ISSP Terms of Use

Terms of use

The website and all content located at the http://sustainabilityprofessionals.org domain name (the “Website”) is owned and operated by the International Society of Sustainability Professionals (“ISSP”), and is subject to these Terms of Use. By accessing or using the Website or any content on the Website and/or submitting content, information or other materials or services to the Website, you accept and agree to be bound by the Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy, available at the end of this document. The Privacy Policy is incorporated into these Terms of Use by reference.

If you do not agree to the Terms of Use, you may not access or use the Website or submit content or other materials. ISSP may modify these Terms of Use from time to time, effective immediately upon posting on the Website. We will provide you with email or other notice of any such changes. Your continued access or use of the Website constitutes acceptance of such modifications.

Access and Use of the Website

Subject to your strict compliance with these Terms of Use and the Member Guidelines as they appear in the “Member Guidelines” section of the site. ISSP hereby grants you limited permission to access and use the Website and to download and print a single copy of the content of the Website solely for your personal, noncommercial use and provided that you retain all copyright and other proprietary notices contained therein. Any other use, copying, distribution, publication, transmission, broadcast, display, modification or other use or exploitation of the Website or any content, whether in electronic, paper or any other media, is strictly prohibited without ISSP’s prior written consent. ISSP reserves all rights not expressly granted in and to the Website and the content of the Website.

User Submissions, as defined below, and other third-party content may be available on or through the Website. You acknowledge that such third-party content is not endorsed by ISSP, and does not reflect the opinion, recommendation or advice of ISSP in any manner. If you believe that any content on the Website violates these Terms of Use or any law or right of a third party, please follow our Copyright Infringement procedure below.

You understand that by accessing and using the Website you may be exposed to User Submissions and other content from a variety of sources that are inaccurate, offensive, indecent or objectionable, and hereby waive any legal or equitable rights or remedies you have or may have against ISSP with respect thereto.

You agree not to access or use the Website, directly or through any automated system, in any manner so as to (a) adversely affect the Website’s resources or the availability of the Website to others; (b) violate any local, state, national or international law, including without limitation laws regarding the export of data from the United States or the country in which you reside; (c) delete or revise any content on the Website; (d) harass any person or collect or store personal information about other visitors; (e) circumvent, disable or otherwise interfere with security features of the Website or features that prevent or restrict use or copying of any content or enforce these Terms of Use; and/or (f) send more request messages to the Website servers in a given period of time than a human can reasonably produce in the same period by using a conventional on-line web browser. Notwithstanding the foregoing, ISSP grants the operators of public search engines limited permission to use spiders to copy materials from the Website for the sole purpose of creating publicly available searchable indices of the materials, but not caches or archives of such materials. ISSP reserves the right to revoke this limited permission either generally or in specific cases, in ISSP’s sole discretion.

Registration

In order to access or use some features of the Website, you will have to create an account. You must be at least 18 years old to create an account. When creating your account, you must provide accurate, current and complete information. You are solely responsible for all activity that occurs under your account and/or password, including without limitation any content or other materials provided from or through your account. You must maintain the confidentiality and security of your account password and login information, and notify ISSP immediately of any breach of security or unauthorized use of your account.

Disclaimer

ISSP provides rules and guidelines for your use of the Website and limits access to certain parts of the Website to those users who are either members of the ISSP or have represented that they are working in or provide services in the field of sustainability. However, ISSP does not investigate, monitor, or check the information submitted by users as part of the registration process or thereafter for accuracy, appropriateness or completeness. Nor does ISSP control what is posted to the Website. As a result, ISSP is not responsible for information submitted by users or posted to the Website. In addition, ISSP does not endorse or vouch for the qualifications or quality of the services of any users that may register to use the Website. If you decide to contact another user of the Website or engage them to provide you with any services, you do so at your own risk and release ISSP from any and all liability that may result.

