California Privacy Notice

Not in use. Replaced by Privacy Notice on July 7, 2023.

Effective Date: January 1, 2020

1. Introduction

This privacy notice (“Notice”) describes how Cooley LLP and Cooley (UK) LLP (collectively, “Cooley”, “we”, “us” and “our”) collect, use and share personal information about California residents in and their rights with respect to that information.

2. Scope

This Notice applies only to “personal information”, as defined in the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (the “CCPA”), that we collect as a “business” as defined in the CCPA, but does not apply to personal information excluded from the scope of the CCPA. This Notice does not apply to you if you are not a California resident or you or are otherwise not entitled to a notice under Section 1798.100 of the CCPA (e.g., because we collect your personal information while interacting with you in your capacity as an employee, controlling owner, director, officer or contractor of an organization while providing or receiving products or services to or from, or performing due diligence on, that organization). In addition, this Notice does not apply to personal information covered by a different privacy notice that we give to California residents, such as the privacy notices we give to our California employees and job candidates. Sections 3-5 of this Notice describe our practices currently and during the twelve months preceding the effective date of this Notice.

3. Personal information we collect

3.1. Categories of personal information

The categories of personal information we collect include:

  • General identifiers, such as your name, home or work address, telephone number, email address, job title and organizational affiliation, and government-issued identification.
  • Online identifiers, such as your username or passwords for any of our websites, or the information we automatically collect through cookies and similar technologies used on our websites, as described in our Cookies Policy. This may include your computer or mobile device’s operating system type and version number, manufacturer and model, browser type, screen resolution, IP address, unique identifier, the website you visited before browsing to our website, and general location information such as city, state or geographic area.
  • Financial information, such as the bank account or credit card information you provide in wiring instructions you share with us and any insurance policy numbers that you provide in connection with our services to you.
  • Medical information, such as any information about your health, health care or health insurance that you provide in connection with our services to you, or any food allergy information you share with in connection with your attendance at catered events.
  • Protected classification characteristics, such as any of the following information that you choose to provide to us or that we collect in connection with our services to you: age (40 years or older), race, color, ancestry, national origin, citizenship, religion or creed, marital status, medical condition, physical or mental disability, sex (including gender, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy or childbirth and related medical conditions), sexual orientation, veteran or military status, genetic information (including familial genetic information).
  • Commercial information, such as the billing details we use to bill you for our services, your billing and payment history, and any records of personal property that we collect in connection with our services to you and other information about your client files. We also collect information about your preferences regarding marketing communications and your participation in our events.
  • Biometric information, such as any fingerprints, iris or retina scans, facial geometry scans, hand or palm scans or voice prints created for the purposes of establishing individual identity and that you choose to provide to us in connection with our services to you.
  • Internet activity or electronic network activity information that we collect about your interaction with our websites, emails and other online content, including the pages you viewed, emails you opened, links you clicked, how long you spent on a page, navigation paths between pages or screens, information about your activity on, access times, and duration of access. We also collect information about your preferences for the marketing emails that we send. If you are given keycard access to our offices, we log information about when and where you use the keycard for access.
  • Audio, electronic, and visual information that we collect in connection with our services to you, such as video or audio recordings of your depositions, recordings of conversations with you made with your consent, and any security camera recordings of your activity in our offices.
  • Professional or employment-related information that we collect in connection with our services to you, such as your job title, employer information and work history.
  • Education information from any school or educational records that we collect in connection with our services to you.

We may also collect other categories of personal information that you choose to share with us.

3.2. Sources of personal information

Except for your online identifiers, internet and network activity information, and security camera footage, which are collected third party sources that you identify to us, parties involved in the matters in which we represent you, and publicly-available or commercially-available sources from which we collect information in connection with our services to you, such as when we conduct investigations. We also collect contact details, information about your interaction with marketing communications and your participation in events from joint marketing partners and event sponsors when they share this information with us.

4. How we use personal information

We use the categories of personal information that we collect about you for the following business purposes:

