Privacy Policy

Last Updated: September 29, 2023

Privacy is of utmost importance at MeteNews.com. We recognize the significance of protecting information which is stored on our servers or network or is intended to be stored on our servers or network and which relates to an individual. The data we protect are the “Personal Data” which is any information that can be used to identify you directly or indirectly.

This Privacy Policy is designed to address regulatory requirements of the jurisdictions in which MeteNews.com offers its Services, including the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”), as enacted by the European Commission and the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”). In this Privacy Policy, the terms “Service” and “Services” have the same meaning as described in the User Agreement.

This Privacy Notice applies to all processing of Personal Data on the website www.MeteNews.com and all other MeteNews.com sites on which it appears (the “Sites”). If you do not agree with this Privacy Policy, in general, or any part of it, you should not use the Sites or Services. This Privacy Policy is periodically reviewed to ensure that any new obligations and changes to our business model are taken into consideration. We may amend this Privacy Policy at any time by posting an amended version on our website.

In this privacy policy, we will tell you:

• Who we are;
• What Personal Data we collect from you and how we collect it;
• On what legal basis we collect your Personal Data;
• For what purpose we collect your Personal Data;
• How long we store it for;
• Who do we share your Personal Data with;
• Whether we intend to transfer it to another country;
• What are your rights with respect to your Personal Data; and
• Children’s Privacy; and
• Changes to this Privacy Policy.

1. Who are we and how can you contact us if you have any concerns?

The organization who is responsible for ensuring that your Personal Data is processed in compliance with applicable regulations is: MeteNews Panama S.A. (Bloc Office Hub, Fifth Floor, Santa Maria Business District, Panama, Republic of Panama).If you have any concern, question or if you would like to exercise any of your rights with respect to your Personal Data, you may contact our Data Protection Officer (“DPO”) at [email protected].

2. What data do we collect about you and how do we collect it?

We collect your Personal Data through a variety of methods: either you provide it to us directly, we collect it from external sources, or we collect it by using automated means.

Information you may provide to us: You may give us information about you by filling in forms on our Sites or through our app or by corresponding with us by phone, email or otherwise. This includes but is not limited to the following information:

• Account Administration. We may collect personal information from you in connection with the administration of your account. This personal information may include, but is not limited to, your name, date of birth, age, nationality, country of residence, gender, occupation, signature, utility bills, professional details, photographs, video footage, phone number, home address, email address, government issued identification such as passport, driver’s license, national identification card with photograph, tax identification number, national insurance number, social security number, visa information and/or any other information deemed necessary to comply with our legal obligations.
• Financial and Transactional Information. We may collect financial information such as your wallet address, bank account numbers, bank statements, transaction history, trading data, and credit/debit card numbers. We may collect personal information and details associated with your transactions including, but not limited to, information about the transactions you make using our services, the purpose of the transactions, information on sources of your funds, sender and receiver of funds, and ultimate beneficiary information.
• Your Communications with Us. We may collect personal information, such as email address, phone number, or mailing address when you request information about our Services, register for our newsletter, request customer or technical support, or otherwise communicate with us.
• Surveys. We may contact you to participate in surveys. If you decide to participate, we may collect personal information from you in connection with the survey.
• Interactive Features. We and others who use our services may collect personal information that you submit or make available through our interactive features (e.g., messaging and chat features, commenting functionalities, forums, blogs, and social media pages). Any information you provide using the public sharing features of the Services will be considered “public,” unless otherwise required by applicable law, and is not subject to the privacy protections referenced herein.
• Sweepstakes or Contests. We may collect personal information you provide for any sweepstakes or contests that we offer. In some jurisdictions, we are required to publicly share information of sweepstakes and contest winners.
• Conferences, Trade Shows, and Other Events. We may collect personal information from you when we attend or host conferences, trade shows, and other events.
• Business Development and Strategic Partnerships. We may collect personal information from you and third parties to assess and pursue potential business opportunities.
• Job Applications. We may post job openings and opportunities on our Services. If you respond to one of these postings, we may collect your personal information, such as your application, CV, cover letter, and/or any other information you provide to us.Information Collected Automatically: With regard to each of your visits to our Sites or our app we automatically collect the following information:
• Automatic Collection of Personal Information. We may collect certain information automatically when you use our Services, such as your Internet protocol (IP) address, user settings, MAC address, cookie identifiers, mobile carrier, mobile advertising and other unique identifiers, browser or device information, location information (including precise location information and/or approximate location derived from IP address), and Internet service provider. We may also automatically collect information regarding your use of our Services, such as pages that you visit before, during and after using our Services, information about the links you click, the types of content you interact with, the frequency and duration of your activities, and other Information about how you use our Services.
• Device Information: We collect information about the device you use to access your account, including the hardware model, operating system and version, and unique device identifiers, but this information is anonymised and not tied to any particular person.
• Transaction Information: In connection with our Services (as such term is defined in our User Agreement), we may collect and maintain information relating to transactions you effect using the MeteNews.com DEX (e.g. converting one virtual currency to another or purchasing virtual currencies).