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS

The Website and all content on the Website (except content provided by you), including without limitation all text, software, scripts, graphics, photos, sounds, music, videos, interactive features, downloads, tools and all other material or information used on or in connection with the Website (the “Content”) and the selection, arrangement and presentation of the Content and overall design of the Website is the property of ISSP and subject to protection under United States and international laws and conventions. Any unauthorized copying, reproduction, republication, posting, distribution, transmission, or modification of Content or any other property of ISSP, whether in electronic or hard copy form, is strictly prohibited without the express prior written permission of ISSP. ISSP reserves all rights not expressly granted to you herein.

ISSP and other names or designations of ISSP or its products or services, the “look and feel” of the Website and the color combinations, layout and other graphical elements of the Website are the trademarks of ISSP (“ISSP Marks”). You may not use any ISSP Mark in any manner without the express, written permission of ISSP, including without limitation in any meta-tags or other hidden text. Other product and company names, trademarks and logs on the Website may be subject to trademark or other rights of other parties.

You may not frame any Website content without ISSP’s prior written consent. You may link to the Website or to your own or other’s User Submissions for non-commercial purposes only, or as otherwise authorized by ISSP in writing. You may use the ISSP “embeddable player” feature to incorporate certain User Submissions on your own personal, non-commercial website(s), provided that you include a prominent link back to they Website on each page incorporating content through the embeddable player. ISSP reserves the right to demand that you remove any link at ISSP’s sole discretion.New Paragraph

Privacy policy

All information you provide through the Website, including without limitation for the purpose of registering an account or submitting User Submissions, is subject to the Website Privacy Policy described below. ISSP requests that you do not provide unsolicited suggestions for improving or marketing our products or services or for new products or services. Any such suggestions you do provide are not subject to our Privacy Policy and will not be treated as confidential. By submitting unsolicited suggestions, you agree that ISSP may (but shall have no obligation to) use, modify, distribute, copy and otherwise exploit such suggestions in any manner, as ISSP sees fit, without restriction or limitation of any kind, and you grant to ISSP a perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free license to do so and to allow others to do so, and agree not to permit or prosecute any action or lawsuit on the ground that our use or alleged use of a suggestion infringes any of your rights.

ISSP has the right, but not the obligation, to review, remove or edit all User Submissions and other third party content, in ISSP’s sole discretion. ISSP has no responsibility and assumes no liability for User Submissions or other content posted by you or any other party.

USER SUBMISSIONS

The Website now or in the future may permit the submission of content or materials by users of the Website and/or include chat features, instant messaging, message board or similar features allowing submission of content (collectively, “User Submissions”) for hosting, sharing or publication on or through the Website, and may allow access or use of User Submissions of other users. You grant ISSP a worldwide, nonexclusive, royalty-free, perpetual and fully sublicensable and transferable right, but not the obligation, to (a) use, distribute, display, reproduce, modify, perform, preserve and create derivatives of any User Submissions you submit, in any media now known or hereafter developed and in connection or compilation with any other content, in connection with the Website and ISSP’s (and its successor’s, assignees and licensees) business, in any media and through all channels, now known or hereafter discovered; and (b) use the name and any other personal information under which you submit such User Submissions in connection therewith, in ISSP’s sole discretion. You also grant each user of the Website a non-exclusive license to access your User Submissions through the Website and to reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works, display and otherwise use such User Submissions as permitted under these Terms of Service. You may terminate or restrict our rights to use your User Submissions by changing the rights granted on the permissions page of your account. However, the changes will only be effective for future uses and will not take effect until 30 days after we confirm your changes have been received and recorded. You understand that changing your permissions shall not require ISSP or any user to remove your submission from any work created prior to the effective date of your change or otherwise modify any prior use of your submission and that ISSP shall not be responsible for any user’s failure to abide by the changes to your permissions.

You acknowledge that whether or not such User Submissions are published, ISSP does not guarantee any confidentiality or security of any User Submissions, or any other information or materials you provide or submit by email or other electronic communication. ISSP may remove any User Submission from the Website at any time, in ISSP’s sole discretion and for any or no reason. You waive all claims against ISSP for any violation of copyright, rights of privacy, publicity, and defamation or other personal torts arising from ISSP’s use of the information you provide.

