Turnitin Website Privacy Policy
Last Updated: 30 January 2024
Note for California Residents: This Privacy Policy and the related Cookie Notice describes how we process your Personal Information and your rights and choices over our processing. In addition, the Notice for California and Other US State Residents section referenced below, contains specific details related to your rights under California law, including your right to opt out of “sales” of Personal Information.
This Privacy Policy applies to the Turnitin, LLC (“Turnitin,” “we,” “us”) websites (collectively, “Websites”). It does not apply to affiliate or subsidiary websites or our education products, which are governed by the policy available here.
This Privacy Policy describes how we may collect, use, and disclose Personal Information information collected on the Websites. Personal Information is information that identifies, describes, or relates to an identified or identifiable individual, or information that is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular consumer or household (“Personal Information”) from visitors to our Websites (“you,” “your”). It also describes your choices regarding use, access, and changes to your Personal Information.
By accessing or using Turnitin Websites, you acknowledge that you have read and understood this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with this Privacy Policy, please do not access or use the Websites.
In addition to reviewing this Privacy Policy, please also review our Website Terms of Use because it and all its terms and conditions are an agreement between you and us.
Table of Contents
- Personal Information We Collect
- Children's Privacy
- Usage Information and Cookies
- Third Party Cookies and Tracking
- How We Use and Disclose Your Personal Information
- How You May Modify Your Personal Information
- Third Parties
- Links
- Turnitin Educator Network
- Security
- Data Retention
- Opt-Out Policy
- Notices For California and Other US State Residents
- Additional Information for Users from the European Economic Area (EEA), Switzerland, and the UK
- EU-US Data Privacy Framework Certification
- Additional Data Rights
- Updates to This Policy
- Contact
Personal Information We Collect
When you visit our Websites, we may collect certain personal information from you. For example, if you request information about our education products or ask a question of our customer support team, we will ask you to provide certain Personal Information so that we may respond to your request. This may include information such as your first and last name, physical address, work email address, telephone number, job role, institution name, institution type, and country. If you choose to join our Educator Network, we will also ask you for a password to help secure your account.
Children's Privacy
Our Websites are intended for a general audience, and not for individuals under the age of 13 or otherwise under the age of consent in each region in which we operate (“children,” “child”). We do not knowingly collect Personal Information from children. Should we learn that we have inadvertently collected Personal Information from a child, we will take steps to promptly delete it.
Usage Information and Cookies
When you access our Websites, our servers automatically collect the Internet Protocol (“IP”) address associated with your computer. We may also collect additional information such as browser type and version, the operating system of your device and language, country, as well as areas in the Websites you visit most frequently and when. If you log into your Educator Network account, we also collect the login timestamp. We use this information to help us administer the Websites, remember your preferences, and diagnose technical problems. We also analyze the information for aggregate trends about how our Websites are used and to help improve our Websites.
To collect this information, we use the following technologies:
- Cookies. A cookie is a small data file sent by a website and stored on the computer or device at the request of that website. Cookies store information related to a user's browser to enable us to recognize the browser on return visits to our Websites and to remember your preferences.
- Pixel tags. A pixel tag (also referred to as a “clear gif” or “web beacon”) allows us to track the online usage patterns of the Websites and to understand which links are clicked. When we send you emails that you have opted into, pixel tags also allow us to track which emails are opened. This information is used to help us improve the Websites.
- HTML5 Storage. HTML5 storage or local storage allows us to distinguish your device from others and to remember information that might be important for the functioning of the Websites, such as to remember your location preference or your logged in state. Typically, HTML5 storage is only deleted if all Internet history, cache, and cookies are deleted. Check your browser controls for information on how to delete your HTML5 storage.
Third Party Cookies and Tracking
We use third-party service providers to help us collect and understand how our Websites are used and to personalize the content you see here and the advertising you see elsewhere on the Internet. Most browsers can be set to detect browser cookies and to let a user reject them, but refusing cookies may affect certain features of our Websites that are provided for your convenience.
