Privacy Policy

Last Updated: December 19, 2024

Previous Version: January 1, 2023

1.    Keeping your information safe

GreenWaste Recovery LLC (“GreenWaste”, “we”, “our” or “us”) is committed to respecting your privacy.  We are committed to keeping your information safe and secure and handling it in accordance with our legal obligations.  We want you to understand how we handle your data.  We also want you to know your rights and choices.

This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) explains how we collect, use, store, protect, and share your personal information collected through our services, including our online domains, physical locations and anywhere else we gather information about you and refer to this Policy.  For simplicity, we call these services the “Platform” in this Policy.

How we handle your information depends on how you use the Platform.  This Policy is grouped into these sections:

• Who we are and how this Policy works;
• Info we collect & why we use it;
• Our disclosures of information to others;
• How long we retain your information;
• Use by minors
• Your rights and controls over information about you;
• Information about local privacy laws.

We encourage you to read this Policy carefully.  If you have questions, please contact us.

2.    Who we are and how this Policy works

(a)     Who we are

GreenWaste operates the Platform. This Policy is designed to explain how we process your personal information and how you can exercise control over our processing. This Policy supplements our Terms of Service and any separate contract through which we provide products or services to you and incorporate or reference this Policy (collectively, “Terms”).  Capitalized terms that are used but not defined in this Policy are defined in the Terms.  The Terms establish a contract between you and us governing your use of the Platform and describe how the Platform works in general, including security measures we use to protect our systems and your information.

(b)     Contact us

If you have questions or comments about this Policy, please contact us at customerservice@GreenWaste.com, with “Privacy” in the subject line or call us at (408) 283-4804.

(c)     When this Policy applies

This Policy applies to you when you use the Platform.  By using or accessing the Platform, you signify that you have read, understand and agree to be bound by this Policy and the Terms.

• If you are a current or former employee or contractor of ours, this Policy does not apply to you. You may contact us about your privacy practices and rights at hr@GreenWaste.com.
• If we receive your information in our role as a service provider to another business, please see ‘Our role’ for more information.

This Policy does not apply to any information you may exchange with Outside Services that the Platform may link to, embed, integrate or otherwise connect you with. Such Outside Services’ websites, services or other events or activities that are not owned or controlled by GreenWaste (“Outside Materials”) are not part of the Platform.  Outside Services have their own data policies and practices. We encourage you to familiarize yourself with their privacy notices and applicable contractual terms.

• For example, our pages may embed third-party content, such as YouTube videos. Those embedded materials are Outside Materials.  We do not control the technologies used by video players and other embedded content experiences.  For example, YouTube controls the player for any embedded YouTube video.  If you interact with the YouTube video, YouTube decides what data it will require before its video content will be served to you.
  • When you interact with embedded content, information about your requests, such as their originating IP address, may be collected by the player. The player may also collect information about the URL of your browser (a page on the Platform), without the involvement of our Platform.

(d)     Changes to this Policy

• Because the Platform changes often, this Policy may change over time. Anytime we modify the Policy, we will post a revised version on the Platform as noted at Last Updated If we intend to use your personal information in a way that is materially different from the ways described at the time of collection, we will notify you before the material changes to this Policy take effect, so you have time to review them.
• If we have your contact information (such as your email or phone number), we will notify you that way. We may also post a temporary notice on the Platform, or notify you by other means to the extent required by law.
• Check the Last Updated date periodically to ensure you’re aware of the current Policy. By using or accessing the Platform, you signify that you have read, understand and agree to be bound by this Policy and the Terms.

(e)     Location-specific sections

The Platform operates from California, in the United States and, as of the Last Updated date, may only be used by California residents.  We have no international operations.  Our practices generally do not differ based on your location, but your rights and choices depend in part on the law where you live.  For example, you may have rights under:

• the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended (“CCPA”) or another U.S. jurisdiction that has enacted a data privacy law similar to CCPA, we extend to you the same rights that CCPA grants to California residents, except where we specify otherwise.

Residents of those states should consult the ‘Additional Information for Users in California’ section.  If that section applies to you, it overrides any contrary descriptions elsewhere in the Policy as they relate to you.

