Terms of Service & Privacy Policy

Last Updated on: March 20, 2017

Agreement and General Terms of Use
1. These Terms of Service constitute the agreement between Dictionary.com, LLC (“Dictionary.com“) and you as a user who accesses, subscribes to access or otherwise establishes a connection (“user,” “you,” or “your”) to the world wide web sites known as Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com (individually and collectively, the “Site” and including any sub-domains or other related Dictionary.com products and services), which are owned, controlled or managed by Dictionary.com.
2. This Site may collect personal information from our users. By using this Services and/or agreeing to this TOS, you consent to the collection, storage and processing of your data as set forth in our Privacy Policy.
3. You must be at least 13 years old to use the Service. If you are at least 13, but are still a minor (this depends on where you live), you must have your parent or legal guardian’s permission to use the Service. Please have him or her read this Agreement with you.
4. You must agree to abide by all of the provisions in this agreement in order to remain an authorized user of the Site and your use of the Site constitutes your agreement to abide by those provisions. You are solely responsible for your use of the Site and for ensuring that your use complies fully with the provisions of this agreement. Your rights are personal and non-assignable. This means that you will be responsible for the acts of anyone accessing the Site through you or using your name and password.
5. Dictionary.com reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to change any or all of the provisions of this agreement at any time. Dictionary.com will notify users of any material changes by posting them on the Site or through other reasonable means of providing notice. Any changes to this agreement will be effective immediately upon notice to you. Your use of the Site after notice of changes to this agreement will be deemed your acceptance of the changes. Dictionary.com reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to change, limit, or discontinue any aspect, content, or feature of the Site, as well as any aspect pertaining to the use of the Site.
6. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE PROVISIONS OF THIS AGREEMENT OR ARE NOT SATISFIED WITH THE SITE, YOUR SOLE AND EXCLUSIVE REMEDY IS TO DISCONTINUE YOUR USE OF THE SITE.
User Activities and Information on The Site; Links
1. You will use the Site and any tools, features, content, material, or information found on the Site solely for lawful, non-commercial purposes. You will not allow any third party to access the Site through your account, upload to, distribute to, or otherwise disseminate through the Site any material or information of any kind that is libelous, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, abusive, or otherwise violates any law or infringes or violates any rights of any other person or entity, or contains a solicitation of funds, advertising, or a solicitation for goods or services.
2. You warrant that any material or information that you make available through the Site, including, for example, postings to comment sections and forums, is solely your original work, or that you have all necessary rights to make the material or information of any other person or entity available on the Site. You will be solely responsible for the content of any material or information that you make available through the Site. You will also be liable for any damage resulting from making any material or information available through the Site.
3. By making any material or information available through the Site, you automatically grant to Dictionary.com a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, and non-exclusive right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, distribute and sublicense any such material or information (in whole or in part) and/or to incorporate it in other works regardless of form, media, or technology. By making any material or information available through the Site, you also grant to users other than yourself the right and license to access, view, store, or reproduce your material and information for that user’s personal use.
4. Dictionary.com has no obligation to, and does not and cannot, review every item of material or information that you and users other than yourself made available through the Site, and Dictionary.com is not responsible for any content of this material or information. However, Dictionary.com reserves the right to delete, move, or edit any material or information that it deems, in its sole discretion, unacceptable, libelous, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, abusive, or otherwise in violation of any law or that infringes or violates any rights of any other person or entity. Further, Dictionary.com reserves the right at all times to disclose any material or information as necessary to satisfy any law, regulation, or governmental request.
5. Dictionary.com reserves the right to collect, use, and distribute demographic data about you and your use of the Site in forms that do not identify you individually or reveal your identity.
6. The Site and Services may provide links to other sites or resources. Because we do not review or have no control over such sites and resources, we shall not be responsible or liable for use of or reliance on any content, products, services or information at such sites or resources. Inclusion of any links does not imply any endorsement, affiliation, approval, association or sponsorship by Investopedia of the linked websites, resources, their operators or owners. When you select a link, you may be leaving our Site. The information available on third parties websites may have certain restrictions on its use or distribution which differ from this agreement.
Rights in Site Content and the Site
