WINDWARD TREE™ LLC
PRIVACY POLICY
Effective Date: September 26, 2026
Windward Tree™ LLC (“Windward Tree,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) respects the privacy of the professionals, businesses, organizations, and other authorized users who access and use our website and software services.
This Privacy Policy explains how Windward Tree collects, uses, stores, discloses, and otherwise handles information in connection with the Windward Tree website, software platform, applications, accounts, subscriptions, and related services (collectively, the “Service”).
The Service is designed and offered for professional, commercial, business, governmental, institutional, and organizational use. It is not intended for personal, family, or household use.
By accessing or using the Service, you acknowledge the practices described in this Privacy Policy.
1. INFORMATION WE COLLECT
The information Windward Tree™ collects depends upon how you interact with the Service. We may collect the following categories of information.
1.1 Account and Business Information
When an account is created or maintained, we may collect information such as:
- name;
- business or organization name;
- professional or business affiliation;
- business address;
- email address;
- telephone number;
- account username or other account identifier;
- subscription information; and
- other information provided in connection with an account.
1.2 Subscription and Transaction Information
When a subscription or other paid Service is purchased, we may collect information concerning the transaction, such as:
- subscription type;
- subscription status;
- transaction date;
- amount charged;
- payment status; and
- related transaction or account identifiers.
Payment card or other payment information may be processed by a third-party payment processor. When payment information is submitted directly to a third-party payment processor, the processor’s collection and handling of that information is governed by its own privacy and security practices.
Windward Tree™ may receive information from the payment processor concerning the transaction without receiving or storing the complete payment-card information.
1.3 Customer Content
Users may enter, generate, store, or otherwise provide information through the Service, including:
- case information;
- property or site information;
- tree information;
- notes;
- geographic or location information;
- information entered for calculations or analysis;
- generated reports; and
- other materials provided through the Service.
This information is referred to in this Privacy Policy as “Customer Content.”
As between Customer and Windward Tree™, Customer retains ownership of Customer Content.
Windward Tree™ does not sell Customer Content.
Windward Tree™ does not use Customer Content for advertising or marketing to third parties.
Windward Tree™ uses and processes Customer Content only as reasonably necessary to provide, maintain, secure, support, and operate the Service, as otherwise directed or authorized by Customer, or as required by applicable law.
Additional provisions governing Customer Content are contained in the Windward Tree™ Terms of Service.
1.4 Technical and Usage Information
When the Service is accessed, certain technical information may be collected automatically, including:
- Internet Protocol (IP) address;
- browser type;
- device type;
- operating system;
- date and time of access;
- pages, screens, or Service features accessed;
- login and authentication events;
- referring or exit information;
- error and diagnostic information;
- system activity; and
- other information concerning interaction with the Service.
We may use this information to operate, maintain, secure, troubleshoot, and improve the Service.
1.5 Communications
If you communicate with Windward Tree™, we may collect and retain information contained in those communications, including your name, email address, business information, the content of your communication, and information reasonably necessary to respond to your request.
2. HOW WE USE INFORMATION
Windward Tree™ may use information collected through the Service to:
- create and administer accounts;
- authenticate users;
- provide access to the Service;
- provide requested software features and functionality;
- process and administer subscriptions;
- provide customer and technical support;
- communicate about accounts, subscriptions, transactions, security, or the Service;
- generate reports, calculations, visualizations, and other outputs requested by users;
- maintain and improve the operation and reliability of the Service;
- diagnose and correct technical problems;
- protect the security and integrity of the Service;
- detect, investigate, or prevent unauthorized access, misuse, fraud, or other prohibited activity;
- enforce our Terms of Service and other agreements;
- maintain business and operational records;
- comply with applicable laws and valid legal obligations; and
- establish, exercise, or defend legal rights.
Windward Tree™ will not use Customer Content for purposes materially inconsistent with this Privacy Policy or the Windward Tree™ Terms of Service without appropriate authorization.
3. CUSTOMER CONTENT AND CONFIDENTIALITY
Windward Tree™ recognizes that Customer Content may relate to professional engagements, investigations, claims, litigation, properties, clients, or other business matters.