If you have questions about your rights under other data privacy laws, please contact us.

(f)       Our role

If you contract with us directly, we serve as the business controlling the personal information we collect about you.

However, if we receive your personal information in our role as a contractor or service provider to another business, we may serve in a different role under applicable law.  If you access or interact with the Platform through another company, like your waste-management utility, that customer of ours may be the business controlling our processing of your information.  In those circumstances:

• Additional privacy notices or policies, provided by our customer to you, may govern or apply to the personal information you provide through the Platform.
• We will direct any questions or rights requests you may send us as required under our customer agreements or applicable law.

3.    Information we collect & why we use it

We collect certain information when you use the Platform. This includes information you provide to through the Platform, information we collect automatically, and information we receive from other sources.  This also includes information you may provide to third-party service providers while using our services. This section describes, comprehensively, how the Platform collects and uses your information, and our legal basis for doing so:

• Any personal information that GreenWaste obtains from third-party sources will be processed by GreenWaste in accordance with this Policy and all applicable laws. For example, our use and transfer of information via Google APIs (like Google Analytics) will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including its Limited Use requirements.

(a)     Information collected when you visit our locations

If you visit our recycling centers or other in-person locations, we may collect additional personal information about your visit through onsite recording devices and other technology.  This additional information may include license plate numbers of vehicles.  We do not have a practice of associating this information with any individual, nor do we maintain this information in repositories linked to individuals.

(b)     Information we don’t collect

For clarity, we do not collect, sell or share:

• Sensitive personal information (while we collect any address you provide in connection with our recycling and waste-management services, we do not collect your precise geolocation, nor do we use your address to infer characteristics about you).
• Personal information about anyone under the age of 16 (see ‘Use by minors’ for more details)

(c)     Security

GreenWaste has implemented technical, administrative and physical security measures to protect your information from unauthorized access, use or disclosure. Still, no data transmission online is 100% secure, so we cannot guarantee or warrant the security of any information you provide, and you do so at your own risk. We cannot promise that your information will remain absolutely secure in all circumstances. We are not responsible for the circumvention of any privacy settings or security measures we may provide.

4.    Our disclosures of information to others

Since our goal is to deliver our recycling and waste-management services to you, the principal reason we exchange your information with third parties is to facilitate those services.

This section describes how and why we exchange personal information with third parties, like our contractors (as defined below).  It also describes exchanges made for certain purposes, like legal reasons and consensual direct marketing.  We may also disclose deidentified and/or anonymized data for these purposes.

(a)     Among our Affiliates

We may share, link or pool user information among our affiliated business entities, but always in accordance with applicable law, applicable agreements and this Policy.

(b)     Direct marketing

We only disclose, rent, sell or share any information about you to third parties for direct marketing purposes if you opt in, and will only do so until you opt out. 

We may share information about you with third party sponsors or partners who will use it for marketing purposes but only if you opt in to such sharing or do not opt out when prompted.  We will never share information in this manner without giving you one of these two options.

(c)     For personalized ads

We share information with select advertising partners to make the advertising presented to you more relevant to you.  We also market the Services to you through ads facilitated by marketing vendors.

In the past twelve months, we have shared these categories of personal information to personalize advertising:

• Device Information (including Personal Identifiers)
• Commercial Information
• Demographic Information
• Internet Activity
• Geolocation

In the past twelve months, this information has been disclosed to the following third parties:

• Google LLC

One way we use Google is to serve ads on the Platform.  Google uses cookies or unique device identifiers, in combination with their own data, to show you ads based on your visits to our webpages and other sites.  You can opt out of the use of the Google cookie by visiting the related Google privacy policy or our cookie opt-out tool (CookieYes as of the Last Updated date).

(d)     Functional disclosures

We contract with companies or individuals to provide certain services related to the functionality and features of the Platform, including payment processing, email and hosting services, software development, ordering and fulfillment processing, data management and surveys and marketing administration.  We call these third-party companies and individuals “contractors.”

