain sites, products or services toward children and intend to collect Personal Information from children, we take additional steps to protect their privacy, including:

• Notifying parents (including guardians) about our information practices with regard to children, including the types of Personal Information we may collect from children, the uses to which we may put that information, and whether and with whom we may share that information;
• In accordance with applicable law, obtaining parental consent for the collection, disclosure or use of Personal Information from their children, or for sending information about our products and services directly to their children;
• Limiting our collection of Personal Information from children to no more than is reasonably necessary to participate in an online activity; and
• Giving parents access or the ability to request access to Personal Information we have collected from their children and the ability to request that such Personal Information be changed or deleted. At any time a parent may request that we cease to collect further Personal Information from their child or request that any Personal Information that we have collected be changed or deleted from our records, in accordance with applicable law, by sending an e-mail to our Customer Support team.

In some instances, certain portions of our Service may allow children to submit Personal Information (such as their name and/or the childs or his or her parents e-mail address) without first obtaining their parents consent. For example, we may collect online contact information from a child for the purpose of:

• Obtaining parental consent and/or providing the childs parent with any information regarding their childs use of our Service, as required by law;
• Responding directly to a specific request from the child on a one-time basis (for instance, in response to a customer support inquiry);
• Responding directly more than once to a specific request from the child (for instance, to receive a newsletter or in-game communication from us), provided that in such case (i) we will use reasonable efforts to notify the childs parent (e.g. via e-mail) of such ongoing communications with the child promptly after our initial response to the child and before making any subsequent responses to the child, and (ii) the childs parent shall have the right to refuse further contact with the child and require the deletion of Personal Information about or collected from the child by contacting our Customer Support team;
• Protecting the safety of a child participant on our Service, provided that we have used reasonable efforts to provide notice to the childs parent (e.g. via e-mail). If the parent fails to respond to such notice, we may use such online contact information for the purpose stated therein; and
• Protecting the security or integrity of our Service, to take precautions against liability, to respond to judicial process or to the extent permitted under other provisions of applicable laws, to provide information to law enforcement agencies or for an investigation on a matter related to public safety, to the extent reasonably necessary to do so.

Parents are encouraged to spend time online with their children and to become familiar with the types of content available through our Service and on the Internet in general. Parents should regularly oversee their childs use of e-mail and other online communications and transactional features. Control tools are available from online services and software manufacturers that can help to provide a safe online environment for children. If your child has used your credit card in connection with our Service without your permission, please contact our Customer Support team immediately.

7. Data Transfers, Storage and Processing Globally

We operate globally and may transfer your Personal Information to individual companies of Linden Research, Inc. or third parties in locations around the world for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy. Whenever your Personal Information is transferred, stored or processed by us, we will take reasonable steps to safeguard the privacy of your Personal Information in accordance with applicable law.

8. Changes to this Privacy Policy

From time to time, we may change this Privacy Policy to accommodate new technologies, industry practices, regulatory requirements or for other purposes. We will provide notice to you if these changes are material and, where required by applicable law, we will obtain your consent.

9. Comments and Questions

If you have a comment or question about this Privacy Policy or our privacy practices, please send an e-mail to privacy@lindenlab.com or write us:

Privacy Rights
Linden Lab
945 Battery Street
San Francisco, CA 94111

Notice to California Residents:

If you are a California resident, California Civil Code Section 1798.83 permits you to request information regarding the disclosure of your Personal Information by Linden Lab to third parties for the third parties direct marketing purposes. With respect to these entities, this Privacy Policy applies only to their activities within the State of California. To make such a request, please send an e-mail to privacy@lindenlab.com or write us at the address listed immediately above.

updated by @marielouise-harcourt: 06 Oct 2016 06:24:13AM

Probably even more money to be made here, than collecting tier..

I don't know about that, or WHAT kind of data LL could exactly collect that could be useful for commercial purposes. Though, they did recently introduced SLshare, permitting you to directly share on facebook. (A netwok which openly sells to third parties)

Maybe what you buy .. adds you click on. Although I must say what is offered up in a search on the MP would appear to be random.

I heard some discussions on SL's groups recently about the terms of service, something about how they can use your uploaded mesh as they want, but I didn't followed them, so I don't remember. There was even a meeting that would happen in the Rose Theater.

