Forbes values your privacy.

This Privacy Statement outlines how Forbes Media LLC (“Forbes” “we” “us” or “our”) collects, uses, processes, and shares your personal information and other information about you (your “user information”) in connection with your access to and/or use of Forbes.com and other Forbes owned digital media (collectively, the “Site”), including any content, features, services, or other offerings that Forbes may provide in connection the Site, such as email communications or newsletters that Forbes may send in connection with your use of the Site. This Privacy Statement also describes your choices and rights regarding the use, access to, correction, or deletion of your user information. By using the Site, you acknowledge that you understand that we will use your user information in accordance with this Privacy Statement. Where required by law, you will also be asked to provide clear and unequivocal affirmative consent to the collection, processing, and sharing of your user information via cookies and similar technologies. The Site is owned and operated by Forbes.

Notice to EU/UK individuals, residents of California and Nevada, and residents of China: this Privacy Statement is intended to comply with: (1) Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of the European Union 27 April 2016 (the “GDPR”), and the UK equivalent (the “UK GDPR”), and provide appropriate protection and care with respect to the treatment of your user information in accordance with those laws; the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”); Nevada law; and China’s Personal Information Protection Law of PRC (“PIPL”).

Summary

To enhance, personalize, and support your experience on the Site, among other things, we collect, use, and share your user information. For example, we use aggregated information to develop content targeted to user interests and to generally improve the Site’s user experience. As detailed below, your user information may also be used by Forbes and its partners to tailor content and ads, provide social media features (e.g., features that allow you to share content directly to your preferred social media platform), track your preferences, analyze traffic, organize Forbes events, and provide similar services and content. Forbes is committed to your privacy and will not share any user information with any third party without your consent, except as outlined in this Privacy Statement or as permitted by law. If you have any requests, comments, or questions about this Privacy Statement or your user information, please contact us in the manner provided below.

What this Privacy Statement Covers

This Privacy Statement applies only to user information collected by us or shared with us in relation to our Site. While you may encounter links on the Site to other websites, such as those relating to our third-party sponsors, advertisers, and other partners (e.g., our affiliate network operators), please note that these websites are not covered by this Privacy Statement (unless otherwise noted on such site, which may be the case if, for example, the site is also owned and operated by Forbes).
This Privacy Statement does not apply to the activities of Forbes’ third-party sponsors, advertisers, and other partners (e.g. our affiliate network operators) that may collect your user information while you access or use such third party’s services in connection with your use of our Site (e.g. social media and sharing services). The privacy and information practices of those third parties are not covered by this Privacy Statement. To learn more about such third party policies, we encourage you to read and review the privacy statements of each third party service that you may choose to use.
As a general reminder, please think carefully before you decide to put anything on the internet. For example, if you voluntarily disclose user information in chat areas or bulletin boards (e.g., comments sections), that information could be seen and used by others, and may result in unsolicited messages from others. We are not responsible for the user information you may choose to submit in these public forums. To request removal of your user information from our blog or community forum, please contact us as provided below. In some cases, for legal retention purposes or technical limitations (e.g., the data may not be searchable), we may not be able to remove user information voluntarily disclosed by you in such forums, in which case, we will notify you.

Gathering of Information

Section Overview: We collect user information when you use the Site. Sometimes you may submit it to us yourself, other times it may be collected automatically. You can manage and change your preferences as outlined below.

Information Collected

When you use the Site, your user information may be collected, used, and shared in a variety of manners. As detailed below, the type of user information collected may vary, but may include, among other things, user information that you voluntarily submit (e.g., when setting up an account or submitting a registration or application—including when signing up for a paid subscription or event—you may submit your contact information, social media account handles, and/or professional information), user information automatically collected about your usage of the Site (e.g., the content that you choose to view), and user information that our third party partners may share with us if such third party partners have previously received your consent to do so or are otherwise permitted by applicable law.

Voluntary Submission

Forbes may collect user information (including personal information) that is voluntarily provided by you or with your permission. For example, we may ask you for user information, such as your email address, when you register to become a member of the Site or register for a Forbes-produced live event. You may also provide user information to Forbes in other contexts, including, for example, on your member profile page and public profile URL (for example, if you choose to add content to your profile page, such as photos, videos or other information about you and your interests), to enter into a sweepstakes, contest, or promotion, or to apply for consideration in connection with a Forbes list or similar accolade (e.g., Under 30 list applications).
In the event you order something from the Site or one of our co-branded websites, or if you sign-up for a paid subscription (or a free trial of a paid subscription), we may request additional user information, such as your address, telephone number and credit card information, in order to complete the order. You may also provide us with other information at the same time, such as your choice of subscription term or type of subscription. If you choose to sign up for a paid subscription via your social media profile (further information on this below under “Information that We Obtain from Third Party Sources”), we may also receive some limited information about you from that social media provider. Where you sign-up for paid subscriptions as a gift option (e.g., on behalf of a friend or colleague, the gift recipient), you may provide us with this information on behalf of the gift recipient.
You always have the option not to provide the information we request. If you choose not to provide the information we request, you can still visit most of the Site, but you may be unable to access certain options and services, such as paid subscription content. If you wish to provide user information to us about a third party, such your friend or colleague, in connection with a referral, gift subscription, recommendation, nomination (e.g., Under 30 list nomination), or other purpose, please only do so if you have the permission of that third party. When you register or become a member of the Site or provide information to Forbes in any other manner, you agree to provide only true, accurate, current and complete information.

