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Date Last Modified: October 28, 2002
Nintendo of America Inc. ("Nintendo") respects the privacy rights of our visitors and is committed to protecting the information we collect about you online. To further this commitment, we have adopted a corporate wide Online Privacy Policy that guides how we collect, use, disclose, and protect the information you provide online to Nintendo. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully before you use any Web sites operated by Nintendo.
This Privacy Policy and the certification seal located to your left confirms that Nintendo is a valid licensee and participating member in the Entertainment Software Rating Board's Privacy Online Program: ESRB Privacy Online. To protect your privacy, we have voluntarily undertaken this privacy initiative and all of our Web sites have been reviewed and certified by ESRB Privacy Online to meet established online information collection and use practices. As part of this privacy program, we are subject to frequent audits of our sites and other enforcement and accountability mechanisms administered independently by the ESRB.
Whenever you visit a Web site that displays the ESRB Privacy Online certification seal, you can expect to be notified of the following:
- Which Web sites are covered by the privacy policy;
- What types of information may be collected and how the information may be used;
- The consequences, if any, if you choose not to provide personal information;
- Whether a company uses cookies, maintains log files, or uses other passive means to collect information;
- Who, if anyone, is collecting your personal information;
- With whom, if anyone, your personal information is shared;
- The company's policy regarding links to third party sites;
- What choices you have with regard to the use of your personal information;
- How you can access, and if necessary, change the personal information that a company collects and maintains;
- Whether and how information is collected from children under 13;
- How a company ensures data security, quality, and integrity; and,
- Where and how to ask questions or file complaints.
This Privacy Policy applies to all Web sites operated by Nintendo. For a list of these Web sites, please click here. In addition, Nintendo owns several other domain names that point to the Web sites listed. From time to time, we will add new Web sites and take reasonable steps to update the list.
Please note that this Privacy Policy applies only to information submitted and collected online through a Nintendo Web site, not to information collected by Nintendo offline. In addition, this Privacy Policy applies only to sites maintained by Nintendo and does not apply to Web sites operated by Nintendo's subsidiaries or independent international distributors (including Nintendo of Canada Ltd.), Nintendo's parent company (Nintendo Co. Ltd.) or Nintendo Co. Ltd.'s other international subsidiaries and distribution partners. Nintendo does not operate the Pokemoncenter.com Web site located at http://www.pokemoncenter.com or the Pokemon.com Web site located at http://www.pokemon.com. When you link to these or any other sites from a Nintendo Web site, this Privacy Policy no longer applies.
Visitors to Nintendo's Web sites from outside of the United States are advised that Nintendo's Privacy Policy is intended to meet the laws and requirements of the United States, which may not necessarily be the same as the laws and regulations of your home country. Nintendo recommends that you NOT provide personal information if you are not a resident of the United States. Any information that you provide to Nintendo online will be treated in accordance with the laws and regulations of the United States.
In order to give you the best experience on our site, Nintendo may collect various types of information about you, including personal, demographic, and aggregate information. Personal information is information that can be directly associated with a specific person such as a user's name, address, telephone number, or e-mail address. Demographic information is anonymous information, which may include age/date of birth, gender, geographic area, hobbies, interests, and favorites. Demographic information is not considered personal information unless it is linked to personal information about a specific user. Aggregate information is data we collect about a group or category of services or users from which individual identities have been removed. In other words, how you use a service may be collected and combined with information about how others use the same service, but no personal information will be included in the resulting data.
Typically, we may ask users to submit personal or demographic information in connection with activities such as registration and login, e-mail newsletters, contests and sweepstakes, E-cards and wish lists, online orders, resumes and media applications, and e-mail correspondence. The types of information requested for each activity and the ways the information may be used are described below.
If you wish to register with us online, you will be asked to create a username and password as well as submit information such as your date of birth, email address, and zip code and country in which you live. We may also ask you for your Nintendo Power Magazine membership number and for demographic information such as your gender. The information submitted to us during this registration process may be used to personalize content or to provide you access to certain members-only areas of our site. For example registered users may have access to exclusive extended stories and information about Nintendo games and other Nintendo products, the Nintendo chat room, bulletin boards and message center (part of the online Nsider community).