Information We Collect Required By Law, Rule, or Regulation: Depending on the Service, we may collect information from you in order to meet regulatory obligations around know-your-customer (“KYC”) and anti-money laundering (“AML”) requirements. Information that we may collect from you includes the following:

• Full name
• Residential address
• Contact details (telephone number, email address)
• Date and place of birth,
• Your status as a politically exposed person
• A static image or a facial motion capture to prevent ID and account takeover fraud
• Source of funds & proof of address
• Passport and/or national driver’s license or government-issued identification card to verify your identity
• Transaction history and account balances in connection with your use of certain Services.

Information We Collect from External Sources: We also receive information from other sources and combine that with the information we collect through our Services. For instance:

• We use “cookies” from time to time to help personalise your online experience with us. A cookie is a small text file that is stored on your computer to help us make your visit to our Sites more “user-friendly.” Please see our Cookie Policy for more details about the cookies we use. Cookies provide us with information about your use of the Sites that can help us improve the Sites and your experience with it. We will process Personal Data collected through cookies in accordance with this Privacy Policy. If you have set your browser to alert you before accepting cookies, you should receive an alert message with each cookie. You may refuse cookies by turning them off in your browser, however, you should be aware that our Sites, like most other popular sites, may not work well with cookies disabled.
• We may analyze public blockchain data to ensure parties utilizing our Services are not engaged in illegal or prohibited activity under our User Agreement, and to analyze transaction trends for research and development purposes.
• We use third-party services that may be co-branded as MeteNews.com but will do so with clear notice. Any third-party services may collect information as determined by their own privacy policies. In some cases, you may elect to provide your personal information to these third-parties, that may be shared with us. We do not control how these third parties collect, store or use your data and you are responsible for reviewing and understanding the applicable terms and conditions as well as privacy policies of these third-parties.
• Banks or payment processors that you use to transfer fiat currency may provide us with basic Personal Data, such as your name and address, as well as, your bank account information.
• Advertising or analytics providers may provide us with anonymised information about you, including but not limited to, how you found our website.

3. On what basis do we collect our data?

We only use your Personal Data where we have a legal basis to do so:

Consent. For some processing activities, we require your prior consent. This applies for example to some of our direct marketing activities which fall under the scope of the GDPR. You will always be prompted to take clear, affirmative action so that we can ensure that you agree with the processing of your Personal Data. This action may, for example, take the form of a checkbox. If you have given us your consent for processing operations, you may always change your mind, and withdraw your consent at any time and easily; all you need to do is to send us an email at the following address [email protected].

Performance of a contract. Some Personal Data we process about you is for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or in order to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contract with us.

Legal obligation. In some cases, we have to process your Personal Data to comply with legal obligations, including those applicable to financial services institutions, such as under the Bank Secrecy Act and other anti-money laundering laws. You may not be eligible for certain Services if we cannot collect the Personal Data necessary to meet our legal obligations.

Legitimate interest. In most cases where we process Personal Data in the context of our Services we rely on our legitimate interests in conducting our normal business as a legal basis for such processing. Our legitimate interests are to identify or prevent fraud, to enhance the security of our network and information systems, or to carry out processing operations for statistical purposes. We will use legitimate interest only when we have carried out an assessment on the impact that this processing may have on you, and concluded that the processing does not unduly infringe your rights and freedoms. For example, we do not use this justification if we process sensitive data, or when the processing would be unexpected for you, or if we consider it to be too intrusive.

