Last Updated on May 14, 2024
This Privacy Policy describes how DigitalOcean, LLC and its affiliates (“DigitalOcean,” “we,” “our” or “us”) collect, use, and share information in connection with your use of our websites (including www.digitalocean.com), services, and applications (collectively, the “Services”). This Privacy Policy (the “Privacy Policy”) does not apply to information our customers may process when using our Services.
If you are looking for California-specific information, check out our CCPA Privacy Notice as well, which is incorporated into this Privacy Policy.
We may collect and receive information about users of our Services (“users,” “you,” or “your”) from various sources, including: (i) information you provide through your user account on the Services (your “Account”) if you register for the Services; (ii) your use of the Services; and (iii) from third-party websites, services, and partners.
We recommend that you read this Privacy Policy in full, including the Additional Disclosures referenced at the bottom of this document, to ensure you are fully informed. If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or DigitalOcean’s data collection, use, and disclosure practices, please contact us at privacy@digitalocean.com.
Information You Provide
I. Account Registration. When you register for an Account, we may ask for your contact information, including items such as name, company name, address, email address, and telephone number. If you choose to refer a friend to our Services, we may also collect your friend’s email address so that we may send them a referral or promotional code to sign up for our Services.
II. Payment Information. When you add your financial account information to your Account, that information is directed to our third-party payment processor. We do not store your financial account information on our systems; however, we have access to, and may retain, subscriber information through our third-party payment processor.
III. Personal Data. This means information that identifies, relates to, describes, is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a user in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, an online identifier or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural or social identity of that natural person. “Personal Data” includes equivalent terms in other Data Protection Law, such as the CCPA-defined term “Personal Information,” as context requires.
IV. User Content. Our “Community” feature allows you to publicly post content on our Services. By registering for our Community, you agree that your profile information and the content you post may be viewed and used by other users and third parties we do not control.
V. Communications. If you contact us directly, we may receive additional information about you such as your name, email address, phone number, the contents of the message and/or attachments you may send us, and any other information you may choose to provide. We may also receive a confirmation when you open an email from us.
The personal information that you are asked to provide, and the reasons why you are asked to provide it, will be made clear to you at the point we ask you to provide your personal information.
Information We Collect When You Use Our Services.
I. Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies. As is true of most websites, we gather certain information automatically and store it in log files. In addition, when you use our Services, we may collect certain information automatically from your device. This information may include internet protocol (“IP”) addresses, browser type, internet service provider (“ISP”), referring/exit pages, operating system, date/time stamp, clickstream data, landing page, and referring URL. To collect this information, a cookie may be set on your computer or device when you visit our Services. Cookies contain a small amount of information that allows our web servers to recognize you. We store information that we collect through cookies, log files, and/or clear gifs to record your preferences. We may also automatically collect information about your use of features of our Services, about the functionality of our Services, frequency of visits, and other information related to your interactions with the Services. We may track your use across different websites and services. In some countries, including countries in the European Economic Area (“EEA”), the information referenced above in this paragraph may be considered personal data under applicable data protection laws.
II. Usage of our Services. When you use our Services, we may collect information about your engagement with and utilization of our Services, such as processor and memory usage, storage capacity, navigation of our Services, and system-level metrics. We use this data to operate the Services, maintain and improve the performance and utilization of the Services, develop new features, protect the security and safety of our Services and our customers, and provide customer support. We also use this data to develop aggregate analysis and business intelligence that enable us to operate, protect, make informed decisions, and report on the performance of our business.
Information We Receive from Third Parties.
I. Third-Party Accounts. If you choose to link our Services to a third-party account, we will receive information about that account, such as your authentication token from the third-party account, to authorize linking. If you wish to limit the information available to us, you should visit the privacy settings of your third-party accounts to learn about your options.
We use the information we collect in various ways, including to:
We may share the information we collect in various ways, including the following:
Our legal basis for collecting and using the personal data described above will depend on the personal data concerned and the specific context in which we collect it.
However, we will normally collect personal data from you only (i) where we need the personal data to perform a contract with you; (ii) where the processing is in our legitimate interests and not overridden by your rights; or (iii) where we have your consent to do so. We have a legitimate interest in operating our Services and communicating with you as necessary to provide these Services, for example when responding to your queries, improving our platform, undertaking marketing, or for the purposes of detecting or preventing illegal activities.
In some cases, we may also have a legal obligation to collect personal data from you or may otherwise need the personal data to protect your vital interests or those of another person.
If we ask you to provide personal data to comply with a legal requirement or to perform a contract with you, we will make this clear at the relevant time and advise you whether the provision of your personal data is mandatory or not (as well as of the possible consequences if you do not provide your personal data).
You may access other third-party offerings through the Services, for example by clicking on links to those third-party offerings from within the Services. DigitalOcean is not responsible for the privacy policies and/or practices of these third-party offerings, and we encourage you to carefully review their privacy policies.
DigitalOcean is committed to protecting your information. To do so, we employ a variety of security technologies and measures designed to protect information from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. The measures we use are designed to provide a level of security appropriate to the risk of processing your personal data. Please note that no service is completely secure. While we strive to protect your data, we cannot guarantee that unauthorized access, hacking, data loss or a data breach will never occur.
