Privacy Policy for Diabetes Knowledge Hub
Introduction
Welcome to Diabetes Knowledge Hub (the “Site”). We are committed to protecting your privacy and being transparent about how we handle your data. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, and your rights. We’ve written it in clear, plain language to be user-friendly and meet legal requirements. By using our Site, you agree to the practices described in this Policy. We comply with applicable data protection laws such as the GDPR and CCPA to safeguard your information.
What Information We Collect
We collect only the information that’s necessary to run our Site and provide you with services or content you request. This includes:
Personal Information You Provide: When you contact us through our Contact Us form or subscribe to our newsletter, we collect personal details like your name and email address. We use this information to respond to your inquiries or send you updates you’ve signed up for. Providing this info is completely voluntary.
Usage Data (Analytics): Like many websites, we use Google Analytics to understand how visitors use our Site. Google Analytics automatically collects non-personal information such as your IP address, browser type, pages visited, and time spent on the site. This helps us see which articles are popular and improve the Site’s content. Google Analytics may log your IP address to give us a rough idea of your location, but it does not reveal your name or identify you personally. We do not combine analytics data with any personal details.
Advertising and Pixel Data: We also use tools like the Facebook Pixel to help us with analytics and relevant content. The Facebook Pixel uses cookies to track when you take certain actions on our Site (for example, visiting a page), which allows us to show you related information or promotions on Facebook. While this means you might see an ad for our Site after visiting, no personally identifiable information (like your name or email) is provided to us by these tracking tools – they simply use the data to present relevant content.
Affiliate Link Activity: Diabetes Knowledge Hub participates in affiliate marketing programs. If you click on an affiliate link on our Site (for example, a link to a product on Amazon or another retailer), a cookie will be placed on your browser to track that click. This cookie tells the affiliate program that our Site referred you. If you make a purchase, we may receive information such as an order number or the product purchased for commission tracking, but we do not receive any personal details like your name or payment information from these affiliate transactions. It simply lets us know a sale occurred so we can earn our small commission.
How We Use Your Information
We only use your information for the purposes for which you provided it and to improve our services. Specifically, we may use the information in the following ways:
To Respond to You: If you contact us with a question or comment, we use your provided contact information (like your email) to respond and address your inquiry. We’ll only use your phone number (if ever provided) to call or text you if it’s necessary to resolve your request.
To Send Newsletters or Updates: If you subscribe to our email newsletter, we will use your name and email to send you the health tips, articles, or updates you requested. We only send these with your consent, and you can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the “unsubscribe” link in the email or contacting us. We won’t spam you – our aim is to send content you find valuable.
For Site Analytics and Improvement: We analyze aggregate data about how users navigate our Site (using tools like Google Analytics) to improve our content layout, fix technical issues, and understand what topics are most interesting to our readers. This helps us make the Site more useful and easy to use. For example, knowing which pages get the most visits or how users find us (via search or referral) guides our content strategy. All analytics are reviewed in summary form – we look at trends, not individual users.
For Personalized Content/Marketing: With your permission, we may use information from cookies and pixels to show you more relevant content. For instance, if you’ve visited a particular article on our Site, we might use that information to show you a related post or an occasional ad on platforms like Facebook or Google. Any marketing or retargeting we do is done in accordance with your consent and applicable laws. You will never receive marketing emails from us unless you opted in, and you can opt out anytime. (See “Cookies and Tracking Tools” below for how advertising cookies work.)
To Earn Affiliate Commissions: As noted, when you use our affiliate links, we may collect data on that activity (such as which links are clicked and if a purchase was made) to track our affiliate earnings. We use this information internally to credit our commissions and keep records (for example, to know which recommendations are useful to readers). This helps support our Site’s operations. We want to assure you this does not affect the price you pay, and it doesn’t reveal any of your personal identity to us – it simply helps us earn a small fee that keeps the Site running.
