Privacy Policy

LEGO is all about fun, and it’s important that you have fun here on Brothers-Brick.com, but online privacy is a very serious matter. Because Brothers-Brick.com takes your online privacy seriously, we want you to know what personal information we collect and how we use it.

Your use of Brothers-Brick.com is subject to the website’s Terms of Service.

Information for Parents and Children Under the Age of 13

Brothers-Brick.com was designed by adult fans of LEGO for other adult fans. Readers of all ages are welcome, but direct participation through interactive features is restricted to readers over the age of 13.

Links to more information about online privacy

Whether you’re an adult without any children, a parent, a teen, or a kid, if online privacy is something you haven’t really thought about, you might want to start with some reading:

Brothers-Brick.com Privacy Policy Overview

To enable you to leave comments on posts, subscribe to follow-up responses, contact us, and otherwise use the site’s interactive features, it is sometimes necessary to collect information about you. This information is called “personally identifiable information” (read more about personally identifiable information on Wikipedia).

Although some types of information are required to use certain features, you are not required to use any of these features. Therefore, providing personally identifiable information to Brothers-Brick.com is entirely voluntary.

Brothers-Brick.com also captures anonymous user data for the purposes of aggregate reporting and advertising. This user data is not personally identifiable.

The Brothers Brick never shares personally identifiable information with third parties except in cases when you have opted in to doing so, such as by participating in a contest or giveaway with prizes provided by a third party.

How much information does Brothers-Brick.com collect about me?

If you choose to use certain features of Brothers-Brick.com, you may be asked to provide a name, your email address, or other information. Your computer’s IP address is also logged by the server and when you leave a comment. We go over details on how each of these pieces of information is used later in this privacy policy.

Brothers-Brick.com uses a tool called Google Analytics to provide general, anonymous information about our visitors. Google Analytics is an industry standard tool that helps us make your experience on Brothers-Brick.com better. It’s important to note that Google’s own privacy policy prevents any data in Google Analytics reports from being personally identifiable.

The reports in Google Analytics help us understand broad characteristics about our readers. For example, knowing what Internet browsers our readers are using helps us design and test the site using the right technology. Knowing readers’ connection speeds helps us optimize the site’s bandwidth usage. Knowing how often readers visit helps us make the right choices about how often to post new content.

How does Brothers-Brick.com authenticate its users?

Brothers-Brick.com provides five ways to sign in to the website in order to ensure that users are unique when they engage with the site’s interactive features, such as comments:

  • Brothers-Brick.com website registration: Create a new account directly on Brothers-Brick.com by providing a name and your email address.
  • WordPress.com: Use your existing WordPress.com account to interact with Brothers-Brick.com.
  • Google: Use your existing Google account to interact with Brothers-Brick.com.
  • Twitter: Use your existing Twitter account to interact with Brothers-Brick.com.
  • Facebook: Use your existing Facebook account to interact with Brothers-Brick.com.

How is my information stored and protected by Brothers-Brick.com?

Brothers-Brick.com relies on a combination of technologies to serve its readers. As a result, user data is stored in a variety of ways.

For users who choose not to engage with any of Brothers-Brick.com’s interactive features, the website’s server infrastructure only captures and retains the IP address from which the user requested a webpage. This information is stored in the website’s server logs, and is only used for troubleshooting purposes when users report technical issues with the website. This server-level technical information is never correlated with personally identifiable information voluntarily provided by users.

Depending on how you choose to authenticate with Brothers-Brick.com, your user data is stored by a third party (such as WordPress.com or Facebook) linked to very limited information stored by Brothers-Brick.com itself. If you choose to sign in to Brothers-Brick.com with a username and email address, Brothers-Brick.com stores this information on its own server infrastructure.

As the largest LEGO hobbyist website in the world, Brothers-Brick.com is hosted on state-of-the-art cloud infrastructure, with regular updates to its platform software (both core software and add-on capabilities via plugins) by a dedicated infrastructure team staffed by experienced IT professionals. Website software includes industry standard security scanning, anti-malware, and anti-spam capabilities. The Brothers Brick’s cloud infrastructure has never been breached and user data has never been compromised.

How does Brothers-Brick.com use names?

