Privacy Policy
View the prior version of our Privacy Policy here.
At Benchling, Inc., including our subsidiaries and affiliates (‘Benchling,’ ‘we,’ ‘our,’ or ‘us’), privacy is in our DNA. One of our core values is “empower through information,” and we intend to exemplify this value in our Privacy Policy. As such, we will provide you with clear, detailed, and easy-to-understand information about Benchling’s data practices and how we process the information we collect – including information about you, that directly identifies you, or that makes you identifiable (“Personal Information”) – when you use Benchling’s Application Services as defined in the Terms of Service and online Main Services Agreement (the “Services”); when you: (i) use Benchling’s educational platform (“Benchling Learning Labs”), (ii) participate in Benchling’s community platform (the “Benchling Community”), (iii) use any other methods of interaction facilitated by Benchling allowing you to interact with Benchling or other Benching users, including Benchling User Groups or any other messaging groups (“Benchling Messaging Groups”), or (iv) visit any of our other websites, including but not limited to benchling.com and pipebio.com ((i) through (iv), collectively, the “Sites”); or when you are our business contact. This Privacy Policy applies to all entities in the Benchling group acting as data controllers unless stated otherwise in a separate notice.
Contents of this Privacy Policy:
What does this Privacy Policy Cover?
This Privacy Policy is applicable when you use our Services, or visit our Sites, or if you are a business contact.
What Personal Information does Benchling collect?
Some Personal Information you share with us directly, some information we collect automatically, and some information we collect from third parties. This section sets forth the categories of data we collect.
Cookies and Tracking Technologies
Benchling uses common information-gathering tools such as cookies, web beacons, pixels and other similar tracking technologies to automatically collect information as you navigate our Sites, use our Services, or interact with emails we send you. You can manage these technologies easily using our Cookie Consent Manager on our Sites.
How we use your Personal Information
Benchling uses Personal Information for a variety of purposes and on the legal bases described in this section.
How long Benchling stores your Personal Information
Benchling will store the Personal Information we collect about you for no longer than necessary for the purposes in which it was collected, in accordance with our legal obligations and legitimate business interests. Read this section to understand the criteria used to determine the period for which we store Personal Information.
How Benchling shares Personal Information
In order to better provide the Services or to operate our Sites, and for our other legitimate business purposes, Benchling may share your Personal Information with third parties. Read this section to understand when Benchling shares your Personal Information.
Your rights & choices about your data
Depending on the data protection laws applicable to you, you may have various rights with respect to how we process your Personal Information. Read this section to understand what those rights are.
How to make choices about your Personal Information
No matter where you are in the world, Benchling provides you with various ways to make choices about your Personal Information, such as accessing it, correcting it, deleting it, or updating your choices about how it is used.
International data transfers
Benchling relies on the Data Privacy Framework (DPF) as our primary data transfer mechanism.
California Privacy
California residents should read this section.
Benchling Security Information
Benchling is committed to maintaining reasonable and appropriate security measures to ensure that your Personal Information is protected both online and offline. Read this section to learn more about our security measures and how you can better protect your account.
Contact us
This section includes our physical addresses, email address, and information about how to contact our designated EU & UK representative.
Updates
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will inform you if we make any material changes.
What does this Privacy Policy cover?
This Privacy Policy applies where Benchling is the “data controller” and is generally responsible for and controls the processing of your Personal Information collected through our Sites and the Services, as well as where data about you is collected as a business contact. It is intended to meet the requirements of data protection laws globally, including the EU / UK GDPR, the CCPA/CPRA), and other applicable data protection laws in the jurisdictions where we operate.
This Privacy Policy does not apply in the following scenarios:
Benchling as “data processor.” This Privacy Policy does not apply to Personal Information processed by Benchling on behalf of our Customers who have set up a paid account on behalf of an institution or organization (an “Enterprise Account"). Please contact that Customer directly if you have any questions about how it processes your Personal Information for its own purposes.
Employee- & recruiting-related collection and processing. This Privacy Policy does not apply to Benchling’s processing of employee data or recruiting data. If you are an applicant or employee of Benchling, please reach out to hr@benchling.com to get a copy of the applicable employee or applicant privacy notice or visit Benchling’s internal wiki.
What Information does Benchling collect?