4. For what purposes do we collect your data?

We collect your Personal Data to:

• Provide our Services (including customer support);
• Process transactions and send notices about your transactions;
• Resolve disputes, collect fees, and troubleshoot problems;
• Communicate with you about our Services and business and to inform you of matters that are important for your account and/or use of the Sites. We also use your Personal Data to respond to any questions, comments or requests you filed with us and the handling of any complaints;
• Comply with applicable laws and regulations;
• Establish, exercise and defend legal claims;
• Monitor and report compliance issues;
• Customize, measure, and improve our business, the Services, and the content and layout of our Sites and apps (including developing new products and services; managing our communications; determining the effectiveness of our sales, marketing and advertising; analyzing and enhancing our products, services, websites and apps; ensuring the security of our networks and information systems; performing accounting, auditing, invoicing, reconciliation and collection activities; and improving and maintaining the quality of our customer services);
• Perform data analysis;
• Deliver targeted marketing, service update notices, and promotional offers based on your communication preferences, and measure the effectiveness of it. To approach you via email for marketing purposes, we request your consent, unless it is not required by law. You always have the option to unsubscribe from our mailings, e.g., via the unsubscribe link in our newsletter;
• Perform risk management, including comparing information for accuracy and verify it with third parties and protect against, identify and prevent fraud and other prohibited or illegal activity, claims and other liabilities; and
• Enforce our contractual terms.

5. How long do we keep your data?

We will only retain your personal information for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which we collected it, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting obligations or to resolve disputes. While retention requirements vary by jurisdiction, information about our typical retention periods for different aspects of your personal information are described below.

• Personal information collected to comply with our legal obligations under financial or anti-money laundering laws may be retained after account closure for as long as required under such laws.
• Contact Information such as your name, email address and telephone number for marketing purposes is retained on an ongoing basis until you unsubscribe. Thereafter we will add your details to our suppression list to ensure we do not inadvertently market to you.
• Content that you post on our Sites such as support desk comments, photographs, videos, blog posts, and other content may be kept after you close your account for audit and crime prevention purposes (e.g. to prevent a known fraudulent actor from opening a new account).
• Information collected via technical means such as cookies, web page counters and other analytics tools is kept for a period of up to one year from expiry of the cookie.

When Personal Data is no longer necessary for the purpose for which it was collected, we will remove any details that identifies you or we will securely destroy the records, where permissible. However, we may need to maintain records for a significant period of time (after you cease using a particular Service) as mandated by regulation. For example, where we are subject to certain anti-money laundering laws, we may be required to retain the record for as long as it is prescribed by the applicable regulation after our business relationship with you has ended.

6. Who do we share your Personal Data with?

We may share your information with selected recipients to perform functions required to provide certain Services to you and/or in connection with our efforts to prevent and investigate fraudulent or other criminal activity. All such third parties will be contractually bound to protect data in compliance with our Privacy Policy. The categories of recipients include:

• Other MeteNews.com entities, including to help detect and prevent potentially illegal acts and violations of our policies, and to guide decisions about our products, services and communications;
• Service providers who help with our business operations and to deliver our Services, such as:
  • Cloud service providers providing cloud infrastructure;
  • Providers of regulated services, e.g. exchange of fiat for cryptocurrency or custody of digital assets;
  • Providers of ID verification solutions and other anti-money laundering or fraud prevention solutions;
  • Providers of website analytics;
  • Providers of customer service solutions; and
  • Providers of marketing automation platforms.
• Law enforcement, government officials, regulatory agencies, our banks, and other third parties pursuant to a subpoena, court order or other legal process or requirement if applicable to MeteNews.com; or when we believe, in our sole discretion, that the disclosure of data is necessary to report suspected illegal or fraudulent activity or to investigate violations of our User Agreement.

We also may share Personal Data with a buyer or other successor in the event of a merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganisation, dissolution or other sale or transfer of some or all of MeteNews.com’s assets, whether as a going concern or as part of bankruptcy, liquidation or similar proceeding, in which Personal Data held by MeteNews.com is among the assets transferred.

