Legal Info: Privacy Policy Statement

We at Crosswinds are committed to protecting your on-line privacy.

Please read the following policy to understand how your personal information will be treated as you make full use of our many offerings.

This page will explain:


About Cookies and how they are used

As part of offering and providing customizable and personalized services, Crosswinds uses cookies to store and sometimes track information about you. A cookie is a small amount of data that is sent to your browser from a web server and stored on your computer's hard drive in a text file called "cookie.txt". All sites on Crosswinds where you are prompted to, require that you accept cookies.

We use cookies to:

  1. Estimate our visitors. When a browser accesses Crosswinds it is given a unique cookie which may then be used to determine if the surfer is a registered Member or visitor, and how often the surfer returns to see us. It is also used to help target advertisements based on member preferences.
  2. Tell us who you are and to access your preferences in order to give you a more personalized service. Cookies are set when you register, login, and are modified when you logout of your account or leave our site.
  3. Keep track of your progress and number of entries in some promotions, sweepstakes and contests.
  4. Measure traffic patterns, based on which areas of Crosswinds are most visited, and enables us to develop or modify the area to serve better content and experiences.
  5. Advertising networks that serve ads onto Crosswinds may also use their own cookies.
Crosswinds also collects IP addresses for administration purposes. In addition, Crosswinds Mail/CWMail includes IP addresses in outgoing mail message headers.

What personal information is collected from you

Crosswinds collects information in several ways:

  1. Some personal information is gathered when you sign up for your account. During the signup process, Crosswinds asks for your name, alternate email address, birth date, gender, address, zip/postal code, and personal interests.
  2. The more (accurate) information you volunteer when you join us, the easier it is for us to customize your personal Crosswinds experience. This information allows us to provide you with more suitable content for your interests, and you are able to take full advantage of Crosswinds' many programs and offerings.
  3. In addition to registration we may ask you for personal information at other times, including (but not limited to) when you enter a sweepstakes, contest or promotion sponsored by Crosswinds and/or our many partners; and when you submit a listing for a web site. If you contact Crosswinds we may keep a record of that correspondence. Crosswinds also occasionally asks Members to complete surveys that we use for service research.
How does Crosswinds use my information?

Crosswinds' main goal is to provide you, the Member, with a content-appropriate and interesting experience. In order to provide free services to our Members, we display advertisements. By knowing a little about you, including your preferences, Crosswinds is able to deliver interesting advertisements and content, which makes your on-line experience with Crosswinds that much better.

Advertisers give us an advertisement and tell us the type of audience they want to reach. Crosswinds takes the advertisement and displays it to Members meeting that criteria. The advertiser never has access to your account information. Only Crosswinds has access to Member's accounts. This kind of advertisement targeting is done with ads as well as promotional email. You will only receive special offers via email from Crosswinds if you have indicated in your account preferences that you would like to receive them. Member newsletters are delivered to all Members of Crosswinds, and are the only correspondence that you may not opt-out of.

Crosswinds does research on our Members' demographics, interests, and behavior based on the information provided to us upon signup, during a promotion, or from our server log files. We do this to better understand and serve our Members.

Who is collecting information?

When you are on a Crosswinds site and are asked for personal information, you are sharing that information with Crosswinds alone, unless we specifically state otherwise. At times we may introduce a "co-branded" service or promotion to you in conjunction with a sponsor or partner company, and at that time it may be necessary for us to share your personal information with the sponsor or partner. If you do not want your data to be shared, you can choose not to allow the transfer by not using that particular service or participate in that promotion.

Please be aware that Crosswinds advertisers or web sites that have links on our site may collect personal information about you. The information gathering practices of those web sites are not covered by this privacy statement.

With whom does Crosswinds share my information?

As a rule, Crosswinds will not disclose any of your information except when we have your permission or under special circumstances, when required by law, or under the events described below.

What are my choices regarding my information?

Crosswinds may occasionally send you email regarding our products and services. In addition, if you indicated upon registration that you are interested in receiving offers or information from Crosswinds and our partners, we may send you e-mail about products and services that we feel may be of interest to you from time to time. Only Crosswinds (or agents working on behalf of Crosswinds and under confidentiality agreements) will send you these direct mailings and only if you indicated that you do not object to these offers. If you do not want to receive such mailings, simply tell us when you give us your personal information. Please note that the Member Newsletter is a mandatory part of your Membership agreement, as stated in the Terms of Service.

You do have choices with respect to cookies. By modifying your browser preferences, you have the option to:

If you choose to reject all cookies you will be unable to use those Crosswinds services that require registration in order to participate. This includes the secure transactions for paid Crosswinds services.

Crosswinds does not sell or rent Member information to anyone. If you do not wish to have your information shared with a sponsor or partner company, you simply do not participate in that promotion or service. By participating in the above, you are granting Crosswinds permission to share your information with the sponsor or partner company.

What is Crosswinds' policy on allowing me to update, revise, or delete my account information?

You may edit your Crosswinds Account Information at any time by logging into your Crosswinds account, and clicking on "Account Setup". If you have forgotten your password, please click here to contact our helpdesk. Depending on when you signed up for your account, the Help Desk personnel may need to ask you some verifying questions before giving you your password. Please note that your IP address and other identifying attributes will be recorded for security reasons when requesting passwords. This is to protect our Members from external vandalism.

What security precautions are in place to protect my information?

Your Crosswinds Account is protected by a password you assign to it, so that only you have access to this personal information. You may edit your Information, including your password, by logging into your account using your Crosswinds Membername and password.

We highly suggest that you do not give your password to anyone. Crosswinds will never ask you for your password for any reason, and we do not require it to review or administer your account. Remember to log out of your Crosswinds account when you have finished working, and shut your browser off. This is especially important in the case of a shared or publicly accessible computer.

Crosswinds is a global service, and has members all over the world. When you give Crosswinds personal information, that information may be sent to servers outside of the country where you originally entered the information, such as to Canada or other countries. In addition, that information may be used, stored and processed outside of the country where you entered that information. Whenever Crosswinds handles personal information as described above, regardless of where this occurs, Crosswinds takes steps to ensure that your information is treated securely and in accordance with the Terms of Service and this Privacy Policy.

No data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed 100% secure. So while we strive to protect your personal information, Crosswinds cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us or from our on-line products or services, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your transmission, we make our best effort to ensure its security on our servers.

What else should I know about my privacy?

Please keep in mind that whenever you voluntarily disclose personal information on-line in guestbooks, message boards, through email, in chat, by entering contests, posting a contact reference on your website, etc. - that information can be collected and used by others. In short, if you post personal information on-line that is accessible to the public, you may receive unsolicited messages that are completely beyond Crosswinds' control and responsibility.

Ultimately, Members are solely responsible for their actions when on-line, and for keeping their passwords, and all other personal information private.

This policy may change periodically and without notice.