Privacy Policy

We value your business and we know your privacy is important to you. Accordingly, we have implemented this Privacy Notice to inform you of the information that we collect from you when you visit this website ("thecomicsfactory.com"), what we do with it and how you can exercise your privacy rights.

Quick Links

We recommend that you read this Notice in full to ensure you are fully informed. However, if you only want to access a particular section of this Notice, then you can click on the relevant link below to jump to that section.

• What personal information do we collect
• What we do with your personal information
• Who we share information with
• Cookies and similar tracking technology
• International data transfers
• How we protect your information
• Your data protection rights & choices
• How we link to other websites
• Data retention
• Children's privacy
• Changes to our Privacy Policy
• How to contact us

What personal information do we collect

Information you provide to us

Certain parts of our Website may ask you to provide personal information voluntarily: for example, we ask you to provide your name, contact details and payment details in order to purchase a printed product from us or to set up an online account, or your email address to sign up to receive a newsletter and/or to submit enquiries to us.

The personal information that you are asked to provide, and the reasons why you are asked to provide it, will be made clear to you at the point we ask you to provide your personal information.

Information that we collect automatically

When you visit our Website, we may collect certain information automatically from your device. Specifically, the information we collect automatically may include information like your IP address, browser-type, the URL of the previous web site you visited, your ISP, operating system and other technical information. We may also collect information about how your device has interacted with our Website, including the pages accessed and links clicked.

Collecting this information enables us to better diagnose problems with our server and to administer our Website, as well as understand the visitors who come to our Website, where they come from, and what content is of interest to them. This information aids us in merchandising and in developing the design and layout of the Website. Some of this information may be collected using cookies and similar tracking technology.

What we do with your personal information

Under no circumstances do we rent, trade or share your address or e-mail address with any other company for their marketing purposes without your consent. We may use the information we collect through our Website for a number of reasons, including to:

• provide, operate, optimize and maintain the Website and our products and services;
• process, fulfill and provide updates on orders;
• set up online accounts;
• where it is in accordance with your preferences send you marketing communications we think you'll find valuable, and if you take advantage of special offers made by our marketing partners, send your details to our marketing partners (with your consent);
• provide customer support, handle your online enquiries and requests, and to provide you with information and access to resources or services that you have requested from us;
• to improve our ability to serve you relevant ads across the Internet for products that will be more interesting to you, we may provide your personal information to our advertising agents that use your information solely for our advertising purposes. You may, from time to time, receive information (including by email or postal mail) from us about new features, new services and special offers we think you'll find valuable;
• improve the layout, navigation and content of our Website;
• identify any server problems or other IT or network issues;
• compile aggregated statistics about customer traffic patterns and site usage to better understand the preferences of our visitors; and
• carry out other legitimate business purposes, such as to improve our products and services, as well as other lawful purposes about which we will notify our users and clients.

We will only process personal information in ways that are compatible with the purpose we collected it for, or for the purposes you later authorize. Before we use your personal information for a purpose that is materially different than the purpose we collected it for or that you later authorized, we will provide you with the opportunity to opt-out.

Who we share information with

We may share and disclose your personal information to other third parties in the following circumstances:

• Within the thecomicsfactory.com group of companies for the purposes outlined in this Notice.
• To vendors and other third party service providers who require access to your personal information to assist in the provision of the Website, our products and services, and other business-related functions. For example, we partner with one or more credit card processing companies to assist us in processing your payment. We may also work with third party service providers to assist us providing targeted email campaigns, assemble and prepare personalized offers and/or make particular product or purchase recommendations. However, those companies do not retain, share, store, or use personal information for any secondary purposes.
• We may also disclose your information to third parties: (a) where required by law or regulatory requirement, court order or other judicial authorization, (b) in response to lawful requests by public authorities, including for the purposes of meeting national security and law enforcement requirements; (c) in connection with the sale, transfer, merger, bankruptcy, restructuring or other reorganization of a business; (d) to protect or defend our rights, interests or property, or that of third parties; (e) to investigate any wrongdoing in connection with the Website or our services; (f) to protect the vital interests of an individual.
• To an actual or potential buyer (and its agents and advisers) in connection with any actual or proposed purchase, merger or acquisition of any part of our business, provided that we inform the buyer it must use your personal information only for the purposes disclosed in this Privacy Notice;
• To any other person with your consent.