As between Customer and Windward Tree™, Customer retains all ownership rights in Customer Content. Windward Tree™ does not acquire ownership of Customer Content merely because Customer uses the Service.
Windward Tree™ will not sell, rent, disclose, distribute, publish, or otherwise share Customer Content with third parties, except:
- to service providers acting on Windward Tree’s behalf when access is reasonably necessary to host, maintain, secure, support, or operate the Service;
- when authorized or directed by Customer, including the limited requests made to provide requested features as described in Section 5; or
- when disclosure is required by applicable law, subpoena, court order, or other valid legal process.
Service providers permitted to access Customer Content on Windward Tree’s behalf will be permitted access only as reasonably necessary to perform services for Windward Tree™ and will be subject to appropriate confidentiality or data-protection obligations.
Windward Tree™ will not use Customer Content for advertising or marketing to third parties and will not sell Customer Content.
4. SERVICE PROVIDERS
Windward Tree™ may engage third-party companies to perform services necessary to operate our business and provide the Service. Depending upon the services used by Windward Tree™, these providers may perform functions such as:
- cloud hosting and data storage;
- website hosting;
- software infrastructure;
- payment processing;
- authentication;
- email delivery;
- customer support;
- security;
- system monitoring;
- error detection;
- backup and recovery; and
- other technical or operational services.
Service providers may receive or process information only to the extent reasonably necessary to perform services for Windward Tree™ or as otherwise permitted by applicable law.
Windward Tree™ does not authorize service providers to sell Customer Content or use Customer Content for their own advertising or marketing purposes.
5. THIRD-PARTY DATA SOURCES
The Service may retrieve, process, organize, display, or use information obtained from governmental agencies, weather reporting stations and networks, mapping providers, geographic databases, and other third-party sources.
Information obtained from these sources is not Customer Content merely because it is displayed through the Service.
To provide requested features, the Service may send addresses or place queries to Esri for stored geocoding, coordinates to the U.S. Geological Survey for elevation, map areas to Mapbox or OpenStreetMap, and relevant location, station, and date criteria to NOAA/NCEI or the Iowa Environmental Mesonet. These requests may occur automatically when a user creates or updates a site or retrieves its context. When Esri geocoding is disabled, address lookup may instead use the U.S. Census Geocoder and, for New Jersey searches, NJGIN.
Address and place searches pass through Windward Tree’s server without forwarding account identifiers, case names, incident dates, or the user’s IP address to the geocoder. The provider receives the location query, server connection information, and any required service credential. Direct browser requests, including map tiles, disclose ordinary connection information such as the user’s IP address. Users should not include client names or case notes in location queries. Time-zone lookup is performed within Windward Tree’s hosting environment rather than sent to an external time-zone service.
The privacy and data practices of third-party sources and services are governed by their respective policies and practices. Independent providers may retain request logs and use request data for their own service, security, and improvement purposes. Mapbox’s published policy permits model training using de-identified data. These practices are distinct from Windward Tree’s use of Customer Content; limited location requests should not be assumed to be anonymous.
Windward Tree’s treatment of weather reporting station data and other third-party information is further described in the Windward Tree™ Terms of Service.
6. COOKIES AND SIMILAR TECHNOLOGIES
Windward Tree™ may use cookies or similar technologies that are reasonably necessary to operate the website and Service. These technologies may be used to:
- maintain user sessions;
- authenticate users;
- remember settings;
- provide security functionality;
- maintain Service functionality;
- diagnose technical problems; and
- understand the operation and use of the Service.
If Windward Tree™ uses analytics or other non-essential tracking technologies that require additional notice, consent, or opt-out rights under applicable law, Windward Tree™ will provide the applicable disclosures and choices. Windward Tree™ does not use cookies or similar technologies for targeted advertising.
Browser settings may permit users to restrict or disable certain cookies. Disabling cookies that are necessary to the operation of the Service may prevent portions of the Service from functioning properly.
New case working copies are held in the open tab’s memory rather than intentionally written to persistent browser storage. Saved cases remain in server storage. Session expiry blocks access but retains open-tab work for reauthentication to the same account. Unsaved work may be lost if the tab closes or the browser crashes; users should save successfully before leaving.
