Privacy Policy and Security Notice

Thank you for visiting the FMC website and reviewing our Privacy & Security Policy, which is outlined below. Because it is our commitment to protect the privacy and security of your visit to the FMC’s website, no personally-identifiable information is collected unless you choose to provide us with that information.

Information the FMC Automatically Collects and Stores

While we collect no personal information about you, we do automatically collect technical information when you visit our site (see Cookies section below). If you only browse through the website, read pages, or download information, we will gather and store certain information about your visit automatically. This information does not identify you personally. We automatically collect and store only the following information about your visit:

The Internet domain (for example, “xcompany.com” if you use a private Internet access account, or “yourschool.edu” if you connect from a university’s domain) and IP address (an IP address is a number that is automatically assigned to your computer whenever you are surfing the Web) from which you access our website;
The type of browser and operating system used to access our site;
The date and time you access our site;
The pages you visit; and
If you linked to the FMC website from another website, the address of that website.

We use this information to help us make our site more useful to visitors — to learn about the number of visitors to our site and the types of technology our visitors use. For site security purposes and to ensure that this service remains available to all users, this government computer system employs software programs to monitor network traffic to identify unauthorized attempts to upload or change information, or otherwise cause damage. However, we do not track or record information about individuals and their visits.

Cookies

A cookie is a message, or segment of data, containing information about a user, sent by a web server to a browser and sent back to the server each time the browser requests a webpage. The cookie allows the website to remember specific information about you. However, your computer will only share the information in the cookie with the website that provided it, and no other website can request it.

There are two types of cookies, session (sometimes called temporary) and persistent. Session cookies last only as long as your browser is open. Once you close your browser, the cookie disappears. Persistent cookies store information on your computer for longer periods of time.

The FMC website only uses session cookies to enhance your experience while visiting our site and they are destroyed once you close your browser. The cookies are used, for example, to enable better navigation through the site, or to allow you to customize your preferences for interacting with the site. The FMC website does not use persistent cookies unless as particular webpage identifies itself as doing so.

Information the FMC Collects from E-mail and Web Forms

If you voluntarily provide us with personal information, for example by sending an e-mail or by filling out a form and submitting it through our website, you are indicating voluntary consent for us to use the information you are submitting to respond to your message and to help us provide you with the information and services that you have requested. We make every effort to disclose clearly how information is used at the point where it is collected so that you can determine for yourself whether you wish to provide the information.

Retention of Collected Information

Information collected by the FMC is destroyed when it is superseded, obsolete, or no longer need for the conduct of agency business.

Sharing and Disclosure of Personal Information

Any voluntary information submitted, including personal information, may be shared within the FMC as well as with other Federal or State agencies or others, if necessary, to address matters raised in your submission, or should release of the information be otherwise required by law. Except for authorized law enforcement investigations, no other attempts are made to identify individual users or their usage habits. Raw data logs are used for no other purposes and are scheduled for regular destruction in accordance with National Archives and Records Administration guidelines. We do not collect, give, sell or rent any personal information to third parties for commercial marketing.

Interaction with Children

We do not intentionally collect information from children under the age of 13. If we choose in the future to collect personal information from children, we will comply with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)

Security Notice

For security purposes and to ensure that this website remains available to all users, this government computer system employs software programs that monitor network traffic to identify unauthorized attempts to upload or change information,. Anyone using this system expressly consents to such monitoring and is advised that if such monitoring reveals evidence of possible abuse or criminal activity, such evidence may be provided to appropriate law enforcement officials.

Unauthorized attempts to upload or change information on FMC servers are strictly prohibited and may be punishable by law, including under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and the National Information Infrastructure Protection Act of 1996.

FMC Website Information Ownership

Most information on this website is public information, except where copyrighted or otherwise noted, which may be distributed or copied. However any improper or malicious use of Commission information or alteration of Commission information is prohibited. In addition, the Commission Seal is the property of the Federal Maritime Commission and may not be used, copied, or altered without express permission. Unauthorized attempts to upload or change information on this site are strictly prohibited and may be punishable by law, including the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and the National Information Infrastructure Protection Act of 1996.

Machine-Readable Privacy Policy Statement

The Privacy Provisions of the E-Government Act of 2002 require both a human readable Privacy Policy and agency use of machine readable technology that alerts users automatically about whether site privacy practices match the user’s personal privacy preferences. Most website visitors do not see the text Privacy Policy until after they have visited one or more of the site’s pages.

The standard for machine-readable Privacy Policy is Platform for Privacy Preferences (P3P). P3P enables websites to translate their privacy practices into a standardized format (Extensible Markup Language, XML) that can be retrieved automatically and automatically interpreted by a user’s browser or other user agent, such as a handheld device, media player, document reader, Internet-capable cellular phone, etc.

P3P uses machine-readable descriptions to describe the website’s practices concerning collection and use of user data. Browsers can use these machine-readable descriptions to take actions such as blocking cookies.

P3P does not monitor the content of cookies (files stored by a Web server on a user’s computer), but does address the following:

Who is collecting data?
What data is collected?
For what purpose will data be used?
Is there an ability to opt-in or opt-out of some data uses?
Who are the data recipients (anyone beyond the data collector)?
To what information does the data collector provide access?
What is the data retention policy?
How will disputes about the policy be resolved?
Where is the human-readable Privacy Policy?

When browsers or other user agents encounter a cookie from a webpage that either does not have a machine-readable P3P policy, or that has a P3P policy that does not match the user’s privacy preferences, the user is alerted by, for example, an icon or audible alert. However, P3P does not set minimum standards for privacy and cannot monitor compliance with stated policy. It merely provides notification based on the contents of the machine-readable privacy statement.

Not all browsers support P3P equally and this support can change over time, so website visitors should always be aware of the capabilities of their particular browser and it is wise to review human-readable privacy policies.

Linking to the FMC Website

You do not need to request permission to link to the Federal Maritime Commission’s website from your website. The FMC is a public website and links may be made to our website from other personal and organizational webpages. However, we request that you link to our site rather than downloading portions of it to another web server, so that our viewers will see our most up-to-date information. Please review our Linking Policy for further information.