Privacy Policy for Witherite Law Group

The Witherite Law Group, PLLC (“WLG”) takes client communication seriously. We strive to facilitate the communication between legal consumers and legal professionals. Legal service professionals may include our affiliates, attorneys, paralegals, case managers, intake specialists and even Chatbots. Consumer acknowledges that the communication between legal consumers and Witherite legal professionals or their affiliates may be recorded. Consumer acknowledges that communication may include but is not limited to telephone calls or text messages and may include prerecorded audio or telephonic messages. The consumer represents and warrants that the contact information you have provided to us is your contact information. You agree that the Witherite Law Group, PLLC, and its affiliates may communicate with you based upon the information that you have provided to us (including, but not limited to telephonic communication, or other electronic or digital communication to the extent permitted by law).

This Privacy Policy ("Privacy Policy") explains what information WLG collects when you use our Services, as well as ways we might use or share it and your legal rights regarding our use of your information. We are committed to protecting the privacy of our users. This Policy doesn’t apply to practices of companies that we do not own or control, including other companies you might interact with on or through WLG services.

Unless indicated otherwise, our Policy applies to information collected on the websites located at http://witheritelaw.com, http://1800TruckWreck.com, http://1800-Car-Wreck.com, any additional website that WLG owns, maintains or links to this Policy, including websites, mobile software applications that have been made available for download (each, an "App", and together, the "Apps") and any related websites or other online properties or offerings owned or controlled by WLG or a related entity, or collected by us in connection to the services that we provide (together with the Apps, the "Services").

General Information

When we say "WLG" (or “WLG”, "we", "us" and "our") we’re referring to Witherite Law Group, PLLC, including any of its affiliates or subsidiaries. We’re a law firm headquartered in Dallas, Texas. For the purposes of EU data protection law, WLG is a controller of personal data processed in the context of the Services.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT AND USE

When we provide the Services, we collect or receive personal information in a few different ways. In many cases, you can choose what information to provide, although some information is required in order to use WLG and for us to provide the Services to you. We use your information for the purposes described below:

We collect a variety of information from you when you provide it to us directly or when you tell us to get it from a third party source. The particular kinds of information we gather usually depend on how you interact with us. For example:

  • We collect basic account information such as your email address, phone number, username and password. We need this information to create your account and it helps secure and provide access to our Services. We also obtain or infer demographic information. If you use Facebook or Google to register for or log in to the Services (or later connect your accounts), you authorize Facebook or Google, as the case may be, to share your personal information with us, including your email address, age and publicly available information about you and your Facebook friends, if you use Facebook for signup.
  • Similarly, if you access the Services with another third party social network we will collect information that you have agreed to make available, such as your name, user ID/URL, profile picture, age, list of friends, email address and/or phone number, and/or your birthday, language selected, and/or geolocation.
  • We collect additional profile information about you when you upload a picture, or add your interests, hobbies, content, music genre, skills, talents, followers and what you love.
  • We gather information from the actions you take to recommend, create, communicate and share content. This includes messages you send, information about the content you create yourself, the people you follow, the interests and hobbies you mark as favorites, follow or share, competition you follow, create or join, content you vote for, users you tag, and the comments you post. In addition, we track social interactions in our Apps (e.g. what you post to, what you vote for (likes), and your comments and invites).
  • If you send us support requests or comments, you may also provide us with additional information to enable us to contact you and address your feedback and we may retain such information to enhance our Services and to respond to you.
  • Forums, message boards, blogs and/or news groups may be available to you through the Services. Please remember that any information you post (including in these areas) may become public information and may be removed or addressed if in violation of our Terms of Service. We use publicly available information to help provide our Services. If you post personal information online that is accessible to the public, you may receive unsolicited responses. You should exercise caution when deciding to disclose any of your personal information in a public forum, including within our applications, as it may be misused or abused by third parties.
  • When you participate in in-app purchases, you provide our payment processor with your payment information. We currently use third parties to process such payments but may change that in the future.
  • To be clear, we don’t ask you to provide us with any sensitive personal information, such as information relating to your race or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, membership of a trade union, physical or mental health, genetic or biometric information, sexual life or sexual orientation. However, if you decide to share this kind of information on WLG Services, you explicitly consent to us displaying it or sharing it in accordance with your selection.