1. All content provided by Dictionary.com on the Site is protected by copyright, trademark, and other applicable intellectual property and proprietary rights laws and is owned, controlled, and/or licensed by Dictionary.com. The Site is protected by copyright, patent, trademark, and other applicable intellectual property and proprietary rights laws and is owned, controlled, and/or licensed by Dictionary.com. Any and all trademarks appearing on the Site are the property of Dictionary.com or their respective owners.
2. You will not modify, publish, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale, create derivative works, or in any way exploit, any of the content, in whole or in part, found on the Site. You agree that all rights to the Site, content and any derivative work will remain with Dictionary.com. You will download copyrighted content solely for your personal use, but will make no other use of the content without the express written permission of Dictionary.com and the copyright owner. You will not make any changes to any content that you are permitted to download under this agreement, and in particular you will not delete or alter any proprietary rights or attribution notices in any content. You agree that you do not acquire any ownership rights in any downloaded content.
3. Certain content found on the Site may be subject to additional terms, conditions, and notices as specified in Section 10 (Content-Specific Notices) below.
Disclaimer of Warranties & Limitation of Liability
1. YOU EXPRESSLY AGREE THAT USE OF THE SITE IS AT YOUR SOLE RISK. NEITHER DICTIONARY.COM, NOR ANY OF ITS AFFILIATES, EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, THIRD PARTY CONTENT PROVIDERS, OR LICENSORS WARRANT THAT THE SITE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR FREE NOR DO THEY MAKE ANY WARRANTY AS TO THE RESULTS THAT MAY BE OBTAINED FROM THE USE OF THE SITE, OR AS TO THE ACCURACY, RELIABILITY, COMPLETENESS, OR CONTENTS OF ANY CONTENT, INFORMATION, MATERIAL, POSTINGS, OR POSTING RESPONSES FOUND ON THE SITE, ANY MERCHANDISE OR SERVICES PROVIDED THROUGH THE SITE, OR ANY LINKS TO OTHER SITES MADE AVAILABLE ON THE SITE.
2. TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE SITE AND ALL CONTENT, MATERIAL, INFORMATION, POSTINGS, OR POSTING RESPONSES FOUND ON THE SITE ARE PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” BASIS WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, WARRANTIES OF TITLE OR NON-INFRINGEMENT OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
3. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, NEGLIGENCE, WILL DICTIONARY.COM (OR ANY OF ITS PARENTS, SUBSIDIARIES, AFFILIATES, EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, THIRD PARTY CONTENT PROVIDERS, OR LICENSORS, AND THEIR RESPECTIVE DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, AND AGENTS), BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES THAT RESULT FROM THE USE OF, OR THE INABILITY TO USE, ANY TOOL, CONTENT, INFORMATION, MATERIAL, POSTINGS, OR POSTING RESPONSES ON THE SITE OR THE SITE ITSELF. THESE LIMITATIONS APPLY REGARDLESS OF WHETHER THE PARTY LIABLE OR ALLEGEDLY LIABLE WAS ADVISED, HAD OTHER REASON TO KNOW, OR IN FACT KNEW OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. YOU SPECIFICALLY ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT DICTIONARY.COM (AND ANY OF ITS PARENTS, SUBSIDIARIES, AFFILIATES, EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, THIRD PARTY CONTENT PROVIDERS, OR LICENSORS, AND THEIR RESPECTIVE DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, AND AGENTS), IS NOT LIABLE FOR ANY DEFAMATORY, OFFENSIVE OR ILLEGAL CONDUCT OF ANY USER, INCLUDING YOU.
Indemnification
You agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless Dictionary.com (and any of its parents, subsidiaries, affiliates, employees, agents, third party content providers, or licensors, and their respective directors, officers, employees, and agents) from and against all claims, liability, and expenses, including attorneys’ fees and legal fees and costs, arising out of your use of the Site or your breach of any provision of this agreement. Dictionary.com reserves the right, in its sole discretion and at its own expense, to assume the exclusive defense and control of any matter otherwise subject to indemnification by you. You will cooperate as fully as reasonably required in the defense of any claim.
Notices Between Us
You will contact us by submitting your message via this form. We will contact you by the e-mail address you provide to us, or by posting a notice on the Site.
Termination
Dictionary.com may terminate this agreement and your use of the Site at any time. Dictionary.com will have the right immediately to terminate your use of the Site in the event of any conduct by you which Dictionary.com, in its sole discretion, considers to be unacceptable, or in the event of any breach by you of this agreement.
Law Governing Performance and Disputes
This agreement, your performance under it, and any disputes arising under it will be governed exclusively by the laws of the United States of America and the State of California, without giving effect to their conflict of laws principles. You expressly consent to the exclusive forum, jurisdiction, and venue of the Courts of the State of California and the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in any and all actions, disputes, or controversies relating to this agreement.
General Terms
This agreement and any posted rules on the Site established by Dictionary.com constitute the entire agreement of the parties with respect to the subject matter hereof. No waiver by either Dictionary.com or you of any breach or default under this agreement will be deemed to be a waiver of any preceding or subsequent breach or default. This agreement will be binding upon and inure to the benefit of Dictionary.com and its successors, trustees, and permitted assigns. Dictionary.com may assign this agreement or any of its rights or obligations under this agreement with or without notice to you.
Content Specific Notices
Please see the notices here regarding specific content that may be found on our Site.

