Privacy Policy

The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) is committed to protecting your privacy and developing technology that gives you a powerful and safe online experience when using our websites. This privacy policy applies to information collected by AILA through all subdomains of aila.org (except careers.aila.org), ailalawyer.com, thinkimmigration.org, and ailawebcle.org (henceforth referred to as AILA’s digital properties), as well as through email, fax, and phone communications with AILA staff. Note: This policy does not apply to ailainsurance.org. This privacy policy will inform you of the following:

• What personally identifiable information is collected from you, how it is used, and with whom it may be shared
• What choices are available to you regarding the uses your data
• The security procedures in place to protect against the misuse of your information
• How you can correct any inaccuracies in the information

The effective date of the current privacy policy is March 11, 2023.

Information Collection

AILA is the sole owner of the information collected through AILA’s digital properties. AILA only collects personally identifiable information that you voluntarily provide via email, website form submission (account creation, profile, purchases, liaison inquiries, etc.), or other direct contact with you.

Account Creation

In order to use personalization features, attend AILA conferences, join the association, or access restricted content on AILA websites, a user must first complete the Create an AILA Account form. On this form, a user is required to provide certain information (such as name and email address). You may also provide certain demographic information (such as gender or age) about yourself, but it is not required.

E-Commerce

In order to purchase products from AILA, you must create an account. In addition to providing basic contact information (such as name and address), you must provide financial information (credit card number, expiration date, and security code). AILA never stores full credit card information, encrypted or otherwise; all credit card information is processed via a secure third party. We only store the credit card type—AmEx, Visa, MC—and the last four digits of the card number in the case of regular payments. For payment plans, we store the same information, plus an electronic payment token and your credit card’s expiration date. This information is used for billing purposes and to complete your orders. If we have trouble processing an order, we will use this information to contact you.

We use an outside shipping company to ship our print publications orders. This company, as well as the shippers themselves (such as UPS, USPS, FedEx), do not retain, share, store, or use personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes beyond filling and tracking your order.

Cookies and Analytics

We use cookies on AILA’s digital properties. A cookie is a piece of data stored on a site visitor's computer to help us improve your access to our site and identify repeat visitors to our site. For instance, a cookie can be used to identify you so you do not have to log in or enter a password more than once, thereby saving you time while on our site. Cookies also enable us to track and target the interests of our users, thereby enhancing their experience on our site.

Additionally, we use Google Analytics and the HubSpot customer relationship management platform to collect and store information about how you interact with our websites and emails so we can provide you with content regarding information and resources related to your interests. Note that you can accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can modify your browser settings to decline cookies if you prefer. If you choose to decline cookies, you may not be able to fully experience certain interactive features of our websites that are provided as member benefits.

Surveys and Forms

From time to time, AILA’s digital properties and communications request information that is collected via surveys and forms. Participation is completely voluntary, and you may choose whether or not to disclose the information requested. Information requested may include contact information, demographic information, information required for feedback and planning for conferences and events, scholarship and tuition applications, or examples of client cases for AILA’s advocacy work. Contact information will be used to follow up on submissions. Information collected via surveys or forms will be used for the purposes indicated on each document.

Listservs and Message Boards

Any information sent through AILA listservs can be seen by anyone on that list. Items posted to the AILA Message Center can be read by AILA staff, the entire AILA membership, and the registered paralegals of current AILA members. While AILA’s listservs and Message Center have guidelines for use, AILA does not control what other users may do with the information posted or emailed.

Social Media

We may also receive information about you from social media platforms including but not limited to when you interact with us on those platforms or access our social media content. The information we receive from social media platforms is governed by the privacy settings, policies, and/or procedures of the applicable platform, and we encourage you to review them.

Usage of Information Collected

AILA collects information about its members and website users in order to:

• Provide services
• Deliver goods
• Analyze legal trends
• Respond to inquiries
• Process Continuing Legal Education (CLE) credits
• Plan for and promote conferences and products
• Provide access to vendor services
• Provide relevant news, information, and resources
• Promote diversity, equity, and inclusion
• Analyze digital data
• Engage in the normal business activities of a membership association

Sharing of Information Collected

When individuals sign up for AILA membership, AILA will share their personal information with the AILA chapter(s) that they select on the membership application and with the American Immigration Council. As part of providing our membership services, AILA will also share individuals’ information with AILA committees and elected association officials as needed. We also share anonymous aggregated demographic information with our chapters, partners, and advertisers. This anonymous aggregated data is not linked to any personal information that can identify any individual person. AILA members may choose to share their information with other AILA members via the Membership Directories on AILA.org. AILA shares limited personal information (name, city, state, etc.) with partner organizations to determine overlap of our audience. If you participate in the Find an Immigration Lawyer service, nonmembers will be able to access only your contact information.