To Comply with Legal Obligations or Protect Rights: In rare cases, we may need to use or disclose information if required by law or to enforce our Terms and Conditions. For example, if necessary, we could use data to investigate or prevent security issues or fraud. We hope this never happens, but we include this for completeness.
We do not use your personal information for any purposes other than the above. In particular, we do not sell your personal data to third parties, and we do not use it for any automated decision-making or profiling that has legal effects for you.
Cookies and Tracking Tools
What are cookies? Cookies are small text files stored on your device when you visit a website. They serve a variety of functions – for instance, remembering your preferences or recognizing you on a return visit. We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to enhance your experience and to gather information as described in the sections above.
How we use cookies:
Some cookies are necessary for the basic functioning of the Site (for example, if our site has a login or remembers your settings, which currently it does not beyond standard browsing).
We use analytics cookies (from Google Analytics) to collect data about traffic and user interactions (such as what pages are viewed, how long you stay, and what site referred you). This helps us understand usage patterns and improve our content.
We use advertising cookies/pixels (like the Facebook Pixel) for understanding our audience and occasionally marketing our Site to interested readers. These cookies allow us to possibly show you a relevant ad or content on other platforms based on your visit to our Site, without revealing who you are.
We also allow affiliate program cookies to function. When you click an affiliate link (to Amazon or other partners), a cookie from that third-party affiliate network is placed to track that you came from our Site. This is purely to ensure we get credit for any resulting purchase; it does not provide us with your personal details.
Third-party cookies: Cookies from third parties (like Google or Facebook) may be set when you visit our Site, as part of the analytics and pixel tracking mentioned. We don’t control these companies or their cookies, but we use them to improve our site’s functionality and reach. For example, Google may set cookies to remember your preferences or to track your visit for analytics, and Facebook may set cookies for the pixel. These third parties have their own privacy policies which govern their use of cookies.
Your choices: You have the right to choose whether to accept cookies. When you first visit our Site, you may see a cookie notice (depending on your location) that allows you to consent or adjust your cookie settings. Regardless, you can always control cookies through your browser settings:
You can set your web browser to refuse all or some cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. Check your browser’s help section for instructions on how to do this. Keep in mind, disabling cookies may affect some features of our Site (for example, analytics or preferences) but you will still be able to read content.
To opt out of Google Analytics, you can install the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on which prevents Google Analytics from collecting your data on any website.
For Facebook ads, you can adjust your Facebook ad preferences to control how your data is used for ads, or use browser tools to block Facebook’s tracking cookies.
More generally, you can visit industry opt-out sites like the NAI Opt-Out or YourAdChoices to opt out of many ad tracking cookies from participating companies.
Remember, our use of cookies is mainly to improve your experience and our service. We respect Do-Not-Track signals; if your browser is set to DNT, our Site will honor it for analytics and advertising tools to the extent possible.
Affiliate Disclosure
Diabetes Knowledge Hub is a participant in several affiliate marketing programs. This means some of our pages contain affiliate links to products or services. If you click on one of these special links and then make a purchase, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.
We specifically participate in the following affiliate programs: Amazon Associates, Impact, CJ Affiliate (Commission Junction), Awin, and Rakuten Advertising. For example, our Site is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. We also take part in affiliate programs with networks like Awin, Impact Radius (Impact), CJ Affiliate by Conversant, and Rakuten. These programs similarly use cookies or tracking links to record when you came from our Site.
How it works: When you click an affiliate link on our Site, a cookie is set by the affiliate partner to track your visit. If you end up buying something, that partner recognizes our Site as the referrer and credits us a commission. The commission is typically a small percentage of the sale – again, it does not add anything to your cost. It’s a way to support our Site for the content we provide.
No endorsement bias: We want you to know that we only affiliate with products or services we genuinely find helpful or relevant to our content about diabetes and health. Affiliate links do not influence our editorial decisions or the integrity of the information we provide. Our primary goal is to be a helpful resource; any affiliate earnings are secondary and help us maintain the website.
