PRIVACY POLICY
Privacy Policy
Meade Instruments ("We", "Our", ";Us") respects your privacy rights. This Privacy Policy applies to Meade Instruments, the Meade.com Website, Meade® and Coronado® Instruments product sales, and Meade mobile applications "StellaAccess" and "SkyKey". By continuing to use this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy. It explains who we are, how we collect, share, and use Personal Information, and how you can exercise your privacy rights.
We recommend that you read this privacy policy in full to ensure you are fully informed.
Please click the following links to learn more about our Privacy Policy:
- What Types of Personal Information Do We Collect?
- How Do We Use Personal Information?
- How Do We Share Personal Information?
- How Do We Respond to "Do Not Track" Signals?
- Your Privacy Choices
- California Privacy Rights
- Nevada Privacy Rights
- Legal Bases for Processing (EEA Individuals)
- EEA Individuals' Rights
- International Users
- Children's Privacy
- Cookie Policy
- Change of Control
- How Do We Protect Personal Information?
- Policy Changes
- Contact Information
1. What Types of Personal Information Do We Collect?
Information You Give Us. We collect a variety of information that you provide directly to us, including information submitted on our website forms and login pages, to our customer service departments, and through our mobile applications.
The categories of information include:
- Product registration information, including model number, serial number, type of installation, date of installation and updates to your product;
- Personal information such as name, telephone number, email address and product registration information provided to us in relation to customer support or technical assistance;
- Personal information such as name, email address and password information provided to us in relation to our mobile software applications, and online website forms;
- Geolocation data provided to us in relation to finding a distributor;
- Personal information such as name and email address provided to us in relation to contest registration and prize acceptance;
- Personal information such as name and email address provided to us in relation to subscribing to and receiving newsletters, alerts or other services from us;
- Commercial information such as name, billing address and payment card details (including card number, expiration date and security code), which is collected and stored by a third-party payment processor on our behalf;
- Social media information, such as social media handles, content and other data shared with us through third-party features that you use on our Site and other service (such as apps, tools, payment services, widgets and plug-ins offered by social media services like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube) or posted on social media pages (such as our social media page or other pages accessible to us); and
- Employment, professional, or education information, such as job title, job history, and schools attended when you apply for a position or work for us.
The specific types of information collected will depend upon the services you use or subscribe to.
For example, when you shop through our web store, we may collect data such as the purchases you have made, items in your shopping cart, and how often you make purchases. To process your order, provide customer service support, or provide warranty and refund services, we may collect your full name, email address, phone number, product serial number, home address, mobile phone number, credit card information, shipping address, and zip code. When you register your products, we may ask, and you may agree to provide information in response to our customer surveys.
We may collect your email address for direct marketing purposes, when you register your products and agree to sign up for our marketing services. You may also agree to sign up for our direct marketing through forms on our website or through sign-up forms at our trade shows.
When you use our SkyKey and StellaAccess mobile applications, the mobile application may access your GPS, Wi-Fi, camera, and location data, for the purposes of providing mobile application services such as constellation mapping and wireless control of telescopes. This GPS, Wi-Fi, camera, and location data is not transmitted to us, and we do not collect it. We do collect aggregate and anonymous financial reports on mobile application downloads, and do not track this information to any particular individual or device.
When you enter our contests and sweepstakes, you may provide us your name, phone number, and mailing address information for the delivery of sweepstake prizes.
Information We Automatically Collect. We may gather certain information automatically and store it in log files. This information may include internet protocol (IP) addresses, browser type, internet service provider (ISP), referring/exit pages, operating system, date/time stamp, and/or clickstream data. We may combine this automatically collected log information with other information we collect about you. We do this to improve marketing, analytics, or site functionality. This information is not used in a form that would enable direct identification of any of our visitors. We may collect this information using cookies, as explained in our Cookie Policy.
We use Google Analytics to measure the overall performance of our website. Meade reviews these reports on an aggregate and anonymous basis and does not re-identify this data to an individual or device.
Information Provided by Third Parties. Where you've purchased our products and services using a third party or partner organization, we often need to exchange information with them as part of managing that relationship and your account – for example, to be able to identify your order and be able to pay them. If we have a contract with a service provider or contractor to provide us with services or provide a service on our behalf, and they may have access to your personal information, we don't authorize them to use or disclose your personal information except in connection with providing their services.
2.How Do We Use Personal Information?
Providing Products and Services. We collect personal information to process the products and services you've bought from us, and to keep you updated with the progress of your order. We also collect information to provide customer service support or provide warranty and refund services. We may contact you if the billing information you provided us with is about to expire or we're not able to take payment, as well as to respond to any questions or concerns you may have about our products or services.
Improving and Innovating our Products and Services. We collect anonymous, de-identified or aggregate information in order to improve the products and service we offer to everyone. This may include research on our users' demographics, interests, and behavior based on the information provided to us when making a purchase, during a promotion, from surveys and from our server log files. This research is combined and aggregated to prevent identification of personal information relating to any one individual.