Privacy Policy

Last revised: July 17, 2017

Dictionary.com, LLC respects your privacy. When you use Dictionary.com, Thesaurus.com or any other online products or websites that we own (our “Site(s)”) and mobile applications (our “Apps”) (collectively, the “Services”), we collect information about you and use it to facilitate and improve the Services as described in this Privacy Policy.

This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, how other companies may use it, and tracking technologies used to collect information.

1. Information we collect

How we collect and store information depends on the Services you use. You can use some of the Services without providing any information other than that automatically collected as described below, but if you do not provide certain information, you may not be able to use some of the services or features we offer.

Information you choose to provide: You may provide us information if you open an account; use certain services or products, like Dictionary.com Premium or Word Dynamo; or to take advantage of special offers, like a contest or a sweepstakes. This information may include your name, email address, and demographic information (age, gender, etc.).

Social Login. If you login or sign in using social networking functionality, e.g., Facebook Connect, you agree to abide by the applicable social network’s terms and conditions. Additionally, if you choose to register using such asocial network account , you are authorizing us to access certain social network profile information, including your first name, last name, gender, birth date and email address, in accordance with your settings on the social network. You may also choose to post content (such as custom flashcards) that you may share with others, through our site or through your Twitter or Facebook account.

Information collected automatically: When you use the Services, we automatically collect and store information about your computer or mobile device and your activities. This information includes:

Your computer’s IP address
Technical information about your computer or mobile device (such as type of device, web browser or operating system)
Your preferences and settings (time zone, language, etc.)
Unique device identifiers
Your mobile device’s geographic location (specific GPS location if you’ve enabled collection of such information, or general geographic location automatically)
The URL of the last web page you visited before coming to one of our sites and the URL you visit after leaving
The words you have looked up and results you selected
The ads you clicked on
How long you used the Services and which features you used
The online or offline status of your App

Cookies and Similar Technologies: We, as well as other companies, use tracking technologies to collect and store data about your computer or mobile device and your activities on the Services. When you visit our sites, we place cookies, pixel tags, web beacons and other such similar technologies to collect and store the information we automatically collect about your computer, device and Services usage.. A cookie is a small text file that is stored on your computer and a pixel tag (also called a web beacon or clear GIF) is a tiny graphic with a unique identifier, embedded invisibly on a webpage (or an online ad or email). We use the term “cookies” in this policy to refer to cookies and all such similar technologies. We use these technologies to store your preferences and track your use of the Services. Ad companies place cookies on your computer to track your activities across various sites so that they can display targeted ads. Some ad companies and game developers use “flash cookies” for ads and games that use Flash media technology.

There are two broad categories of cookies: (1) first party cookies, served directly by us to your computer or mobile device, and (2) third party cookies, which are served by a third party on our behalf. Cookies have a lot of jobs. For example, our cookies enable us to recognize you (e.g. as a registered user) when you visit our website and to store your preferences and settings. We use third party cookies for functionality, performance / analytics, advertising and social media purposes. Cookies from advertising companies, for example, help to ensure that the advertisements you see online are more relevant to you and your interests. To understand more about cookies and pixel tags, click here.

How To Control Or Delete Cookies: Most browsers allow you to change your cookie settings. Users can usually set their browsers to block all third-party cookies (which are those set by third-party companies collecting information on websites operated by other companies), block all cookies (including first-party cookies such as the ones We uses to collect search activity information about its users), or block specific cookies. These settings will typically be found in the “options” or “preferences” menu of your browser. In order to understand these settings, the following links may be helpful, otherwise you should use the “Help” option in your browser for more details.

Flash cookies operate differently than browser cookies, and cookie management tools available in a web browser will not remove flash cookies. To learn more about how to manage flash cookies, you can visit the Adobe website and make changes at the Global Privacy Settings Panel.

Please note that if you choose to block cookies, this may interfere with certain functionality on our Sites. Also, if you have disabled one or more cookies, we may still use information collected from cookies prior to your disabled preference being set; however, we will stop using the disabled cookie to collect any further information.

Third parties whose products or services are accessible or advertised through the Services, including social networking services, may also use cookies or similar tools, and we advise you to check their privacy policies for information about their cookies and other practices. We do not control the practices of such partners and their privacy policies govern their interactions with you. We encourage you to read their privacy policies.