We may disclose information about you, including activity data and device information, to contractors as necessary for them to perform their services to us.  Our contractors are not permitted to use your information for any other purpose.  In the past 12 months, we have disclosed account information, usage data and device information to the following types of contractors:

• Analytics providers, namely Google Analytics, to tell us how the Platform is doing, such as which parts interest visitors and how long they visit before leaving. Among other data, they may receive your IP address.
• Various hosting services and data processors to provide the infrastructure of the Platform, such as DreamHost, which ensures that traffic is from real people, not computers. Among other data, they may receive your IP address.
• Payment providers, PayPal, 1stMILE LLC and other payment processors as added as of the Last Updated date, to process payments between you and us, such as for products or ongoing Services. These providers receive information about your order in order to tie your payment to your order.  We don’t receive all of the information you may provide to them as part of that process (for instance, we don’t receive full payment-account numbers).
• Support providers, namely Genesys Cloud Services Inc., to provide assistance to you when you request it. They are able to retrieve information about you that is relevant and necessary to your requests, such as account information and order details.

(e)     For legal reasons

Finally, we may share your Information:

• In response to subpoenas, court orders, or other legal process; to establish or exercise our legal rights; to defend against legal claims; or as otherwise required by law. In such cases we reserve the right to raise or waive any legal objection or right available to us;
• When we believe it is appropriate to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal or suspected illegal activities; to protect and defend the rights, property, or safety of our company, our users, or others; and in connection with the enforcement of our Terms and other agreements; or
• In connection with a corporate transaction, such as a divestiture, merger, consolidation, or asset sale, or in the unlikely event of bankruptcy.

(f)       With your consent or at your request

We may periodically ask for your consent to disclose your information to third parties.  Whenever we ask for your consent for this reason, we will summarize the purpose and scope of the disclosure. In those cases, the Platform will display a tickbox near an email-entry field explaining that by submitting your information, you agree to share your email with the content provider. To be clear, we only disclose information about you with third parties for direct marketing purposes if you opt in, and will only do so until you opt out.

(g)     Technical

Finally, we may use and disclose non-personal information (meaning information that, by itself, does not identify who you are, such as device information, general demographics, general behavioral data, location data in de-identified form) under any of the above circumstances.

5.    How long we retain your information

We retain your information only as long as we need it for the purposes described under ‘Information we collect & how we use it’, except when longer retention is required by our compliance policies and efforts toward applicable legal, tax, accounting and regulatory requirements.

How long we need information for those purposes varies by category, and even within categories.  These retention determinations always consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal information, the potential risk of harm from its unauthorized use or disclosure, whether we can achieve those purposes without using the personal information.

For example, we delete some Activity Data as soon as you exit the Platform, whereas we may retain records of your orders for services and products for several years as required by law or contract, such as agreements with our payment processor(s) or under our accounting standards.

6.    Use by minors

The Platform is intended for adult users.  We do not knowingly collect information from anyone under the age of 16.  If we learn that we have collected information from a child under the age of 16, we will delete that information as quickly as possible.

• If you are under 16: sorry, but please leave the Platform.  If you’ve already sent us information, please contact us first so we can delete it.
• If you are a parent or guardian of a child under 16 years of age and you believe your child has provided us with information, please contact us.

7.    Your rights

(a)     In General

As a user of the Platform, you have rights and choices about your personal information.  We want you to be in control of your information, so we want to remind you of the following options and tools available to you:

• Account Controls

You can update the personal information in your Account through the account settings made available on the Platform.  Any updated information will be reflected in our records and throughout the Platform promptly.

• Opting Out of Cookies

You can opt out of non-necessary cookies on the Platform by using our cookie opt-out tool (CookieYes as of the Last Updated date). The tool enables you to opt out of functional, analytic, performance, advertisement, and uncategorized cookies and save your preferences.

• Opting Out of Communications

As described above, we may use the information we collect from you to send messages to you.  If you do not want to receive such communications, you can opt out (as applicable) by using the unsubscribe link at the bottom of our communications, unchecking the applicable box to opt out when prompted, texting “STOP” in response to any text message we may send you, or by simply not opting in when prompted.  You may also at any time opt out of receiving communications from us by sending an e-mail to customerservice@GreenWaste.com with the subject line “Opt Out.”

