Privacy Policy

Lines for Life Online Texting Emotional Support Disclaimer & Privacy Policy

If you are in danger or need emergency help, call 911 or your local authorities.

Scope of Service
We provide online texting emotional support for our Military Helpline, the Oregon Drug and Alcohol Helpline, the Suicide Helpline and the YouthLine.

Before using online texting emotional support please read the following. By accessing or using, you agree to the terms of service and privacy policy described below. You may contact us by e-mail at [email protected] with any questions about these terms. If you don’t agree to the terms, you may choose not use Lines for Life’s online texting emotional support. You can find a list of other hotlines at http://psychcentral.com/lib/common-hotline-phone-numbers/

 

Privacy and Security
We take your privacy and security very seriously and employ reasonable security controls (including encryption) to help protect your information. Despite these protections, SMS remains an imperfectly secure environment.  Lines for Life cannot guarantee complete protection from intruders or interceptors. You agree to use Lines for Life’s online texting emotional support and submit information at your own risk, and you agree that Lines for Life has no liability regarding anyone’s unauthorized access to online texting emotional support or the data associated with it.

 

Introduction; Scope
At Lines for Life (“online texting emotional support,” “We,” “Us”), our goal is to help people in crisis. We’re here to try to help you out of crisis, which means to go from an emotionally elevated “hot” moment to a deescalated “cool” moment and we try to help equip you with the tools necessary to do this yourself if you face a crisis in the future. We also want you to feel safe when you text with us. We want you to share all those awful things that are making you feel awful, so we can help you feel better.

To make sure we’re doing everything we can to secure your information, we communicate our privacy and security guidelines to our employees and crisis counselors.This privacy policy describes what information we collect when you use online texting emotional support, and explains how we use, transfer and store your information after we collect it. This policy will inform you if and to whom we disclose any of that information, and what choices you have in how we use that information. So before using online texting emotional support, please read the following.

 

Your Consent and Changes in Privacy Policy
By using online texting emotional support, you agree to the practices outlined in this privacy policy. Lines for Life may change this privacy policy from time to time, so please consult it regularly for any such changes. Any changes will be effective immediately upon our posting them to our website at linesforlife.org. Your use of online texting emotional support after any such changes have been posted shall constitute your acceptance of the revised privacy policy and terms.

 

Collection and Use of Personally Identifiable Information
“Personally Identifiable Information” is data that can be used to uniquely identify you, such as your full name or home address. During your use of online texting emotional support, you may be prompted (but never required) to voluntarily provide Personally Identifiable Information, including but not limited to, your home address or email address. We will ONLY ask for this if we believe it would help us to better serve you.

While we may collect Personally Identifiable Information, we will not sell or license to any third party any Personally Identifiable Information we receive from you, and will not share it with any third parties except as noted below.

Lines for Life uses the information it collects about you to, among other things, improve online texting emotional support, contact you, provide anonymous reporting internally, and fulfill your requests, including but not limited to referrals to other services. In other words, we collect information so we can provide you and others like you with a better service.

The following section provides examples of the types of Personally Identifiable Information online texting emotional support may collect and how we may use it.

 

What Personally Identifiable Information We Collect
We do not collect any Personally Identifiable Information from you other than the phone number you text us from and that which you voluntarily provide to us. Some of the types of Personally Identifiable Information that we may request include:
– When you contact Lines for Life, we may request information including your name, age, and zip code.
– When you contact Lines for Life about a friend, family member, or other person in need of our services, we may request the information you provide about those people such as name and zip code.
– In situations where you or someone else is in danger or in need of emergency help, we may request your current location, or the current location of the person in danger.

 

How We Use Your Personally Identifiable Information
We use Personally Identifiable Information to help us improve our services.
– We may also use Personally Identifiable Information for internal purposes such as auditing, data analysis, and research to improve Lines for Life services.
– We may also use your information to help us personalize your experience with us and to operate, maintain and improve the features and functionality of our service.

 

Disclosure to Third Parties
At times we may make certain Personally Identifiable Information available to strategic partners that work with us.

 

Police and EMS
It’s our goal to support you in staying safe and healthy and to do so in the least invasive way possible. If a crisis counselor identifies imminent harm to yourself or someone else (you have the desire, plan, and means) or suspects abuse or neglect, they let you know they’re concerned about your safety. At this point, they might ask you where you are or what your name is. They’ll continue to work to support you, and if they feel like you might not be able to keep yourself safe, they may contact local police or EMS. We’re here to do our best to support you in staying healthy and safe.

 

Crisis Counselors
We operate online texting emotional support in conjunction with volunteer and staff crisis counselors (“Crisis Counselors”). Any information, including Personally Identifiable Information, that you share with Lines for Life support may be viewed by online texting emotional support staff or Crisis Counselors for quality control and to better assist you with your crisis.

If you provide feed back through an anonymous feedback survey, that feedback may also be shared with Lines for Life Staff and Crisis Counselors.

 

Outside Referrals
Sometimes, we may refer you to another hotline or program. We will give you their contact information but we will not give them your contact information. So, it’s up to you if you want to use the referral. If you would like to receive support from other services, please note that different rules may apply to their use or disclosure of Personally Identifiable Information. We do not control the privacy policies of others. We encourage you to ask questions before you disclose your Personally Identifiable Information to others.

 

Other Third Parties; Legal Processes
In certain narrow circumstances, we may disclose Personally Identifiable Information we collect from you to additional third parties to the extent necessary to: (A) to comply with the law or in response to a subpoena, court order, government request, or other legal process; (B) to protect the interests, rights, safety, or property of Lines for Life, its affiliates, employees, or agents, including but not limited to Crisis Counselors; (C) to enforce this privacy policy or terms; (D) in connection with a merger, acquisition, liquidation, or corporate divestiture of Lines for Life or its affiliates, or (E) to address fraud, security, technical issues, or to operate Lines for Life or its infrastructure systems properly.

 

How We Protect Your Personally Identifiable Information
Lines for Life cares about you and the security of your Personally Identifiable Information. We take reasonable precautions, including administrative, technical, and physical measures, to protect your Personally Identifiable Information from loss, theft, misuse, unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, and destruction. We store all information on secure servers only accessible by approved Lines for Life employees and third parties pursuant to the practices described above.

 

You Should Also Protect Yourself
Always be careful and responsible regarding your Personally Identifiable Information. We are not responsible for, and cannot control, what others not affiliated with Lines for Life do with information you provide to them. One suggestion: you might want to delete Lines for Life’s conversations from your phone. You might even want to clear us from your history and make sure we are not saved in your contact list.

 

Contact Us
If you have any questions or concerns about our privacy policy or the privacy practices described here, please contact: [email protected].