Third-Party Vendors

AILA partners with third-party vendors to provide some of the services described in this policy and may share names and other contact information as necessary for the third party to provide these services. These parties are not allowed to use personally identifiable information except for the purpose of providing these services. Encrypted usernames are also shared with third-party service providers to provide a seamless login process between AILA’s digital properties and the vendors’ sites.

Mailing Lists

We do not sell any phone numbers or email addresses.

AILA sells the opportunity to advertise to AILA members via postal mail to third parties who must be screened and approved by AILA. We do not share any phone numbers or email addresses for third-party advertising. The information provided for third-party advertising is limited to a one-time-use electronic file sent to a verified third-party mail house; the third-party advertiser never has direct access to this list.

Additional Disclosures

External Links

AILA’s digital properties and digital communications may contain links to third-party sites. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the content or privacy practices of such sites. We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our site and to read the privacy statements of any other site that collects personally identifiable information.

Lawful Disclosures

AILA will disclose your personal information, without notice, only if required to do so by law or in the good-faith belief that such action is necessary to: (a) conform to the edicts of the law or comply with legal process served on AILA, (b) protect and defend the rights or property of AILA, or (c) act under exigent circumstances to protect the personal safety of the users of AILA’s digital properties or the public. Should AILA go out of business, no personal data will be considered an asset for sale, and unless legally obligated to retain the information, personal data records would be destroyed.

Conference and Education Services

Registration, attendance, and participation in AILA conferences, events, and services constitute an agreement by the registrant to the use and distribution of the registrant’s image or voice in photographs, videos, webcasts, electronic reproductions, and audio recordings of such events by AILA. Biographical information submitted by speakers will be published and may be shared with chapters and third-party vendors purchasing the conference materials. Conference and online course attendance lists are shared with all attendees and exhibitors and may be shared via a third-party app. Email addresses and other service-specific information may be required to access the conference app, webcast, and CLE processing services. Information may be collected and shared with hotels and vendors to assist in ADA-compliance preparations, audit of rooming lists, and/or other special assistance planning. Attendance tracking systems may be used by AILA and/or its vendors to gather attendance and demographic data to facilitate future planning.

General Data Protection Regulation Disclosures

Some of the recipients of users’ personal information may be located outside of your home country. In particular, but not exclusively, users in the European Union (EU) should be aware that their data will be transferred to the United States and that the European Commission has not found United States law to adequately protect the rights of data subjects under General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Users in the EU have the right to lodge a complaint under GDPR with their Member State’s supervisory authority.

Your Access to and Control over Information

View and Update

You have the right to change or correct any information that AILA has about you. You may also request to see what additional data AILA has about you if any. You can change or update your information online at: https://www.aila.org/myaila or you may contact us via email at membership@aila.org or via phone at 202-507-7600.

Data Retention and the Right to Be Forgotten

AILA collects personal data from members and nonmembers who wish to create an account. AILA stores that data for the period necessary to fulfill the purposes outlined in this privacy policy, unless a longer retention period is required or allowed by law. You may request that we delete any of your personal contact information that we have with the exception of financial transaction history within the past seven years. You can change or update your information online at: http://www.aila.org/myaila or you may contact us via email at membership@aila.org or via phone at 202-507-7600.

Right to Opt Out

You may opt out of any future mail or email contact from AILA or its third-party partners at any time. You can do so by changing your account’s communication preferences at: http://www.aila.org/MyAila/Account/ContactSettings or by contacting AILA via email at membership@aila.org or via phone at 202-507-7600. All promotional emails contain information on how to unsubscribe or change your communication preferences.

Security Procedures

AILA uses administrative, technical, and physical safeguards to protect the information that AILA collects. This includes, when required or when appropriate and feasible, obtaining written assurances from third parties that may access your data that they will provide a level of protection equivalent to AILA’s. However, no information system can be 100% secure, so we cannot guarantee the absolute security of your information. Moreover, we are not responsible for the security of information you transmit to us over networks that we do not control, including the internet and wireless networks.

We take additional security measures with regard to credit card information. When you submit credit card data, that information is encrypted and transmitted to AILA in a secure way using SSL methods. You can verify this by looking for a closed lock icon at the bottom of your web browser, or by looking for “https” at the beginning of the web page address (URL). While we use encryption to protect sensitive information transmitted online, we also protect your information offline. We do not store credit card numbers in our database. We only store the type of card, its expiration date, and the last four digits.

Direct access to our membership database is limited to AILA National office staff and our third-party programmers. The computers/servers in which we store personally identifiable information are kept in a secure hosting environment that requires biometric access and access is limited to our third-party hosting contractors. Information stored in our member database is viewable only by AILA staff through their computers.

Policy Updates, Questions, and Concerns

Our privacy policy may change from time to time and all updates will be posted on this page and distributed via the AILA.org Recent Postings alert.

If you feel that we are not abiding by this privacy policy, you should contact us immediately via email at membership@aila.org or via phone at 202-507-7600.