We collect information to operate, improve, and secure our Services and Sites. This includes information you provide directly, information we collect automatically when you interact with us, and information we receive from third parties. Below is a detailed breakdown:
1. Information you provide directly
When you interact with the Sites or Services or participate in related events and communities, you may provide information directly to us . This includes:
Account Information: When you register for and use our Services, we collect personal and organizational identifiers such as your full name, email address, phone number, username, user ID, password, responses to security questions, and the name of the organization you are affiliated with. This information is used to authenticate users, administer accounts, and provide secure access to Benchling’s platform.
Communications & Feedback: If you submit queries, respond to surveys, use support tools, or participate in community discussions (including in the Benchling Community or Messaging Groups), we collect the content of your communications. This may include technical support requests, product feedback, and general correspondence, which we use to respond to inquiries and improve our Services.
Collaborative Content: While using our collaboration tools or participating in shared workspaces or forums (such as the Benchling Community), you may generate or share content. This includes comments, uploaded files, annotations, and contributions to group projects. Such content may contain Personal Information depending on what you choose to submit
Marketing & Events: We collect personal and professional details when you engage with our marketing activities. This includes:
Requesting a demo of our Services
Signing up for newsletters or updates
Registering for webinars, conferences, or user events like Benchtalk
Interacting with our sales team (e.g., requesting commercial offers)
Providing evaluations or feedback during marketing campaigns or live events This information helps us tailor communications and improve the relevance of our outreach.
2. Information we collect automatically
When you use our Services or visit our Sites, we automatically collect certain data about your interactions and devices, which helps us understand usage trends and enhance functionality:
Usage Data: This includes metadata such as your IP address, access times, pages viewed, mouse clicks, form interactions, scroll depth, and referring/exiting URLs. We use this to monitor performance, detect abuse, and analyze how our Services are used.
Device & Browser Data: We collect data about the device and browser you use to access our Services, including device model, operating system version, browser type and version, language preferences, and unique device identifiers (e.g., cookies or mobile advertising IDs). This allows us to optimize user experience across different platforms.
Geolocation:We may estimate your general location (e.g., city or country) using your IP address. This is used to localize content and troubleshoot issues. .
Cookies & Tracking:Like many digital services, we use cookies, web beacons, and similar technologies to recognize returning visitors, understand engagement, and personalize content. For details, see our Cookies and Tracking Technologies section.
3. Information from Third Parties
We may also collect information from third-party sources including:
Other Users:Other users of Benchling may provide your information, for example, when they invite you to collaborate on a project, share data with you, or mention you in content.
Third-party Apps:When you integrate third-party applications or tools with Benchling (e.g., electronic lab notebooks, file storage tools), we may receive relevant information such as identifiers, metadata, or files, depending on the permissions you’ve granted.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Providers: If you choose to log in using an SSO provider (e.g., Google Workspace, Okta), we receive basic account data including your name, email address, and authentication tokens necessary to verify your identity.
Events & Partners: We may receive your information through our event partners or co-sponsors when you register for or attend Benchling-hosted or co-hosted events.
Public & Commercial Sources: We may collect or enrich profile information (e.g., job title, employer, industry) from publicly available sources like LinkedIn or commercial data vendors. This helps us tailor marketing and sales communications and maintain data accuracy..
Benchling does not intentionally collect sensitive personal data (e.g. health, biometric, or special category data as defined under GDPR)
Cookies and tracking technologies
What are cookies?
A cookie is a piece of data contained in a very small text file that is stored in your browser or elsewhere on your hard drive. Cookies allow Benchling to identify your device as you use the Services and navigate our Sites. This makes navigating and interacting with our Services and Sites more efficient, easy and meaningful for you.
Benchling uses both session and persistent cookies. Session cookies are cookies that disappear from your device or browser when you turn off your computer. Persistent cookies stay on your device even after you’ve turned it off. Additionally, the cookies on our websites fall into four categories: (1) Essential Cookies, (2) Functional Cookies, (3) Analytics Cookies, and (4) Advertising Cookies. Where required by applicable law, we rely on your consent to use cookies that are not strictly necessary for the functioning of our Sites. To learn more about each category of cookie, you can visit our cookie consent tool by clicking on the “Preferences” link on the bottom right of the Benchling website you are visiting.
How Benchling uses Cookie Data
We use Cookie Data to understand how you are using the Services and the Sites and which pages and features are most popular. This information ensures our Sites and Services are able to operate and helps us understand how we can improve our Sites and Services, track performance of our advertisements, and better market to you.