The ability to login is available only to those users that have already registered and created a password during an earlier visit to our site. To login, you must submit your username and password. This information is collected so that we can easily retrieve, via a cookie, such things as your shopping cart, saved wishlist, and other preferences.
To subscribe to our e-mail newsletter(s), you must provide the following personal information: date of birth, email address, and -- if you choose to receive regular mail from us -- name, mailing address, and phone number. In addition, we may ask you for demographic information such as your gender, the information you would like to see in our newsletter, the game systems you own, and your favorite game categories. The personal and demographic information you provide us in this process is used to inform you, via our newsletter, about new products, features and enhancements, special offers, upgrade opportunities, and other events of interest.
To enter our online contests and sweepstakes, you may be required to submit personal information such as your name and e-mail address. You may also be asked to give demographic information such as your age and your favorite Nintendo games. If you choose not to be added to our mailing lists, the information you provide will only be used for purposes of the specific contest or sweepstakes that you enter. For more information about our contests or sweepstakes, please see the official contest or sweepstakes rules.
Web users who wish to send an E-card or their wish list to a friend or family member are required to give us their first name and the email address(es) of the person(s) to whom they wish to send the E-card or wish list. After we send the E-card or wish list, we hold outgoing email addresses for a limited time for quality control and network monitoring and security purposes, but we do not store the recipients' email addresses or use them for other purposes.
Visitors purchasing goods and services through our online store will need to provide a valid credit card number, expiration date, and, if applicable, credit card security code, in addition to name, mailing and billing addresses, phone number and e-mail address. Please note that you must be over the age of 18 to place orders online. All financial information is transmitted by SSL protocol via Nintendo's secure server.
Some of our sites allow users to submit personal information in a business capacity (e.g., resumes or applications to enter our Media Only site). Personal information collected in this capacity will be used solely for the purpose specified. For example, resume submissions will be used for the sole purpose of accepting and evaluating candidate applications for job postings.
Nintendo may respond to e-mail correspondence if such correspondence includes a return e-mail address. Because an e-mail address is personal information, Nintendo protects the privacy of the sender by limiting access to these e-mail messages and keeping them in a secure e-mail system. Although most e-mail messages are deleted after we respond, in certain cases hard copies or data from certain e-mail correspondence may be kept on file. Any such copy or data will also be stored in a secure location, and information from these messages will not be used for marketing purposes.
In addition to the uses specified above, we also use your personal and demographic information for our internal marketing and demographic studies, so we can constantly improve the products and services we provide you and to better meet your needs.
In some cases, we may add to or update your personal information with data collected from other sources. For instance, if you mail in a warranty card, we may add information about the product you have purchased to other information about you. In the event we do so, we will take reasonable steps to maintain the integrity and quality of that personal information. If we combine information collected offline with information collected online, the combined information will be treated in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
For each of the activities described above, we only collect and store personal information as needed for our valid business purposes.
If you choose not to submit personal information when requested, you may not be able to participate in certain activities on our site and you may limit the services we can provide you. For example, to access certain areas of our online community and areas reserved for Nintendo Power subscribers, you must first register with us. However, to simply browse our site, you do not need to give us any personal information.
Nintendo uses cookies on some of our Web sites. Cookies are small text files that a Web site places on your hard drive whenever you visit the site. These files identify your computer and record your preferences and other data about your visit so that when you return to the site, the site knows who you are and can personalize your visit. Cookies may be linked to personal information about you. Specifically, Nintendo uses cookies to keep track of your shopping cart and wish lists and to prevent you from having to reenter your registration data (e.g., username and password) at each connection. In addition, we may use the information collected by cookies for other purposes, such as helping us determine how to improve our sites by seeing which areas, features, and products are most popular; personalizing the site and making recommendations based on products you have liked in the past; and completing transactions you have requested.
