In general, you can visit GDF on the Internet without telling us who you are and without giving any personal information about yourself. There are times, however, when we or our partners may need information from you.

You may choose to give us personal information in a variety of situations. For example, you may want to give us information, such as your name and address or e-mail id, to correspond with you, to process an order, or to provide you with a subscription. You may give us your credit card details to buy something from us or a description of your education and work experience in connection with a job opening at GDF that you wish to be considered for. We intend to let you know how we will use such information before we collect it from you; if you tell us that you do not want us to use this information to make further contact with you beyond fulfilling your requests, we will respect your wishes. If you give us personal information about somebody else, such as a spouse or work colleague, we will assume that you have their permission to do so.

The following paragraphs describe in more detail how GDF may use your personal information and with whom we may share it. Depending on the type of GDF Web site you are visiting, one or more of the paragraphs may apply. For example, if you order a product from an GDF Web site, your information will be handled as described in such paragraphs as Fulfilling Your Transaction Request and Marketing Use.

If you request something from an GDF Web site, for example, a product or service, a callback, or specific marketing materials, we will use the information you provide to fulfill your request. To help us do this, we may share information, with others, for instance, other parts of GDF, GDF's Business Partners, financial institutions, shipping companies, postal or government authorities (for example, Customs authorities) involved in fulfillment. In connection with a transaction we may also contact you as part of our customer satisfaction surveys or for market research purposes.

The information you provide to GDF on certain GDF Web sites may also be used by GDF and selected third parties for marketing purposes. Before we use it, however, we will offer you the opportunity to choose whether or not to have your information used in this way.

If you participate in an GDF discussion forum or chat room, you should be aware that the information you provide there will be made broadly available to others, potentially inside or outside GDF, who have access to that discussion forum or chat room. Also, please recognize that individual forums and chat rooms may have additional rules and conditions. Each participant's opinion on a forum or chat room is his or her own and should not be considered as reflecting the opinion of GDF.

We intend to protect your personal information and to maintain its quality. We implement appropriate measures and processes, such as using encryption when transmitting certain sensitive information, to help us to keep your information secure and to maintain its quality.

From time to time we may supplement information you give us via an GDF Web site with information from other sources, such as information validating your address or other available information about businesses. This is to help us maintain the accuracy of the information we collect and to help us provide a better service.

We sometimes collect non-identifiable information from visits to our Web sites to help us provide better customer service. For example, we keep track of the domains from which people visit, and we also measure visitor activity on GDF Web sites, but we do so in ways that keep the information non-identifiable. This information is sometimes known as "clickstream data." GDF or others on GDF's behalf may use this data to analyze trends and statistics and to help us provide better customer service.

Also, when we collect personal data from you in a transaction, we may extract some information about that transaction in an non-identifiable format and combine it with other non-identifiable information such as clickstream data. This information is used and analyzed only at an aggregate level to help us understand trends and patterns. This information is not reviewed at an individual level. If you do not want your transaction details used in this manner you can disable your cookies.

We collect the information we mentioned in the previous paragraphs through the use of various technologies, including one called "cookies". A cookie is a piece of data that a Web site can send to your browser, which may then be stored on your computer as an anonymous tag that identifies your computer but not you. Some GDF pages use cookies, sent by GDF or its third party vendors, or other technologies to better serve you when you return to the Web site. You can set your browser to notify you before you receive a cookie, giving you the chance to decide whether to accept it. You can also set your browser to turn off cookies. If you do so, however, some Web sites may not work properly.