Privacy and Security

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MDC Internet User Privacy and Security Policy

The Missouri Department of Conservation has created this privacy statement in order to demonstrate our firm commitment to privacy.

Our policy is simple: we collect no personal information about you unless you choose to provide it. We do not gather personal information for the purpose of selling it to others. For details about how we safeguard personal information, please read below.

Browsing (visiting our Web site)

Our web servers record your visit to our web site with the standard web usage log (used by the vast majority of web servers). The web usage log records your IP address, time of visit, the page you visited and the page you came from.

No personal information is recorded in this log. If you, for example, visit our site from America Online, the usage log only shows that someone from America Online visited our web site -- not who visited our web site.

We use this information to help diagnose problems with our server, and to administer our Web site as well as to generate statistics on the web site's usage.

To ensure that our system remains available to all visitors, our operating system tracks unauthorized attempts to upload or change information, or otherwise cause damage.

MDC also uses Google Analytics and other third-party software to get statistical information on who uses our site. These may put a cookie on your browser to help us understand how the public uses our site. See below for more information on the cookie that Google Analytics uses.

While MDC will make every reasonable effort, as described herein, to protect the privacy of your personal information, MDC makes no warranty, express or implied, as to such information or your use of our web site and any consequential or incidental damages that may accrue therefrom.

Cookies

"Cookies" are bits of code that are saved on your computer by your Web browser. They are set by web sites and can be used to personalize your visit to a Web site or track your navigation of a Web site.

MDC uses cookies when you shop on an MDC site, such as the MDC Nature Shop, the Seedling Order Form, and the Permits page. These pages use cookies to keep track of the items or transactions you are doing. No personal information (e.g., your mailing address, your phone number, credit card information) is kept via cookies.

MDC uses Google Analytics to provide additional information about how you use our site. Google will put persistent cookies on your browser to help us know how people use our site. These cookies collect anonymous traffic data; no personal information is kept via cookies. You can find out more about Google Analytics cookies from the Google Analytics Terms of Service.

If you block cookies from Google, you can still view our content, but we will not be able to use information from your visit to improve our site.

Web Forms

When you fill out web forms to correspond with us, we may request personal information. We will indicate required information (such as your name or mailing address) and optional information on forms where this information is necessary. We record your IP address when you use our web forms to help us filter out spam and bots.

First Game Certificates

When you fill out a certificate form, you have the option to upload an image. This image is stored on our public server for a period of time to allow you to print and share the certificate with others.

Comment and Question Page

The MDC comment and question page requires contact information like your name, e-mail and postal addresses and ZIP code. This information is used to respond to your question or comment.

Your ZIP code helps us get your comments and questions to the right MDC employee.

If you send us a question or comment is about the MDC Web site, we send information about the Web page you visited prior to the comments form as well as the your browse along with your comment or question. This helps troubleshoot any problems with the MDC Web site.

Blog Comments

Comments to any of MDC's blogs are moderated to ensure content is not spam. Appropriate comments are considered public conversation and displayed on the blog post. 

E-mail

If you send us e-mail directly (and do not use our web comment forms), the message will usually contain your return e-mail address. If you include personal information in your e-mail, we may use that information in responding to your request. E-mail is not necessarily secure or confidential, so you should send only the information necessary to answer your question or process your request.

Links to Other Sites

Our site provides links to other web sites. The MDC privacy policy does not apply to any of these external Web sites. Read the privacy policies of other sites you visit. Be informed. You are the person best qualified to protect your own privacy.

Missouri Sunshine Law

As a state agency, MDC is subject to Chapter 610 of the Revised Statutes of Missouri, commonly known as the Sunshine Law. If an appropriate request is made to this office for information that is subject to disclosure by the Sunshine Law, MDC may be required to disclose the information requested, even if it includes your personal information. Hunting, fishing, and trapping permit records are also governed by section 252.228 of the Revised Missouri Statutes, which requires MDC to disclose certain personal information of permit holders to specified law enforcement entities, other state and local government entities, and the permit holder, but allows the permit holder to request that such personal information not be disclosed to the public.

Mobile Applications

MDC uses programs called "Appsee" (appsee.com) and "Firebase" (firebase.google.com) that anonymously collects and encrypts user interaction data from our mobile applications. Data collected pertain to: crash reporting, session playback, touch heatmaps, realtime app analytics and alerts, conversion funnels, action cohorts, retention analytics, user flows, and navigation paths. This data provides the Department with user insight to help support, maintain and enhance our mobile applications to ensure we are meeting user needs. The Department will only use this information to gain general knowledge of how its apps are being used by the public. Private user information, such as Conservation ID and date of birth, is masked which prevents it from being collected and stored.

E-Commerce and Registrations

We take every effort to protect your privacy when you purchase products and/or services from MDC. Detailed information is provided below:

Your Conservation ID number

Although you should not share your Conservation ID number with others, we realize that this occurs when you register a party for waterfowl reservations or managed deer hunts. Because of this, MDC does not treat your Conservation ID number as private information.

When you register online for the waterfowl reservations and managed deer hunts, you identify yourself and members in your party by using your Conservation ID numbers. The Conservation ID number is the only identity number stored on the Web site. When results of waterfowl registration or managed deer hunt draws are made, you may enter your Conservation ID number and find the result of your registration. Again, only the drawing results and the Conservation ID number are stored on the Web site.

MDC uses your Conservation ID number to help us keep track of what Missourians are requesting particular services without exposing private information (such as name or home address) to the public.

Security

System Monitoring

We monitor this system to protect the system from unauthorized use and to ensure that the system is functioning properly. Anyone using this system expressly consents to such monitoring and is advised that if such monitoring reveals possible conduct of criminal activity, system personnel may provide evidence of such monitoring to law enforcement officers.

Unauthorized attempts to upload information and/or change information on this agency’s Websites are strictly prohibited and are subject to prosecution under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and Title 18 U.S.C. Sec.1001 and 1030 (https://www.justice.gov/usao-edmo/cybercrime).

Secure Transactions

Agencies that conduct online transactions that require sensitive data such as social security number or credit card are required to encrypt the data transmission with current industry standard secure socket layer (SSL) technologies.

MDC uses SSL for our employment application and the Nature Shop.

For More Information

If you have any questions or comments about our privacy policy, you can contact us on our comments page or write us at:

Web development team
Missouri Department of Conservation
2901 W. Truman Blvd.
Jefferson City, MO 65102
Phone: (573) 751-4115 x3244
Fax: (573) 751-2260