Blend-Exchange Privacy Policy

This policy is effective May 25th.

In this document Blend-Exchange ("we","us") refers to the operators of this website ("the Blend-Exchange service","the service"). You ("the user","user") refers to any user of the Blend-Exchange service. Content providers refers to services that provide data either as loadable resources (including but not limited to fonts, javascript files and images) or technical services (including but not limited to file storage services).

Data Sharing

We may share the data we collect (as defined by the section on Data Collection) in various ways, including the following:

In Aggregate Form: Blend-Exchange will disclose your personal information when legally permissible in aggregate or anonymized form so long as it cannot be reasonably used to identify you.
As Required by Law: Any information held by Blend-Exchange will be disclosed to satisfy any particular law, legal process or governmental request.
Third party providers: Blend-Exchange shares your personal data with third party providers as is required to provide the Blend-Exchange service.
As required to operate the Blend-Exchange service Some of the data we collect is shared to various 3rd parties (who these parties are is specified below in the section on Data Collection for each kind of data we collect). This is done when required to provide the Blend-Exchange service's functionality.

For more specifics on which type of data gets shared with which 3rd parties and how it is shared, see below.

Data Collection

Blend-Exchange collects and processes the following data:

Technical Data

"Technical Data" is data that your device sends our servers or provides to our web page. This includes:

IP Addresses
HTTP-Header meta data. This is data that is sent along with a request to our server.

Blend-Exchange keeps this data in order to better protect, maintain, and develop the Blend-Exchange service. Technical Data may be linked to user accounts or any other kind of collected data. In addition, Technical Data may be associated with other user data including accounts and uploaded blend files. Technical Data is stored in log files, sometimes in hashed form for security reasons. In addition, Technical Data will be sent to the following 3rd party content providers:

Google Fonts. Please see their privacy policy here (https://policies.google.com/privacy)

Shared/Uploaded Data

This includes all data provided when a blend file is uploaded. This includes:

The contents of the blend file binary.
The URL to the blender.stackexchange.com question.
A reference to the current authenticated account (if the user is logged in).

All of the listed data is available publicly for download. Once data has been shared, you cannot revoke permission for Blend-Exchange to pubish and share this data. Blend-Exchange no longer possess control over data once it has been made public. Blend files are stored using Google Drive. See their privacy polices for more details (https://policies.google.com/privacy).

Account Data

User account data is all the data provided when creating an account. This includes:

The username provided when registering. This is stored in a database without encryption. This information is publicly accessible without restriction. Once it has been made public, Blend-Exchange looses control over this data.
The email provided when registering. This is stored in a database without encryption. This email is not publicly accessible, and will only be used to notify the user of the following:
- Updates/Events relating to the security of the Blend-Exchange service and the user's personal information.
- Updates to the privacy policy or terms of service of Blend-Exchange.
- Responses to inquires made by the user via email. (Responses will be to the inquiring address)
- Notifications of termination/removal/modification of services. (Services may be terminated without notification). This is to help prevent any inconvenience for users.
A hash of the password provided when registering. This is stored in a database without additional encryption.
A set of references to .blend-files uploaded while authenticated with the account. This information is publicly accessible without restriction.
In addition, an ID is created which can be linked back to the account. This information is publicly accessible without restriction.

Referring URL

Blend-Exchange uses the referring URL if provided to detect abuse of its services. Referring URLs are stored indefinitely and linked to a hashed version of the IP address that visited that page. They are compared to the provided question URLs for blends to detect if the links to blends are being shared outside blender.stackexchange (a possible sign of abuse).

Use of Cookies

Blend-Exchange uses cookies (small bits of data placed on your device) to check if users are logged into accounts. They are not used for any other kind of tracking. If you do not wish to be tracked with cookies created by Blend-Exchange (not including 3rd party cookies), disable cookies in your browser for this site or logout. Blend-Exchange's content providers may use cookies for their own purposes, as described by their respective privacy polices. The following third parties have the ability to create and read cookies on your device if your device permits:

Google Fonts. Please see their privacy policy here (https://policies.google.com/privacy)

Logged Actions

Certain User Actions (A specific web request or set of web requests that triggers a specfic action) are recorded in conjunction with linked techincal data. The following user actions are recorded:

Login Attempts
Registration Attempts
Downloading a File
Uploading a File
Visiting a Page

These User Actions are not shared publicly and are used for the security, development, and maintenance of Blend-Exchange.

Public Actions

In addition to logged User Actions, the following User Action are recorded and information about them is made public in order to enable certain features of the service:

"Favorting" a blend file (Performed by clicking the favorite button on a .blend files page). This action will change the publicly visible favorite tally for that blend file. This data is associated with an IP address. It is possible for 3rd parties to determine if an IP address has been used to favorite a .blend file. IP Addresses are used to ensure that users do not repeatedly "favorite" a .blend file.
"Viewing" a blend file (Performed by visiting a .blend file's page). This action will change the publicly visible view tally for that blend file. This data is associated with an IP address.
"Downloading" a blend file (Performed by downloading a .blend file from Blend-Exchange). This action will change the publicly visible download tally for that blend file. This data is associated with an IP address.

These actions require users to opt-in by performing an action and/or visiting a page.

Data Use

The data Blend-Exchange collects is used to provide the Blend-Exchange service. Specifically, it is used to:

Make the service function.
Comply with regulations and laws.
Contact you about the Blend-Exchange service as is required to serve you.

Data Storage

All data collected by Blend-Exchange is stored within the United States using the methods described in the previous section.

Controlling Your Data

Accessing Data Held by Blend-Exchange

The user profile includes links to the binary files uploaded. They can be downloaded from there in the original format in which they were uploaded. The provided password cannot be retrieved in any form due to security concerns. Other account details can be obtained in plain text from the user profile page. Please contact Blend-Exchange if assistance is needed.

Removal of Data Held by Blend-Exchange

If you need your data removed, please make contact. Blend-exchange will attempt to remove your data when the operator can allocate the sufficient time without undue inconvenience. Blend-Exchange may refuse to remove certain data if it is not legally obliged to remove that data.

Correction of Data Held by Blend-Exchange

To correct any personal data held by Blend-Exchange, please make contact. Your username, email and password can all be updated from your user account page.

Blend-Exchange can be contacted via the following email address: [email protected]