2. How we use your information

We use your information to:

Verify your eligibility to use the Services,
Facilitate your use of the Services and allow you to log in
Send you communications that you have requested or that may be of interest to you in accordance with your preferences.
Provide and improve our services,
Customize services for you (such as by remembering your preferences or providing you with certain content),
Make special offers (like sweepstakes) and deliver prizes in connection with contests and sweepstakes;
Better understand our users through research and analytics,
Diagnose and fix problems,
Provide customer support, and sell and display ads that may be relevant to you. We may aggregate and/or de-identify information collected by the Services or via other means so that the information is not intended to identify you. Our use and disclosure of aggregated and/or de-identified information is not subject to any restrictions under this Privacy Policy, and we may disclose it to others without limitation for any purpose.

3. How we Share Your Information

We share user information with others for various reasons. What information we make available to other companies depends on the nature of our relationships with them.

Service Providers: We may share your information with vendors who provide services on our behalf (such as voice transcription, email messaging, customer service, advertising, trouble shooting, survey providers) who are required to treat the data in accordance with confidentiality requirements.
Contests/Sweepstakes Partners. When you sign up to participate in a contest or sweepstakes, your information may be provided to our sweepstakes or contest advertisers, operators, or sponsors and the use of that information will be also governed by those advertisers, operators, or sponsors privacy policies or practices.
Companies within the IAC Group of Companies: We may share your information with our affiliates, which are entities under common ownership or control of our ultimate parent company, IAC/InterActiveCorp
Advertisers:We may share your information with third-parties with whom we have a contractual relationship, including without limitation third-party advertisers and advertising networks.
Sale or merger of our business: We may transfer your information to a third party if we or any of our affiliates are involved in a corporate restructuring (e.g., a sale, merger, or other transfer of some or all of our assets).
Legal Matters: We may disclose your information when we believe in good faith that such disclosure is appropriate in order to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding possible illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person, violations of this Privacy Policy or the Terms of Service for the Services you accessed, and/or to protect the rights and property of Dictionary.com, our employees, users and the public. This may involve the sharing of your information with law enforcement, government agencies, courts, and/or other organizations.

4. Online and Mobile Interest-Based Advertising:

When you use the Services, we may serve you with ads based on various factors such as the content of the page you are visiting, information you provide such as your age or gender, your searches, demographic data, user-generated content and other information that you provide to us. These ads may be based on your current activity or your activity over time and may be tailored to your interests.

Advertisers and advertising networks may also place ads (including sponsored links in search results) on our Services. These companies, as well as data analytics companies who service them, may use cookies, pixel tags, mobile device advertising IDs and other similar technologies to collect data about you when you visit our Services (for example, web pages visited and searches made). They use the data to enable them to track your activity across various sites where they display ads and record your activities, so they can show ads that they consider relevant to you. We neither have access to, nor does this Privacy Policy govern, the use of cookies or other tracking technologies that may be placed on your computer, mobile phone, or other device you use to access the Services by non-affiliated, third-party ad technology, ad servers, ad networks or any other non-affiliated third parties. You may opt-out of receiving interest-based online advertising from advertising networks that is delivered on the Services and other websites by visiting the following websites:

Network Advertising Initiative (http://www.networkadvertising.org/)
Digital Advertising Alliance (http://www.aboutads.info/consumers)

Please bear in mind that there are many more companies listed on these sites than those that drop cookies on our Services.

When using a mobile application you may also receive tailored in-application advertisements. Each operating system, iOS for Apple phones, Android for Android devices and Windows for Microsoft devices provides its own instructions on how to prevent the delivery of tailored in-application advertisements. You may review the support materials and/or the privacy settings for the respective operating systems in order to opt-out of tailored in-application advertisements. For any other devices and/or operating systems, please visit the privacy settings for the applicable device or contact the applicable platform operator. We do not control how the applicable platform operator allows you to control receiving tailored in-application ads; thus, you should contact the platform provider if the above options are no longer available.

Mobile Device Location Information: When you use one of our location-enabled services (for example, when you access Services from a mobile device), we may need to collect and process information about your specific GPS location (including the latitude, longitude or altitude of your mobile device) and the time the location information was recorded, and we may use that information to customize the Services with location-based information, advertising, and features. Some of these services require us to associate location data with your device ID and other information we hold about you. If you wish to use the particular feature, you will be asked to consent to your data being used for this purpose. You can withdraw your consent at any time by disabling the relevant feature. If you do not want your location information collected when you use the Services from a mobile device, please see your device manufacturer’s settings.