Information that We Collect Automatically

When you visit our Site, we may collect certain user information automatically from your device. In some territories, including California, the European Economic Area (“EEA”), the United Kingdom (the EEA and the United Kingdom, together “Europe”), and China, this information may be considered personal data or personal information under applicable data protection laws.
Specifically, the user information we collect automatically may include information like your IP address, device type, unique device identification numbers, browser-type, broad geographic location (e.g., country or city-level location) and other technical information. We may also collect user information about how your device has interacted with our Site, including the pages accessed and links clicked.
Collecting this information enables us to better understand the visitors who come to our Site, where they come from, and what content on our Site is of interest to them. We use this information for our business and commercial purposes, including internal analytics purposes and to improve the quality and relevance of our Site to our visitors. With respect to any content that is subject to a paywall, we also use this information to notify users via a notice on the Site when they have read their quota of “free” content (and would need to purchase a subscription to continue reading additional articles).
Some of this information may be collected using cookies and similar tracking technology, as explained further below.

Cookies

A cookie is a small data file that is written to your computer’s hard drive by your web browser. A cookie file can contain and/or automatically collect user information, such as a user identification code or IP address, that a website will use to track the pages and number of times you have visited. The data read from these cookies may be linked to your user information, so our use of these cookies may allow us to better understand how you use our Site, or to serve you with personalized advertising.
In particular, we and our partners use cookies and similar technologies on the Site for our business purposes of personalizing and optimizing your browsing experience and the Site by:

• providing you with tailored content and advertisements (see below for more information),
• enabling social media features,
• safeguarding against spam and malware,
• analyzing trends, traffic, and user behavior,
• administering the Site, including triggering paywalls for certain content as appropriate,
• gathering demographic information about our user base as a whole,
• tracking web and advertising analytics throughout the Site and its affiliate websites,
• remembering your preferences and voluntarily-submitted information (e.g. custom video playlists, preferences, job title, story ratings, membership status),
• performing location-related functionalities and analytics,
• participating in market research (e.g., Site ratings), and
• educating ourselves about how we can continue to improve the Site and its various elements.

Cookies fall into the subcategories below.

Required Cookies. Certain cookies are used for specific purposes that are essential to your secure use and navigation of the Site. Without them, Forbes may not be able to provide core Site functions and features to you, and the Site would not operate as well as you or Forbes would like. These cookies collect and use information such as your server preferences, single-session data and corresponding identifier, web beacons and log files (detailed below), and other credential-related information.
Functional Cookies. Other cookies may be used to collect and process information about your preferences and similar choices in connection with the Site in order to optimize your browsing experience (e.g., various local preference settings; which geographically-customized version of the Site and related content you may prefer e.g., Forbes US, Forbes Asia, Forbes Europe). Functional cookies include social media cookies, which collect information about your social media usage and other data you may have provided in connection with such usage (if you access the Site through a social media website or mobile application, you may have social media cookies). If you wish to modify or change your social media cookies, please visit and review the settings on your applicable social media account(s). Functional cookies also include analytics cookies, which provide us with data that allows Forbes to better understand its users and improve the Site based on what we have learned from that data.
Advertising Cookies. To help support the Site and further tailor your experience, Forbes and its advertising partners (and/or their third-party analytics providers) may also use cookies on the Site to personalize the content and advertisements you may be shown. Such advertisements use cookies to provide you targeted advertisements that may be more consistent with your interests than non-targeted advertisements. Certain Forbes advertising partners may also use cookies to monitor or track the performance of their advertising content, including native advertising content (e.g., BrandVoice). Forbes does not provide user information to advertising partners except in connection with the Site or as required by law.
If you would like to manage your cookie preferences or learn more information about this practice and your right to decline (or opt-out of) cookies placed by some or all of these companies, please click here. If you are a California resident and to the extent our use of cookies qualifies as selling personal information under the CCPA, you can opt out of that sale by clicking the “Cookies on Forbes” tab or by contacting us as indicated below.
Please be aware that if you do choose to disable the receipt of cookies from our Site, you may not be able to use or benefit from certain features of the Site, particularly the features that are designed to personalize your experience. To learn more about the use of cookies in online advertising including how to manage or delete them click here.
Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but generally allow users to modify their browser settings to display a warning before accepting a cookie, to accept cookies only from certain websites, and/or to refuse all cookies. Please do review your web browser settings if you want to use your web browser to control our cookies.