Most browsers are automatically set to accept cookies. You can disable cookies or set your browser to alert you when cookies are being sent. However, some areas will not function properly if you do so. There are many sources for additional information about Internet cookies, and we encourage anyone concerned about the use of cookies to do more research on the topic so you can make an informed decision about accepting them from any site. As technology advances and cookies provide more functionality, we expect to utilize them in different ways. As we do so, we will update this Privacy Policy to provide you with more information.
Nintendo maintains log files, which contain Internet Protocol ("IP") addresses. An IP address is a numeric address that is assigned to your computer by your Internet Service Provider. We do not link IP addresses to personal information. In general, we only use log files to monitor traffic on our Web sites and to troubleshoot technical problems. In the event of abuse, however, we may block certain IP addresses.
Nintendo uses a common Internet technology called "Web beacons" (a.k.a., "Web bugs," "action tags," "pixel trackers," or "clear GIFs") on some of its sites. Web beacons are small graphic images placed on a Web page, Web-based document, or in an e-mail message that are designed to allow us or a third party to collect certain information and monitor user activity on our sites. Web beacons are invisible to the user because they are typically very small (only 1-by-1 pixel) and the same color as the background of the Web page, document or e-mail message. We do not use Web beacons to collect or to link to personal information. We may use Web beacons to collect non-personal information such as the IP address of the computer that the Web beacon is sent to, the URL of the page the Web user comes from, and the time the Web beacon is activated (such as when you view the Web page, advertisement, or e-mail that contains the Web beacon). We may also use Web beacons to display e-mails in the appropriate HTML or text format. From time to time, we may permit third parties to place Web beacons on our sites or in e-mails sent on our behalf for purposes of collecting the same types of information specified above, but these Web beacons do not collect and are not linked to personal information either. For example, DoubleClick is an online advertising manager that uses Web beacons to help us analyze our advertising campaigns and the general usage patterns of visitors to our Web sites. For more information about DoubleClick, including information about how to opt out of this technology, go to: www.doubleclick.net/us/corporate/privacy.
The information you provide to our Web site is collected by Nintendo or by a third party on our behalf. For example, a company called @Once handles the collection of personal information for our e-mail newsletters, and another company called WebHire does the same for our job postings.
Nintendo does not sell or rent personal information to third parties. We may share personal information with third-party vendors who help us perform various internal functions necessary to operate our business, but we limit the information shared to that which is needed to carry out these functions. For example, the personal information that you submit when subscribing to the Nintendo Power Magazine online is shared with the printer of the Magazine for the sole purpose of addressing and mailing the Magazine to you. Similarly, if you opt-in to receive announcements by regular mail when subscribing to our newsletter, your personal information may be sent to certain third parties that can send out this mail on Nintendo's behalf. Occasionally, Nintendo also uses outside agencies for job recruiting and marketing research, and may provide them with your personal information for those purposes. Nintendo takes reasonable steps to assure that these companies adequately protect the confidentiality, security, and integrity of the personal information we provide them, and that they not use that information for any purpose other than to perform the services we have requested.
From time to time, we are approached by companies and organizations that provide products or services that we believe may be of interest to you, and we may send out notices on behalf of these companies. We will only send out notices on their behalf if you opt-in to receive such notices when subscribing to our newsletter(s). We see this as a value-added service helping you find useful products or services, and we strive to limit use of the information you provide to those offers that we think you would appreciate receiving.
Other than as explained above, we disclose personal information in the good faith belief that we are required to do so by law, or that doing so is reasonably necessary to comply with legal process; respond to any claims; or, to protect the rights, property, or personal safety of Nintendo, our customers, or the public. In addition, information about our customers, including personal information, may be disclosed as part of any merger, sale, transfer of company assets, or acquisition.
You should be aware that while you are on a Nintendo Web site you could be directed to other sites that are operated independently or are beyond our control and for which we are not responsible. Because we cannot guarantee that the privacy policies of these Web sites meet our high standards and the requirements of the ESRB Privacy Online Program, we recommend that you read the privacy policy of the Web site to which you link before you submit any personal information.