5. Do Not Track

Do Not Track (“DNT”) is a privacy preference that users can set in certain web browsers. DNT is a way for users to inform websites and services that they do not want certain information about their webpage visits collected over time and across websites or online services. We are committed to providing you with meaningful choices about the information collected on our website for third party purposes, and that is why we provide the NAI “Consumer Opt-out” link and the DAA opt-out link above. However, we do not recognize or respond to browser-initiated DNT signals, as the Internet industry is currently still working toward defining exactly what DNT means, what it means to comply with DNT, and a common approach to responding to DNT.

6. Right to Access, Review, Change or Delete information

You may have the ability to access, review, change or delete certain information we have collected from you by loggin g into your account and visiting the account page.

To delete your account, visit the Contact Us page and send a message to our Support team. Be sure to select “Information Removal Request” under the dropdown box that’s labeled “Subject,” and include your email address so that we can confirm your request.

7. Marketing Choices

You may choose to stop receiving marketing communications we send to you by adjusting your email settings at http://app.dictionary.com/users/settings or by clicking on the “unsubscribe” link at the bottom of such emails. To unsubscribe from other specific services, visit the Contact Us page and send a message to our Support team. Please allow time, consistent with applicable law, for us to process your requests.

8. How Do We Protect Your Information?

We have implemented a variety of administrative, technical, and physical security measures to protect against the unauthorized access, destruction or alteration of your information. These safeguards vary based on the sensitivity of the information that we collect, process and store and the current state of technology.

Although we take appropriate measures to safeguard against unauthorized disclosures of information, we cannot guarantee that information that we collect will never be disclosed in a manner that is inconsistent with this Privacy Policy.

9. How long do we keep the information we collect?

We retain the information we collect about and from you for as long as necessary to fulfill a business purpose or comply with a legal request. We may also choose to anonymize certain of the information you provide to us so that it can no longer be attributed to you if we would like to retain it for longer periods of time.

10. Children Under 13

The Services are not intended for users under the age of 13. We do not knowingly collect any personal information from children under 13. If we become aware that a person submitting information is under 13, we will attempt to delete the information as soon as possible. You hereby represent that you are at least

11. Use Outside the United States of America

The Services are controlled and offered by Dictionary.com, LLC from the United States of America and, regardless of your place of residence, your use of them is governed by the laws of the State of California, USA. Dictionary.com, LLC makes no representations that the Services are appropriate for use in other locations or are legal in all jurisdictions. Those who access or use the Services from other locations do so at their own risk and are responsible for compliance with local law. You hereby consent to the transfer and processing of your data in the United States of America and any other jurisdiction throughout the world, which may or may not have different levels of privacy protection that those in your jurisdiction.

12. English Language.

We may provide local-language versions of the Services for the convenience and enjoyment of our international users. We reserve the right to correct translation errors and similar issues occasioned by the offering of local language versions of the Services. The Privacy Policy governing the Services is made available in English only. If you do not agree with this Privacy Policy you should not use the Services.

13. Linked Sites and Advertisements.

The Services may contain links to third-party websites. We are not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of those third-party websites. We have relationships with third-party providers to provide content, products, services, and functionality through the Services. Such providers may collect information from you directly, in which case the provider’s privacy policy (which may differ from this Privacy Policy) would apply. If you have any questions regarding the privacy policy of any of our providers, you should contact the provider directly for more information.

14. Your California Privacy Rights

If you are a resident of the State of California, under the California Civil Code, you have the right to request from companies conducting business in California a list of all third parties to which the company has disclosed personal information (as defined by California law) during the preceding year for direct marketing purposes. Alternatively, the law provides that if a company has a Privacy Policy that gives either an opt-out for use of your personal information by third parties for their own marketing purposes, the company may instead provide you with information on how to exercise your disclosure choice options. We qualify for the alternative option; If you are a California resident and you want to opt out of such sharing, please send your request via email or postal mail. Send an email to us at privacy@dictionary.com, or contact us via regular mail at: Dictionary.com, LLC, 555 12^th Street, Suite 400, Oakland, CA 94607, Attn: Your California Privacy Rights c/o Privacy Administrator. All requests sent via regular mail must be labeled “Your California Privacy Rights” on the envelope or post card and clearly stated on the actual request. For all requests, please include your name, street address, city, state, and zip code (your street address is optional if you wish to receive a response to your request via email. Please include your zip code for our own recordkeeping).

15. No rights of third parties.

This Privacy Policy does not create rights enforceable by third parties.

16. Changes to this Privacy Policy.

We reserve the right to change this Privacy Policy at any time to reflect changes in the law, our data collection and use practices, the features of our Services, or advances in technology. Please check this page periodically for changes. Your continued use of the Services following the posting of changes to this Privacy Policy will mean you accept those changes.