We collect information from your browser, computer, or mobile device, which provide us with technical information when you use the Services, including:

  • When you use the Services, we automatically collect certain log data, including your IP address, browser type, hardware type, unique device ID, the version of your operating system and your activity within the Services. We use log data for security purposes (such as preventing content from being improperly accessed) and to improve our Services (such as enhancing site performance in certain regions).
  • We receive device identifiers like Apple’s IDFA, IDFV and Google’s AdID. These are principally used for online advertising and marketing purposes.
  • We access geo-location information from your mobile device. This helps us share where you are in the world, provide locations to your posts and content, and display local activities and content based on your current location. It also helps us to send you relevant messages based on where you live. You can control the collection of geo-location information through your device.
  • A cookie is a small piece of data stored by your web browser on your computer or mobile device. We use cookies, which deposit small data files stored on your computer or mobile device, and other similar technologies like software development kits ("SDKs") or third-party libraries. We use cookies to distinguish you, identify your interests and your account and its status and settings, to collect usage data, keep track of your preferences and deliver content specific to your interests. Our advertising partners may use cookies and similar technologies to identify and deliver content and advertising specific to your interests, to track the effectiveness of such advertising and to provide and analyzes their services. You can configure your browser to reject cookies. By using our Services, you consent to our, and our advertising partners use of cookies and related technologies, and the sharing of data with our advertising partners. You can withdraw your consent to our use of cookies using your browser settings or your device’s limit ad tracking settings. Note, this could disable features or functionality of the Services. You may also be able to control the use of cookies via industry websites or through other functionality which we may have available from time to time.

GOOGLE ANALYTICS

We may use third party analytics tools. We currently use Google Analytics, in order to collect information sent to your browser or mobile device. For more information regarding how Google Analytics collects, uses and shares your information please see http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners. As a consumer you can also opt out of Google Analytics by visiting http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en. WLG reserves the right to use other third-party analytics tools.

HOW WE USE YOUR INFORMATION

We use the information we have to help us provide, operate, improve, understand, customize, support, and market our Services.

  • In order to register for a WLG account, we need certain information. We may use your email address and/or phone number to send you information about the Services, provide customer support or to notify you of additional WLG products and services, where permitted by applicable law. You may use your account settings to unsubscribe from notifications from WLG.
  • We may use the information we collect to evaluate your legal needs and determine your need for legal services.
  • We may use the information to provide you with the legal services that you request.
  • We may use information from one WLG App to improve your experience in other Apps: we seek to integrate our Services.
  • We collect information to learn about your use of the Service and to enhance your social experience when using the Services, such as friend-to-friend interaction and notifications, chat, or messaging functionality, public leader boards, head-to-head competition and other similar features. We try to show you social content that we think will be of most interest to you.
  • We try to continuously improve our Services and your experience. As part of this, we use the data we have to identify ways to make our Services better and more engaging for our users. We use your interactions on the Services, along with the other data described in this policy, to infer your interests. We do this to identify and suggest content that you may like and to tailor advertising, including off-site advertising.
  • We may use the information to enforce our Terms of Service and this Privacy Policy.
  • We use data to identify and respond to potential risks to our users and Services (e.g., spammers, phishing attempts, screen scraping, bullying and other violations of our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines).
  • We may use the information to protect our rights, the security of our business, on-line services, users, affiliates and business partners.
  • We may use the information to hire, evaluate and recruit employees.
  • In limited situations, we share de-identified content and information with researchers for educational research purposes.
  • If you provide us with your list of friends on a third party social network or a mobile device, your friends on such network can automatically follow you when you use the Services and your WLG account can be automatically configured to follow your friends. You can, however, unfollow any other user on WLG at any time.
  • We promote our Services via customized advertising on third party sites. We may use your information to target advertising; including to design advertising campaigns designed to reach individuals with similar profiles to existing WLG users.
  • We may use your information for customer relationship management (CRM) purposes, including for targeting email and other engagement campaigns.
  • We sometimes conduct or sponsor surveys and contests. Participation in surveys and contests is completely voluntary. If you elect to participate, we may ask you for contact, demographic, and other information and may ask you to agree to additional terms and conditions.
  • We use log data, such as device identifiers, to recognize you and / or your devices across different WLG applications. We do so to provide you with seamless access to another WLG application by identifying you and making your content available on both applications.
  • We may use the information to comply with applicable law, regulations.