California Privacy Rights

California law permits residents to ask us for a list of personal data we share with third parties or corporate affiliates for those third parties or corporate affiliates direct marketing purposes. If you are a California resident and would like a copy of this notice, please contact us at info@thecomicsfactory.com. This request can be made once a year, free of charge, for the prior calendar year. The notice will itemize the information collected along with the third parties and affiliates it was shared with, and the third parties and affiliates names and addresses. You also have the right to request us to delete Personal Information we have collected from you using the same email address above.

Legal basis for processing your personal information (EEA visitors/customers only)

If you are a visitor/customer located in the European Economic Area ("EEA"), our legal basis for collecting and using the personal information described above will depend on the personal information concerned and the specific context in which we collect it. We will normally collect personal information from you only where we have your consent to do so, where we need the personal information to perform a contract with you, or where the processing is in our legitimate business interests. In some cases, we may also have a legal obligation to collect personal information from you.

If we ask you to provide personal information to comply with a legal requirement or to enter into a contract with you, we will make this clear at the relevant time and advise you whether the provision of your personal information is mandatory or not (as well as of the possible consequences if you do not provide your personal information). Similarly, if we collect and use your personal information in reliance on our legitimate interests, we will make clear to you at the relevant time what those legitimate interests are.

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 under the 'How to contact us'.

Cookies and similar tracking technology

Using cookies

Cookies are pieces of information stored directly on the computer that you are using. Cookies allow us to collect information such as browser type, time spent on the Services, pages visited, language preferences, and other traffic data. We and our third party service providers use the information for security purposes, to facilitate navigation, to display information more effectively, and to personalize your experience. We also gather statistical information about use of the Services in order to continually improve their design and functionality, understand how they are used and assist us with resolving questions regarding them. Cookies further allow us to select which of our programs, initiatives, offerings and services are most likely to appeal to you and display them while you are on the Services. We may also use cookies or other technologies in online advertising to track responses to our ads. We do not currently respond to browser do-not-track signals. If you do not want information collected through the use of cookies, most browsers allow you to automatically decline cookies or be given the choice of declining or accepting a particular cookie (or cookies) from a particular website. You may also wish to refer to http://www.allaboutcookies.org/manage-cookies/index.html. If, however, you do not accept cookies, you may experience some inconvenience in your use of the Services. You also may not receive advertising or other offers from us that are relevant to your interests and needs.

Using technology to track use of services and improve the services

Pixel Tags (also known as web beacons or clear GIFs) may be used to, among other things, track the actions of users of the Services (including email recipients), measure the success of our marketing campaigns, and compile statistics about usage of the Services and response rates.

In some instances, we may use Google Analytics, which uses cookies and similar technologies to collect and analyze information about use of the Services and report on activities and trends. This service may also collect information regarding the use of other websites, apps and online resources. You can learn about Google’s practices by going to https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites, and opt out of them by downloading the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on, available at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout

Adobe Flash technology (including Flash Local Shared Objects (“Flash LSOs”)) and other similar technologies. We may use Flash LSOs and other technologies to, among other things, collect and store information about your use of the Services.

Your IP address is automatically assigned to your computer by your Internet Service Provider. An IP address may be identified and logged automatically in our server log files whenever a user accesses the Services, along with the time of the visit and the page(s) that were visited. Collecting IP addresses is standard practice and is done automatically by many websites, applications and other services. We use IP addresses for purposes such as calculating usage levels, diagnosing server problems and administering the Services. We may also derive your approximate location from your IP address.

Physical Location

We may collect the physical location of your device by, for example, using satellite, cell phone tower or WIFI signals. We may use your device’s physical location to provide you with personalized location-based services and content. We may also share your device’s physical location, with our promotional partners to enable them to provide you with more personalized content and to study the effectiveness of advertising campaigns. In some instances, you may be permitted to allow or deny such uses and/or sharing of your device’s location, but if you do, we and/or our promotional partners may not be able to provide you with the applicable personalized services and content.

International data transfers

Your personal information may be stored and processed by us in any country where we have facilities or where we engage service providers, and your personal information may therefore be transferred to countries outside of your country of residence, including the U.S., which may have different data protection rules to those of your country. Where we do so, our collection, storage and use of your personal information will be in accordance with the purposes set out in this Notice.

