White House Website Privacy Policy

Thank you for visiting the White House Website and reviewing our privacy policy. Our privacy policy is clear: We will collect no personal information about you when you visit our website unless you choose to provide that information to us.

Here is how we handle information about your visit to our website:

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" if you use a private Internet access account, or "yourschool.edu" if you connect from a university's domain) and IP address (an IP address is a number that is automatically assigned to your computer whenever you are surfing the Web) from which you access our website;
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 White House website from another website, the address of that website.

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

If You Send Us Personal Information

If you choose to provide us with personal information -- as in an e-mail to the President, Vice President or someone else, or by filling out a form with your personal information and submitting it to us through our website -- we use that information to respond to your message and to help us get you the information you have requested. We treat emails the same way we treat letters sent to the White House. We are required to maintain many documents under the Presidential Records Act for historical purposes, but we do not collect personal information for any purpose other than to respond to you. We only share the information you give us with another government agency if your inquiry relates to that agency, or as otherwise required by law. Moreover, we do not create individual profiles with the information you provide or give it to any private organizations. The White House does not collect information for commercial marketing.

Links to Other Sites

Our Website has links to many other federal agencies. In a few cases we link to private organizations, with their permission. Before leaving the White House website, a page will appear informing you that you are leaving our server. Once you link to another site, you are subject to the privacy policy of the new site.

Kids' Page

We at the White House are especially concerned about protecting children's privacy. We hope parents and teachers are involved in children's Internet explorations. It is particularly important for parents to guide their children when children are asked to provide personal information on line. The White House homepage for kids allows children to send email messages to the White House. We ask children to type their name, email address, and home mailing address as part of their message so that we can respond to them. Providing this information is entirely optional. We specifically ask children to get their parents' permission before providing any information on line -- at our site or any other site -- and hope parents will always be involved in those decisions.

Here are helpful Internet tools for parents and more information on kids privacy.