Please note that even if you unsubscribe from our communications, we may still need to contact you with important information related to changes to the Platform, your account and your payments.  For example, even if you have unsubscribed from our promotional emails, we will still send you confirmation of a purchase you have made on our Platform or to alert you to changes to our Terms or Privacy Policy.

• Opting Out of Personalized Advertising

You have a choice about participating in personalized advertising.  If you wish to opt out, in addition to the cookie opt-out above and any location-specific rights that may apply, there are several ways to exercise choice regarding technologies similar to cookies:

• Many popular browsers provide the ability to clear browser storage, typically in the settings or preferences area. See your browser’s help function or support area to learn more.
• Your mobile device settings may allow you to limit the use of information from your device in personalized advertising through a “Limit Ad Tracking” setting (on an iOS device) or an “Opt Out of Personalized Ads” setting (on an Android device). You can download the AppChoices app to opt out in mobile apps.
• You can learn more about advertising networks and personalized advertising, and your ability to opt out, by visiting the Digital Advertising Alliance Webchoices Browser Check or the Network Advertising Initiative Opt Out of Interest-Based Advertising

In providing you with transparency and access to choice regarding personalized advertising, we are acting in accordance with our commitment to the Digital Advertising Alliance’s Self-Regulatory Principles.  You can learn more about these Principles here.

If any of the local privacy laws listed below apply to you, see ‘Requesting information’ to exercise your rights.

8.    Information about local privacy laws

• The Services operate from the United States, but this Policy applies worldwide. Our practices generally do not differ based on your location, but your rights and choices depend in part on the law where you live.
• If any of these local privacy laws apply to you, that section overrides any contrary descriptions elsewhere in the Policy as they relate to you. If you have questions about your rights under other data privacy laws, please contact us.

(a)     Requesting information

(i)        Submitting requests

• To exercise any rights described in this Policy, please contact us. Your request must:

• provide sufficient information to identify you and the law that applies to you, such as your name, e-mail address, home or work address, or other information we maintain.
• not include social security numbers, driver’s license numbers, third-party account numbers, credit or debit card numbers, or health information.

(ii)       Verifying requests

• We verify requests by first confirming the source of the request and then by matching the information submitted to the information we maintain. If your request is unclear or we are unable to authenticate your identity, we will respond with direction on how to remedy the deficiencies, in accordance with law that applies to you.
• If we cannot verify the identity of the individual making the request, we may deny it, in full or in part.

(iii)      Responses to requests

• We will respond to your request as quickly as we can, taking into account the nature of your request and the volume of pending requests. The content of our response will vary with the nature of your request, but will always respond in accordance with any deadlines or requirements specified by the laws that applies to you.

• Under certain circumstances, we may be unable to provide responsive personal information, such as when disclosure would create a substantial, articulable and unreasonable risk to the security of the information, customers’ account with us, or the security of our systems or networks. We do not disclose account passwords or any other non-personal information that enables access to an account.
• Please understand, however, that we reserve the right to retain an archive of any deleted information, to the extent permitted by law. We may also retain deidentified or aggregate data derived from information about you.

(iv)     Appealing decisions

• Residents of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Virginia and other jurisdictions that provide for an appeal mechanism may appeal a decision we have made regarding their requests by contacting us.

(b)     Information for Users in Certain U.S. States

• Exercising your rights: As described in the ‘Your rights’ section of the Policy, all our users have control over their information and can limit what data we process. If you are a resident of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Utah, Virginia or another state with a similar data-privacy law, you may have additional rights that you (or, in certain states, an authorized agent acting on your behalf) can exercise by contacting us, including the right to:

• More information about the categories and specific pieces of personal information we have collected and disclosed for a business purpose in the last 12 months
• Access and/or receive a copy of certain personal information we hold about you
• Correct your personal information
• Delete certain personal information we hold about you
• Receive information about the financial incentives that we offer to you, if any
• Opt out of the processing of your personal information for purposes of profiling in furtherance of decisions that produce legal or similarly significant effects, if applicable
  • You also have the right to not be discriminated against for exercising your rights. You may also have the right to opt out of “sales” of your information and “sharing/processing of your information for targeted advertising.” We do not sell the sensitive personal data of our users or share sensitive personal data for targeted advertising purposes.
  • Certain information may be exempt from the requests above under applicable law. For example, we need to retain certain information in order to provide our services to you. We also need to take reasonable steps to verify your identity before responding to a request. If you are an authorized agent submitting a request on a user’s behalf (where permitted), we may require proof of your written authorization before processing the request. Depending on applicable law, you may have the right to appeal our decision to deny your request.
  • If you have any questions about these rights, wish to exercise them, or request an appeal, please contact us.