Marketing. For customers or other individuals who have subscribed to our marketing announcements, we will keep you informed generally about new and existing products and services, send you newsletters or white papers, invite you to participate in market research or let you know about offers, promotions, prize draws or competitions. We tailor these messages for example, based on the sorts of products and services you've bought from us.
Research and Analytics. We may conduct market research and to carry out research and statistical analysis to monitor how customers use our networks, products and services; personalize our marketing campaigns; or provide anonymized reports to third parties.
Security and Fraud Prevention. We will sometimes need to profile you, for credit, fraud and security purposes. We will also use your personal information for identity verification purposes, for access to your account and for general account management.
3. How Do We Share Personal Information?
Service Providers. Where applicable, we share information about you with partners, suppliers or agents involved in delivering the products and services you've ordered or used. We also share information with companies who are engaged to perform services for, or on behalf of, Meade. For example, we use Quivers for our online payment portal, a PCI-compliant credit card processor. We also share information with third parties that we use to serve you e-mail newsletters, for example, MailChimp.
If we have a contract with a service provider or contractor to provide us with services or provide a service on our behalf, and they may have access to your personal information, we don't authorize them to use or disclose your personal information except in connection with providing their services.
Third Party Links and Websites. Our website may contain links to and from the websites of third parties. If you follow a link to any of these websites, please note that these websites have their own privacy policies and that we do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies. Please check these policies before you submit any data to these websites.
Social Media. Our website may include social media buttons or widgets (“social media elements”). These social media elements may collect your IP address, which page you are visiting on our site, and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. Social media elements are governed by the privacy policy of the social media company providing the feature and/or widget.
Disclosures Required by Law. We may be required to disclose your data in response to lawful requests by public authorities, including to meet law enforcement requirements. We may be under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation, to enforce or apply our terms and conditions and other agreements, to protect our rights, property, or safety, or the protect the rights, property, or safety of others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for the purposes of fraud protection.
4. How Do We Respond to "Do Not Track" Signals?
Do Not Track ("DNT") is a privacy preference that users can set in certain web browsers. DNT is a way for users to inform websites and services that they do not want certain information about their webpage visits collected over time and across websites or online services. We do not recognize or respond to browser-initiated DNT signals, as the Internet industry is currently still working toward defining exactly what DNT means, what it means to comply with DNT, and a common approach to responding to DNT.
5. Your Privacy Choices
Marketing Opt-Out: You have the right to ask us not to process your personal data for marketing purposes. You can exercise your right to prevent such processing by following the unsubscribe instructions included in these emails, or you can contact us at the contact information below. You will still continue to receive service-related messages concerning products and services you have purchased (unless we have indicated otherwise).
Mobile Application Settings. If you do not want the SkyKey and StellaAccess applications to access your GPS, Wi-Fi, camera, and location data for the purposes set forth above, you can turn off the location services and camera access for the mobile application located in your account settings or in your mobile phone settings and/or within the mobile application. If you turn off these settings, you will be unable to access the mobile application services.
6. California Privacy Rights
If you are a California consumer, you have the following rights:
- The right to know what personal information is being collected about you.
- The right to know whether your personal information is sold or disclosed and to whom.
- The right to say no to the sale of personal information.
- The right to access your personal information.
- The right, in certain circumstances, to delete the information you have provided to us.
- The right to equal service and price, even if you exercise your privacy rights, unless the difference in service and/or price is reasonably related to the value provided to the you by your personal information.
Request for Information. California consumers have the right to request, up to twice in a 12-month period that a business that collects personal information about the consumer disclose to the consumer the information listed below for the preceding 12 months. We have the right to request verification of your identity for all requests for information.
- The categories of personal information it has collected about that consumer.
- The categories of sources from which the personal information is collected.
- The business or commercial purpose for collecting or selling personal information.
- The categories of third parties with whom the business shares personal information.
- The categories of personal information that the business sold about the consumer and the categories of third parties to whom the personal information was sold, by category or categories of personal information for each third party to whom the personal information was sold.
- The categories of personal information that the business disclosed about the consumer for a business purpose.
- The specific pieces of personal information it has collected about that consumer.
To make such a request, please call us at the following toll-free number 800-626-3233 or contact us at the contact information below.
Do Not Sell My Personal Information. California consumers have the right to opt out of the sale of the consumer's personal information. To make such a request, please call us at 800-626-3233, contact us at the contact information below, or submit your request at https://www.meade.com/content/do-not-sell-my-personal-information/.
Third Party Marketing. California Civil Code Section 1798.83 permits you to request information regarding the disclosure of your personal information to third parties for the third parties' direct marketing purposes. To make such a request, please contact us at the contact information below.
7. Nevada Privacy Rights
Do Not Sell My Personal Information. Nevada consumers have the right to opt out of the sale of the consumer's personal information. We do not sell Nevada consumer's personal information to third parties.
8. Legal Bases for Processing (EEA Individuals)
If you are from the European Economic Area, our legal basis for collecting and using the Personal Information, we will process your personal data based on:
- The performance of your contract or to enter into the contract and to take action on your requests. For example, the processing of your orders for products or services offered by us.