No personal info from affiliates: Importantly, when you purchase through an affiliate link, we do not receive any of your personal information from the seller. For instance, we don’t see your name, address, credit card details, or who you are. We only get reports that might say something like “X product was purchased via your link, you earned Y commission.” These reports are primarily numbers and product names for accounting purposes. Your transaction is otherwise anonymous to us.
Please note that external sites linked via affiliate links (like Amazon or other retailers) have their own privacy policies. Once you leave our Site by clicking a product link, any information you provide on the external site is governed by that site’s privacy practices, not this Privacy Policy. We encourage you to review the privacy policies of any third-party sites you visit.
User Rights
We believe you should have control over your personal data. Whether you are a visitor from the European Union, California, or anywhere else, you have certain rights regarding your information. We will do our best to help you exercise these rights. These rights include, but are not limited to, the following:
Right to Access: You can request a copy of the personal information we hold about you and information about how we use it. For example, EU residents under GDPR and California residents under CCPA have the right to know what personal data a business has collected about them. We will provide you with this information, once we verify your identity, as required by law.
Right to Rectification (Correction): If any personal details you have provided us are incorrect or outdated (for instance, you want to correct your name or update your email address), you have the right to have it corrected or updated. Just let us know and we will fix it.
Right to Deletion: You can ask us to delete the personal information we have about you. This is sometimes called the “Right to be Forgotten.” For example, if you subscribed to our newsletter and want your data removed, you can request that we erase your email from our list. We will honor such requests to the extent required by law. (Do note there may be legal reasons we might retain certain data for record-keeping or security, but we’ll inform you if any exception applies.) Both GDPR and CCPA give individuals the right to request deletion of their data (with some exceptions).
Right to Opt-Out of Sale of Personal Information: Important: We do not sell your personal information. However, CCPA gives California residents the right to direct businesses not to sell their personal data. Even though we don’t sell data, we respect and acknowledge this right. If you have any concerns or want to double-check, you can contact us to confirm that your data is not being sold or to object to any potential future “sale” or sharing of your information.
Right to Withdraw Consent: If we are processing your data based on your consent (for example, you consented to receive our newsletter or to cookies), you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. For instance, you can unsubscribe from our emails (which withdraws your consent to get emails) or adjust your cookie settings to withdraw consent for optional cookies. This will not affect the lawfulness of any processing we did before you withdrew consent – it just means we will stop the particular activity going forward.
Right to Object or Restrict Processing: You may have the right to object to certain types of data uses or ask us to limit how we use your data. For example, you can ask that we stop using your data for direct marketing (we will always honor that). EU users can also object to processing based on our legitimate interests, in which case we will consider your objection and stop or restrict processing unless we have a compelling reason not to that aligns with GDPR.
Right to Non-Discrimination: If you exercise any of your rights under privacy laws, we will not treat you differently. California law specifically gives you the right not to receive discriminatory treatment for exercising CCPA rights. In short, we won’t deny you services, charge you a different price, or provide a lesser experience just because you made a privacy request. Everyone is entitled to the same quality of service and content from us, whether you choose to exercise privacy rights or not.
How to exercise your rights: If you wish to exercise any of these rights, you can contact us (see “Contact Information” below). For certain requests, we may need to verify your identity to ensure we’re protecting your privacy (for example, we wouldn’t want to give your data to an impostor). Verification might be as simple as confirming your email address or other basic information. We will respond to your request as soon as possible, and at most within the timeframe required by law (which is generally 30 days under GDPR and 45 days under CCPA, with possible extensions). There is usually no cost for exercising your rights, though if a request is excessive or unfounded, applicable law might allow us to charge a reasonable fee or refuse the request – however, we have not had to do this and will try our best to accommodate all reasonable requests.
If you are in the EU and have concerns about our data practices, you also have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority. We would appreciate the chance to address your concerns first, so please feel free to reach out to us with any questions.