For more information on DigitalOcean’s security controls, please see the following resources:
We retain personal data we collect from you where we have an ongoing legitimate business need to do so (for example, to provide you with a service you have requested or to comply with applicable legal, tax, or accounting requirements).
When we have no ongoing legitimate business need to process your personal data, we will either delete or anonymize it or, if this is not possible (for example, because your personal data has been stored in backup archives), then we will securely store your personal data and isolate it from any further processing until deletion is possible.
If you are a registered user, you may access certain information associated with your Account by logging into our Services or emailing privacy@digitalocean.com. If you terminate your Account, any public activity on your Account prior to deletion may remain stored on our servers and may remain accessible to the public.
To protect your privacy and security, we may also take reasonable steps to verify your identity before updating or removing your information. The information you provide us may be archived or stored periodically by us according to backup processes conducted in the ordinary course of business for disaster recovery purposes. Your ability to access and correct your information may be temporarily limited where access and correction could: inhibit DigitalOcean’s ability to comply with a legal obligation; inhibit DigitalOcean’s ability to investigate, make or defend legal claims; result in disclosure of personal data about a third party; or result in breach of a contract or disclosure of trade secrets or other proprietary business information belonging to DigitalOcean or a third party.
If you are a resident of the EEA, Switzerland, or the United Kingdom (“UK”), you have the following data protection rights:
We respond to all requests we receive from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with applicable data protection laws.
You can use some of the features of the Services without registering, thereby limiting the type of information that we collect.
You may unsubscribe from receiving certain promotional emails from us. If you wish to do so, simply follow the instructions found at the end of the email. Even if you unsubscribe, we may still contact you for informational, transactional, account-related, or similar purposes.
Many browsers have an option for disabling cookies, which may prevent your browser from accepting new cookies or enable selective use of cookies. Please note that, if you choose not to accept cookies, some features and the personalization of our Services may no longer work for you. You will continue to receive advertising material but it will not be tailored to your interests.
DigitalOcean does not knowingly collect information from children under the age of 13, and children under 13 are prohibited from using our Services. If you learn that a child has provided us with personal data in violation of this Privacy Policy, you can alert us at privacy@digitalocean.com.
This Privacy Policy may be modified from time to time, so please review it frequently. Changes to this Privacy Policy will be posted on our websites. If we materially change the ways in which we use or share personal data previously collected from you through our Services, we will notify you through our Services, on this page, by email, or other communication.
With respect to Personal Data of Data Subjects located in the EEA, Switzerland, or the United Kingdom that Customer transfers to DigitalOcean or permits DigitalOcean to access, the parties agree that by executing the DPA they also execute the Standard Contractual Clauses, which will be incorporated by reference and form an integral part of the DPA. The parties agree that, with respect to the elements of the Standard Contractual Clauses that require the parties’ input, Schedules 1-3 contain all the relevant information.
DigitalOcean, LLC complies with the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (“EU-U.S. DPF”), the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF (“UK Extension”), and the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (“Swiss-U.S. DPF”) as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce. DigitalOcean has certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles with regard to the processing of personal data received from the European Union in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF and from the United Kingdom (and Gibraltar) in reliance on the UK Extension. DigitalOcean has also certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (together with the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles, the “DPF Principles”) with regard to the processing of personal data received from Switzerland in reliance on the Swiss-U.S. DPF. If there is any conflict between the terms in this Privacy Policy and the DPF Principles, the DPF Principles will govern. To learn more about the Data Privacy Framework (“DPF”) program, and to view our certification, please visit https://www.dataprivacyframework.gov/. DigitalOcean’s compliance with the EU-U.S. DPF, UK Extension, and Swiss-U.S. DPF is subject to the investigatory and enforcement powers of the Federal Trade Commission.
Please also refer to our GDPR FAQ and Data Processing Agreement for more information about data transfers.
DigitalOcean complies with the DPF Principles for all onward transfers of personal data from the EU, UK, and Switzerland, including the onward transfer liability provisions.
DigitalOcean commits to resolve DPF Principles-related complaints about our collection and use of your personal information. EU, UK, and Swiss individuals with inquiries or complaints regarding our handling of personal data received in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF, the UK Extension, and the Swiss-U.S. DPF should first contact DigitalOcean using the details provided below.
In compliance with the EU-U.S. DPF and the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF and the Swiss-U.S. DPF, DigitalOcean LLC commits to refer unresolved complaints concerning our handling of personal data received in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF and the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF and the Swiss-U.S. DPF to the American Arbitration Association (“AAA”), an alternative dispute resolution provider based in the United States. If you do not receive timely acknowledgment of your DPF Principles-related complaint from us, or if we have not addressed your DPF Principles-related complaint to your satisfaction, please visit https://go.adr.org/dpf_irm.html for more information or to file a complaint. The services of AAA are provided at no cost to you.
For complaints regarding DPF compliance not resolved by any of the other DPF mechanisms, you have the possibility, under certain conditions, to invoke binding arbitration. Further information can be found in Annex 1 of the DPF Principles.
If you have any questions or concerns about this Privacy Policy, please email us at privacy@digitalocean.com or write to us at:
DigitalOcean
101 6th Ave New York, NY 10013
ATTN: Legal
The data controller of your personal information is DigitalOcean, LLC.
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