Hilton Statement Regarding Cookies and Other Technologies
Last Updated: June 2016
Effective Date: August 1st, 2016
This Statement Regarding Cookies and Other Technologies (this “Statement”) describes the different types of Cookies and Other Technologies that may be used in connection with the websites and apps (the “Site”) owned or controlled by Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. (“Hilton,” “we,” or “us”). This Statement also describes how you can manage Cookies and Other Technologies.
We may change this Statement at any time. Please take a look at the “Last Updated” section at the top of this page to see when this Statement was last revised. Any changes in this Statement will become effective when we make the revised Statement available on or through the Site.
If you have any questions, please contact us by email at customer_privacy@hilton.com or by postal mail at Hilton Customer Privacy Department, 7930 Jones Branch Drive, McLean, VA 22102, USA.
Click on one of the links below to jump to a specific section:
OUR COLLECTION AND USE OF OTHER INFORMATION
Like many other websites, our Site may use “Cookies” or “Other Technologies” (such as “pixel tags,” “web beacons,” “clear GIFs”, links in emails, JavaScript, device IDs assigned by Google or Apple, or similar technologies). Cookies and Other Technologies allow us and third parties to obtain information about your visits to the Site, including to analyze your visiting patterns. We use this information to process your reservations or requests and to deliver online and mobile advertisements, messages and content for us and others that are specific to your interests.
Cookies are small text files that are stored on your computer or mobile device (“device”) when you visit a website. Cookies alone cannot be used to disclose your individual identity to us, though in some cases we may tie Hilton or third-party Cookies to personal information you have provided to us or that we have otherwise obtained about you. Cookies may be used on the Site in order to improve your experience. For example we will use Cookies to:
Remember your user name and password for future visits so that log-in is easier and faster;
Remember your language and other preferences;
Ensure you obtain all requested information;
Provide a safe and secure service for online transactions;
Track your response to advertisements and website or app content for analysis and the number of times we send you the same advertisement;
Measure how many people use the Site, and how they use it, so that we may keep it running quickly and efficiently; and
Help us and others deliver communications and content to you that are relevant and responsive to your interests and location.
Below we explain the different types of Cookies that may be used on the Site.
Essential Cookies – Essential Cookies are necessary for the Site to work, and enable you to move around it and use its services and features. Disabling these Cookies may make the services and features unavailable.
Functional Cookies – We use Functional Cookies to save your settings on the Site—settings such as your language preference, or booking information you have previously used when booking a hotel with us. We also use Functional Cookies to store such things as the last hotel you searched for, so that you can easily find it the next time you visit. Some Functional Cookies are essential to viewing maps or videos on our Site. We also use “Flash Cookies” for some of our animated content.
Session Cookies – These types of Cookies are stored only temporarily during a browsing session, and are deleted from your device when you close the browser. We use Session Cookies to support the functionality of the Site and to understand your use of the Site—that is, which pages you visit, which links you use and how long you stay on each page.
Persistent Cookies – These types of Cookies are not deleted when you close your browser, but are saved on your device for a fixed period of time or until you delete them. Each time you visit the Site, the server that set the Cookie will recognize the persistent Cookie saved on your device. We and others use persistent Cookies to store your preferences, so that they are available for your next visit, to keep a more accurate account of how often you visit the Site, how often you return, how your use of the Site may vary over time and the effectiveness of advertising efforts.
Advertising cookies – allow us and other advertisers to show you the most relevant products, offers, and advertisements on the Site and third-party sites, or through emails or other message platforms. For example, some Advertising Cookies help our service providers and other advertisers select advertisements that are based on your interests, including those expressed or inferred by visits to our websites or apps or across other websites, online services, and apps over time. Others help prevent the same advertisement from continuously reappearing for you. These types of Cookies also help us provide you with content on the Site that is tailored to your interests and needs. As noted below, some Analytics Cookies and Other Technologies are used in part to facilitate advertising.
Social plugin cookies – Advertising Cookies also include Social Plug-In Cookies. Social Plug-In Cookies are used to share content from the Site with members and non-members of social media networks such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest. These Cookies are usually set by the social networking provider, enabling such sharing to be smooth and seamless.
Analytics cookies – collect information about your use of the Site, and enable us to improve the way it works. These Cookies give us aggregated information that we use to monitor site performance, count page visits, spot technical errors, see how users reach the Site, and measure the effectiveness of advertising (including emails we send to you).
Other technologies may be used for the same purposes as our Cookies, to allow us and third parties to know when you visit the Site, and to understand how you interact with emails or advertisements. Through Other Technologies, non-personal information (e.g., your operating system, your browser version, and the URL you came from) or aggregate information may be obtained and used to enhance your experience and understand traffic patterns.