- Our legitimate business interests. For example, fraud prevention, maintaining the security of our network and services, direct marketing, and improvement of our services.
- Compliance with a mandatory legal obligation. For example, accounting and tax requirements, which are subject to mandatary retention periods. We may also collect your personal information to record your requests to exercise your rights and to verify your identity for such requests.
- Consent you provide where we do not rely on another legal basis. Consent may be withdrawn at any time.
- In some limited cases, we may also have a legal obligation to collect personal information from you, in response to lawful requests by public authorities, including to meet law enforcement requirements, as described above in "How Do We Share Personal Information?"
If you have questions about or need further information concerning the legal basis on which we collect and use your Personal Information, please contact us using the contact details provided in the "Contact Information" section below.
9. EEA Individuals' Rights
If you are from the European Economic Area, you have the right, under certain circumstances, to:
- Access your personal information;
- Correct inaccurate personal information;
- Request erasure of your personal information without undue delay;
- Request the restricted processing of your personal information;
- Request portability of the personal information that you have given us; and
- To object to the processing of your personal information.
If you are from the European Economic Area, you also have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, under certain circumstances.
You may contact us at the contact information below for more information, or to exercise your rights.
10. International Users
Any data that you provide to us may be accessed, shared or processed by our offices, located in the United States, and service providers located in the United States and abroad, if such data transfer is necessary for the specific purpose for which you submitted your data (such as the provision of goods or services under a written contract). This may entail a transfer of your personal information across international borders, including, but not limited to, transfers from within the European Economic Area (the "EEA") to the United States. The data protections standards may differ and be lower than the standards enforced in your jurisdiction. We maintain appropriate safeguards as required by applicable law for any personal information transferred internationally, and as required by applicable law, will seek your consent prior to such transfers.
11. Children's Privacy
This website is not directed at individuals under the age of 16. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 16. If you become aware that a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us at the contact information below. If we become aware that a child under 16 has provided us with personal information, we will take steps to delete such information.
12. Cookie Policy
To make this site work properly, we sometimes place small data files called cookies on your device. A cookie is a small text file that a website saves on your computer or mobile device when you visit the site. The cookies we use enable us to track aggregate activity on the website.
Cookie Types
First-party cookies originate from the same domain as the website you're currently visiting (e.g., Meade.com). Third-party cookies originate from a domain that's different to the website being visited. For example, when you visit our website, we may link to another company's website — like our Facebook or Twitter account, or a video from our YouTube page. We don't control how they use their cookies, so we suggest you check their website to see how they're using them and how you can manage them.
Here are the first-party cookies currently used on this website:
| Cookie | Description |
| __utma __utmb __utmc __utmz |
We use Google Analytics to analyze the performance of our website, to analyze trends, administer the website, track aggregate users' movements around the website, to gather statistical data about the demographics of our user base, and to improve your experience with our website. We do not use Google Analytics to identify any individual users. In addition to tracking pixels, Google Analytics serves its __utma, __utmb, __utmc, and __utmz cookies to our website visitors. You can find tools to help you opt-out of Google Analytics tracking and cookies at this url: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout. |
Controlling Your Cookies
You can control cookies in your browser, to enable or disable them. If you wish to restrict or block the cookies which are set by any website, you should do this through the web browser settings for each web browser you use, on each device you use to access the internet.
Information on controlling and deleting cookies, including on a wide variety of browsers, is also available at allaboutcookies.org.
You can also manage many companies' cookies used for online advertising via the consumer choice tools created under self-regulation programs in many countries, such as the US-based aboutads.info choices page or the EU-based Your Online Choices.
13. Change of Control
We may choose to buy or sell assets and may share and/or transfer customer information in connection with the evaluation of and entry into such transactions. Also, if we (or our assets) are acquired, or if we go out of business, enter bankruptcy, or go through some other change of control, your personal information could be one of the assets transferred to or acquired by a third party.
14. How Do We Protect Personal Information?
We use commercially reasonable efforts to protect personal information we obtain through the Site against accidental, unlawful or unauthorized destruction, loss, alteration, access, disclosure or use. The safety and security of your information also depends on you. Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password for access to certain parts of our Site, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone. We urge you to be careful about giving out information in public areas of the Site like message boards. The information you share in public areas may be viewed by any user of the Site.
Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we use commercially reasonable efforts to protect your Personal Information, we cannot guarantee the security of your Personal Information transmitted to our Site. Any transmission of Personal Information is at your own risk. We are not responsible for circumvention of any privacy settings or security measures contained on the Site.
15. Policy Changes
We may change our privacy policy at any time. If we make material changes to this policy, we will notify you here, by email, or by means of a notice on our homepage. We encourage you to periodically review this Privacy Policy to ensure you are familiar with the most current version.
16. Contact Information
If you wish to contact us or have any questions about or complaints in relation to this Privacy Policy, please contact us:
Email address: customerservice@meade.com
Phone: 800-626-3233
Mailing Address:
Meade Instruments
89 Hangar Way
Watsonville, CA 95076 USA