  • Client services. We use all of the categories of personal information described above (except to the extent related to marketing) to perform legal services to our clients (“client services”), administer their files and to bill for and collect payments for those services.
  • Online services. If you use our websites, any software applications that we make available, our social media properties, and any online data rooms that we operate or any services provided through them (collectively, “online services”), we use your general identifiers, online identifiers, internet activity information (as described above in Section 3.1) and other information that you submit through the online services to:
  • Hosting and events. If you register for our events, we use your general identifiers, online identifiers, food allergy information and commercial information (as described above in Section 3.1) to fulfill your registration requests, communicate with you about the event, and to host you at the events. If you visit our offices, we collect your name and organizational affiliation to register and host you.
  • Research and development. We may use your general identifiers, online identifiers, internet activity information and commercial information (as described above in Section 3.1) for research and development purposes, including to analyze and improve our client services, online services, events and our business. As part of these activities, we may create aggregated, de-identified or other anonymous data from personal information we collect. We make personal information into anonymous data by removing information that makes the data personally identifiable to you. We may use this anonymous data and share it with third parties for our lawful business purposes.
  • Marketing. We may use your general identifiers, online identifiers, internet activity information and commercial information (as described above in Section 3.1) in connection with sending you marketing communications as permitted by law, including by mail and email. You may opt-out of marketing communications by following the unsubscribe instructions in marketing emails, contacting us via this web form or calling us toll free at +1 866 714 5537. 
  • Compliance and protection. We may use any of the categories of personal information described above to:
    • Comply with applicable laws, lawful requests, and legal process, such as to respond to subpoenas or requests from government authorities.
    • Protect our, your or others’ rights, privacy, safety or property (including by making and defending legal claims).
    • Audit our internal processes for compliance with legal and contractual requirements and internal policies.
    • Enforce the terms and conditions that govern our websites and our services.
    • Prevent, identify, investigate and deter fraudulent, harmful, unauthorized, unethical or illegal activity, including cyberattacks and identity theft.

We may also use personal information for other purposes consistent with the Notice or that are explained to you at the time of collection of your personal information.

5. How we share personal information

We may disclose for business purposes all of the categories of personal information described above with the following categories of third parties:

  • Affiliates. Our affiliates, for purposes consistent with this Notice or to operate shared infrastructure, systems and technology.
  • Service providers. Companies that provide us with services that help us provide services or operate our business, such as IT and software services, mailing services, marketing services, event management services, eDiscovery services, cyber security services and office security services.
  • Government authorities, law enforcement and others. Government authorities, law enforcement, courts, and others as described in the compliance and protection section above.
  • Transaction participants. Parties to transactions and potential transactions for the sale, transfer or licensing of a portion or all of our business or assets, including your personal information, such as a corporate divestiture, merger, consolidation, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets, or in the event of bankruptcy or dissolution.
  • Professional advisors. Our lawyers, accountants, bankers and other outside professional advisors in the course of the services they provide to us.

We may also share personal information with other categories of third parties with your consent or as described to you at the time of collection of your personal information. We do not “sell” your personal information as defined in the CCPA.

6. Your California privacy rights

6.1. Your CCPA rights

  • Information. You can request the following information about how we have collected and used your personal information during the past 12 months:
    • The categories of personal information that we have collected.
    • The categories of sources from which we collected personal information.
    • The business or commercial purpose for collecting and/or selling personal information.
    • The categories of third parties with whom we share personal information.
    • The categories of personal information that we sold or disclosed for a business purpose.
    • The categories of third parties to whom the personal information was sold or disclosed for a business purpose.
  • Access. You can request a copy of the personal information that we have collected about you during the past 12 months
  • Deletion. You can ask us to delete the personal information that we have collected from you.
  • Nondiscrimination. You are entitled to exercise the rights described above free from discriminatory treatment prohibited by the CCPA.

You may submit a request to exercise your information, access and deletion rights above by using our web form or calling us toll free at +1 866 714 5537. We will need to verify your identity to process your requests and we reserve the right to confirm your California residency. Government identification may be required. If you wish to designate an authorized agent to make a request on your behalf, we will need to verify both your and your agent’s identities, which may require submission of government identification. Your agent must also provide valid power of attorney or other proof of authority acceptable to us in our sole discretion. We cannot process your request if you do not provide us with sufficient detail to allow us to understand and respond to it. In certain cases, we may be permitted by law to deny your request.

6.2. Your right to information about our disclosures of personal information to third parties for their direct marketing purposes

As noted above, we may disclose personal information to our affiliates, which may use this information for all purposes described in this Notice. Because separate legal entities are considered “third parties” for purposes of California Civil Code Section 1798.83, and certain communications from our affiliates might be viewed as promoting their legal services, California residents who have provided us with their personal information during the creation of or during the course of an established legal services relationship that is primarily for personal, family, or household purposes may request information about our disclosures of certain categories of personal information to third parties (i.e., our affiliates) for such third parties’ direct marketing purposes by using this web form or calling us toll free at +1 866 714 5537. We will provide a list of the categories of personal information disclosed to third parties (i.e., our affiliates) for their direct marketing purposes during the immediately preceding calendar year, along with the names and addresses of these third parties. This request may be made no more than once per calendar year. We reserve our right not to respond to requests submitted other than to the email address specified in this section.

7. Other information about this Notice

7.1 Third parties

This Notice does not address, and we are not responsible for, the practices of any third parties, which have their own rules for how they collect and use your personal information.  Our links to third party websites or services are not endorsements.

7.2 Changes to this Notice

We reserve the right to change this Notice at any time.  The "Effective Date" heading at the top of this Notice indicates when it was last revised.  Any changes will become effective when we post the revised notice on our Careers Site.

8. Contact us

Please address any questions relating to this Notice to the firm’s Data Protection Officer using this web form or by calling us toll free at +1 866 714 5537.