We may also collect publicly available information about you that we have gathered through services like LinkedIn. We use this information to help understand our customer base better and to reach out to potential customers.
Web beacons
Benchling also uses web beacons to gather data about your use of our Services and Sites and how you interact with emails we have sent to you. Web beacons are clear electronic images that can recognize certain types of data on your computer, like when you view a particular website tied to the web beacon, and a description of a website tied to the web beacon. Additionally, we may put web beacons in marketing emails that notify us when you click on a link in the email that directs you to one of our Sites. We use web beacons to operate and improve our Sites, Services and email communications to you.
How to control and delete Benchling cookies
Consent Tools. Benchling uses a cookie consent tool, which you can utilize to customize your cookie preferences. When you visit any of our Sites for the first time, a cookie consent banner will pop up and ask you to customize your cookie preferences. If you decide to change your preferences at a later date, you can easily do so by clicking on the “Preferences” link on the bottom right of the Site you are visiting. Please note that Required Cookies cannot be disabled, and if you decide to opt out of Functional Cookies, certain functionality of our websites or your account may be impacted.
Using Your Browser. In addition to using the Cookie Consent tool on the Site you’re using you can use your browser settings to opt out of Functional Cookies and Advertising & Analytics Cookies. For more information on how to do that, click here. To manage privacy and storage settings for flash cookies, click here.
Do Not Track. Some browsers allow a “do not track” (DNT) setting that requests that a web application disable its tracking of an individual user. When you choose to turn on the DNT setting in your browser, your browser will send a special signal to websites, analytics companies, ad networks, plug-in providers, and other web services you encounter while browsing and stop tracking your activity. To set up DNT, you can visit the All About DNT page. If you do choose to set up DNT, we will automatically turn off all non-required cookies on Benchling’s websites for you. Please note that this may impact the functionality of our websites or your account.
Global Privacy Control. Global Privacy Control (GPC) is a technical specification that you can use to inform websites of your privacy preferences in regard to ad trackers. To set up GPC, you can visit the Global Privacy Control page. If you do choose to set up GPC, we will automatically turn off all non-required cookies on Benchling’s websites for you. Please note that this may impact the functionality of our Sites.
Opting out of Advertising & Analytics Cookies. To learn more about how to opt out of targeting and advertising cookies, you can go to the Your Online Choices page, the Network Advertising Initiative page, and the Digital Advertising Alliance’s Consumer Choice page. These opt-out tools are provided by third parties, not Benchling. We do not control or operate these tools or the choices that advertisers and others provide through these tools.
How we use your information
This section describes the purposes for which your information is processed by Benchling and, where required in certain regions (such as Europe), the legal bases for the processing of any Personal Information.
Providing the Services: We use information about you to operate and provide our Services and Sites and to tailor our Services and Sites to your needs and preferences to perform our contract with you. Where we have not entered into a contract with you, we process your Personal Information in operating and improving our internal operations, systems, Services and Sites, and to provide you with the Services and Sites you access and request.
Providing Benchling Learning Labs: We may use information about you to: (i) operate and provide Benchling Learnings Labs, (ii) tailor Benchling Learning Labs to your needs and preferences, and (iii) communicate with you about Benchling Learning Labs.
Providing the Benchling Community. We may use information about you to: (i) operate and provide the Benchling Community (including public forums that you may participate in), (ii) tailor the Benchling Community to your needs and preferences, and (iii) communicate with you about the Benchling Community.
Providing the Benchling Messaging Groups. We may use information about you to: (i) operate and provide the Benchling Messaging Groups (including public forums that you may participate in) and (ii) communicate with you about the Benchling Messaging Groups
Sending administrative communications: We may use your contact information to send you information related to our Services such as confirmations, invoices, expiration and renewal notices, technical notices, service updates, security alerts, and support, onboarding, and administrative messages to perform our contract with you.
Sending targeted communications and requests for feedback. We may use contact information and information about how you use the Services to send targeted and granular communications, such as, but not limited to, informing you about new releases that will be interesting to you or to get your feedback on specific features you utilize.
Sending marketing communications: We may use contact information and information about how you use the Services to reach out to you about our Services we think might be of interest to you or when you ask to be contacted by us (for example in relation to a demo or event). This may include information about our Services or events. Please see the "How to Make Choices about your Personal Information" section, below, to learn how you can control the processing of your Personal Information by Benchling for marketing purposes.