INFORMATION YOU AND WE SHARE

You share your information as you use and communicate through our Services, and we share your information to help us operate, provide, improve, understand, customize, support, and market our Services.

  • Account Information. Your phone number, profile name and photo, bio, status, last seen status, and receipts may be available to anyone who uses our Services, although you can configure your settings to manage whether certain information is available to other users and businesses with whom you communicate.
  • WLG may share, at your direction or with your permission, your Personal Information with other law firms and/or other lawyers where we jointly represent a client and when we refer cases or potential cases to other counsel, or as otherwise required in connection with our legal representation of you. Personal Information provided pursuant to an attorney/client relationship may not be shared with third parties except as is done with such precautions to preserve the confidentiality of such information and any attorney/client privilege as may attach to such information.
  • Your Contacts and Others. Users and businesses with whom you communicate may store or re-share your information (including your messages) with others on and off our Services.
  • We may share information about you or your use of the Services with our advertisers and third party advertising partners. This means that we may give our advertisers information about the characteristics of our users, along with sharing certain identifiers and/or location information, but we do not specifically identify you by name or share your contact information. Third parties can use this data to deliver targeted advertisements that they believe will be of most interest to you or to assess the effectiveness and reach of advertising campaigns.
  • We may share your information with entities related to WLG (including, but not limited to 1800TruckWreck, LLC, KDC, LLC, Eberstein & Witherite, LLP, WLG Atlanta, LLC, any entity whether disclosed or not that is owned in whole or part by Amy Witherite).
  • We work with Google Analytics which collects information such as how often users visit our website, what pages they visit when they do so, and what other sites they used prior to coming to the website. You may opt-out of Google Analytics tracking with the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on.
  • Third-Party Service Providers. We work with third-party service providers to help us operate, provide, improve, understand, customize, support, and market our Services. When we share your information with third-party service providers, we require them to use your information on our behalf in accordance with our instructions and terms.
  • Any information in your public profile (e.g., your username and any profile image, location or additional information that you provide as part of your Public Profile, but not your phone number, or email address) will be accessible by other users of the Services. Content that you create through or upload to the Services will by default be public and available to users of the Services.
  • We may publicly disclose aggregated statistics (like what musical genres are popular in a certain city).
  • We may preserve and disclose your information if we believe in good faith that we are required to do so in connection with any legal investigation or legal complaint, or by law or regulation, including in response to a court order, subpoena, regulatory requirement or other legal demand or request or if we believe in good faith that it is reasonably necessary to protect the safety of any person, to address fraud, security or technical issues, to protect WLG's rights or property, and/or to investigate or assist in preventing any violation or potential violation of the law, this Privacy Policy, or our Terms of Service.
  • We may use any recording, video and/or other content you create and post in the Services in order to promote WLG or our Services.
  • We may share some or all of your information in connection with, or during negotiation of, any merger, financing, acquisition or dissolution, transaction or proceeding involving sale, transfer, divestiture, or disclosure of all or a portion of our business or assets. In the event of an insolvency, bankruptcy, or receivership, information may also be transferred as a business asset.
  • We may share information to comply with laws, regulations or other legal obligations, to assist in an investigation, to protect and defend our rights and property, or the rights or safety of third parties, to enforce our Terms of Use or this Privacy Policy or agreements with third parties, or for crime-prevention purposes.
  • We may otherwise disclose information in accordance with your consent.
  • Phone numbers provided for SMS purposes will not be shared with third parties.