Funding and transaction information related to your use of certain Services may be recorded on a public blockchain. Public blockchains are distributed ledgers, intended to immutably record transactions across wide networks of computer systems. Many blockchains are open to forensic analysis which can lead to deanonymization and the unintentional revelation of private financial information, especially when block chain data is combined with other data.

Because blockchains are decentralised or third-party networks that are not controlled or operated by MeteNews.com or its affiliates, we are not able to erase, modify, or alter Personal Data from such networks.

7. Is your data transferred outside of the European Union?

As we are located outside of the European Union, we will ensure that any entity, whether our processor or affiliate that transfers Personal Data to us from the EU employs appropriate safeguards. If your Personal Data is transferred to us from the European Economic Area by our service providers (i.e., Data Processors who are engaged on our behalf) and business partners, we will ensure that the transfer is lawful.

8. What are your rights?

Under the GDPR and relevant implementation acts, individuals have statutory rights related to their Personal Data. Please note that rights are not absolute and may be subject to conditions.

One key right is the Right to object. You have the right to object to processing of your Personal Data where we are relying on legitimate interests as our legal basis (see above). Under certain circumstances, we may have compelling legitimate grounds that allow us to continue processing your Personal Data. Insofar as the processing of your Personal Data takes place for direct marketing purposes, including profiling for direct marketing, we will always honor your request.

Other rights are as follows:

• Right to withdraw consent. Insofar as our processing of your Personal Data is based on your consent (see above), you have the right to withdraw consent at any time.
• Right of access. You have the right to request access to your Personal Data.
• Right to rectification. You have the right to request rectification of the Personal Data that we hold about you.
• Right to erasure. You have the right to request erasure of your Personal Data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove Personal Data in certain circumstances.
• Right to restriction. You have the right to request restriction of processing of your Personal Data.
• Right to data portability. In some cases, you have the right to request to transfer your Personal Data to you or to a third party of your choice.

The exercise of the aforementioned rights is free of charge and can be carried out by accessing our Data Subject Request Portal or contacting us at [email protected].

Before responding to your request, we will verify your identity and / or ask you to provide us with more information to respond to your request, if we have any doubts about your identity. We will deny your request if we are unable to verify your identity. Failure to provide information or evidence to us in a timely manner may also result in your request being denied.

We will do our best to respond to your request within one month, unless your request is particularly complex (for example if your request concerns a large amount of sensitive data). In such a case, we will inform you of the need to extend this response time by two additional months.

9. How about children’s privacy?

MeteNews.com does not address anyone under the age of 18. We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 18. If you are a parent or guardian and you are aware that your child has provided us with Personal Data, please contact us at [email protected]. If we become aware that we have collected Personal Data from children without verification of parental consent, we take steps to remove that information from our servers.

10. What happens if we make changes to this Privacy Policy?

We may update this policy to reflect changes to our information practices but we will not reduce your rights under this Privacy Policy without your express consent. We will post any changes to this page and, if the changes are significant, we will provide a more prominent notice. We will also keep prior versions of this Privacy Policy in an archive for your review. We encourage you to periodically review our Privacy Policy for the latest information on our privacy practices and to contact us if you have any questions or concerns.

California Consumer Privacy Act Addendum

At MeteNews.com, we take our responsibilities under the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) seriously. If you are a California resident, the following provisions apply to our processing of information that identifies, relates to, describes, is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular consumer or household subject to the CCPA. For such residents, the provisions of this CCPA Addendum prevail over any conflicting provisions in our MeteNews.com Privacy Notice.

1. California Personal Information We Collect

We have collected the following categories of California Personal Information within the last 12 months:

For each of these categories, we obtain California Personal Information from a variety of sources. These sources include: yourself, with respect to both online and offline interactions you may have with us or our service providers; other entities with whom you transact; others with whom you maintain relationships who may deal with us on your behalf; the devices you use to access our websites, mobile applications, and online services; identity verification and fraud prevention services; marketing and analytics providers; public databases; social media platforms; and others consistent with this CCPA Addendum. For more information, please see the “For what purposes do we collect your data?” section of our Privacy Notice.

