HEART FAILURE CHAT PRIVACY POLICY ABSTRACT: Your privacy is very important to HeartFailureChat.com. While we gather information about our users to help provide the best service possible, we adhere to strict policies to safeguard your privacy at all times. This page states, in plain language, our privacy policy, so that there may be no misunderstandings about what information we gather, and why we gather it.

When you register an account with HeartFailureChat, you will have access to a preferences page which allows you to provide various information, including including your email address. All information you submit on this page, with the exception of your "username" and your "user profile," is completely confidential. We will never give or sell your email address to any third party. We will never reveal your address to other users.

HeartFailureChat uses standard web logfiles, which automatically record all requests made of the HeartFailureChat.com servers. Such information includes I.P. addresses, the HeartFailureChat.com pages requested, the type of browser you use, etc. We study these data in aggregate in order to try to understand our customers' preferences better and to improve our site.

Your preferences page has an area we call the "user profile" where you may voluntarily provide information about yourself. The purpose of this feature is to introduce yourself to other members. You are not obligated to write anything in this area. Whatever information you volunteer in your "user profile" will be visible to all other members of the site.

We caution against including your email address in your user profile, because email-harvesting spiders (a.k.a. "spambots") may extract your email from this page for the purpose of sending you junk email.

"Cookies" are small files of data that reside on your computer and allow us to recognize you. If your browser accepts cookies, you will receive a HeartFailureChat.com cookie the first time you visit our site. This cookie allows us to customize the site's behavior and appearance to fit your tastes. We do not use the cookie for any other purpose. You are able to erase your cookie at any time by visiting the sign-out page which will wipe out our HeartFailureChat cookie until you choose to sign-in again.

HeartFailureChat.com is proud to maintain a decorum suitable for mature children. However, when a child under age 13 registers with HeartFailureChat.com, we suggest that a parent is present to prevent the child from inadvertently volunteering sensitive information.

HeartFailureChat allows you to identify and interest in certain pages ("Favorites") and certain users ("Friends"). These decisions are not confidential, and will be publically visable. If that bothers you, then do not avail yourself of these features.

HeartFailureChat will never ask you for your password, your credit card, or any other sensitive information via email nor via Heart-to-Heart Mail. If you receive a message apparently from us requesting sensitive information, it is a forgery. In such an event, we suggest you do not reply to the email, but instead forward it to heart@heartfailurechat.com for investigation.