Providing customer support: We may use information about you and your use of the Services to troubleshoot and diagnose product problems, and provide other customer care and support services, including to help us provide, improve, and secure the quality of our Services and Sites, and to investigate security incidents.
Improving and developing the Sites and Services: We may use information about you and your use of the Services to improve the Sites and Services. For example, this data can tell us how often users use a particular feature of the Services, and we can use that knowledge to optimize the Services for as many users as possible.
Enterprise Account Assistance: If you are part of an Enterprise Account, we may send some elements of usage data to the administrator of your account or to other individuals at your institution who make decisions about how the Services are used by your institution. This information allows your institution to make decisions about things like purchasing more licenses or what additional modules or features to include in the Services based on usage patterns. Please note that we will never send your geo-location data to your institution.
Securing the Services: We use information about how you use the Services to track the use of our Sites and Services for the purposes of maintaining the safety and security of our Sites and Services, including verifying accounts and activity, investigating suspicious activity, and enforcing our terms and policies, in promoting the safety and security of our Sites and Services, systems and applications and in protecting our rights and the rights of others.
Displaying advertising and relevant offers: We may use cookies we collect through our interactions with you to advertise to you and provide personalized information about us on and off our Sites, and to provide other personalized content based on your activities and interests. Please see the "Your Privacy Rights" section below to learn how you can control the processing of your Personal Information by Benchling for personalized advertising. For these purposes, we may link or combine information about you with data from third parties , to help understand your needs and provide you with better and more personalized service or content.
Complying with legal obligations: We may process any of your Personal Information when cooperating with public and government authorities, courts or regulators in accordance with our legal obligations under applicable laws, to the extent this requires the processing or disclosure of Personal Information to protect our rights, or in protecting against misuse or abuse of our Sites and Services, protecting personal property or safety, pursuing remedies available to us and limiting our damages, complying with judicial proceedings, court orders or legal processes, or to respond to lawful requests.
For contacting our vendors, business partners and visitors: We may use some information for other legitimate business purposes, such as to update, expand, and analyze our records, identify and contract with new vendors and business partners and to expand our business activities. We may also process it to register visitors to our offices and to manage non-disclosure agreements that visitors may be required to sign, in protecting our offices and our confidential information against unauthorized access.
Legal grounds for using your data We only collect and use your information when we have a valid legal basis under applicable law. The relevant legal basis depends on the Services you use and how you use them. In particular, we process your data only when:
It’s necessary to provide the Services to you, such as to operate them, deliver support, offer personalized features, and maintain their security;
We have a legitimate interest in doing so—such as for research and development, marketing, or protecting our legal rights—and that interest is not overridden by your data protection rights;
You have given us clear consent for a specific purpose, and you haven’t withdrawn that consent; or
We’re required to do so by law.
If you’ve given consent, you can withdraw it at any time. This won’t affect any processing we’ve already carried out. If we rely on a legitimate interest (ours or a third party’s, such as your employer), you have the right to object to that use as well.
How long Benchling stores Personal Information
Benchling will store the Personal Information we collect about you for no longer than necessary for the purposes in which it was collected. The criteria used to determine the period for which we store Personal Information varies depending on the legal basis under which we process that Personal Information:
Legitimate Interests. Where we are processing Personal Information based on our legitimate interests, we generally will retain such information for a reasonable period of time based on the particular interest, taking into account the fundamental interests and the rights and freedoms of data subjects.
Consent. Where we are processing Personal Information based on your consent, we will retain the information until you withdraw your consent.
Perform a Contract. When we are processing Personal Information based on a contract with you, we generally will retain the information for the duration of the contract plus some additional limited period of time that is necessary to comply with law or that represents the statute of limitations for legal claims that could arise from the contractual relationship.
Legal Obligation. Where we are processing Personal Information based on a legal obligation, we generally will retain the information for the period of time necessary to fulfill the legal obligation.
We may need to apply a “legal hold” that retains information beyond our typical retention period where we face threat of legal claim. In that case, we will retain the information until the hold is removed, which typically means the claim or threat of claim has been resolved.
In all cases, in addition to the purposes and legal bases, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the Personal Information, as well as the potential risk of harm from unauthorized use or disclosure of your Personal Information.
