THIS NOTICE IS APPLICABLE AND HAS AN EFFECTIVE DATE AS OF JUNE 13, 2025, FOR NEW SURVEY RESPONDENTS.
FOR PRIOR AND EXISTING SURVEY RESPONDENTS, THIS NOTICE WILL TAKE EFFECT BEGINNING JULY 13, 2025, UNLESS YOU ACKNOWLEDGE RECEIPT OF THIS NOTICE EARLIER. UNTIL THEN, THE TERMS IN OUR PREVIOUS PRIVACY NOTICE, OR THE VERSION YOU RECEIVED AT THE TIME OF THE SURVEY, ARE APPLICABLE.
GfK US MRI, LLC d/b/a MRI-Simmons (“MRI-Simmons”, “we,” “us,” or “our”) is a United States-based company and a leading provider of actionable insights on the American consumer. We enable our customers with profiling, media planning and activation tools to help them better understand the U.S. consumer and improve their abilities to analyze, enrich, and action against those insights. You’ll most likely interact with us when participating in one of our surveys. We refer to this as being a part of our consumer dataset and make references throughout this Notice to our “survey respondents.”
This Privacy Notice (“Notice”) describes how MRI-Simmons handles the Personal Information we collect and the rights you may have over this information. We collect data both online and offline – mainly through your survey responses – via our websites (mrisurvey.com and mrisimmons.com), email and postal correspondence, and telephone interactions (collectively, our “Services”). Our MRI-Simmons Health Data Notice supplements this Notice and describes our privacy practices as related to consumer health data. You may also receive additional supplemental privacy notices specific to those interactions at the time your Personal Information is collected.
MRI-Simmons belongs to the group of companies listed here, which together form the “NIQ Group.” This Notice does not apply to any other product or service provided by NielsenIQ, nor your interactions with us as employees or job applicants.
In this Notice:
- “Personal Information” refers to any data that can identify or be reasonably linked to a particular individual. This includes details like name, address, phone number, and email, but also encompasses information derived from inferences and insights about your personal life, such as your purchasing habits, preferences, and interests. The term also includes “personal data,” or similar terms as defined in applicable law.
- “Sensitive Personal Information” refers to Personal Information that is generally considered private and that could be used to cause harm if it falls into the wrong hands, such as identity theft or fraud. This includes information revealing a person’s racial or ethnic origin, sex life or sexual orientation, financial information, religious and philosophical beliefs, and health status or conditions. The term also includes “sensitive personal data,” or similar terms as defined in applicable law.
NOTICE AT COLLECTION OF PERSONAL INFORMATION
This Notice at Collection provides some key information about our privacy practices: the categories of Personal Information we collect; how we obtain, share, and maintain Personal Information; and how you can instruct MRI-Simmons to stop sharing your Personal Information.
Please note that we do not use your name, address, or any directly identifiable information you provide to us for direct marketing or sales purposes to you. We never share this identifiable information with telemarketers, nor do we permit our business customers to use it for direct marketing or sales to you.
We collect the following categories of Personal Information mainly through your survey responses via our Services. Note that some specific data elements may fall into one or more of the categories.
- Identifiers and Biographical Information, including your name, age, postal address, phone number, email address, and number of children in your household. We automatically collect device identifiers such as Internet Protocol (“IP”) address, and identifiers and other information that are stored in cookies and similar technologies.
- Commercial Information, including your claimed purchase history of products and services, as well as your buying and financing preferences.
- Internet or Other Electronic Network Activity Information, including the pages of our websites that you visit and the amount of time you spend viewing the websites, form field entries, IP address, browser type and version, browser plug-in type and version, device type, operating system, carrier, and platform.
- Professional or Employment-Related Information, including your education level, industry, occupation, income range, job title, and role.
- Approximate Location Information based on the IP address assigned to the device and the time-zone setting that you use to access our websites.
- Sensory Information, including audio recordings of phone calls you have with us and voice messages you leave us.
- Sensitive Personal Information that may be revealed through your survey responses, such as your race, ethnicity, health information, religious and philosophical beliefs, sex and sexual orientation, and the sex and age of children in your household.