OUR LEGAL BASES FOR COLLECTING, USING, SHARING AND OTHERWISE PROCESSING YOUR INFORMATION

For the purposes of EU law, WLG relies on a number of legal methods to collect, use, share, and otherwise process the information we have about you for the purposes described in this Policy. These legal bases include:

  • Certain processing is necessary to provide the Services in accordance with the Terms of Service. For example, we need to disseminate your content to provide our Service. We need basic contact information in order to register you for a WLG account and to share content on WLG, which is at the heart of our Service;
  • Where you have consented to certain processing. For example we may send you marketing messages if you have consented to receiving them, or we may ask you if you want to take part in voluntary surveys or contests. You may revoke that consent at any time;
  • For WLG to comply with a legal obligation, a court order, or to exercise and defend legal claims, to protect your vital interests or those of others, or where the processing is necessary in the public interest. For example, we may share data where we are required by law to do so; and
  • Some processing is necessary because it is in WLG’s or a third party’s legitimate interests, such as those of visitors, members or partners.
  • We process your information in furtherance of the following legitimate interests:
    • Keeping the Services safe and secure: We use your information to try and keep our Services safe and secure. We do so as it is necessary to pursue our legitimate interests, the interests of our community and yours, in ensuring WLG is secure, and to protect against fraud, spam, misuse and abuse. For example, we process your information to protect you and WLG from malicious scraping of our website by those seeking to download content, and recordings. We also want to protect against hackers who try to access content.
    • Providing our Services: We use your information to provide the Services, including any personalized services. We do so as it is necessary to pursue our legitimate interests in providing an innovative and tailored offering to our users on a sustained basis and to provide stable connectivity. For example, where there is poor connectivity in an area or neighborhood, users can experience difficulty in downloading/uploading content. In that case, WLG needs to process log data, including your IP address, to troubleshoot the issue. Without your IP address and location info, it can be hard to fix connectivity issues.
    • Learning how we can improve your experience on our Services, and contributing to research: We work hard to develop, enhance and improve our Services, such as by sponsoring competitions, recognizing top users. We also share data with researchers to contribute to academic research. Where we contribute to academic research, we take into account your rights and ensure that protections are in place with respect to your information.

MANAGING AND DELETING YOUR INFORMATION

If you no longer wish to receive communications from us, you can let us know by sending an email to DL_marketing@witheritelaw.com or by mail at the address provided below in “Contact Us”. The electronic communications we send may also contain an opt-out mechanism. Please note that it may take up to 10 calendar days to remove your contact information from our communications lists, so you may receive correspondence from us for a short time after you make your request.

We also offer the ability to correct or update the information collected via your account settings on our website or the applicable App or by contacting support via e-mail at DL_marketing@witheritelaw.com. We rely on the accuracy of the information you provide us (such as your age). It is the consumers responsibility to correct inaccurate information. You may request deletion of your account by contacting support via e-mail at DL_marketing@witheritelaw.com.

We retain your information in our server logs, our databases and our records only for as long as necessary in light of the purposes set out in this Policy, subject to any legal obligations to further retain such information. We may use third party service providers to store and maintain such data. We retain your verification-related information for a reasonable period of time, even if you do not complete all verification steps, to assist with future verifications and to prevent abuse of our verification processes. If you decide not to verify the account and would like us to delete the verification information you provided, contact support via e-mail at DL_marketing@witheritelaw.com.

If you create content with other users such group content will remain after you delete your account.

YOUR RIGHTS

If you reside in certain territories, including the European Economic Area, you benefit from a number of rights in relation to your information. While some of these rights apply generally, certain rights apply only in certain limited cases. We describe these rights below in a summary format, but mandated applicable law shall govern.