A list of companies that use cookies on our Websites, the services they provide, and information on how you may opt out of certain cookies is included in our Cookie Notice. To make choices about cookies placed by us or our third parties on our Websites, you may do so by visiting our Cookies Settings in the footer of the website, which may also appear, in certain jurisdictions, as “Do Not Sell My Personal Information”. If you do not/no longer want to have cookies placed on your browser by third parties, many of them also offer ways to opt out. To learn more about browser cookies, including how to manage or delete them, refer to the “Tools,” “Help,” or similar section of your web browser.
We do not serve targeted advertising on our Websites; however, when you use the Internet, we and our third parties including ad networks, web analytics companies, and social networking platforms may use tracking technologies such as those described above, to collect information about your online activities over time and across our and other websites. We and they may use this information to measure the effectiveness of our advertising and to target advertisements for products and services that may interest you.
This information may be used to provide advertisements for products and services that may interest you, and those companies may use cookies, clear GIFs and other tracking technologies.
Currently, our websites do not respond to “do not track” (DNT) signals transmitted by web browsers. For more information about third-party advertisers and how to prevent them from using your information, visit the NAI’s consumer website at https://www.networkadvertising.org/choices, https://www.aboutads.info/choices/, or https://www.youronlinechoices.com/uk/. If you do want to opt out of using these tools, you need to opt out separately for each of your devices and for each web browser (such as Chrome, Edge Firefox, Safari or others) that you use on each device.
Note that DNT is different than the Global Privacy Control (GPC), which we do respond to in certain applicable territories. To find out more about GPC, please visit https://globalprivacycontrol.org/.
How We Use and Disclose Your Personal Information
We do not access or disclose your Personal Information except as noted at the time that we request it, when you choose to share your information in our Educator Network, or as listed below.
- To administer our Websites: to maintain and administer our Websites and the Educator Network accounts, to ensure service quality, and to protect the security of our Websites, including via support, services and security provided by our third party providers.
- To communicate with you: including to respond to your requests, resolve a support issue, notify you about changes to the Websites, and to otherwise communicate with you and solicit feedback on your product experience.
- To generate and manage log-in credentials: to create the Educator Network account, provide login credentials, and authenticate members of the Educator Network.
- In the event of a reorganization, merger, sale, assignment, bankruptcy, or similar business change: we may need to transfer your Personal Information to that re-organized entity or new owner after the sale or reorganization for them to use in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
Our legal basis for these practices, where required by applicable law, is the fulfillment of our legitimate interests as processing this Personal Information is necessary for us to provide you with access to our Websites, to communicate with you about issues related to the Websites, and to change or operate our business. These activities are reasonably expected by you and do not unduly and negatively affect your privacy rights, and enable us to perform our contracted-for obligations and provide you with access to our Services.
- In relation to a known or suspected violation of our terms of use, fraud prevention or other unlawful use: including to share Personal Information with entities assisting us in investigation and as may be required by applicable law.
- In connection with legal or regulatory obligations: We may use and disclose your Personal Information as necessary to protect our rights or the rights and safety of our users, or as necessary in the event of a court order, regulatory inquiry or other lawful request. Provided, however, that unless legally prohibited, we will direct any such request to you or notify you before responding unless to do so would prejudice the prevention or detection of a crime.
Our legal bases for these practices, where required by applicable law, are to fulfill our legal obligations such as to allow us to ensure the legality of our Websites; and legitimate interests, because processing this Personal Information is necessary to the provision of our Services, and to protect our legal rights, these activities are reasonably expected by you and these activities do not unduly and negatively affect your privacy rights.
- To provide you with marketing materials: to provide you with updates, and offers about our products. At any time, you may unsubscribe or opt-out of further communication on any electronic marketing communication by using the link labeled “unsubscribe” available in each email communication or by contacting us at tiisupport@turnitin.com.
