Privacy

Email

Email addresses are public records under Florida Law and are not exempt from public-records requirements. If you do not want your email address subject to being released pursuant to a public-records request do not send electronic mail to this entity. Instead contact the County department by telephone or in writing, via the United States Postal Service.

Information Collected and Stored Automatically

If you do nothing during your visit but browse through the website, read pages, or download information, we will gather and store certain information about your visit automatically. This information does not identify you personally. We automatically collect and store only the following information about your visit:

• The Internet domain (for example, "xcompany.com")
• The type of browser and operating system used to access our site
• The date and time you access our site;
• The pages you visit; and
• If you linked to the Hillsborough County website from another website or social media service, the name of that website or service.

We use this information to help us make our site more useful to visitors -- to track the number of visitors to our site and the types of technology our visitors use. We do not track or record personal information about individuals and their visits.

If You Send Us Personal Information

If you choose to provide us with personal information -- as in an email to County staff, or by filling out a form and submitting it to us through our website -- we will use that information to respond to your message and to help us provide you the information you have requested. We treat emails the same way we treat letters sent to the County offices. We are required to maintain many documents for historical purposes and we are subject to mandated retention policies. We do not regularly collect personal information for any purpose other than to respond to you. However, information we receive may be considered public information which is subject to disclosure under Florida’s Sunshine law. Except for information disclosure required by Florida law, we only share the information you give us with another government agency, if your inquiry relates to that agency, or the subject matter of the information comes within the regulatory or prosecutorial jurisdiction of that agency. Hillsborough County does not collect information for commercial marketing.

Site Security

For site security purposes and to ensure that this service remains available to all users, this computer system employs commercial software programs to monitor network traffic to identify unauthorized attempts to upload or change information, or otherwise cause damage.  Unauthorized attempts to upload information or change information on this service are strictly prohibited and may be punishable under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986, the National Information Infrastructure Protection Act, and any applicable law.

Protection of Minors

We are especially concerned about protecting children's privacy. We hope parents are involved in children's Internet explorations. It is particularly important for parents to guide their children when children are providing personal information on line. We ask that children get their parents' permission before providing any information online -- at our site or any other site -- and recommend parents always be involved in those decisions.

Cookie Use

To better serve you, we occasionally use "cookies" to customize your browsing experience. Cookies are small text files stored by your web browser and they provide a method of distinguishing among visitors to the websites. Cookies created on your computer by using our websites do not contain personally identifiable information and do not compromise your privacy or security. This cookie, by itself, only tells us that a previous visitor has returned. It doesn't tell us private information about you. You can refuse the cookie or delete the cookie file from your computer at any time by using any one of a number of widely available methods. Your choice to refuse the cookie may inhibit your access to some of the information available on the County website. Cookies are sometimes used to pass information between web pages. Your acceptance of the cookie will serve to provide you with additional functionality in choosing the information you wish to view on a regular basis..

Passwords

In certain instances, you will have the opportunity to receive or create a password to access or submit personal information. You should not divulge your password to anyone and Hillsborough County employees will never ask you for your password in an unsolicited phone call or email. When you are finished with those applications that are password protected, you should exit the page.

Links to other websites

The website has links to many other governmental and non-governmental agencies. In some cases we link to private organizations (please refer to the External Link Policy for more information). Once you link to another site, you are subject to the privacy policy of the new site.