Perhaps that refers to section 2.3 of the Terms of Service? I didn't read that, nor did I ever know that!

Except as otherwise described in any Additional Terms (such as a contests official rules) which will govern the submission of your User Content, you hereby grant to Linden Lab, and you agree to grant to Linden Lab, the non-exclusive, unrestricted, unconditional, unlimited, worldwide, irrevocable, perpetual, and cost-free right and license to use, copy, record, distribute, reproduce, disclose, sell, re-sell, sublicense (through multiple levels), modify, display, publicly perform, transmit, publish, broadcast, translate, make derivative works of, and otherwise exploit in any manner whatsoever, all or any portion of your User Content (and derivative works thereof), for any purpose whatsoever in all formats, on or through any media, software, formula, or medium now known or hereafter developed, and with any technology or devices now known or hereafter developed, and to advertise, market, and promote the same. You agree that the license includes the right to copy, analyze and use any of your Content as Linden Lab may deem necessary or desirable for purposes of debugging, testing, or providing support or development services in connection with the Service and future improvements to the Service. The license granted in this Section 2.3 is referred to as the "Service Content License."

There are quite a few discussions about this including Second Life license change implies they can resell your content from SLU if you want to follow up on it.

I take everything I read with a grain of salt

--
Proprietress of Tatiana's Tea Room ~ Owner of the Provence Coeur Estate ~ Webmistress of this site

I have a rather simplistic view of Privacy Policies.

I operate under the assumption that anything I put on the Internet will never die and has the potential to be distributed i.e.once I've hit the Enter key that information is out of my control no matter what a current Privacy Policy might say.

This mean's that I'm usually pretty careful about information sharing and I try towalk a balanced line that gives me the benefits of Social Media etc. without inviting too much personal risk.

Companies are always changing their Privacy Policies which makes it really hard to keep up. Add to that the possibility that personalinformation can be distributed by mistake (I include hacking in this) and you come back to the conclusion that it's best just to be cautious up front.

In an odd way it kind of makes me impervious to LL Privacy Policy Changes so though I keep an eye on them I don't really worry about them too much.

--
Proprietress of Tatiana's Tea Room ~ Owner of the Provence Coeur Estate ~ Webmistress of this site

Well the fact they claim rights to things uploaded I can understand nor would it really matter, but with mesh.. 3D Modeling is a serious industry for people. Thank you for sharing, Tatiana.

I don't think LL intends to use any of this nefariously; most of this probably is legalese for "I can take pictures of your beautiful sim and use it for advertising for Second Life."

But - similar convos are taking place among users of google products, and Facebook - all of whom do use data from their users for targeted marketing, selling that data to other merchants, or giving it to the government when asked.

As much as we like to pretend otherwise, SL, FB, and "the google" are none public forums. This is their sandbox, and we just get to play in it.

I don't think LL intends to use any of this nefariously; most of this probably is legalese for "I can take pictures of your beautiful sim and use it for advertising for Second Life."

Don't you just love the word "nefarious"? I do!! In fact it was mentioned on this week's episode of Elementary .

Back on topic, I agree with Phantom Republic but unfortunately the LL TOS change has resulted in some sites that provide material used to create SL content withdrawing their use in SL. For example:

[CG ]Textures] - Textures for 3D, graphic design and Photoshop!

6th
September 2013: Terms of Service update, using our images in Second Life is no longer allowed.

Why am I no longer allowed to use your images in
Second Life?
On the 15th of August 2013, Linden Labs changed their Terms of Use without any announcement or warning. One of the changes is the rights that Linden Labs claims when you upload your work.

We'll see how/if LL actually responds to this.

--
Proprietress of Tatiana's Tea Room ~ Owner of the Provence Coeur Estate ~ Webmistress of this site

Second Life Terms of Service Community Meeting October, 2013

--
Proprietress of Tatiana's Tea Room ~ Owner of the Provence Coeur Estate ~ Webmistress of this site

No I didnt.

Thanks for this, Tatiana.

--
Antiquity Hedgewitch

Latest developments in the ToS issue: Peter Gray responds to the UCCSL

--
Proprietress of Tatiana's Tea Room ~ Owner of the Provence Coeur Estate ~ Webmistress of this site