How Benchling shares Personal Information
In order to provide our Services, deliver our Sites and conduct our activities described in this Privacy Policy, we may share your Personal Information with the following third parties:
Other Users of the Services and/or other Users of the Benchling Community / Benchling Messaging Groups. Certain user profile information, including your name, email address, generalized location (city & state), and any video, or image or that you voluntarily choose to upload to the Services, may be displayed to other users to facilitate user interaction within the Services or the Benchling Community, or the Benchling Messaging Groups. Please remember that any content you upload to any public user profile, along with any Personal Information or content that you voluntarily disclose online in a manner other users can view (on discussion boards, in messages and chat areas, etc.) becomes publicly available, and can be collected and used by anyone.
Third-party service providers or consultants. We employ other companies and people to perform tasks on our behalf and need to share information about you with them in order to provide the Services to you; for example, we may use cloud infrastructure providers, data analytics vendors, consumer data platform, and IT and security vendors to host and operate the Services. Unless we tell you differently, our service providers do not have the right to use the Personal Information we share with them beyond what is necessary to assist us and in accordance with applicable law.
Compliance with legal obligations. We may disclose your Personal Information to a third party: (i) if we reasonably believe that disclosure is compelled by applicable law, regulation, legal process, or a government request, (ii) to enforce our agreements and policies, (iii) to protect the security or integrity of our Services, or (iv) to protect ourselves, our other customers, or the public from hardship and/or illegal activities. If we are required by law to disclose your Personal Information, we will notify you of the disclosure requirement, unless we are prohibited to do so by law. Please note that we will object to requests we do not believe were issued properly.
Business Transfers. If we go through a corporate sale, merger, reorganization, dissolution or similar event, data we gather from you may be part of the assets transferred or shared in connection with the due diligence for any such transaction.
Aggregated or de-Identified data. We may de-identify Personal Information about you so that you are not identified as an individual, and provide that information to our partners. We may also provide aggregate Usage Data to our partners (or allow partners to collect such information from you), who may use such information to understand how often and in what ways people use our Sites and Services, so that they, too, can provide you with an optimal online experience.
Your rights and choices about your Personal Information
Depending on the data protection laws applicable to you, you may have the following rights in relation to your Personal Information that we process as a data controller:
that we provide details about the categories of Personal Information that we collect about you, including how we collect and share it;
that we provide you access to, and a copy of, the Personal Information we collect about you;
that we update or correct any inaccurate Personal Information we have about you;
that we delete the Personal Information we have about you;
that we restrict processing of Personal Information about you;
that we provide you with your Personal Information in a structured, commonly used format and to transmit that information to another controller, and where feasible, transmit the information directly;
that we provide you with the right to object to the processing of Personal Information, including profiling;
that we provide you with a free, easy mechanism to object to use of your Personal Information for direct marketing purposes;
that you not be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling, that produces legal effects or similarly affects your individual rights;
to withdraw your consent; and
to complain to a competent supervisory authority and/or to commence proceedings in a court of competent jurisdiction.
Benchling will honor your rights subject to limitations in certain situations, such as where Benchling can demonstrate that it has a legal requirement or legitimate interest to process your data or can legitimately apply an exemption to the exercise of a right under applicable law. Please click here to exercise some of these rights.
How to make choices about your Personal Information
You have the following self-service options and other ways to reach out to us to make choices about how your Personal Information is processed:
Accessing, amending and deleting your Account Data. Through your account settings, you may access, and, in some cases, edit or delete the Personal Information that you have provided to us. Please note that the information you can view, update and delete may change as the Services are updated. If you have any questions about viewing or updating your Personal Information, please contact us at privacy@benchling.com.
Deletion. You can request that we delete your data by clicking here. However, if you have collaborated on projects with other users or if your account is associated with an Enterprise Account, some of your Personal Information may not be deletable, depending on how you have contributed to a project or group.
Obtaining a copy of your data. You may request a copy of your data by clicking here.
Opt out of marketing communications. You can opt out of receiving marketing communications from us at any time by clicking the “unsubscribe” link at the bottom of any marketing email you receive from us or by emailing us at privacy@benchling.com. You may continue to receive service-related, operational, and other non-marketing emails.
Cookies and tracking technologies. To learn how you can take control and delete cookies and other tracking technologies when you visit our Sites, please see the next section “Cookies and tracking technologies.”