How You May Modify Your Information
If you would like to review, correct, update or request that we delete Personal Information you have provided to us, please contact us at tiisupport@turnitin.com and specify what you would like to review, correct, update or have deleted.
Third Parties
We may engage with third parties to facilitate our delivery of our Websites and to provide certain features on our behalf, such as data hosting, analytics, content delivery, maintenance, email and marketing management, security and similar functions. These third parties may require a limited amount of information, including Personal Information, in order to deliver their services.
Links
Our Websites contain links to third party websites, including social networking websites. The fact that we link to a website is not an endorsement of or representation of an affiliation with that website. We do not control third party websites or their privacy practices. These other websites may place their own cookies or other files on your computer, collect data or solicit personal information from you. Other sites follow different rules regarding the use or disclosure of the personal information you submit to them. We encourage you to read the privacy policies or statements of the other websites you visit.
Turnitin Educator Network
To the extent an “Educator Network” section appears on the Websites, you may read, comment and share blog posts within such section. Any comments you post in this area may be read, collected and used by others. You may also log onto third party social networking websites via social network sharing widgets to share, comment or recommend blog posts. The social network sharing widgets may provide information to their associated social networks or third-parties about your interactions with our web pages , even if you do not click on or otherwise interact with the plug-in or widget. This Information is transmitted from your browser and may include an identifier assigned by the social network or third party and may include information about your browser type, operating system, device type, IP address, and the URL of the web page where the widget appears. If you use social network tools or visit social networking sites, you should read their privacy policies to learn what information they collect, use, and share.
Security
We use physical, administrative, and technical safeguards to help protect the confidentiality, integrity and availability of your Personal Information. We host Personal Information in cloud-based environments that use firewalls, encryption and other industry-standard technologies in an effort to prevent interference or access from outside intruders. The Internet, however, is not perfectly secure and we are not responsible for security breaches not reasonably within our control.
Data Retention
We retain Personal Information for as long as is necessary to provide you with access to our Websites or as long as is permissible under applicable law, including as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, enforce our agreements, comply with applicable industry standards, and protect the security of our Websites.
Opt-Out Policy
We may send you emails with information about our products that we believe may be of interest. You may opt out of receiving these email messages from us by clicking on the “unsubscribe” link found at the bottom of every email that we send or by contacting us at tiisupport@turnitin.com.
We do not send email messages on behalf of third parties.
Notice For California and Other US State Residents
Depending on the jurisdiction in which you reside, including if you are a consumer in California or other US states, you may have certain rights with respect to your Personal Information, as described below. We are required by law to verify your identity when you make certain requests in order to prevent unauthorized access to your data, as described below.
Right to Know and Access Personal Information: You have the right to request access to the Personal Information we maintain about you in the ordinary course of business. This may include Personal Information we collect, use, or disclose about you.
Right of Correction: You have the right to correct inaccuracies in the Personal Information we maintain about you.
Right to Delete: You have the right to request that we delete your Personal Information
Right to Opt Out of “Sale” or “Sharing” of Personal Information: You have the right to opt out of “sales” of personal information or “sharing” of personal information for cross- contextual behavioral advertising purposes (as these terms are defined under applicable law), which for our Websites means transfer of your Personal Information to certain third parties for their or for others’ commercial purposes, including advertising purposes. You may opt out of this practice by clicking on the “Do Not Sell My Personal Information” link available on the footer of our Websites and follow the instructions.
In the case of all such requests, we may not fulfill all or part of the request as permitted or required by applicable law. For example, if you request that we delete your Personal Information, there may be certain records we are legally required to retain.
Verification
In the case of requests to know, correct, and delete in relation to our Websites, we must take reasonable steps to verify your identity before fulfilling your requests. For example, we may seek to establish your identity to a reasonable or a reasonably high degree of certainty by matching information that you submit alongside your request with information that we have in our records. We may ask you or your authorized agent for supplemental information as needed to establish your identity. Authorized agents may also be required to provide a copy of the consumer’s signed permission authorizing the agent to submit requests on the consumer’s behalf under applicable local law.