You are solely responsible for user submissions and other information and materials you provide to ISSP. You represent and warrant to ISSP that (a) you own, or have the necessary licenses, rights, consents, and permissions to use and authorize ISSP to use any user submissions and other information or materials you provide in the manner contemplated by the website and these terms of service; and (b) you have the written consent of each identifiable individual person appearing or included in your user submissions to use his or her name, likeness and other personal indicia in the manner contemplated by the website and these terms of service.

You agree not to submit any User Submissions or other materials, content or information which is illegal, obscene, defamatory, libelous, threatening, pornographic, harassing, hateful, racially or ethnically offensive, invasive of privacy or which encourages criminal conduct, infringes any intellectual property or other proprietary right of any person or entity or otherwise gives rise to civil liability, or which contains viruses, corrupt data, cancel bots, trojan horses or the like. You further agree not to submit or post advertisements or solicitation of business and/or use false email addresses or impersonate any person or otherwise mislead as to the origin of any User Submission or other materials, content or information you submit or provide.

COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT

If you are a copyright owner or authorized agent of a copyright owner and believe any content available on or through the Website infringes your or your principal’s copyright interest, please provide the following information, in writing and signed by you, to the ISSP Copyright Agent at the address listed below:

A description of the allegedly infringing content reasonably sufficient to permit ISSP to identify and locate such content on the Website, and of the copyrighted work which you believe is infringed, including an assertion that you either own such copyright interest, or are the authorized agent of the owner.
Your address, telephone number and e-mail address.
Your statement that all information you have provided is accurate and that you have a good-faith belief that the use of the disputed content is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent or by law.

OTHER VIOLATIONS

Please contact ISSP at info@sustainabilityprofessionals.org in the event you want to report conduct you deem abusive. Although ISSP has no obligation to police the conduct of visitors to the Website, we do try to remove content that is clearly inappropriate when it is brought to our attention, in our sole discretion.

THIRD PARTY WEBSITES

The Website may contain links to third party websites that are not owned or controlled by ISSP. ISSP has no control over, and assumes no responsibility for, the content, privacy policies, or practices of any third party websites or the products or services offered by or through such sites, even those with which ISSP may have an affiliation. No endorsement of any third party product, service or information is expressed or implied by any information, material or content referred to, included on or linked from or to the Website. You access any third party sites linked through the Website at your own risk. Accordingly, we encourage you to be aware when you leave the Website, and to read the terms and conditions and privacy policy of each other website that you visit.

ADVERTISERS

ISSP shall have no responsibility or liability of any kind in connection with or arising from any dealings between you and any advertiser on the Website, or any other website, including without limitation any purchase, payment, delivery of goods or services, or any other terms, agreements, warranties or representations associated with your dealings with such advertisers.

SECURITY

Communication via the Internet may use potentially unsecure computers and links and data or content, including personal information, may be lost, or intercepted and/or used by unauthorized third parties during or after such transmission. ISSP takes reasonable steps to protect your personal information in accordance with our Privacy Policy described below but is not responsible for the security of any personal information you post or e-mail to the Website. You agree that ISSP shall have no liability whatsoever in connection with lost or intercepted data or information.

DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY

Your access and use of the website and content is at your own risk. ISSP disclaims all warranties with respect to the website and its contents. ISSP does not warrant that the website content is accurate, complete, reliable, current or error-free or that the website will meet your requirements, or that your access or use of the website or content will be uninterrupted, timely, secure or error-free, nor does ISSP make any warranty whatsoever regarding the quality of any products, services, information or any other material you obtain through the website or through any third party. The website and all content are provided “as is” and “as available” with no warranty of any kind, express or implied (including without limitation warranties of title or noninfringement, or implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.) ISSP may modify, delete, or supplement the website and the content, in whole or in part, at any time and without notice, including without limitation linked or embedded content.

ISSP does not warrant that any content available for downloading or otherwise obtained through the website is free of viruses, worms, trojan horses or any other code with contaminating or destructive properties or effects. You are solely responsible for safeguarding your own data, equipment and software.

