IFI CLAIMS PATENT SERVICES PRIVACY POLICY

Privacy Notice

This Notice applies to ificlaims.com and related services (“IFI CLAIMS Patent Services”). IFI CLAIMS Patent Services is operated by Fairview Research LLC, doing business as IFI CLAIMS Patent Services (“IFI”, “we” or “us”), with offices at 195 Church Street, 11th Floor, New Haven, CT 06510, United States. IFI is part of Digital Science.

We respect your concerns about privacy and value our relationship with you. This Notice explains what personal data we collect, how we may use and manage it and the rights you may have in relation to such personal data. When we refer to “personal data” in this Notice, we mean information relating to an identified or identifiable individual that we collect and use in connection with “IFI CLAIMS Patent Services;” not aggregate or other anonymized data or information we process on behalf of our customers.

How do we collect and use personal data?

We collect personal data in the following ways:

• Information you provide to us directly online. For example, when you register to use any part of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, complete one of our web forms, subscribe to updates or make a support request, we collect the personal data you provide, like your name, email address and other basic contact details / professional information. We will use this information to enable you to access and use IFI CLAIMS Patent Services or fulfill the request you’ve made. More occasional examples could include where you respond to a survey or enter into a competition.
• Information we collect from your use of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services. When you use IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, we may collect information about that usage and other technical information, such as your IP address, browser type and any referring website addresses. We may combine this automatically collected log information with other information we collect about you and use it to keep a record of our interaction and to enable us to support, personalize and improve IFI CLAIMS Patent Services. We may also collect this type of information using cookies and other similar technologies – please see our cookie settings for further details.
• Information you provide to us in person. For example, when you visit one of our exhibition booths or attend one of our events, you may provide us with your contact details. We will use this information to answer your enquiries or provide other information requested by you.
• Information we collect from our other interactions / business dealings. For example, if you attend a webinar, contact us via social media or otherwise interact with our business, including as a representative of a current / prospective customer, supplier or business partner, we may track and make a record of those interactions, which may contain personal data. If you visit one of our offices, this may be captured on CCTV and used for security reasons; and photographs / videos may be taken at our events and used for promotional purposes, details of which will be available on request at the relevant site.
• Information we collect from third parties or publicly available sources. As part of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, we aggregate publicly available information published by national and international patent authorities which may include personal data - see section entitled “Personal Data in the Data Collection” below. We process and enrich this information, and make it available via IFI CLAIMS Patent Services for use by our clients. We may also collect information you post online (e.g. social media) about us, our products/services and/or our industry, for market research and product improvement purposes.

In all the above cases, where we have a relationship with you, we may also use the personal data we collect to manage and keep a record of that relationship and other business administration purposes you’d reasonably expect and, subject always to your preferences, to provide information we think may be of interest to you.

In many of the above cases, we may also use the information collected to create aggregate or other non-personal data to enable us to benchmark and improve IFI CLAIMS Patent Services and for other analytical / research purposes.

Unless we specifically request it, you should not provide us with any sensitive personal information. If you provide personal data to us about someone else (such as one of your colleagues), please ensure that you have their permission to do so and that they’re aware of the contents of this Notice.

The legal basis for IFI’s use of your personal data

In order to comply with European data privacy laws, we are required to set out the legal bases for our use of your personal data, which are as follows:

• where you have given us your explicit consent, which you can withdraw at any time. For example, we rely on your consent to fulfill specific requests you’ve made, such as to receive our blog emails, or provide information you’ve opted-in to receive;
• where the processing is necessary for the performance of our contract with you, or to enter into such a contract. For example, if you register to use IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, we will need to use your details to set-up and administer your account;
• where the processing is necessary to comply with our legal obligations; or
• the processing is in our legitimate interests, provided these are not overridden by your individual rights. For example, we rely on our legitimate interests:
  • to process personal data contained in the patent information we aggregate, and to make that information available for use by our clients via IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, without (for example) having to manually organize, normalize and standardize the data themselves. By doing so, amongst other things, we contribute to the quality, usability and distribution of this information, for use by others.
  • to contact you when you’ve not previously given us your consent to do so, such as to tell you about things that we think might be of interest to you, or to ask for your feedback or opinion on us or our products/services.
  • to collect publicly available information, such as posts on social media, for market research and product improvement purposes.
  • to create aggregated or other non-personal data from your personal data.
  • to use CCTV on our premises for security reasons.

Who we share your personal data with

We may share your personal data within the Digital Science group on a confidential basis for our internal administrative, billing and other business purposes, including to improve the products and services that may be used by or offered to you, and to fulfill requests that you might have made. We do not generally disclose or share personal data with third parties, except where it’s necessary for legitimate business reasons, such as:

• to the agents, advisers and service providers that assist us in running / we use to administer our business;
• to the subcontractors and service providers* we use to provide and support IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, for example providers of hosting, security and infrastructure services, customer support platforms and third party payment processors;
• if you express interest in an initiative we’re involved in, to other participants in such initiative;
• if required to enable the integration or use of third party resources accessed / used on IFI CLAIMS Patent Services;
• if part of our business is sold to or integrated with another business, to our advisers and any prospective purchasers (and their advisers);
• in such circumstances for which you have given your consent;
• if necessary for the performance of the contract we have with you or in order to enforce any claims we are entitled to;
• if required by law or ordered by a court;
• details of content you have acquired via the Service, to the relevant rightsholder;
• in the case of usage information relating to your access of a version of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services that is paid for by, or co-branded or branded with the name of, another organization, to that organization;
• in the case of already publicly available patent-related information, to users of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services;
• if you register for a webinar or other event, to other attendees and co-organisers of that event.