To Exercise Your Rights
To exercise the rights described above, please go here or contact us using the information below. Should you have any questions or concerns regarding your privacy rights or this privacy policy, you may contact us using the contact information below.
- 2101 Webster St, Ste 1900 Oakland CA. 94612 USA
- tiisupport@turnitin.com
- +1 866 816 5046 x241
Non-discrimination
We shall not discriminate or otherwise penalize anyone for exercising their rights under this Privacy Policy.
The chart below explains our Personal Information collection and sharing practices over the past 12 months.
| Categories of Personal Information we may collect | • Identifiers such as your first and last name, work email address, institution type, and country, which is considered Personal information under subdivision (e) of California Business and Professions Code Section 1798.80. |
| • Internet or other electronic network activity information related to your use of our Websites including your Internet Protocol address. | |
| • Professional or employment-related information, including your job title, institution name, and state. | |
| • If you choose to sign up to receive resource or newsletter updates, we will collect your email address. | |
| We do not collect Sensitive Personal Information as it is defined under applicable law. | |
| Categories of sources from which the Personal Information is collected | We collect the Personal Information directly from you during your interaction with our Services including during the time you spend on the Websites. |
| Business or commercial purpose for collecting, “selling,” or sharing Personal Information | We collect your Personal Information to operate the Websites, respond to your requests and for the following business purposes: |
| • Maintaining or servicing the Websites and providing customer service. | |
| • Detecting security incidents, protecting against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity, and prosecuting those responsible for that activity. | |
| • Debugging to identify and repair errors that impair existing intended functionality. | |
| • Sending you marketing communications. | |
| • Inferences drawn from your use of our Websites are used by us and third parties to support our marketing and remarketing efforts, and by third parties for their or others commercial interests, including to enable interest-based advertising. | |
| Categories of third parties with whom we share or “sell” your Personal Information | • We may share your Personal Information – specifically your IP address, device ID or similar online identifier, with certain third parties, such as social networks and advertising networks. This information may be used to inform the advertising you see after you’ve visited our Websites, which may constitute the “sale” of your Personal Information (as defined under applicable law.) |
| • We may also share your Personal Information with our parent, subsidiaries, affiliates and other related entities, such as those listed at https://www.advance.com/, and our advisors, including lawyers, consultants, accountants, and others for our lawful business purposes. | |
| Specific pieces of Personal Information we have collected in the past 12 months. | • Internet Protocol address, device ID |
| • Internet or other electronic network activity information, including, but not limited to, browsing history, search history, and information regarding a consumer’s interaction with our website. | |
| • First and last name, work email address, institution type, company name, country and state of residence, job role/title, phone number. | |
| • Any other information you choose to provide. |
California “Shine the Light” Law
If you are a resident of California, you may request certain information regarding our disclosure of Personal Information (if any) for marketing purposes. To make such a request, please contact us at: Turnitin, LLC, Attn: Legal Department 2101 Webster St., Suite 1900, Oakland, California 94612
Additional Information for Users from the European Economic Area (EEA), Switzerland, and the United Kingdom (UK)
If you are located outside of the United States, please be aware that your Personal Information will be transferred to, processed and stored in the United States and Canada.
When you access our Websites, we function as a “data controller” under the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”). In some cases, we will ask for your consent so that we may process your personal information. In other circumstances, we may rely on a different lawful basis, as explained in the section, “How we Use and Disclose Your Personal Information.”
By submitting your Personal Information, you acknowledge that we may transfer, process and store your information in this way. Wherever the information is, it will be treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy and applicable privacy laws of the United States. These laws may be different from the privacy laws in your country. However, this does not change our commitments to safeguard your privacy and we will comply with all applicable laws relating to the cross-border disclosure of your Personal Information. Where required, we will implement Standard Contractual Clauses with our third parties or rely on such other transfer mechanisms to ensure that the transfer of your Personal Information outside of your country is lawful. You may request details of the transfer mechanisms that we rely on to transfer personal information outside of your country by emailing us at tiisupport@turnitin.com.