LIMITATION OF LIABILITY

ISSP shall have no liability for any loss or damage whatsoever, direct or indirect, including but not limited to incidental, consequential, punitive or indirect damages (including without limitation damages for loss of profits, business interruption, loss of data and the like) arising out of your use of, or inability to use or access the website or any content provided on or downloaded from the website; the defamatory, offensive or illegal conduct of any third party, including other visitors and persons submitting user submissions and other content to the website; any delay in use or access to the website or content provided on the website; any claim arising from or relating to errors, omissions or inaccuracies in the content provided on or through the website; and/or statements or conduct of any third party on or in relation to the website, to the extent permitted by applicable law, even if issp has been advised of the possibility of such damages.

Without waiving the exclusive governing law provision set forth below, some jurisdictions do not allow the exclusion or limitation of liability for consequential or incidental damages, therefore the above limitation may not apply to you. In such jurisdictions, ISSP’s liability is limited to the greatest extent permitted by law.

The limitation of liability set forth above shall apply to every form of action, whether in contract, warranty, strict liability, negligence or other tort, and shall survive any breach of the terms or any agreement, or the failure of the essential purpose of the terms or an agreement or any exclusive remedy.

Notwithstanding anything else herein, in no event shall ISSP’s liability to you exceed $50.00.

INDEMNITY

You acknowledge that you are personally and exclusively responsible for your use of the Website and agree to indemnify, defend and hold harmless ISSP and its affiliates and subsidiaries, and all members, officers, directors, employees, attorneys, agents, successors, advisors, consultants, partners, visitors and third party information and service providers from and against any loss, damage, expense or liability of any kind (including attorneys’ fees and costs) resulting from your (a) violation of these Terms of Use; (b) use of or access to the Website; (c) submission of User Submissions or other material or information or communication with ISSP; and/or (d) any act or failure to act by you.

TERMINATION

These Terms of Use remain in effect until terminated by either you or ISSP. If you terminate these Terms of Use, you must immediately discontinue all access and use of the Website, and destroy all content and any other materials downloaded from or otherwise obtained from the Website, and any copies and installations thereof. ISSP reserves the right to suspend or terminate your access to or use of the Website or any portion of the Website at any time, with or without notice, if you breach these Terms of Use or the terms of any agreement or obligation to ISSP or for any other reason or no reason. ISSP may, in its sole discretion, discontinue providing the Website, in whole or in part, and with or without notice to you. ISSP shall have no liability to you or any third party for any termination of the Website or access to the Website. Your limited right to use the content on the Website under these Terms shall terminate immediately upon notice to you that ISSP has terminated your access to or use of the Website, and you must promptly destroy all content and copies of content obtained through the Website in your possession or control, in whatever form. Notwithstanding the above, the license you granted to ISSP and other users use your User Submissions will continue indefinitely. The disclaimer of warranty, indemnification and general provisions of these Terms of Use shall survive termination of these Terms of Use for any reason.

You also grant each user of the Website a non-exclusive license to access your User Submissions through the Website and to reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works, display and otherwise use such User Submissions as permitted under these Terms of Service.

GENERAL

The Website is controlled and operated by ISSP from its facilities in the state of Oregon, United States of America. ISSP makes no representations that the Website or any content or materials on the Website is appropriate or available for use in other locations. If you access or use the Website from outside the state of Oregon, United States of America, you do so at your own volition and are responsible for compliance with applicable laws of your jurisdiction.

These Terms of Use, and any dispute that may arise between you and ISSP shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of Oregon, U.S.A., without regard to conflict of laws principles. The Terms of Use, as they may be amended from time to time, set forth the entire understanding of you and ISSP as to the subject matter hereof. You irrevocably and unconditionally consent to the exclusive jurisdiction of and venue in the courts of Multnomah County, Oregon, U.S.A. for any all disputes arising out of or relating to the Terms of Use and/or the Website.