Note that, to the extent that information collected through Cookies and Other Technologies constitutes personal information, the provisions in the Global Privacy Statement apply and complement this Statement. Please note that at this time we do not honor Do Not Track and similar signals.
ONLINE AND MOBILE ADVERTISING; MOBILE APPS
We and third parties engage in interest-based advertising provided by vendors in order to deliver advertisements and personalized content that we and other advertisers believe will be of interest to you. To the extent third-parties are using Cookies or Other Technologies to perform these services, Hilton does not control the use of this technology or the resulting information for online, mobile, or email advertising, and is not responsible for any actions or policies of such third parties. Advertisements, emails, and other messages may be delivered to you by Hilton or its service providers based on your online or mobile behavior (on Hilton and non-Hilton sites), your search activity, your geographic location or other information that is collected by us or obtained from third parties. For example, if you go to the Site to book a hotel room, you may later see an advertisement from us when you visit another website. These advertisements may appear on our sites, third-party websites or on mobile platforms. You may also see advertisements for third parties on the Site, other websites or properties, or on your mobile device, based on your visits to, and activities on, the Site, other sites and our apps and third-party apps. Some of our vendors and we may use our own or third-party aggregated or anonymized personal information, demographic data, and other inferred commercial interests to assist in the delivery of our advertisements to you. As stated in our Global Privacy Statement, in some instances we may combine Other Information with personal information. If we do combine any Other Information with personal information, the provisions in the Global Privacy Statement apply and complement this Statement.
We comply with the Digital Advertising Alliance’s (DAA) Self-Regulatory Principles for Online Behavioral Advertising and related DAA Principles and Guidelines.
CROSS-DEVICE TECHNOLOGIES
We and our business partners use third parties to establish deterministic or probabilistic connections among devices (such as smartphones, tablets, and computers) to deliver more relevant advertising to you and for advertising analytics and reporting purposes. This means that information about your use of websites or applications on your current device may be combined with information from your other devices. We also may share this information and other inferences with third parties to allow them to target advertising, personalize content, or analyze behavior. This allows, for example, advertisements you see on your tablet to be based on activities you engaged in on your smartphone.
These business partners may share and combine information from cookies with identifiers (such as device IDs assigned by Google or Apple) and IP addresses to make connections among related devices. This also allows for a more personalized experience across our services and applications. For example, Hilton may through its vendors match your devices if you log into Hilton Honors on multiple devices or web browsers, or if your devices share similar attributes that support an inference that they are used by the same person or household.
To opt out of our cross-device linking vendors, go to www.aboutadvertisements.info/choices and perform a global opt-out on each browser and device that you would like to be opted out on. Opt out means that the browser on the device from which you opt out will no longer receive interest-based advertisements from information collected on devices linked to it, that devices linked to it will not receive interest-based advertisements based on information collected from the opted-out device, and that the vendor will not transfer data collected from the opted-out device to a third party. If, in the future, we work with cross-device vendors who have a proprietary opt-out, and for whom the DAA opt-out is not effective as described above, we will provide a link to those vendors’ proprietary opt-outs.
MANAGING COOKIES AND OTHER TECHNOLOGIES
If you want to remove or block Cookies from your device at any time, you can update your browser settings (consult your browser’s “help” menu to learn how to remove or block Cookies). Hilton is not responsible for your browser settings. You can find good and simple instructions on how to manage Cookies on the different types of web browsers at www.allaboutcookies.org.
You can also find a good summary of how to manage Flash Cookies at http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/help/settings_manager07.html.
Please be aware that rejecting Cookies may affect your ability to perform certain transactions on the Site, and our ability to recognize your browser from one visit to the next.
You can also control tracking Cookies by installing browser extensions like Ghostery: https://www.ghostery.com/products/.
If you want to clean out all of the Cookies left behind by the websites you have visited, here are links where you can download programs that clean out tracking Cookies:
You can learn more about interest-based advertising and opt out of our vendors’ and other advertisers’ use of Cookies to tailor content or advertising to you by visiting http://www.networkadvertising.org/managing/opt_out.asp and http://www.aboutads.info/choices.
In Europe only: If you are based in Europe, you also can adjust your Cookie preferences through adjusting the Cookie Settings through the Cookie Consent Manager, which can be found here: Cookie Preferences.
HILTON COOKIES STATEMENT REVISIONS
As stated above, we may modify this Statement from time to time. To help you track the most significant changes, we will include a history of changes below.
Last Update: June 2016 Effective Date: August 1, 2016
Updated to include how we use cross-device technologies and how to opt out.
May 2015 Changes:
Updated to reflect that we may combine Hilton and third party Cookies with offline information from or about you for purposes of advertising.
Updated to add language to reflect that Hilton and third parties may use technologies to track your activities over time and across sites and apps to deliver advertising and content that may be of interest to you.
Updated to include a link to the Cookie Consent Manager in Europe.