Successful explicit sign-out clears open-tab case copies and the signing-out account’s older app-owned browser case cache, with a warning when unsaved work or older recovery copies are present. Other accounts’ older caches and unowned legacy copies require separate recovery or cleanup review. Authentication sessions, settings, browser-managed caches, and downloaded reports may remain on the device. Windward Tree™ does not encrypt browser storage; users should protect their devices and use trusted browser profiles.
7. HOW WE DISCLOSE INFORMATION
7.1 Service Providers
We may provide information to service providers that perform functions on our behalf and need the information to provide those services.
7.2 Customer-Directed Disclosure
We may disclose information when Customer requests, directs, authorizes, or initiates the disclosure. For example, information may be included in a report or export generated by Customer and subsequently downloaded, transmitted, or distributed at Customer’s direction.
7.3 Legal Requirements
We may disclose information when we reasonably believe disclosure is required to comply with applicable law, regulation, subpoena, court order, governmental request, or other valid legal process.
7.4 Protection of Rights and Security
We may disclose information when reasonably necessary to investigate or address fraud, unauthorized access, security incidents, violations of our Terms of Service, threats to the Service, or conduct that may harm Windward Tree™, our users, or others.
7.5 Business Transactions
If Windward Tree™ is involved in a merger, acquisition, financing, reorganization, sale of assets, or similar business transaction, information may be disclosed as reasonably necessary in connection with the proposed or completed transaction, subject to appropriate confidentiality protections where applicable. Any successor receiving personal information through such a transaction will be subject to applicable legal obligations concerning that information.
8. NO SALE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION OR CUSTOMER CONTENT
Windward Tree™ does not sell personal information or use or disclose personal information for targeted advertising. Windward Tree™ does not use Customer Content to train general-purpose artificial intelligence models or submit Customer Content to general-purpose artificial intelligence services for model training. Independent providers’ handling of limited request data is described in Section 5.
Windward Tree™ does not sell Customer Content.
Windward Tree™ does not rent Customer Content to third parties.
Windward Tree™ does not disclose Customer Content to third parties for their independent advertising or marketing purposes.
9. DATA SECURITY
Windward Tree™ takes reasonable administrative, technical, and organizational measures designed to protect information under its control against unauthorized access, acquisition, alteration, disclosure, destruction, or loss.
Windward Tree™ uses HTTPS/TLS for Service communications and relies on provider-managed encryption at rest for its hosted database. Offsite database backup archives are encrypted before upload to Google Drive; temporary export components are processed before encryption and cleanup. These safeguards are not a representation that every browser copy, downloaded report, email, log, or temporary processing copy is encrypted by Windward Tree™.
Windward Tree™ also maintains safeguards designed to protect Customer Content and other information processed through the Service. Access to Customer Content is limited to personnel and service providers with a legitimate need for access in connection with providing, maintaining, securing, supporting, or operating the Service.
Windward Tree™ expects service providers that process or store Customer Content on its behalf to maintain appropriate security measures consistent with the nature of the services they provide and the information they process.
No method of electronic transmission, network communication, encryption, or electronic storage can be guaranteed to provide absolute security. Accordingly, while Windward Tree™ uses security measures designed to protect information, Windward Tree™ cannot guarantee that unauthorized access, acquisition, disclosure, alteration, destruction, or loss will never occur.
Users are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality and security of their account credentials and should promptly notify Windward Tree™ of known or suspected unauthorized access to an account.
10. DATA RETENTION
Windward Tree™ retains information for as long as reasonably necessary to provide the Service, maintain legitimate business and operational records, comply with applicable legal obligations, resolve disputes, enforce agreements, maintain security, and protect legal rights.
Retention periods may vary depending upon the nature of the information, the purpose for which it is maintained, contractual requirements, backup and recovery processes, and applicable legal requirements.
Backup copies are retained separately from active records and are not necessarily removed when an active record is deleted. Backups are periodic, not continuous replication, and may exclude reproducible weather indexes, caches, and platform settings. Recovery may require rebuilding data and restoring compatible services; recovery of every change or uninterrupted availability is not guaranteed.