Web Beacons

We may use web beacons (invisible images often referred to as pixel tags or clear GIFs) on our Site for our business purposes of recognizing users, assessing traffic patterns, identifying preferred content and measuring site engagement. We may also include web beacons in our email communications, including newsletters, in order to measure engagement with our communications (e.g., to count how many, and when, email communications have been opened, or which links in such communications have been clicked on).
Forbes and its partners (including advertisers, ad servers, and affiliate link e-commerce providers) may also use web beacons to collect various data provided by your browser while you are on our Site and elsewhere (i.e., outside of the Site) where we may be acting as a third party. This data is collected in the aggregate, but may include or be associated with other user information that users have voluntarily submitted. As we do not control or have access to the manner in which these third parties may use cookies or other tracking technologies, Forbes is not responsible for the privacy practices of these third parties (if you have questions about any of these third parties, we encourage you to review their corresponding privacy policies).

Log Files

The Site’s web and ad servers log information about a user’s IP address, browser type and the current URL the user is requesting. This information is always provided by a user’s browser and automatically logged by most websites. These log files are stored in a secure location and used for our business purpose of internal analysis of traffic patterns within our Site.

Information that We Obtain from Third Party Sources

From time to time, we may collect personal information about you from third party sources (including data append services such as public or social graph data, or social media websites if you have chosen to log in or connect your social media with our Site) which we will use for our business or commercial purposes (for example, in order to better serve you with content or promotions). However, we will only use this information where these third parties either have your consent or are otherwise legally permitted or required to disclose your personal information to us.
When you sign into our Site or purchase a paid subscription on our Site using a social media log-in, you give permission to that social media company to share certain information with us. For example, if you sign in or purchase a subscription using Facebook or LinkedIn, you give permission to Facebook or LinkedIn (as applicable) to share with us your email address and certain other information contained in your profile on that social media platform (but only if you have made this information public in your corresponding Facebook or LinkedIn profile). This will be limited to your full name, age range, profile picture (if you have one) and link to your Facebook or LinkedIn profile (as applicable). If you log-in or purchase a subscription using your Google account, you give Google permission to share personal data with us that you have made public in your Google profile. This will be limited to your full name, your email address (and whether your email has been validated), your age range, your profile picture (if you have one) and a link to your Google profile. If you log-in or purchase a subscription using your Apple ID, you give Apple permission to share your personal data with us (however, you can choose to hide your email address and instead Apple will create a random email address so that your personal email can stay private). This email address will be linked to your account and will be used to allow you to access your subscribed content.
We will use this information to form a profile for your account, or to enable you to purchase a paid subscription. If you later remove the Site from your Facebook or LinkedIn settings, Google settings, or Apple ID, we will no longer have access to this information. However, this will not affect our ability to use the information that we already received when you first set up your account (or purchased a subscription) using that social media login, as long as we continue to need to use it for the purposes as described in this Privacy Statement.

Use of Your Information

Section Overview: Our primary goal in collecting, using, and sharing user information is to enhance your experience on the Site, support the Site, and improve its features, performance, and other elements. Your user information may be used for the purposes outlined below, and we may combine user information you provided us with information we automatically collected or collected from third parties to better understand you and to better facilitate the uses described below, like serving you more targeted content and advertising. We will not use your user information without a valid legal basis to do so.

To Target Content and Advertising

Forbes may use your user information for advertising purposes in order to promote our Site or our other products or services, and the products and services of third parties. To develop and provide content and advertising to you that is targeted to your interests, we use the analytics collected by the systems described above to determine which areas of our Site you prefer based upon the frequency of your visits and engagement with those areas. We may make reasonable assumptions based on your browser provided data to target relevant content and advertising to you on our site and elsewhere where we may be acting as a 3rd party. We may also make reasonable geographic and demographic assumptions based on your presented IP address to target relevant content and advertising.

To Provide Interactive Communications from the Site

To enhance your experience, we may provide you with interactive communications, such as notifications of activity by topic or contributor to the email address that you provide to us. Such interactive communications are provided only to those users who have expressly provided us with their permission to receive them as part of their user profile.
From time to time we may provide emails highlighting new features, promotions or contests on the Site to those users who have expressly provided us with their permission to send such communications as part of their user profile, or where we are otherwise permitted by law.