Privacy Policy
Last Revised September 1, 2026 (“Effective Date”)
Thank you for your interest in the ACTC Biobank. The Biobank is operated by the Alzheimer’s Therapeutic Research Institute (“ATRI”) at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, as part of the Alzheimer’s Clinical Trials Consortium (“ACTC”). This website is used to describe the Biobank’s collection and services, and to allow investigators to make contact with us.
The University of Southern California (“USC”), the Keck School of Medicine of USC, ATRI and the ACTC Biobank, and their officers, agents, employees and representatives, are collectively referred to here as “we”, “us” or “our”.
This privacy policy (“Privacy Policy”) is part of your Agreement, which is described in the Terms of Use referenced below, and governs your use of this website (the “Site”). Any use of the Site constitutes your agreement to this Privacy Policy and to all other terms and conditions that form part of your Agreement.
USC publishes a university-wide privacy notice at usc.edu/privacy-notice, which this policy supplements for this Site.
Contact Information
If you have questions, requests, complaints or comments about this Site, about information we may collect from you, or about the Biobank itself, you may contact us at:
ATTN: ACTC Biobank
USC Epstein Family Alzheimer’s Therapeutic Research Institute
Keck School of Medicine of USC
9860-80 Mesa Rim Road
San Diego, CA 92121
Or by email: ask@actcinfo.org
If you have a privacy question that we are not able to resolve, you may also contact USC’s compliance office at compliance@usc.edu.
Our Commitment to You
Protecting your privacy while you use this Site matters to us. We collect as little information as possible, we use it only to respond to you, and we do not sell it.
Disclaimer
All health and health-related information on this Site is general in nature, does not constitute medical advice, and should not be used as a substitute for consultation or treatment by a health care professional. Your health care provider should be consulted regarding matters concerning the medical condition, treatment and needs of you and your family. We do not monitor or review communications from or provided through the Site for medical diagnostic or emergency health care purposes.
Although we try to ensure that the material on the Site is accurate and timely, it is provided for the convenience of the website user. You should not assume that information on any topic available on the Site is accurate, complete, up to date, or applicable to any medical problem or condition you may have. Content found on the Site is for informational use only.
This information is provided without warranty for quality or accuracy. Neither we nor any other contributing author is responsible for any errors or omissions in any information provided on the Site, or for the results obtained from the use of such information.
In the event of a medical emergency, call your doctor or dial 911 immediately. Do not disregard or delay seeking medical care or advice because of content you may have read on the Site.
Information You Give Us
This Site has two forms: a request form, for investigators seeking specimens or looking to bank specimens with us, and a contact form for general questions. Both ask for your name, your email address, your institution or organization, and a description of what you need.
These forms are for professional correspondence between investigators and the Biobank. They are not intended to collect information about research participants, and we ask that you do not include participant-identifiable information in them. The forms carry that request on the field where it matters most. If you do send us information of that kind, we will handle it in accordance with the applicable institutional and legal requirements, but the Site is not built to receive it and you should not use it for that purpose.
You are under no obligation to use these forms. Our postal address, telephone number and email address are published on this Site, and you are welcome to reach us by any of them instead.
How We Use and Share Your Information
We use what you send us to answer you, and to administer the Biobank’s services. Within USC and ATRI, your information may be seen by the staff and investigators who need it in order to respond to your request.
We do not sell your information. We do not share it with third parties for their marketing purposes. We do not use it to send you promotional material.
We may share information where we are required to do so by state or federal law, or in response to a lawful request from law enforcement or another government authority.
If you have used a form and would like the message removed from our records once the matter is closed, contact us at the address above and we will do so where we are able.
What Is Collected Automatically
Our hosting provider keeps standard server logs, which record technical information such as your internet protocol (“IP”) address, browser type, operating system, the pages you visit, and the times and dates of your visits. These logs are used to operate and secure the Site.
With your consent, we also use Google Analytics, described below.
Browser signals. You may set your browser or operating system to limit tracking or to decline cookies. Our analytics cookies are already off by default, and are only set if you accept them through the cookie banner on this Site.
Cookie Policy
Cookies are small text files that a website stores on your device. Session cookies last until you close your browser; persistent cookies remain for a defined period.
Analytics cookies are not set on this Site unless you accept them. When you first visit, a banner asks whether you consent. Until you accept, the analytics script does not load and no analytics cookies are created. You can change or withdraw your choice at any time through the same banner, and you can delete cookies through your browser at any point.
A small number of cookies are set regardless of your choice, because the Site cannot function without them. One records what you decided about the other cookies, so that you are not asked again on every page and so that we have a record of your preference; without it, we would have no way to remember that you declined. The others are set by our hosting provider’s security service, which checks incoming traffic for automated activity. None of them are used for advertising or to build a profile of you. All are listed in the table below.
We do not use cookies for advertising, and we do not use them to build a profile of you.
Our Use of Google Analytics
If you accept analytics cookies, we use Google Analytics 4 to understand how visitors use the Site, so that we can improve it. Google Analytics reports aggregate trends: which pages are read, how visitors arrive, and how long they stay.
Google Analytics collects an identifier stored in a cookie, together with technical information such as your IP address, which Google processes on our behalf. We do not use it to identify individual visitors, and we do not combine it with anything you send us through the forms.
If you have accepted analytics and change your mind, you can withdraw consent through the cookie banner. You may also install Google’s opt-out browser add-on, which applies across all sites you visit, at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout. To learn more about how Google handles data from sites that use Google Analytics, see https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/.
Information Security
This Site is hosted on a managed hosting platform, and traffic between your browser and the Site is encrypted in transit using TLS.
Form submissions are not stored in a database on this Site. When you send a message it is delivered by email to a staff inbox, and copies are retained in the Site’s mail logs.
The Site is not a system of record for protected health information and no PHI is submitted through it. Requests are professional correspondence about specimens and studies, and are handled as such.
Form Protection
Our forms are protected by Cloudflare Turnstile, a service that checks whether a submission is coming from a person rather than from automated software. It runs when you open a page that has a form on it, and in most cases it completes without asking you to do anything. To make that check, Turnstile collects a small set of technical signals, including your IP address and browser information. Cloudflare processes them on our behalf to detect automated traffic, and separately, on its own responsibility, to improve how well Turnstile detects bots generally. They are not used for advertising and not used to build a profile of you.
Cloudflare’s Turnstile Privacy Addendum is at cloudflare.com/turnstile-privacy-policy.
Email Security
Ordinary email is not encrypted end to end, and it is possible for email to be intercepted or misdirected. We are not responsible for the privacy of email in transit or on systems we do not control. Please bear that in mind when deciding what to put in a message, and do not send participant-identifiable information by email.
We would never ask you for personal financial information such as bank account details by email. If you receive such a request purporting to come from us, please report it to the Internet Crime Complaint Center, a partnership between the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center.
Links to Other Sites
Some pages on this Site link to third-party websites that we do not manage or control. We do not review, control or take responsibility for the content of those sites, and these links do not imply endorsement of any service, information or product.
Terms of Use
You must agree to the Terms of Use, available at /terms-of-use/, together with this Privacy Policy and any other policy or guidelines incorporated into your Agreement, before you access, browse or use the Site. If you do not agree, you may not use or access the Site or any content. By using or accessing the Site, you acknowledge that you have read, understand and agree to be bound by this Privacy Policy, the Terms of Use, and any other policy or guidelines incorporated into the Agreement by reference.
Modifications or Changes to This Privacy Policy
We reserve the right to modify or change this Privacy Policy. Any such modification is effective when posted, and the revision date at the top of this page will be updated. You are encouraged to review this page periodically to stay informed of any changes.