Some type of name is required if you want to register on Brothers-Brick.com, leave a comment, or use the Contact Form. You can choose to use your own name, but you can also use a nickname, screen name, or other type of anonymous username. If you leave a comment, the name you provided appears on the comment. If you use the Contact Form, your name is included in the email message that is sent to Brothers-Brick.com.

How does Brothers-Brick.com use email addresses?

An email address is required to register or use the Contact Form, and may be required if you choose not to authenticate to Brothers-Brick.com with an existing social media account such as Google or Facebook. This is part of the system that helps to make sure that anonymous spambots can’t leave spam comments or send website users junk email.

The email address you provide when you leave a comment is not displayed to other readers. We will not use this email address to contact you except in rare cases where your online privacy or safety is at risk (for example, you’ve shared inappropriate personally identifiable information in a comment). However, by using the Contact Form, you give us permission to contact you in response.

Does Brothers-Brick.com use cookies?

Cookies are small pieces of information that a web server puts on your computer (read more about HTTP cookies on Wikipedia). Brothers-Brick.com discloses its use of cookies to all website visitors, with a link to this Privacy Policy. Brothers-Brick.com itself only puts a cookie on your computer if you register and then choose to have the website remember you the next time you visit.

Google Analytics and advertising partners such as Amazon.com may also place a cookie on your computer to provide information on when you’ve visited Brothers-Brick.com. Because these cookies are managed by Google, Amazon, and other third parties, and are designed to provide anonymized aggregate information, Brothers-Brick.com does not have either direct control of or access to these cookies. These third-party cookies are governed by their respective Privacy Policies.

This Site is affiliated with Monumetric (dba for The Blogger Network, LLC) for the purposes of placing advertising on the Site, and Monumetric will collect and use certain data for advertising purposes. To learn more about Monumetric’s data usage, click here: http://www.monumetric.com/publisher-advertising-privacy

How does Brothers-Brick.com use IP addresses?

An IP address is the unique electronic address that your Internet service provider assigns to your computer (read more about IP addresses on Wikipedia). When you use the Contact Form, the Contact Form logs the IP address of the person who used the form. Brothers-Brick.com does not use these IP addresses in any way.

When you leave a comment, The Brothers Brick’s website software stores your IP address to ensure that the person leaving the comment is unique. This enables The Brothers Brick to investigate and address potential instances of identity spoofing (someone claiming to be someone they are not) and other potentially abusive behaviors that violate the website’s Terms of Service. This information is never displayed to other website visitors and The Brothers Brick does not use these IP addresses in any other way.

Google Analytics uses IP addresses to determine what part of the world a reader is located in. Google Analytics data is completely anonymous, and Brothers-Brick.com does not have access to any personally identifiable information collected by Google.

What happens when I register?

Registering on Brothers-Brick.com is only open to administrators and contributors. Registration requires a username and an email address (see the sections on names and email addresses earlier in this privacy policy), and you can also choose to share additional information, such as a link to your website or social media profile. Registration is subject to our Terms of Service and does not grant you the right to become a contributor or administrator.

Registering as a user is different from registering to leave a comment. When you leave a comment using one of the five available authentication methods, Brothers-Brick.com only retains very basic information about you, as outlined earlier in this Privacy Policy.

Does Brothers-Brick.com collect any other information?

The interactive, free-form nature of commenting on this website means that you can choose to share whatever information you feel is appropriate. We highly recommend that you follow good online safety practices, but if you choose to share information such as your real name, email address, or location in places that are visible to the general public (such as comment text), this is your choice.

When it’s clear that inappropriate information has been shared, we reserve the right to edit comment text to remove personally identifiable information and to contact you to recommend correcting this. However, we can’t guarantee that we will see and correct these issues immediately, so we strongly recommend that you do not share any personally identifiable information in comments.

How do I request that The Brothers Brick removes all of my user data

The European Union’s Global Data Protection Regulation requires that websites enable their users to request removal of their user data from the website. To request removal of any and all data you may have contributed to the website through the use of our interactive features (primarily by leaving comments on articles), you can make this request through our Contact Form.

Who do I contact if I have questions or concerns about this privacy policy?

This policy was written by a person, not a robot or a lawyer. You can contact the people behind The Brothers Brick by using the Contact Form.