International data transfers
Benchling primarily operates in the United States, so by accessing the Services or our Sites, your Personal Information may be transferred to, stored, or processed in the United States and maintained on computers or servers located outside of your state, province, country, or other jurisdiction where the privacy laws may differ from those in your jurisdiction.
However, we take appropriate safeguards to ensure that your Personal Information remains protected in accordance with this Privacy Policy and applicable data protection laws. You can learn more about Benchling’s technical and organizational safeguards here.
Any data transfers made in relation to the use or access of our Services are made in compliance with relevant legislation and data protection laws. To implement such transfers Benchlings relies on: (a) its certification under the Data Privacy Framework (details below), (b) implementing the European Commission's Standard Contractual Clauses or (c) ensuring that the country of transfer has been approved by the relevant authorities as providing adequate protection for Personal Information.
Data Privacy Framework (DPF)
Benchling relies upon: (i) the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (“EU-U.S. DPF”) as the valid transfer mechanism for transfers of Personal Information from the European Union to the United States, (i) the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF (“UK Extension”) as the valid transfer mechanism for transfers of Personal Information from the United Kingdom to the United States and (iii) the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (“Swiss-U.S. DPF”) as the valid transfer mechanism for transfers of Personal Information from Switzerland to the United States. Benchling is subject to the investigatory and enforcement powers of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and we commit to fully aligning the creation and full implementation of our privacy policy to the EU-U.S. DPF, the UK Extension, and the Swiss-U.S. DPF as described below.
Certifications and Adherence
Benchling complies with the EU-U.S. DPF and the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF and the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (Swiss-U.S. DPF) as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Benchling has certified (or will certify) to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (EU-U.S. DPF Principles) with regard to the processing of Personal Information received from the European Union and the United Kingdom in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF and the UK Extension to the EU-U.S. DPF. Benchling has certified (or will certify) to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (Swiss-U.S. DPF Principles) with regard to the processing of Personal Information received from Switzerland in reliance on the Swiss-U.S. DPF. If there is any conflict between the terms in this privacy policy and the EU-U.S. DPF Principles and/or the Swiss-U.S. DPF Principles, the Principles shall govern. To learn more about the Data Privacy Framework (DPF) program, and to view our certification, please visit https://www.dataprivacyframework.gov/.
Dispute Resolution and Arbitration
In compliance with the EU-U.S. DPF and the Swiss-U.S. DPF, Benchling commits to refer unresolved complaints concerning our handling of Personal Information received in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF and the Swiss-U.S. DPF to JAMS, an alternative dispute resolution provider based in the United States. If you do not receive timely acknowledgment of your DPF Principles-related complaint from us, or if we have not addressed your DPF Principles-related complaint to your satisfaction, please visit https://www.jamsadr.com/eu-us-data-privacy-framework for more information or to file a complaint. The services of JAMS are provided at no cost to you.
Individuals should be aware of the potential to invoke binding arbitration under specific conditions. Benchling is obligated to arbitrate claims as detailed in Annex I of the DPF Principles. An individual can invoke this arbitration by delivering notice to Benchling and adhering to the procedures outlined in Annex I of the Principles (available here).
Onward Transfers and Liabilities
Benchling follows the DPF Principles regarding the onward transfer of Personal Information to third parties. We remain accountable for any damage caused by these third parties under the DPF, unless we didn't instigate the damage-causing events.
User Empowerment and Choices
Lastly, Benchling empowers all users of our Services, Benchling Community, Benchling Messaging Groups, Benchling Learning Labs, and Sites to control the use and disclosure of their Personal Information so that it is consistent with that individual’s expectations and choices. Accordingly, any individual can opt out of the use or disclosure of their Personal Information by clicking here. Details of other choices you have in regards to your Personal Information are described in Section 8 of this Privacy Policy.
California Privacy
Collection and Use of Personal Information
We collect Personal Information from and about you for a variety of purposes, as described in the sections above “What Personal Information Does Benchling Collect”. In the last twelve months, we have collected the following categories of Personal Information:
Identifiers, such as your name, address, phone number, email address, or other similar identifiers;
California customer records, such as payment information;
Commercial information, such as records of services purchased, obtained or considered;
Internet/Network information, such as device information, logs and analytics data;
Geolocation data, such as approximate location data generated based on your IP address or other information (please note that we do not collect precise geo-location data);
Professional/Employment Information, such as the business or organization you represent, your title with that business or organization and information relating to your role with the business or organization, job application information and other details contained in your resume; and
Inferences about your interests and preferences, generated from your use of our Sites and/or Services.
