IRSforum.org Privacy Policy

Your privacy on the Internet is important to us.  IRSforum.org has created this privacy statement in order to demonstrate our firm commitment to privacy. Our privacy policy covers how IRSforum.org collects and receives personal information and how the IRS Forum uses this information.  By accessing IRSforum.org, you are consenting to the information collection and use practices described in this privacy policy.

Collection of your Personal Information

The IRS Forum is a non-profit educational organization, approved by the IRS as a charitable organization under § 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code to serve the mission of IRSforum.org.  As part of the operation of IRSforum.org, we gather certain types of information from members and we would like to explain the types of information we gather, what we do with them, and how to correct or change this information.  Personal information is information about you that is personally identifiable like your name, email address, state, zip code or phone number, and that is not otherwise publicly available.

Registering as a member of IRSforum.org is mandatory, but there are no membership fees.  Our sites' registration forms require members to give us contact information (like their name and email address).  Your privacy is protected with a personal password and a user identification number.  However, you can voluntary disclose additional private information for submitted experiences with the IRS and in message boards.

The member's contact information may be used to contact the visitor when necessary by staff of the IRS Forum.  The member contact information may be used to get in touch with the member if that member invites contact to help resolve a personal or financial problem.  Specific requests from members for help or assistance from outside sources will constitute a waiver of privacy if outside assistance is provided to the requesting member.  The IRS Forum is not responsible for the products of services provided by any outside source invited to help resolve an identified issue or problem.  The IRS Forum will not represent members before the IRS.  It is possible that the media or one or more members of the US Congress may be interested in a specific member experience.  Your privacy will be protected unless you offer to waive your privacy in these circumstances.  All privacy waivers will be voluntary.  Staff of the IRS Forum may call or write for more details about a specific experience for purposes of editing or explaining a personal IRS experience.  You are not obligated to provide that information.

The IRSforum.org website may collect certain information about your visit, such as the name of the Internet service provider and the Internet Protocol (IP) address through which you access the Internet; the date and time you access the Site and the pages that you access while at IRSforum.org.

IRSforum.org uses the information:

• To help you quickly find information that is relevant to you based on your interests.
• To help us create site content areas most relevant to you.
• To confirm your registration on the site.
• To clarify information you submit to IRSforum.org

We reserve the right to edit message boards and submitted data for clarity, relevance, scalability.  We may place that data in our web page in more than one place in our web page.  We reserve the right to delete messages and submitted data that does not meet the standards of propriety, accuracy, or relevance.

IRSforum.org may contain links to other educational sites for tax information.  IRS Forum is not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of such websites.

Information Sharing and Disclosure

The IRSforum.org does not rent, sell, or share personal information about you with other people or nonaffiliated companies except to provide products or services you've requested, when we have your permission, or under the following circumstances:

•         We provide the information to trusted partners who work on behalf of or with the IRS Forum under confidentiality agreements.  Message boards and our archives are monitored by our trusted partners.  These partners do not have any independent right to share this information.  Trusted partners may include employees or contractors who work with software, text, managing the data or otherwise add educational information.

•         We respond to subpoenas, court orders, or legal process, or to establish or exercise our legal rights or defend against legal claims.  We believe it is necessary to share information in order to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person, violations of the IRS Forum’s terms of use, or as otherwise required by law.

Cookies

IRSforum.org uses cookies to automate the process of logging on to certain areas of the site. The IRSforum.org cookie is a small data file stored on your computer that contains a single, randomly assigned user ID number. By recognizing this ID number, IRSforum.org can automatically provide you with the personalized content which you requested. Cookies can neither read any other files on your computer, nor damage your computer. Most browsers are initially set to accept cookies. If you'd prefer, you can set your browser to refuse cookies or to alert you when cookies are being sent.

Credit Card Donations

IRSforum.org uses a credit card processing service to process tax deductible charitable contributions.  We collect visitor's financial information (like their credit card number) and contact information (like their email address). Financial information that is collected is used to bill the user for pledged donations. The merchant bank service will not retain, share, store or use personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes. The credit card processing service will not use personally identifiable information except for the purpose of providing merchant bank services.

When you donate to the IRSforum.org, we collect only enough information about you to process your donation.

For credit card transactions, IRSforum.org uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) online technology which encrypts the data you provide. This means that sensitive information, such as your credit card number, becomes unreadable to anyone who wrongly intercepts the information. SSL is supported by all major Web browsers, including Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator. The site becomes locked while you are giving us your credit card information and unlocks only when you leave the secured area. To know when you are going to a secure area of a website, you can set your browser to notify you. (If you are using Internet Explorer, go to Tools > Internet Options > Advanced, and scroll down to the section called Security. Then check the box that says "Warn if changing between Secure and not Secure mode.") Other ways to know if you are in a secure mode is to look for a gold key or a gold padlock in the bottom right-hand corner of your browser window. Also, when you are in a secure area, the address bar at the top of your window will indicate "https" as opposed to "http."

Changes to this Privacy Policy

The IRS Forum may update this policy. We will notify you about significant changes in the way we treat personal information by sending a notice to the primary email address specified in your IRSforum.org registration or by placing a prominent notice on our site.

Questions and Suggestions

If you have questions or suggestions, please contact us electronically at: info@IRSforum.org

Or via postal mail at:

IRS Forum

9667-B Main Street

Fairfax, VA 22031-3751