When information is no longer reasonably necessary for the purposes for which it is maintained, Windward Tree™ may delete, anonymize, or otherwise dispose of it in accordance with its applicable practices and legal obligations.
11. ACCOUNT CLOSURE AND CUSTOMER CONTENT
Customers may contact Windward Tree™ regarding account closure or Customer Content associated with their account.
Termination or cancellation of a subscription does not necessarily result in the immediate deletion of all information associated with the account.
Certain information may remain in backups, system records, security logs, transaction records, or other records maintained for legitimate business, technical, legal, security, or compliance purposes.
Where reasonably available, Customers should export Customer Content they wish to retain before closing an account or allowing a subscription to terminate.
12. PRIVACY RIGHTS AND REQUESTS
Depending upon applicable law and the circumstances, an individual may have rights concerning personal information maintained by Windward Tree™. Requests may include requests to:
- obtain information about personal information maintained by Windward Tree™;
- correct inaccurate personal information;
- request deletion of certain personal information; or
- exercise another privacy right provided by applicable law.
Requests may be submitted to: support@windwardtree.com
Windward Tree™ may need to verify the identity and authority of the person making a request before acting upon it.
Certain information may be exempt from a request or may need to be retained where permitted or required by applicable law, including information necessary for security, fraud prevention, contractual obligations, legal compliance, dispute resolution, or the establishment, exercise, or defense of legal rights.
Where Windward Tree™ processes information on behalf of a business Customer and the request concerns information controlled by that Customer, the individual may need to direct the request to the applicable Customer.
13. BUSINESS AND PROFESSIONAL USERS
The Service is offered exclusively for professional, commercial, business, governmental, institutional, or organizational use.
The Service is not directed toward individuals seeking to use it for personal, family, or household purposes.
Where an individual uses the Service through or on behalf of an employer, professional practice, business, governmental entity, or other organization, that organization may control the individual’s account and information associated with its use of the Service.
14. CHILDREN’S PRIVACY
The Service is not directed to children and is not intended for use by individuals under the age of 18.
Windward Tree™ does not knowingly solicit personal information from children through the Service.
If Windward Tree™ becomes aware that personal information from a child has been collected in circumstances where such collection was not appropriate, Windward Tree™ may take reasonable steps to delete the information.
15. EXTERNAL WEBSITES AND SERVICES
The Service may contain links to, integrate with, or obtain information from third-party websites or services.
Windward Tree™ does not control the privacy, security, or data-handling practices of independent third parties.
Users should review the privacy policies of third-party websites and services before providing information directly to them.
16. EMAIL AND SERVICE COMMUNICATIONS
Windward Tree™ may send communications reasonably necessary to administer an account or provide the Service, including communications concerning:
- account administration;
- subscriptions;
- transactions;
- security;
- changes to the Service;
- technical matters;
- support requests; and
- changes to applicable policies or terms.
Certain operational or account-related communications may be necessary for Windward Tree™ to provide the Service and may not be subject to marketing opt-out preferences.
Where Windward Tree™ sends marketing communications, recipients may use the unsubscribe mechanism provided in the communication or contact Windward Tree™ to request that such communications stop.
17. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY
Windward Tree™ may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in the Service, our information practices, legal requirements, or business operations.
When the Privacy Policy is updated, Windward Tree™ will revise the Effective Date above.
If a change materially affects how Windward Tree™ uses or discloses information already collected, Windward Tree™ will provide additional notice or obtain consent when required by applicable law.
18. RELATIONSHIP TO TERMS OF SERVICE
This Privacy Policy should be read together with the Windward Tree™ Terms of Service.
The Terms of Service govern Customer’s use of the Service and contain additional provisions concerning Customer Content, third-party information, account use, intellectual property, professional responsibilities, and other matters.
Nothing in this Privacy Policy transfers ownership of Customer Content to Windward Tree™.
19. CONTACT INFORMATION
Questions, requests, or communications regarding this Privacy Policy or Windward Tree™’s privacy practices may be directed to:
Windward Tree™ LLC
971 US Highway 202N, Ste N
Branchburg, NJ 08876
Email: support@windwardtree.com
Website: windwardtree.com
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