Thank you
for visiting the FAS Web site. Our
privacy policy is clear: We will collect no personal information
about you when you visit our Web site unless you choose to provide
that information to us.
Here is how we handle information
about your visit to our Web site:
Information Collected and
Stored Automatically
If you do nothing during your visit
but browse through the Web site, 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 Web site;
- 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 FAS Web site from another
Web site, the address of that Web site.
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 are
using. We do not track or record information about individuals and
their visits.
If You Send Us Personal
Information
If you choose to provide us with
personal information, as in an e-mail to the Secretary or someone
else or by filling out a form with your personal information and
submitting it to us through our Web site, we use that information to
respond to your message and to help us locate for you the
information you have requested. We treat e-mails the same way that
we regard letters sent to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. We are
required to maintain many documents under the Presidential Records
Act for historical purposes, but we do not collect personal
information for any purpose other than to respond to you. We only
share the information you give us with another government agency if
your inquiry relates to that agency, or as otherwise required by
law. Moreover, we do not create individual profiles with the
information you provide or to give it to any private organizations.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture does not collect information for
commercial marketing.
When You Visit FAS or Other
USDA Agency/Staff Office Web Sites
Please read the FAS and USDA
Agency/Staff Office Privacy Statement when you visit those Web sites.
Where necessary, an Agency/Staff Office may have additional privacy
criteria, conditions, or information that you should know.
Links to Other Sites
Our Web site has links to many other
federal agencies. In a few cases we link to private organizations,
with their permission. Once you access another site through a link
that we provide, you are subject to the privacy policy of the new
site.
Web Site
Security
Information presented on the FAS Web site
is considered public information and may be distributed or
copied. Use of appropriate byline/photo/image credits is requested.
- 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.
- 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
General
Schedule 20.
- Unauthorized attempts to upload
information or change information on this service are strictly
prohibited and may be punishable under the
Computer
Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and the
National
Information Infrastructure Protection Act.
Comments or Questions
If you have any questions or comments about the information presented here, please
forward them to lallie.leighton@fas.usda.gov.