EU-US Data Privacy Framework Certification
Turnitin and its group company, ExamSoft Worldwide LLC, comply with the EU-US Data Privacy Framework (“EU-US DPF”), the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF, and the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (Swiss-US DPF) (collectively, the “Frameworks”) as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Turnitin has certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (“EU-US DPF Principles”) with regard to the processing of Personal Information received from the European Union in reliance on the EU-US DPF and from the United Kingdom (and Gibraltar) in reliance on the UK Extension to the EU-US DPF. Turnitin has certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the Swiss-US Data Privacy Framework Principles (“Swiss-US DPF Principles”) with regard to the processing of Personal Information received from Switzerland in reliance on the Swiss-US DPF. If there is any conflict between the terms in this Privacy Policy and the EU-US DPF Principles and/or the Swiss-US DPF Principles, the Principles shall govern. To learn more about the Data Privacy Framework (“DPF”) program, and to view our certification, please visit https://www.dataprivacyframework.gov.
In compliance with the Frameworks, Turnitin commits to resolve DPF Principles-related complaints about our collection and use of your personal information. EU, UK and Swiss individuals with inquiries or complaints regarding our handling of Personal Information received in reliance on the Frameworks should first contact Turnitin at:
Data Protection Officer
Turnitin, LLC, 2101 Webster Street, Suite 1900, Oakland 94612 CA USA
Phone: +44 (0) 191 681 0227
Email: DPO@turnitin.com
Turnitin must respond within 45 days of receiving a complaint.
In compliance with the EU-US DPF and the UK Extension to the EU-US DPF and the Swiss-US DPF, Turnitin commits to cooperate and comply respectively with the advice of the panel established by the EU data protection authorities (“DPAs”) and the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and the Gibraltar Regulatory Authority (“GRA”) and the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner (“FDPIC”) with regard to unresolved complaints concerning our handling of Personal Information received in reliance on the respective Frameworks.
The Federal Trade Commission has jurisdiction over Turnitin’s compliance with the Frameworks. Turnitin will submit to binding arbitration in the event that a dispute can not be resolved by the aforementioned mechanisms. Turnitin shall assume liability for any onward transfers of Personal Information made to third parties.
Additional Data Rights
Please note that the rules in your country may provide you with additional rights or may limit these rights. In all cases, our provision of the rights will comply with the applicable laws.
If you are based in the EEA, for example, you may have the right to access, update or correct your Personal Information, to request deletion of such Personal Information, and to object to certain processing, including that related to marketing, to receive a machine-readable copy of the Personal Information concerning you that you provided to us or request us to transfer such data to an applicable third party in certain circumstances.
In addition, where you provided your consent for our processing of your Personal Information, you may withdraw such consent by contacting us using the details provided in the “Contact” section. You may also restrict how we use your Personal Information while a complaint is being investigated.
Your exercise of these rights is subject to certain exemptions to safeguard the public interest (e.g. the prevention or detection of crime) and our interests (e.g., the maintenance of legal privilege). If you contact us to exercise any of these rights, we will verify your request and respond within thirty days.
Updates to This Policy
As our Websites evolve, we may make changes to this Privacy Policy. We will alert you to changes by providing notice within the Website or otherwise as required by law. The “last updated” note at the top of this policy indicates when it was last revised, and updates will become effective when they are posted.
Contact
If you have any concerns or complaints about how we handle your Personal Information, or if you have questions regarding this Privacy Policy, please contact us at:
2101 Webster St., Suite 1900
Oakland, California 94612
866 816 5046
legal@turnitin.com
If you have concerns or complaints regarding this Privacy Policy or our data handling procedures, you may have a right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority.
Our Data Protection Officer may be reached at DPO@Turnitin.com.