Privacy policy

Your privacy is important to us. This privacy statement explains the personal data Business Vision Center (BVC) processes, how BVC processes it, and for what purposes.

BVC offers a wide range of products, including server products used to help operate enterprises worldwide, devices you use in your home, software that students use at school, and services developers use to create and host what’s next. References to BVC products in this statement include BVC services, websites, apps, software, servers, and devices.

Please read the product-specific details in this privacy statement, which provide additional relevant information. This statement applies to the interactions BVC has with you and the BVC products listed below, as well as other BVC products that display this statement.

Personal data we collect

BVC collects data from you, through our interactions with you and through our products. You provide some of this data directly, and we get some of it by collecting data about your interactions, use, and experiences with our products. The data we collect depends on the context of your interactions with BVC and the choices you make, including your privacy settings and the products and features you use. We also obtain data about you from third parties.

If you represent an organization, such as a business or school, that utilizes Enterprise and Developer Products from BVC, please see the Enterprise and developer products section of this privacy statement to learn how we process your data. If you are an end user of a BVC product or a BVC account provided by your organization, please see the Products provided by your organization and the BVC account sections for more information.

You have choices when it comes to the technology you use and the data you share. When we ask you to provide personal data, you can decline. Many of our products require some personal data to provide you with a service. If you choose not to provide data required to provide you with a product or feature, you cannot use that product or feature. Likewise, where we need to collect personal data by law or to enter into or carry out a contract with you, and you do not provide the data, we will not be able to enter into the contract; or if this relates to an existing product you’re using, we may have to suspend or cancel it. We will notify you if this is the case at the time. Where providing the data is optional, and you choose not to share personal data, features like personalization that use such data will not work for you.

How we use personal data

BVC uses the data we collect to provide you with rich, interactive experiences. In particular, we use data to:

Provide our products, which includes updating, securing, and troubleshooting, as well as providing support. It also includes sharing data, when it is required to provide the service or carry out the transactions you request.
Improve and develop our products.
Personalize our products and make recommendations.
Advertise and market to you, which includes sending promotional communications, targeting advertising, and presenting you with relevant offers.

We also use the data to operate our business, which includes analyzing our performance, meeting our legal obligations, developing our workforce, and doing research.

In carrying out these purposes, we combine data we collect from different contexts (for example, from your use of two BVC products) or obtain from third parties to give you a more seamless, consistent, and personalized experience, to make informed business decisions, and for other legitimate purposes.

Our processing of personal data for these purposes includes both automated and manual (human) methods of processing. Our automated methods often are related to and supported by our manual methods. For example, our automated methods include artificial intelligence (AI), which we think of as a set of technologies that enable computers to perceive, learn, reason, and assist in decision-making to solve problems in ways that are similar to what people do. To build, train, and improve the accuracy of our automated methods of processing (including AI), we manually review some of the predictions and inferences produced by the automated methods against the underlying data from which the predictions and inferences were made. For example, we manually review short snippets of voice data that we have taken steps to de-identify to improve our speech recognition technologies. This manual review may be conducted by BVC employees or vendors who are working on BVC’s behalf.

Reasons we share personal data

We share your personal data with your consent or to complete any transaction or provide any product you have requested or authorized. We also share data with BVC-controlled affiliates and subsidiaries; with vendors working on our behalf; when required by law or to respond to legal process; to protect our customers; to protect lives; to maintain the security of our products; and to protect the rights and property of BVC and its customers.

How to access and control your personal data

You can also make choices about the collection and use of your data by BVC. You can control your personal data that BVC has obtained, and exercise your data protection rights, by contacting BVC or using various tools we provide. In some cases, your ability to access or control your personal data will be limited, as required or permitted by applicable law. How you can access or control your personal data will also depend on which products you use. For example, you can:

Control the use of your data for interest-based advertising from BVC by request opt-out option
Choose whether you wish to receive promotional emails, SMS messages, telephone calls, and postal mail from BVC.
Access and clear some of your data through the BVC privacy dashboard.

Not all personal data processed by BVC can be accessed or controlled via the tools above. If you want to access or control personal data processed by BVC that is not available via the tools above or directly through the BVC products you use, you can always contact BVC at the address in the How to contact us section or by using our web form.

We provide aggregate metrics about user requests to exercise their data protection rights via the BVC Privacy Report.

Cookies and similar technologies

Cookies are small text files placed on your device to store data that can be recalled by a web server in the domain that placed the cookie. We use cookies and similar technologies for storing and honoring your preferences and settings, enabling you to sign in, providing interest-based advertising, combating fraud, analyzing how our products perform, and fulfilling other legitimate purposes. BVC apps use additional identifiers, such as the advertising ID in Windows described in the Advertising ID section of this privacy statement, for similar purposes.

We also use “web beacons” to help deliver cookies and gather usage and performance data. Our websites may include web beacons, cookies, or similar technologies from third-party service providers.

You have a variety of tools to control the data collected by cookies, web beacons, and similar technologies. For example, you can use controls in your internet browser to limit how the websites you visit are able to use cookies and to withdraw your consent by clearing or blocking cookies.

Products provided by your organization—notice to end users

If you use a BVC product with an account provided by an organization you are affiliated with, such as your work or school account, that organization can:

Control and administer your BVC product and product account, including controlling privacy-related settings of the product or product account.
Access and process your data, including the interaction data, diagnostic data, and the contents of your communications and files associated with your BVC product and product accounts.