For each of these categories, we share Personal Information with a variety of third parties. These third parties include: other MeteNews.com entities; service providers; marketing and advertising providers; analytics providers; law enforcement, government officials, or other third parties pursuant to a subpoena, court order, or other applicable legal process or requirement; and merchants in cases of suspected fraud or in connection with an ongoing investigation.

2. Sale and disclosure of California Personal Information

Within the last 12 months, within the meaning of “sale” under the California Consumer Privacy Act, we have disclosed California Personal Information identified in the above categories for business purposes. This includes the use of cookies on our website, including those placed by third parties. You can configure your browser to prevent the placement of cookies when using our site. To learn more about cookies, please see our Cookie Policy or your browser help documentation for more information. To learn more about the categories of third parties with whom we share such information, please see the “Who do we share your Personal Data with?” section of our Privacy Notice.

3. Use of California Personal Information

For each of the above categories, we use the California Personal Information we collect for the business purposes disclosed within this CCPA Addendum. Please note that the business purposes for which we may use your information include:

• Audits and reporting relating to particular transactions and interactions, including online interactions, you may have with us or others on our behalf;
• Detecting and protecting against security incidents, and malicious, deceptive, fraudulent or illegal activity, and prosecuting the same;
• Debugging to identify and repair errors in our systems;
• Short-term, transient use including contextual customization of ads or website;
• Providing services on our behalf or on behalf of another, including maintaining or servicing accounts, providing customer service, fulfilling transactions, verifying identity information, processing payments, and other services;
• Conducting internal research to develop and demonstrate technology; and
• Conducting activity to verify, enhance, and maintain the quality or safety of services or devices which we may own, control, or provide.
• We may also use the information we collect for our own or our service providers’ other operational purposes, purposes for which we provide you additional notice, or for purposes compatible with the context in which the California Personal Information was collected.

4. Your California Rights

If you are a California resident, you have certain rights related to your California Personal Information. You may exercise these rights free of charge except as otherwise permitted under applicable law. If you wish to submit a request under the CCPA, please do so by writing to [email protected].

As required under applicable law, we may take steps to verify your identity before granting you access to information or acting on your request to exercise your rights. We may require you to provide information to verify your identity in response to exercising requests of the above type, including name and account information. We may limit our response to your exercise of the below rights as permitted under applicable law.

4.1. Right to Access/Know

You have the right to request that we disclose to you:

• the categories of California Personal Information we have collected about you
• the categories of sources from which the California Personal Information is collected;
• our business or commercial purpose for collecting or selling California Personal Information;
• the categories of third parties with whom we share California Personal Information; and
• the specific pieces of information we have collected about you.

To the extent that we sell your California Personal Information within the meaning of the California Consumer Privacy Act or disclose such information for a business purpose, you may request that we disclose to you:

• the categories of California Personal Information that we have collected about you;
• the categories of California Personal Information about you that we have sold within the meaning of the California Consumer Privacy Act and the categories of third parties to whom the California Personal Information was sold, by category or categories of personal information for each third party to whom the California personal information was sold; and

the categories of California Personal Information about you that we disclosed for a business purpose.

4.2. Right to Delete

You have the right to request that we delete California Personal Information about you which we have collected from you unless an exception applies.

4.3. Right to Opt-Out and Right to Opt-In

You have the right to direct us to not sell your Personal Information at any time (the “right to opt-out”) by managing your cookie preferences by contacting us at [email protected].

4.4. Non-Discrimination

Subject to applicable law, we may not discriminate against you because of your exercise of any of the above rights, or any other rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act, including by:

• Denying you goods or services;
• Charging different prices or rates for goods or services, including through the use of discounts or other benefits or imposing penalties;
• Providing you a different level or quality of goods or services; or
• Suggesting that you will receive a different price or rate for goods or services or a different level or quality of goods or services.

5. Changes to this Notice

We may amend this Notice at any time by posting a revised version on our website. The revised version will be effective at the time we post it. You are responsible for periodically reviewing this Notice.

6. Contact Information

You may contact us with questions or concerns about our privacy policies or practices at [email protected].