Children's Online Privacy Protection Act
Notice to Parents of Children Under Age 13
Your child has registered to use the Art of Problem Solving (AoPS) website artofproblemsolving.com. As such, the federal Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) requires that we inform you of our practices with regards to our collection, use, or disclosure of your child's personal information, and to obtain your consent prior to collecting, using, or disclosing any such information.
1. Information we have already collected
We have already collected your child's email address, for the sole purpose of contacting you with this notification. We have also asked your child to select a username; however, this username is "inactive" and cannot be used until we receive your consent, as described below.
2. Requirement of parental consent
Your consent (as described in section 5 below) is required before we collect, use, or disclose any personal information from your child, except as noted in item #1 above. We will not collect, use, nor disclose any personal information obtained from your child until we receive your consent.
3. Additional information we may collect and share
Once we have received your consent:
(a) Children may provide us their email address during registration or as part of receiving our services. We may use this email address to communicate directly with the child. If the child joins one of our email lists, their email address will be shared with the third party we use to manage our email lists. We will not otherwise share an email address with a third party except when required by law.
(b) A username used to uniquely identify each child is created during registration. This username may be disclosed on our website, for example in our message boards, online classroom, or any other part of the site on which the child may participate. Other members of the website may use the child's username to directly contact the child (for example, by private message or in online classroom discussions).
(c) We may ask the child to provide his or her real name. The child's name will only be used for internal purposes, or will be disclosed only to third parties to whom the child has given specific authorization, for example a teacher at the child's school who has requested access from the child to view the child's online school reports or a coach overseeing the child’s participation in a contest you have authorized to access your contest results. Such third parties must request permission from us before they request this information from the child, and we make a reasonable effort to determine if the third party has your consent and their request is legitimate before granting such permission. The child's real name will never be made publicly available on our website by us.
(d) Other non-identifying data may be collected in the course of a child's participation on the website; for example, online homework submissions, live classroom discussions, etc. These data may be combined or associated with the child's username, and may be publicly available on the site, at the child's or parent's discretion.
(e) Children using our site may have the opportunity to post personal information about themselves (for example, in a message board post or on a blog or in our online classroom). Such information may be publicly displayed on the website alongside the child's username. We strongly discourage users from sharing personal information, but we cannot prevent it in every instance.
(f) When children use our websites, certain information may automatically be collected by third parties: IP address or mobile identifier, the type of computer operating system, the web browser, the frequency with which the user visits various parts of our sites or applications, and information regarding the online or mobile service provider. This information is collected using technologies such as cookies, which are described above.
This data is primarily collected and shared with third parties for internal purposes, in order to:
- report, in aggregate, how our visitors find and use our website;
- understand overall visitor behavior; and
- inform how we update and improve our website.
(g) Children using our site may participate in contests hosted on the AoPS Contest Platform for a third-party organization responsible for operating the contest (“Contest Organization”). These users are directed to AoPS by the Contest Organization. Information collected for registration in the contest may include your child’s real name, grade, age, parent contact information (e.g., email and address), proctor contact information, and optional gender and ethnicity information. This information will be shared with your child’s contest coach and the Contest Organization.
(h) We may disclose a child’s personal information if permitted or required by law, for example, in response to a court order or a subpoena.
4. Online notice of our information practices
Our information practices regarding children under the age of 13 are available on our website at http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/company/privacy and incorporated herein.
5. Methods of providing consent
You may provide consent for us to collect, use, or disclose your child's personal information as described above, by one of the following methods:
(a) Complete the attached parental permission form, sign, and return to us via one of the following methods:
- scan and send by email to privacy@artofproblemsolving.com, or
- fax to (855) 430-9531, or
- mail to AoPS Incorporated, 15330 Avenue of Science, San Diego CA 92128
(b) Enroll your child in an online class on our website, for which you pay an enrollment fee via credit card, debit card, or PayPal, and at the time of enrollment certify that you are the parent or guardian of the child being enrolled. Such enrollment and certification constitutes implicit parental consent of our collection, use, or disclosure of information from your child, as described above, in accordance with Section 312.5(b)(ii) of Title 16 of the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations.
6. Failure to provide consent
If you do not provide consent as described above within 6 months of receiving this notice, the information that we have already collected from your child (as described in item #1 above) will be permanently deleted.
AoPS Incorporated Parental Permission Form
To comply with the federal Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA):
I, on behalf of myself as the parent (or legal guardian) of the child listed below and the child, affirm I have read and understand the attached "Notice to Parents of Children Under Age 13" (“Notice”) and consent to AoPS Incorporated’s (d/b/a Art of Problem Solving) collection, use and disclosure of my child’s personally identifiable information as described in the Notice and the Privacy Policy, located at: https://artofproblemsolving.com/company/privacy.
Child's username:
Child's email address:
Signed:
Printed parent's name:
Parent's email address:
Parent's phone number:
Please return this signed form to us via one of the following methods:
(1) scan and send by email to privacy@artofproblemsolving.com, or
(2) fax to (855) 430-9531, or
(3) mail to AoPS Incorporated, 15330 Avenue of Science, San Diego CA 92128
You may revoke your consent at any time. If you wish to revoke this consent, please provide written confirmation to us via one of the methods set out above.
