This web site is maintained by Charlotte County Sheriff's Office, 7474 Utilities Road, Punta Gorda, FL 33982, USA. By accessing or using the www.CCSO.org Web site, you agree to the terms of the CCSO Online Privacy Policy, as outlined below. If you do not agree to these terms, please do not access or use this site.

Under Florida law, e-mail addresses are public records. If you do not want your e-mail address released in response to a public records request, do not send electronic mail to this entity. Instead contact this office by phone or in writing.

As of March 1, 2002, Charlotte County Sheriff's Office updated its Privacy Policy to give you a better understanding of our Privacy Policy and Practices. If you have any questions, please contact webmaster@CCSO.org.

CCSO has established this Online Privacy Policy to help you understand how we intend to treat your Personal Information.

We at Charlotte County Sheriff's Office ("CCSO") are committed to respecting your online privacy and recognize the need for appropriate protection and management of personal identification information ("Personal Information") you share with us.

Personal Information includes any information that may be used to identify you, such as: first and last name, home or other physical address, telephone numbers, e-mail addresses, or other contact information that is provided to us by you, or any other party. In general, you may visit CCSO's web pages without telling us who you are or revealing any Personal Information about yourself.

You should be aware that if you choose to provide us with your Personal Information, we may transfer that Information, within CCSO or to CCSO's third party service providers, across borders and from your country or jurisdiction to other countries or jurisdictions around the world, subject to the limitations of this Privacy Policy.

CCSO strives to comply with all applicable laws around the globe that are designed to protect your privacy. Although legal requirements may vary from country to country, CCSO intends to adhere to the principles set forth in this Online Privacy Policy.

COOKIES AND OTHER TRACKING TECHNOLOGIES

When you visit www.CCSO.org, you can surf the site anonymously and access important information without revealing your identity. In order to analyze and improve our site, we may use "cookies" to track your visit. A cookie is small amount of data that is transferred to your browser by a Web server and can only be read by the server that gave it to you. It cannot be executed as code or deliver viruses.

Most browsers are initially set to accept cookies. You can set your browser to notify you when you receive a cookie, giving you the chance to decide whether or not to accept it. (For some Web pages that require an authorization, cookies are not optional. Users choosing not to accept cookies will not be able to access those pages.)

While CCSO may use cookies to track your visit to www.CCSO.org, and our Web servers automatically log the IP/Internet address of your computer, this information does not identify you personally and you remain anonymous unless you have otherwise provided CCSO with personal information.

To protect your privacy, we have adopted the following principles:

NOTICE:

CCSO will only collect Personal Information where it is relevant for the purposes for which we are collecting it. We will not process any Personal Information for any purposes that are incompatible with the purposes for which it has been collected or subsequently authorized by you.

CHOICE

You may choose whether or not to provide Personal Information to CCSO. However, when you engage in certain activities on this site, such as filing crime reports, CCSO may ask you to provide certain information about yourself by filling out and submitting an online form. It is completely optional for you to engage in these activities. If you elect to engage in these activities, CCSO may require that you provide certain personal information, such as your name, mailing address, e-mail address, and other personal identifying information.

SECURITY

Wherever your Personal Information may be held by CCSO or on its behalf, reasonable and appropriate precautions will be taken to protect such information from loss, misuse or unauthorized access.

ACCESS/ ACCURACY

To the extent that you do provide us with Personal Information, CCSO wishes to maintain it accurately. Where we collect Personal Information from you, our goal is to provide a means of contacting CCSO should you need to access, update or correct that Information. If for any reason you desire to review such information, please contact us at webmaster@CCSO.org and we will make reasonable efforts to provide you with such information. Further, if you notify us that such information is incorrect, or you wish to have such information removed, we will correct, amend, or delete your Personal Information as soon as practicable.

CHILDREN'S PRIVACY

www.CCSO.org is not structured to attract children. Accordingly, we do not intend to collect Personal Information from anyone we know to be under 13 years of age. If we are made aware that information is or has been submitted by or collected from a child under the age of thirteen, we will delete this information.

SENSITIVE INFORMATION

We do not collect Sensitive Information such as medical, health, racial, ethnic, political, religious, philosophic, union membership or sexual orientation information. If we are made aware that we have received such information, we will delete this information.

COMMITMENT

We are committed to privacy and support current industry initiatives to preserve individual privacy rights on the Internet. Protecting your privacy on-line is an evolving area, and CCSO's web sites are constantly evolving to meet these demands.

If you have any comments or questions regarding our Online Privacy Policy, please contact us at webmaster@CCSO.org.

YOUR CONSENT

By using this web site, you consent to the terms of our Online Privacy Policy and to CCSO's processing of Personal Information for the purposes given above. Should the Online Privacy Policy change, we will take reasonable steps to ensure that these changes are brought to your attention by posting all changes prominently on our web site for a reasonable period of time.