Who we are

We are The National Institute of Canine Service and Training (NICST), a nonprofit that trains service dogs.

Our website address is: https://ourdogssavelives.org.

What personal data we collect and why we collect it

In general, you can visit us on the internet without telling us who you are or giving us personal information. There are times when we may need information from you, for instance: to process an application, to correspond, or to provide a subscription. We may supplement this information to complete a transaction or to provide a better service.

This site was built using WordPress. By default WordPress does not collect any personal data about visitors, and only collects the data shown on the User Profile screen from registered users.

If you fill out any of our website forms we collect the information you provide to us so that we may correspond with you at your request. This may include name, email, phone number, address and any other details you provide for the purpose of us contacting you.

Comments

The NICST site does not currently use or accept user comments, but we are leaving this section in our Privacy Policy in the event that we do accept comments in the future.

When visitors leave comments on the site we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.

An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.

Contact Forms & Applications

We have several forms on the site for the purpose of you contacting us. These forms include our general contact form, our sponsorship inquiry form, our partner inquiry form, our canine training partner inquiry form, our newsletter sign up form, our volunteer application form and our PAWS quiz form.

These forms collect personal information such as your name, e-mail address, phone number, address and other information you provide to us so that we may correspond with you at your request.

We do not sell or share your personal information with any third party organizations.

Any health and or sensitive information we collect through our application process is used to determine how our service dogs may best serve you. This information is never shared outside the organization.

Cookies

Like most websites, we use cookies to remember things about visitors so that we can provide you with a better experience. Cookies are small data files stored on your browser or device. They may be served by the this website that you are visiting (“first-party cookies”) or by other companies (“third-party cookies”). For example, we use a third-party analytics provider, Google, which sets cookies when you visit our websites. This helps us understand how you are using our website so that we can continue to improve it.

WordPress Cookies

This website has been built using WordPress, which places one ‘session cookie’ on your computer when you arrive on the website:

  • PHPSESSID – A random unique number or string of letters and numbers. The cookie is deleted when you close your web browser. As you browse around the pages on this site, the session cookie tells the website that you are the same person requesting the webpages, and not a new visitor to each page. This cookie does not identify you personally and is not linked to any other information we store about you.

WordPress uses the following cookies to enable registered users to log into the website:

  • wordpress_test_cookie – A session cookie, deleted when you close your web browser. WordPress sets this cookie when you navigate to the login page. The cookie is used to check whether your web browser is set to allow, or reject cookies.
  • wordpress_xxxxx – A session cookie, deleted when you close your web browser. WordPress uses these cookies to store your authentication details, and their use is limited to the admin console area.
  • wordpress_logged_in_xxxxx – A session cookie, deleted when you close your web browser. WordPress uses this cookie to indicate when you’re logged in, and who you are, for most interface use.
  • wp-settings-xxxxx,wp-settings-time-xxxxx – Persistent cookie, expire a little under one year from the time they’re set. WordPress uses this cookie to customize your view of admin interface, and possibly also the main site interface.

If you comment on an article on this website, WordPress uses the following cookies:

  • comment_author, comment_author_email, comment_author_url – (Your name, email address and website address) Persistent cookies, which expire a little under one year from the time they’re set. WordPress sets these cookies purely for convenience, so that you won’t need to re-type all your information again when you want to leave another comment.

Further information is available in the WordPress Codex: WordPress Cookies

Google Analytics and Cookies

This site uses Google Analytics which employs the following cookies to log website traffic and usage data:

  • _ga – Used to distinguish users. (expiration time: 2 years)
  • _gid – Used to distinguish users. (expiration time: 24 hours)
  • _gat – Used to throttle request rate. If Google Analytics is deployed via Google Tag Manager, this cookie will be named _dc_gtm_<property-id>. (expiration time: 1 minute)
  • AMP_TOKEN – Contains a token that can be used to retrieve a Client ID from AMP Client ID service. Other possible values indicate opt-out, inflight request or an error retrieving a Client ID from AMP Client ID service. (expiration time: 30 seconds to 1 year)
  • _gac_<property-id> – Contains campaign related information for the user. If you have linked your Google Analytics and Google Ads accounts, Google Ads website conversion tags will read this cookie unless you opt-out. Learn more. (expiration time: 90 days)
  • Further information is available in the Google Analytics Help Center: Google Analytics Data Privacy and Security

Embedded content from other websites

Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.

These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

Analytics

This site uses Google Analytics to track page visits and traffic so that we can optimize our site content and performance.  Google Analytics which employs the cookies listed above (see Google Analytics and Cookies) to log website traffic and usage data

By default WordPress does not collect any analytics data. However, many web hosting accounts collect some anonymous analytics data.

YouTube

Our website uses plugins from YouTube, which is operated by Google. The operator of the pages is YouTube LLC, 901 Cherry Ave., San Bruno, CA 94066, USA.

If you visit one of our pages featuring a YouTube plugin, a connection to the YouTube servers is established. Here the YouTube server is informed about which of our pages you have visited.

If you’re logged in to your YouTube account, YouTube allows you to associate your browsing behavior directly with your personal profile. You can prevent this by logging out of your YouTube account.

YouTube is used to help make our website appealing. This constitutes a justified interest pursuant to Art. 6 (1) (f) DSGVO.

Further information about handling user data, can be found in the data protection declaration of YouTube under https://www.google.de/intl/de/policies/privacy.

Google Web Fonts

For uniform representation of fonts, this page uses web fonts provided by Google. When you open a page, your browser loads the required web fonts into your browser cache to display texts and fonts correctly.

For this purpose your browser has to establish a direct connection to Google servers. Google thus becomes aware that our web page was accessed via your IP address. The use of Google Web fonts is done in the interest of a uniform and attractive presentation of our plugin. This constitutes a justified interest pursuant to Art. 6 (1) (f) DSGVO.

If your browser does not support web fonts, a standard font is used by your computer.

Further information about handling user data, can be found at https://developers.google.com/fonts/faq and in Google’s privacy policy at https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/.

Events Calendar Plugin

What personal data we collect and why we collect it

Event, Venue, and Organizer Information

If you create, submit, import, save, or publish Event, Venue, or Organizer information, such information is retained in the local database:

  1. Venue information: name, address, city, country, state, postal code, phone, website, geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude)
  2. Organizer information: name, phone, website, email
  3. Event information: website, cost, description, date, time, image

What rights you have over your data

If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.

Your choices

  • When we collect information from you, you may tell us that you do not want it used for further marketing contact and we will respect your wishes.
  • You may also turn off cookies in your browser.

Our contact information

If you would like to contact us regarding your data, privacy or any other concerns please contact us through our contact form, mailing address, or phone number.

The National Institute of Canine Service and Training (NICST)
1647 Willow Pass Road #157
Concord, CA 94520-2611
925-246-5785

Effective Date: January 1, 2020