If any provision of this Agreement is deemed invalid by a court of competent jurisdiction, the invalidity of such provision shall not affect the validity of the remaining provisions of this Agreement, which shall remain in full force and effect. No waiver of any term of this Agreement shall be deemed a further or continuing waiver of such term or any other term, and ISSP’s failure to assert any right or provision under these Terms of Use shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision. ISSP may assign its rights and duties under these Terms of Use to any party, at any time, and without notice to you. You may not assign your rights or obligations under these Terms of Use without ISSP’s prior, written consent.

Nothing contained in these Terms of Use shall be deemed to constitute you and ISSP as partners or joint venturers or constitute an employment or agency relationship between you and ISSP.

These Terms of Use constitute a written agreement between you and ISSP, and a printed version of these Terms of Use, and of any electronic notice pertaining to these Terms of Use, shall be admissible in an judicial or administrative proceeding to the same extent, and subject to the same restrictions, as any other contract, document or record originally in printed form.

All rights not expressly granted herein are reserved to ISSP.

ISSP PRIVACY POLICY OVERVIEW

This ISSP Privacy Policy applies to information ISSP learns about or obtains from you when you visit the website located at the http://sustainabilityprofessionals.org domain name (the “Website”). Your access or use of the Website constitutes your legally binding acceptance of and agreement to this Privacy Policy. Definitions contained in the Website Terms of Use also apply to this Privacy Policy.

This Privacy Policy may be modified by ISSP from time to time, in ISSP’s sole discretion and as provided by applicable law. Such modifications are effective upon posting on the Website. You should check this Privacy Policy frequently for any such changes, but in any case your continued access or use of the Website shall constitute acceptance of any modifications. ISSP’s use of information gathered or obtained at any time is subject to the Privacy Policy in effect at the time of such use.

European Union GDPR regulations

To comply with new GDPR regulations from the European Union that went into effect May 25, 2018, we have developed a Privacy Policy Overview to provide a brief, transparent description of how and why ISSP collects and uses data.

CONTROLLER OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

Any personal information provided to, or collected by ISSP through the Website is controlled by International Society of Sustainability Professionals.

COMPLIANCE WITH COPPA

The Website is not directed at children under the age of 13. ISSP complies with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act and does not knowingly permit submission of Personal Information by anyone under 13 years of age. You must be over age 13 to use the Website.

TYPES OF INFORMATION COLLECTED

During registration we collect information about you such as your name, address, phone number, etc. While most of this information is required for registration purposes, your address, phone and email are never displayed to other users. Any of this information may be changed or updated by you by visiting and editing your user profile. You can gain access to your profile at any time you are logged onto the ISSP site by clicking on your name in the “welcome” message in the upper left hand corner of the page. This does not apply to information collected by cookies and used internally to recognize you and/or facilitate your visits to the Website, or information we may retain to comply with legal requirements.

AUTOMATIC INFORMATION COLLECTION

As you navigate within the Website, we may automatically track and collect information about your computer, PDA, telephone or other equipment that you use to access the site. This information includes IP address, device specifications, domain server, browser specifications, mobile identification number and telecommunications identifying information and the date and time of your access. We may also collect information about which websites, WAP sites, and other sites you visit. We use “cookies” to automatically gather some of this information. A cookie is a small text file that the Website system sends to your computer to collect information about your activities on the Website. The cookie transmits this information back to the Website each time your browser requests a page from the Website, and the information is stored to help facilitate your use of the Website the next time you visit. If you do not want to receive cookies from the Website, you can set your browser to not accept cookies, but you may not be able to access or use certain portions of the Website.

INFORMATION YOU PROVIDE

ISSP receives and stores information you provide when you register as a user on the Website, redeem or otherwise use promotional codes or similar materials, or otherwise provide information through the Website, email or in any other manner, including Personal Information. Of course, you can choose not to provide Personal Information, but then you might not be able to access or use portions of the Website. We may also ask you to select a user name and password or PIN.

ISSP may, but is not obligated to, retain the content of any e-mail you send or information or data you provide by other means, including your e-mail address and other personally identifiable information, so that ISSP may respond to your requests for information or questions, and comply with any legal requirements.