If you do not want Nintendo to send you e-mail or regular mail about our products and services, you can opt-out at the time of registration or information collection. If you have opted-in and, at a later date, you wish to have your name removed from our e-mail or regular mail databases, you can log into http://www.nintendo.com and update your preferences in "Communications Central". If you are not a registered member of Nintendo.com and would like to be removed from our mailing list, please send an e-mail to remove@cmail.nintendo.com. Put the word "REMOVE" in the subject line. In the body of the email, please include the name and address of the person you would like removed and the database(s) from which you would like the person to be removed. That way we can ensure that we have all the information needed to remove you from our lists. You may also call (888) 977-7627 or send a fax with your request to (425) 558-7300.
In addition, in every e-mail communication sent to you, Nintendo gives you the opportunity to discontinue receiving that specific form of e-mail (i.e., unsubscribe from a particular newsletter subscription).
As a registered member of Nintendo.com, you may access your personal information by logging in and going to the "My Nintendo" section of the Nintendo.com Web site. Once there, you may view and change your personal information. If you are a parent or guardian and have established parental controls for a child, you can access and change the information and permission settings for that child.
If you are not a registered member of Nintendo.com, access to your personal information is available by contacting us via email at privacypolicy@noa.nintendo.com, by phone at (888) 977-7627, or by fax at (425) 558-7300, and we will review or update your information as appropriate. Please be aware that you will need to provide the updated information to our Online Administrators; to protect your privacy, no information that we have on file will be given out.
Nintendo recognizes a special obligation to protect personal information obtained from young children. As such, we encourage parents and guardians to spend time online with their children, and instruct their children to never give out their real names, addresses or phone numbers, without permission, when using the Internet.
In order for children under 13 years old to participate in online activities that require registration, we require prior written permission from a parent or guardian (opt-in). Please click here to get a copy of our permission form. This form must be signed by the child's parent or guardian and returned to Nintendo by fax at (425) 558-7300 or by mailing it to Nintendo, Online Privacy Policy Administrator, 4820 150th Ave. NE Redmond, WA 98052. Once we have obtained parental consent, we only ask the child for information that is reasonably necessary for the child to participate in our online activities. Parents and guardians are encouraged to become registered members of Nintendo.com after sending in the permission form. By doing so, parents will be able to view information that we have on file, to adjust permission settings as they wish, and to add additional children without having to submit an additional permission form.
A parent who has given Nintendo permission to collect his or her child's information can, at any time, do the following: (1) confirm, correct or have deleted the child's personal information; (2) discontinue further use of the child's information and/or communication with the child; and/or, (3) revoke his or her earlier consent to collect and use the child's information. If you are a registered member of Nintendo.com and have established a parent/child relationship on our site, please login and go to the "Parental Controls" section to view your child's information, update the permission settings, or deactivate the child's account. If you are not a registered member of Nintendo.com, please contact us at privacypolicy@noa.nintendo.com, call (888) 977-7627, or send a fax to (425) 558-7300, and we will review or update your child's information as appropriate. Please be sure to include in your email message or fax the username and password your child used to register.
Nintendo maintains reasonable safeguards in an effort to ensure the security, integrity and privacy of the personal information we collect. We also have implemented reasonable security measures in an effort to protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of the information under our control. Here are some examples of how we safeguard your personal information: (1) personal information collected by Nintendo is stored in secure operating environments that are not available to the public (e.g., locked rooms) and access to that information is limited to employees who need the information to provide you with Nintendo products or services; (2) the Nintendo online store uses industry-standard technology (e.g., encryption) to prevent unauthorized electronic access to sensitive financial information such as your credit card number; and, (3) we take reasonable steps to assure that third parties to whom we transfer data--for such purposes as sending an e-mail announcement on Nintendo's behalf--provide sufficient protection of such personal data.
If you have any questions, complaints or comments regarding our Privacy Policy Statement or practices, please contact the Nintendo Privacy Policy Administrators at (888) 977-7627 or at privacypolicy@noa.nintendo.com.
You can also contact ESRB Privacy Online directly at www.esrb.org or by regular mail at 845 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10022.
We reserve the right to make changes in this policy. If we make such changes, we will post them in this Privacy Policy as well as change the "date last modified" found at the top of this Policy. Please check back from time to time to ensure you are aware of any changes in our privacy practices.
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