(c)     Additional Information for Users in California

• In addition to the rights described above, consumers residing in California are afforded the right to certain additional information with respect to their personal information under the CCPA. If you are a California resident, this section applies to you.
• ‍Our collection and use of personal information: We collect the following categories of personal information—identifiers (such as your username, the email address you used to make an Account, and your phone number if you’ve chosen to provide it); commercial information (a record of what you’ve bought from GreenWaste, if anything); financial data (limited payment information); internet or other network information (how you interact with the Platform); location information (because your IP address may indicate your general location); inference data about you (for example, what content you may be interested in); and other information that identifies or can be reasonably associated with you.
• For more information about what we collect and the sources of such collection, please see the ‘Information we collect & why we use it’ section of the Privacy Policy. To the extent we collect or use sensitive personal information as defined by law (such as the CCPA), we do so in accordance with applicable legal requirements, and we do not use or disclose it other than for purposes for which there is not a right to limit under the CCPA.
• We may disclose your personal information with service providers and third parties for business or commercial purposes as described under ‘Our disclosures of information to others’ above.

• ‍Disclosure of personal information: We may share your personal information with third parties as described in the ‘Our disclosures of information to others’ section of the Policy. We disclose the categories of personal information mentioned in that section for business or commercial purposes.
• ‍No sale or “share” of personal information: The CCPA sets forth certain obligations for businesses that sell or “share” personal information. We do not sell or share the personal information of our users as those terms are defined in the CCPA. We do disclose certain information as outlined in the ‘Our disclosures of information to others’ section of the Policy and you can make choices with respect to your information as outlined in that policy.
• We disclose personal information for the following categories of purposes, as defined by CCPA:
  • Advertising and Marketing
  • Error Management
  • Internal Research
  • Provide Products or Services
  • Quality Assurance
  • Security
  • Short-Term Transient Use
    • We retain personal information as described in the ‘How long we retain your information’ section of the Policy.
    • California’s “Shine the Light” law gives residents of California the right under certain circumstances to request information from us regarding the manner in which we share certain categories of personal information (as defined in the Shine the Light law) with third parties, as defined under applicable law, for their direct marketing purposes. We only share your personal information with third-parties for direct marketing purposes with your consent and, if you have consented, only until you withdraw your consent.
  • Because we only give your information to third parties for direct marketing purposes with your consent, and always allow you to opt out of direct marketing communications after opting in, we believe we are not currently required to comply with California Civil Code Section 1798.83.

(i)        Preference signals

The Platform honors global Opt-out preference signal sent from California IP addresses to the Platform through browser or device-level settings, provided the signal complies with CCPA’s requirements.  Our goal is for the Platform to automatically respond to compliant signals by opting California residents out of any sharing or sale of their data in a frictionless manner.  Please contact us if you believe the Platform collected or processed your information in a manner inconsistent with your opt-out preference signal.

(ii)       Request process for CCPA rights

To submit a CCPA request relating to the foregoing rights, please contact us as described under ‘Requesting information’.  That section generally applies to requests to exercise CCPA rights.  However, in addition:

• We will confirm receipt of your CCPA request within 10 days, and will substantively respond within 45 days.
• We may initially substantively respond by informing you that we will require up to 45 further days, along with an explanation of why our substantive response is delayed.
• We provide responses in the manner we receive your request (i.e., with an email response to an email request).

Finally, we may deny deletion requests, in whole or in part, with respect to information we reasonably need to:

• comply with a legal obligation
• allow you, other consumers, or us to exercise free-speech rights or other legal rights
• perform a contract with you (for instance, if a product you purchased carries a warranty or could reasonably be subject to recall under applicable law)
• or if we use the information for solely internal purposes reasonably aligned with consumer expectations.