  • Access and Porting. You can access much of your information by logging into your account. Where legally required, we can provide your information upon your request. Note that, in accordance with applicable law, information will not be provided where doing so would adversely affect the rights (including the intellectual property rights) of others.
  • Change, Restrict, Limit, Delete. You can also change, restrict, limit or delete much of your information by logging into your account. If you cannot do this, or you do not have a WLG account, contact support via e-mail at DL_marketing@witheritelaw.com. We may retain certain information as required by applicable law.
  • Object. If we process your information based on our legitimate interests explained above, or in the public interest, you can object to this processing in certain circumstances. In such cases, we will cease processing your information unless we have compelling legitimate grounds to continue processing or where it is needed for legal reasons. If you live in the European Economic Area, you also have a general right to object to the use of your information for direct marketing purposes.
  • Revoke consent. Where you have previously provided your consent, you have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of your information at any time. For example, you can withdraw your consent to email marketing by following the link provided in a marketing email. You can also revoke any consent you have provided to our use of your geo-location information by changing the setting on your mobile device. If you withdraw your consent to the use of your information for purposes set out in this Policy, you may not have access to all (or any) of our Services and we might not be able to provide you all (or any) of the Services. In certain cases, we may continue to process your information after you have withdrawn consent if we have a legal basis to do so or if your withdrawal of consent was limited to certain processing activities.
  • Complain. If you reside in the European Economic Area, should you wish to raise a concern about our use of your information (and without prejudice to any other rights you may have), you have the right to do so with your local data protection authority.

SECURITY

We maintain technical and organizational measures to protect against accidental or unlawful destruction, loss, alteration, unauthorized disclosure of, or access to your information.

We endeavor to ensure a level of security appropriate to the risks that are presented by the processing, having all due regard to the state of the art, the costs of implementation and the nature, scope, context and purposes of the processing as well as the risk to users. No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure, however. Therefore, while we use reasonable efforts to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee its security.

WEBSITE LINKS

Consumer acknowledges that this Privacy Policy does not apply to third-party websites or social media features that may be accessed through links that we provide for your convenience and information. Accessing those links will cause you as the consumer to leave WLG’s or an affiliate’s website and may result in the collection of information about you by a third party. As referenced above, WLG does not control, endorse or make any representations about third-party websites or their privacy practices, which may differ from WLG’s or its affiliates. We encourage consumers to review the privacy policy of any site you interact with before allowing the collection and use of your information.

USING THE SERVICES FROM OUTSIDE OF UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

If you are accessing our Services from outside of the United States of America, consumer is acknowledging that your Personal Information may be transferred, stored or processed in the United States of America. WLG’s servers are located and our central database is operated in the United States of America. Consumer is also acknowledging that the data protection and other laws of the United States of America might not be as comprehensive as those in your home country. By using any portion of the Services, you understand and consent to the transfer of your Personal Information to our facilities in the United States of America and those third parties with whom we share it as described in this Privacy Policy.

In certain cases, we may use a legal mechanism known as "standard contractual clauses" to protect information transferred outside the EU. Standard contractual clauses refer to contracts between companies transferring personal information that contain standard commitments approved by the EU Commission protecting the privacy and security of the information transferred. You can contact us to learn more and to request a copy of any clauses which may relate to your data.

CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS WHO USE OUR SERVICES

California Civil Code Section § 1798.83 permits California Residents who are users of our Services to request certain information regarding our disclosure of “Personal Information” (as defined by California law) to third parties for their direct marketing purposes. To make such a request, please send an email to DL_marketing@witheritelaw.com

CHILDREN'S PRIVACY

Our Services are intended for general audiences, and are not intended for anyone under 18, anyone under 19 in the European Economic Area or anyone under the minimum age to use the Services in the jurisdiction where they reside ("Minimum Age"). Persons under the Minimum age are prohibited from using our Services and we do not knowingly collect information from such individuals. If we become aware that a child under the Minimum Age has provided us with their information, we take steps to remove such information and terminate the child's account, unless proper parental consent is delivered to WLG.

RIGHT TO AMEND THIS POLICY

WLG reserves the right to amend this Privacy Policy from time to time to make changes to this policy or to comply with the law. Note, such changes are effective upon posting and you as a consumer agree to accept said changes to this Privacy Policy by continuing to use our Services. The date the Privacy Policy has been updated will be noted in the contact information below.

CONTACT US

If you have any questions or comments or if you would like to exercise any statutory rights, please contact us at:

Witherite Law Group, PLLC
10440 N. Central Expy., Suite 400
Dallas, Texas 75231