If you lose access to your work or school account (in event of change of employment, for example), you may lose access to products and the content associated with those products, including those you acquired on your own behalf, if you used your work or school account to sign in to such products.

Many BVC products are intended for use by organizations, such as schools and businesses. Please see the Enterprise and developer products section of this privacy statement. If your organization provides you with access to BVC products, your use of the BVC products is subject to your organization's policies, if any. You should direct your privacy inquiries, including any requests to exercise your data protection rights, to your organization’s administrator. When you use social features in BVC products, other users in your network may see some of your activity. To Contact us for more information about the social features and other functionality, please review documentation or help content specific to the BVC product. BVC is not responsible for the privacy or security practices of our customers, which may differ from those set forth in this privacy statement.

When you use a BVC product provided by your organization, BVC’s processing of your personal data in connection with that product is governed by a contract between BVC and your organization. BVC processes your personal data to provide the product to your organization and you, and in some cases for BVC’s business operations related to providing the product as described in the Enterprise and developer products section. As mentioned above, if you have questions about BVC’s processing of your personal data in connection with providing products to your organization, please contact your organization. If you have questions about BVC’s business operations in connection with providing products to your organization as provided in the Product Terms, please contact BVC as described in the How to contact us section. For more information on our business operations, please see the Enterprise and developer products section.

For BVC products provided by your K-12 school, including BVC 365 Education, BVC will:

not collect or use student personal data beyond that needed for authorized educational or school purposes;
not sell or rent student personal data;
not use or share student personal data for advertising or similar commercial purposes, such as behavioural targeting of advertisements to students;
not build a personal profile of a student, other than for supporting authorized educational or school purposes or as authorized by the parent, guardian, or student of appropriate age; and
require that our vendors with whom student personal data is shared to deliver the educational service, if any, are obligated to implement these same commitments for student personal data.

BVC account

With a BVC account, you can sign in to BVC products, as well as those of select BVC partners. Personal data associated with your BVC account includes credentials, name and contact data, payment data, device and usage data, your contacts, information about your activities, and your interests and favorites. Signing in to your BVC account enables personalization and consistent experiences across products and devices, permits you to use cloud data storage, allows you to make payments using payment instruments stored in your BVC account, and enables other features.

There are three types of BVC account:

When you create your own BVC account tied to your personal email address, we refer to that account as a personal BVC account.
When you or your organization (such as an employer or your school) create your BVC account tied to your email address provided by that organization, we refer to that account as a work or school account.
When you or your service provider (such as a cable or internet service provider) create your BVC account tied to your email address with your service provider’s domain, we refer to that account as a third-party account.

If you sign into a service offered by a third party with your BVC account, you will share with that third party the account data required by that service.

Collection of data from children

When a BVC product collects age, and there is an age in your jurisdiction under which parental consent or authorization is required to use the product, the product will either block users under that age or will ask them to provide consent or authorization from a parent or guardian before they can use it. We will not knowingly ask children under that age to provide more data than is required to provide for the product.

Once parental consent or authorization is granted, the child's account is treated much like any other account. The child can access communication services. Contact us for more information about parental consent and BVC child accounts.

Parents or guardians can change or revoke the consent choices previously made, and review, edit, or request the deletion of the personal data of the children for whom they provided consent or authorization. As the organizer of a BVC family group, the parent or guardian can manage a child’s information and settings on their Family Safety page and view and delete a child’s data on their privacy dashboard.

Other important privacy information

Below you will find additional privacy information, such as how we secure your data, where we process your data, and how long we retain your data. You can find more information on BVC and our commitment to protecting your privacy at BVC Privacy.

Product-specific details:

Enterprise and developer products

Enterprise and Developer Products are BVC products and related software offered to and designed primarily for use by organizations and developers. They include:

Cloud services referred to as Online Services in the Product Terms,
Other enterprise and developer tools and cloud-based services
Server, developer, and hybrid cloud platform products
Appliances and hardware are used for storage infrastructure,
Professional services referred to in the Product Terms that are available with Enterprise Online Services, such as onboarding services, data migration services, data science services, or services to supplement existing features in the Enterprise Online Services.

In the event of a conflict between this BVC privacy statement and the terms of any agreement(s) between a customer and BVC for Enterprise and Developer Products, the terms of those agreement(s) will control.

You can also Contact us for more information about our Enterprise and Developer Products’ features and settings, including choices that impact your privacy or your end users’ privacy, in product documentation.

If any of the terms below are not defined in this Privacy Statement or the Product Terms, they have the definitions below.

General. When a customer tries, purchases, uses, or subscribes to Enterprise and Developer Products, or obtains support for or professional services with such products, BVC receives data from you and collects and generates data to provide the service (including improving, securing, and updating the service), conduct our business operations, and communicate with the customer. For example:

When a customer engages with a BVC sales representative, we collect the customer’s name and contact data, along with information about the customer’s organization, to support that engagement.
When a customer interacts with a BVC support professional, we collect device and usage data or error reports to diagnose and resolve problems.
When a customer pays for products, we collect contact and payment data to process the payment.
When BVC sends communications to a customer, we use data to personalize the content of the communication.
When a customer engages with BVC for professional services, we collect the name and contact data of the customer’s designated point of contact and use information provided by the customer to perform the services that the customer has requested.

The Enterprise and Developer Products enable you to purchase, subscribe to, or use other products and online services from BVC or third parties with different privacy practices, and those other products and online services are governed by their respective privacy statements and policies.

Productivity and communications products

Productivity and communications products are applications, software, and services you can use to create, store, and share documents, as well as communicate with others.

Business Vision Center