* We include appropriate confidentiality and security obligations in our contracts with our service providers and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions (not for their own purposes). Such service providers may include: Netsuite, Inc. for billing (USA), Salesforce.com, LLC for customer relationship management (USA), Qualtrics LLC (USA) for product feedback and Google LLC for business operations (USA).

Note, where you are using IFI CLAIMS Patent Services pursuant to an organization’s subscription, that organization may have certain admin rights over your account, including the ability to track your usage; and we will act in accordance with any instructions they may give in respect of such information (if any) they may provide to us about you or which we may collect on their behalf (whose policies – not this policy – will govern how the personal data we process on their behalf is used).

Security and storage

We take appropriate technical and organizational security measures to protect personal data from accidental or unlawful destruction, accidental loss and unauthorized access, destruction, misuse, modification or disclosure, including generally accepted standards designed to protect personal data provided to us, both during transmission and once it is received.

We only keep your personal data for as long as it is necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, after which it will be destroyed, erased or anonymized.

International transfers

IFI’s primary business operations, and much of the IFI CLAIMS Patent Services infrastructure, is based in the United States (“USA”). This means that in order to run our business and provide IFI CLAIMS Patent Services, personal data may be transferred to the USA, as well as to other locations where our affiliates and service providers are based. Whenever we make such transfers, we will ensure an appropriate level of protection is afforded to your personal data, which in the case of personal data originating from the UK or the European Economic Area (EEA) shall involve implementing at least one of the following safeguards:

• making sure the destination country has been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data;
• by using model form contracts that have been officially declared to afford your personal data an appropriate protection;
• relying on an alternative recognized compliance standard for the lawful transfer of personal data.

Please email us at privacy@ificlaims.com if you would like more information about these safeguards.

Marketing and emails

Depending on your preferences, we may contact you about things we think might be of interest to you. Some of these messages may be tailored to you, based on your interests (e.g. previous browsing activity), public profile and posts (e.g. on social media), use of our products/services, public research history and other information we may hold. If you no longer wish to receive such communications, you can click the unsubscribe button. Note, even if you unsubscribe from marketing messages, we may still send you emails about the services you use, such as details of new functionality / changes to legal terms of use.

Use and access of IFI CLAIMS Patent Services database

We aggregate publicly available information published by national and international patent authorities as part of the IFI CLAIMS Patent Services database. All of the patent assignee, applicant and inventor information that are included are published directly by these various patent authorities. We do not have any control over these national or international agencies or the accuracy, content and timeliness of any information these entities publish. If you feel that your personal data has been published improperly, without authorization or consent, or incorrectly, then we encourage you to take that issue up with the appropriate patent authority to ensure that any future update of the IFI CLAIMS Patent Services database will not include improper, inaccurate or expunged personal data related to such data subject.

We will also separately review any data subject request directly, and we may be able to remove your personal data from the IFI CLAIMS Patent Services database.

We may be subject to contractual or legal requirements which prevent us from removing your personal data even after you submit a request. These requirements are imposed on us by the national or international patent agencies. Certain public agencies may permit us to mask your personal data. You may wish to contact the agency where you filed your patent to determine whether this type of option is available to you. We make no guarantees that any such requests you make of us or to the patent agencies will be honored since we have no control over these agencies including their data collection policies and practices.

Cookies

Please see our cookie settings for information on how we collect personal data using cookies and similar technologies.

Your rights

Various data privacy laws give rights to individuals in respect of personal data that organizations hold about them. For example, under European data privacy laws, you may be entitled:

• to request a copy of the personal data that we hold about you;
• to object to the processing of your personal data; or
• to request that your personal data is rectified or deleted, or its processing limited.

To make any requests regarding your personal data, please email us at privacy@ificlaims.com. We will comply with any such requests as required in accordance with applicable law. Please be aware, however, that there are typically a number of limitations to these rights, and there may be circumstances where we’re not able to comply with your request.

Additional information for certain jurisdictions

For additional information relevant to certain jurisdictions about the personal data we collect, how we may use and manage it and the rights you may have in relation to such personal data, please visit this page.

Third party sites

If any part of IFI CLAIMS Patent Service is made available on or through third party websites or other resources, includes links to such resources, or other resources contain links to any part of IFI CLAIMS Patent Service, this is done for convenience only. We recommend that you check the privacy and security policies of such resources as they are not subject to this Notice.

Contact details

If you would like any further information, or have any questions or concerns, regarding your personal data, as a first step, please email us at support@dimensions.ai or write to us at:

• If you’re based in Europe: 4 Crinan Street, London N1 9XW, UK
• If you’re based outside of Europe: 625 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to your local supervisory authority for data protection issues. We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns in the first instance.

Changes to this Notice

We reserve the right to modify or replace this Notice at any time by posting the revised Notice on our website. You are responsible for reviewing any such change each time you access any part of IFI CLAIMS Patent Service.

Last Updated: 21 November 2024