Specifically, we may transfer your personal and non-personal information to thecomicsfactory.com for storage in the U.S.

EU-U.S. and Swiss-US Privacy Shield

If thecomicsfactory.com has received your personal information in the U.S. and subsequently transfers it to a third-party agent or service provider for processing, and such third party agent or service provider processes your personal information in a manner inconsistent with the Privacy Shield Principles, thecomicsfactory.com. remains responsible under the Privacy Shield unless we can prove we are not responsible for the event giving rise to the damage.

You can direct any questions or complaints about the use or disclosure of your personal information to us at info@thecomicsfactory.com. We will investigate and resolve any complaints or disputes regarding the use of personal information within forty-five (45) days of receiving your complaint.

thecomicsfactory.com has further committed to cooperate and comply with the panel of European data protection authorities (EU DPAs) and the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner (Swiss FDPIC) in the resolution of any Privacy Shield complaints. If you have an unresolved Privacy Shield complaint that we have not addressed satisfactorily, please contact your local EU DPA or the Swiss FDPIC, as applicable. The contact details of the EU DPAs can be found here.

You may have the option to select binding arbitration for the resolution of your complaint under certain circumstances. To find out more about the Privacy Shield's binding arbitration scheme please see https://www.privacyshield.gov/article?id=ANNEX-I-introduction. For information on how to request access, rectification or deletion of your personal information if it is inaccurate or processed in violation of the Privacy Shield, see Section 10 below on "Your data protection rights".

How we protect your information

The security of your personal information is very important to us.

When you enter sensitive information such as a credit card number on our registration or order forms, we encrypt that information using secure socket layer technology (SSL). For purchases made online with credit cards, we store your credit card number in encrypted form for a limited amount of time, and our employees do not have access to this information. We do not store PIN data or 3-digit security codes.

We use appropriate technical and organizational security measures to protect your personal information from loss, misuse, and unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration and destruction, both during transmission and once we receive it. However, no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure. Therefore we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Your data protection rights & choices

You have the following rights:

• If you wish to access, correct, update or request deletion of your personal information, you can do so at any time by contacting us using the contact details provided under 'How to contact us' heading. You can correct many of the details in your account by logging in to your account.
• You have the right to complain to a data protection authority about our collection and use of your personal information. Contact details for data protection authorities in the EEA, Switzerland and certain non-European countries (including the US and Canada) are available here.

You have the right to opt-out of marketing communications we send you at any time. You can exercise this right by clicking on the “unsubscribe” link in the marketing e-mails we send you. Alternatively, please contact us at info@thecomicsfactory.com.Please include your complete name, e-mail address and mailing address. Note that it may take up to three business days to remove you from our marketing lists and after this point you may still receive customer service related communications from us.

We respond to all requests we receive from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with applicable data protection laws.

How we link to other websites

Our Website contains links to websites, third party plug-ins (such as social media sharing buttons) operated by other companies. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other websites. We encourage you to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy notices of such other websites. This Notice applies solely to information collected by our Website.

Data retention

We will retain your personal information for the period necessary to fulfil the purposes outlined in this Notice unless a longer retention period is required or permitted by law, for legal, tax or regulatory reasons, or other lawful purposes.

When we have no ongoing legitimate business need to process your personal information, we will either delete or anonymize it or, if this is not possible (for example, because your personal information has been stored in backup archives), then we will securely store your personal information and isolate it from any further processing until deletion is possible.

Children's privacy

Protecting children's privacy is important to us, and the Site is not intended for children under the age of thirteen. We do not direct the Site to, nor do we knowingly collect any personal information from, such children. If it’s found that a child under the age of thirteen has provided personally identifiable information to the Site, we will use reasonable efforts to remove such information from our files.

Changes to our Privacy Policy

If we change our Privacy Policy, we will post a new version on our Website, which will become effective when posted. The new policy will apply to all current and past users of the Website and will replace any prior policies that are inconsistent with it. We encourage you to check this page regularly to ensure you are up to date with any changes.

How to contact us

If you have any questions or concerns regarding the use or disclosure of your personal information, you can contact us by sending an email to info@thecomicsfactory.com.