Data Security and Retention
Data Security: We take the security of your personal information seriously. We use a variety of technical and organizational measures to protect your data. For instance, our website is encrypted using HTTPS, which means any data you submit (such as through forms) is transmitted securely. We also restrict access to personal data to only those in our team or service providers who need it to perform their duties. They are all subject to confidentiality obligations. We regularly update our systems and practices to address new security threats and use reputable hosting providers with strong security practices.
However, please understand that no method of transmission over the Internet or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. While we strive to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee absolute security. In the unlikely event of a data breach that affects your personal information, we will notify you and the appropriate authorities as required by law.
Data Retention: We will keep your personal information only for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes we collected it for, including for any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements. This means:
If you contact us with a question, we’ll retain that correspondence and your contact info for a reasonable period to follow up with you or keep a record of our communication (generally, we might keep emails for customer service history unless you request deletion).
If you subscribe to our newsletter, we will keep your email on our mailing list until you unsubscribe or ask us to remove it. Once you unsubscribe, we will delete your email from the active mailing list immediately, and in any case, we will not send you further newsletters. (We might retain a record on a suppression list to make sure we honor your unsubscribe request.)
If you have engaged with our Site, our analytics data is typically retained for a certain period (for example, Google Analytics may retain data for 14 months or as configured) to allow us to analyze trends over time. This data is not personally identifiable beyond possibly an IP address and is usually aggregated.
Affiliate referral information is kept as long as needed for tracking commissions and complying with the affiliate programs’ requirements. This is usually just transactional records, not personal data about you.
In all cases, we do not retain personal data longer than necessary for the purpose it was collected. When we no longer have a legitimate need for your information, we will securely delete or anonymize it. For example, if you ask us to delete your info or withdraw consent, we will remove your personal data (except for information we are required to keep by law or for legitimate business purposes like preventing fraud or fulfilling our financial/tax obligations).
No Selling of Info: As mentioned before, we do not sell your personal information to any third parties. We also do not share it with third parties for their direct marketing purposes. The only third parties who might receive your data are those who help us run our Site and services (e.g., our email newsletter provider, or analytics service) – and in those cases, they are bound to use the information only on our behalf and under strict confidentiality. We never provide your personal details to unrelated parties for their own use.
International Data Transfers: If you are visiting our Site from outside the country where our servers are located, be aware that your information might be transferred across international borders. We primarily operate online and our web hosting and service providers might be in various countries (for example, United States). Rest assured, we take steps to ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect your data during such transfers, in compliance with applicable laws. If you have questions about where your data is stored, feel free to contact us.
Changes to This Policy
From time to time, we may update or make changes to this Privacy Policy, for example to reflect changes in our practices or for legal reasons. We reserve the right to update or modify this Policy at any time. If we make material changes (significant changes) to how we handle your personal information, we will notify you. For instance, we might send a notice to the email address we have on file for you (if you have provided one) or post a prominent notice on our Site, prior to the change becoming effective. We encourage you to review this Privacy Policy periodically, especially before you provide any new personal data, to stay informed about how we are protecting your information.
We will always indicate at the top of the Policy when it was last updated so you know what version you are reading. Your continued use of the Site after any changes to this Privacy Policy signifies your acceptance of the updated terms.
Contact Information
Your privacy matters to us, and we welcome any questions or concerns you might have about this Privacy Policy or our data practices. If you want to ask questions, request to exercise your rights, or withdraw your consent, you can contact us at any time.
Email: You can reach out to us via email at [email protected] (for example). Please include “Privacy Inquiry” in the subject line so we can direct it to the right team. We will do our best to respond promptly.
Contact Form: Alternatively, you can send us a message through our Contact Us form on the website (available at diabetesknowledgehub.com/contact). This form will ask for your name, email, and your message. We will receive your inquiry and get back to you via email.
At any time, please feel free to contact us with any questions or concerns related to this Privacy Policy. We are here to help and want you to feel safe and informed when using Diabetes Knowledge Hub.
Thank you for reading our Privacy Policy. Your trust is important to us, and we are dedicated to keeping your information secure and handling it with care.