HOW ISSP USES INFORMATION

We use the information you provide and we collect to:

Administer the Website and diagnose problems with our server;
Verify your identity and respond to your requests for information and to customize your experience on the Website;
Send you ISSP articles, notices of events, announcements of new ISSP products and other such information deemed relevant by the administrators of ISSP and our affiliates;
To facilitate performance by ISSP or you under the Terms of Use and any other agreement you may enter into with ISSP;
Comply with applicable law, statute or regulation;
Measure the number of visitors to the Website and how the Website is used and other statistical analysis of visitor behavior;
Editorial and feedback purposes, product development and site improvement;
Inform advertisers of the number of visitors that have seen or clicked on their advertisements or viewed their promotions, in which case data is maintained and reviewed in an aggregate basis; and
As specifically provided in the Terms and as you may otherwise agree

Disclosure of Information

ISSP may disclose information you provide and we collect to our parent and/or subsidiaries or affiliates, and as described below:

To other companies and individuals who perform services and other functions on our behalf, including processing payments and registrations;
In the event ISSP transfers some or all of its assets to another entity, or is acquired by a third party, information will likely be one of the transferred assets, but should remain subject to existing privacy terms as required by applicable law, statute or regulation;
As we may decide is necessary to comply with applicable law, enforce the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy and/or protect the rights, property or safety of ISSP or third parties, including responding to claims by third parties of infringement or other violation of law or the Terms of Use; and
As you may otherwise agree.

Public Forums

Please remember that information you post to the Website itself, including User Submissions, will be public information, available for access, use and disclosure by other visitors to the Website. ISSP has no obligation to monitor, moderate, screen or otherwise be responsible for any content posted by you or any other third party to the Website, or for use or disclosure of such content. YOU SHOULD EXERCISE CAUTION WHEN DECIDING TO DISCLOSE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION ON ANY WEBSITE.

Subpoenas

ISSP may respond to any subpoena received from a government agency without prior notice to you. Unless prohibited by law or by a court order, we will notify you of any subpoena received from any other party (i.e., for civil litigation) which requires us to disclose your identity, and will wait ten (10) days, or a lesser amount of time as required by the deadline in the subpoena, before providing the information requested by the subpoena.

By registering for membership in the ISSP, you consent to our using your email address or other personal information to send you information or otherwise communicate with you.

Links

The Website may contain links to other sites. These links are for the convenience of visitors to the Website only, and ISSP makes no representations whatsoever regarding such other sites, including those sites with which we may have an affiliation. This includes third party providers of goods or services or promotional materials offered through the Website. You should review the privacy policies of other sites carefully before providing any information to such sites. ISSP is not responsible for the privacy policies or procedures or the content of any other site or entity.

Security

The Website has reasonable security measures in place to protect against the loss, misuse or alteration of information under ISSP’s control. While we strive to protect your personal information, ISSP cannot ensure, and does not warrant, the security of any information. Communication via the Internet is not failsafe, and there is always a possibility that data may be lost, or intercepted by unauthorized parties during such transmission or after receipt by ISSP. You agree that ISSP shall have no liability whatsoever in connection with such lost or intercepted data.

Lost or Stolen Information

You must notify ISSP promptly if any user name or password that you use on the Website is lost, stolen or used without permission. Upon such notice, ISSP may cancel such user name or password and update our records accordingly.

Correct/Update Procedure

Your profile information is always available to you for updating and editing. Edit your profile by logging onto the site and clicking your name in the “welcome” message in the upper left hand corner of the home page.

ISSP reserves the right to verify the identify of any person registered on the site; provided that we shall have no liability whatsoever resulting from false or erroneous registration or profile information.

Personally identifiable information collected and transferred to back-up or archival storage may, however, be retained indefinitely. ISSP has the right to retain your information regarding transactions as necessary for our business records, and as required under applicable law.

Conditions of Use

Your access and use of the Website is subject to this Privacy Policy and the Website Terms of Use described above including limitations on damages, and the applicability of the law of the State of Oregon.

CONTACT US:

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, the Terms of Use, or any other questions concerning the Website or ISSP, please contact us by email at info@sustainabilityprofessionals.org. Please include your username and password.

Terms & conditions