We collect this information directly from you, from your browser or device when you visit our Sites, or from third parties that you permit to share information with us.
Disclosure of Personal Information
We share Personal Information with third parties for business purposes. The categories of third parties to whom we disclose your Personal Information for a business purpose include: (i) other affiliates in our family of companies; (ii) our service providers and advisors; (iii) advertising and analytics providers; and (iv) social networks.
Right to Opt-Out of Sale of Personal Information
Benchling does not make it a practice to sell your Personal Information, but like many providers of online services, Benchling relies on advertising cookies to support the operation and development of our Sites. Please see the section titled “Cookies and tracking technologies” above to understand how to do this.
Your California Privacy Rights
If you are a California resident, you may be able to exercise the following rights (subject to certain limitations at law):
The Right to Know any or all of the following information relating to your Personal Information we have collected and disclosed in the last 12 months, upon verification of your identity:
The specific pieces of Personal Information we have collected about you;
The categories of Personal Information we have collected about you;
The categories of sources of the Personal Information;
The categories of Personal Information that we have disclosed to third parties for a business purpose, and the categories of recipients to whom this information was disclosed;
The categories of Personal Information we have sold and the categories of third parties to whom the information was sold; and
The business or commercial purposes for collecting or selling the Personal Information.
The Right to Request Deletion of Personal Information we have collected from you, subject to certain exceptions.
The Right to Opt Out of Personal Information Sales to third parties now or in the future.
You also have the right to be free of discrimination for exercising these rights. However, please note that if the exercise of these rights limits our ability to process Personal Information (such as in the case of a deletion request), we may no longer be able to provide you with the Services or engage with you in the same manner.
How to Exercise your California Privacy Rights
You may submit a request to exercise your California Privacy Rights by clicking here. To fulfill your request, we will need to verify your identity and possibly ask for additional information and documents.
Only you, or someone legally authorized to act on your behalf, may make a request related to Personal Information collected about you. To designate an authorized agent, the authorized agent must provide sufficient information that allows us to reasonably verify that they have been authorized by you to act on their behalf.
Information from Children
We do not knowingly collect or solicit Personal Information from anyone under the age of 16. If you are under 16, please do not attempt to register for the Services or send any information about yourself to us. If we learn that we have collected Personal Information from a child under age 16, we will delete that information as quickly as possible. If you believe that a child under 16 may have provided us Personal Information, please contact us at privacy@benchling.com.
Benchling security information
Benchling employs technical, organizational and physical safeguards designed to protect the Personal Information we collect. However, security risk is inherent in all internet and information technologies and we cannot guarantee the absolute security of your Personal Information.
You should take steps to protect against unauthorized access to your password, phone, and computer by, among other things, signing off after using a shared computer, choosing a complex password that nobody else knows or can easily guess, and keeping your login credentials private and secure.
Please note that we may collect and use your Personal Information to detect, prevent, or investigate security incidents, fraud, or abuse and misuse of our Sites, the Services, Benchling Learning Labs, Benchling Messaging Groups, and/or the Benchling Community
Contact us
If you have any questions or concerns regarding this Privacy Policy, please contact us at:
Benchling, Inc. 680 Folsom St., Floor 8 San Francisco, CA, 94107 privacy@benchling.com
Designated Representative & Contact Information:
Individuals and data protection supervisory authorities in the EEA, the UK, and Switzerland may contact our data protection representatives:
EU: Benchling Germany GmbH Theresienstraße 1 c/o Contra AG, 1 Floor 80333 Munich privacy@benchling.com
UK: 4/4a Bloomsbury Square London, Greater London WC1A2RP United Kingdom privacy@benchling.com
Switzerland: Benchling Switzerland GmbH Uraniastrasse 31 8001 Zürich privacy@benchling.com
Updates
We may change this Privacy Policy from time to time, and if we do, the most current version will be available at https://benchling.com/privacy with the date indicating when it was last updated. These changes might be minor, such as updating an address or fixing a typo, or they may be material, such as changes that affect your rights. If we make material changes to this Privacy Policy that affect your rights, we will notify you by placing a notice on the Benchling website, by sending you an email, and/or by some other means as required by applicable law.