- Protected Classification Characteristics, under applicable state and federal law, such as your age, race, military or veteran status, national origin, and disability, that may be revealed through your survey responses.
- Other Personal Information that you voluntarily provide to us when responding to our surveys or otherwise engaging with our Services, which may be dependent on the type of survey you’re completing for us.
- Inferences about your interests and habits based on your survey responses and the categories of Personal Information listed above. This includes information about your media consumption, purchase history and usage of certain types of products or services, as well as your attitudes, opinions, values, preferences, activities, behaviors, and intentions.
We collect these categories of Personal Information to provide MRI-Simmons’ customers with data they use for market research, product development, marketing and business strategy that helps them understand their markets and prospective customers.
We may “sell” or “share” (as those terms are defined in applicable law) some types of Personal Information to third parties. If you participate as a survey respondent, we may provide Personal Information such as data about your preferred products and services, as well as some of your demographic characteristics, to customers such as e-commerce businesses, investment companies, consumer brands, media companies, marketing agencies, and data brokers. As a reminder, your directly identifiable Personal Information will never be sold or shared with MRI-Simmons’ customers to target you or sell to you.
We do not sell or share directly identifiable Personal Information about individuals under the age of 18. Before collecting information from or about survey respondents under the age of 18, we first obtain consent authorizing our processing of the Personal Information from a parent or legal guardian.
Our websites use Google Analytics to collect Personal Information, including identifiers and information about your activity on our websites for our impression, demographic, and interest reporting. You can opt-out of the use of this technology through the Google Analytics opt-out browser add on, your Google Ad Settings, your device’s Ad Settings for mobile apps, and the NAI’s consumer opt out.
Privacy Requests: To opt out of the sale or sharing of Personal Information collected through our Services, including parents or guardians on behalf of individuals under age 18, navigate to Your Privacy Rights. Because we do not process your Personal Information for targeted advertising purposes, we do not offer an ability to opt out/withdraw consent of targeted advertising.
You may also choose to enable a browser-based signal that automatically communicates your opt-out preferences, such as the Global Privacy Control (“GPC”). Where required, we will process the GPC signal as a request to opt out of sales through the websites.
Retention: We will retain your Personal Information for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfill the purposes described in this Notice, or to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements. Our data retention period reflects several factors, including our relationship with users of our Services, the nature and sensitivity of Personal Information, and what is reasonably necessary and proportionate to provide and improve our Services.
1. HOW WE COLLECT AND USE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
We may collect Personal Information (a) that you provide directly to us; (b) automatically when you use our websites as a survey respondent or separately as a website visitor; and (c) from third parties.
A. Information You Provide
We invite people like you to take part in a variety of surveys, which begin once you receive an invitation from us. When you choose to participate, we start collecting certain personal information – like your email or mailing address – so we can stay in touch and send you any Thank You Payments you may earn.
We use this Personal Information for the following business and commercial purposes:
- To operate, maintain, and improve our Services, including verifying your identity and administering our surveys
- To provide reports to our customers, including reports relating to: marketing; retail sales measurement and analysis; product advertising and marketing strategies and tools; consumer preferences and demands; product innovation and development; consumer purchasing decisions, histories, and behaviors; competitor and market analysis; and supply chain management
- To develop our product and service offerings, such as our:
- Lookalike models, the frameworks in how we organize groups of consumers who are likely to be interested in ads for certain types of products and services,
- Lookalike audiences, new audiences we create to mirror the characteristics of our survey respondents, and
- Segments for targeted advertising, distinct groups within our audiences, categorized based on specific criteria such as demographics, interests, behaviors, or geographic location.
- To measure the effectiveness of advertising campaigns that our customers conduct
- To create datasets about your survey responses
- For analytics, insights, product development, and market dynamics and/or research
B. Information That We Automatically Collect
Our websites use cookies and other similar technologies which differ based on whether you use our websites as a survey respondent or separately as a website visitor – we don’t combine website visitors’ cookie profiles to survey respondents’ details. When you visit and interact with our websites, we, or our third-party advertising and analytics partners and service providers, may use a variety of technologies, such as cookies, tags, SDKs or scripts, to collect information about how you use our websites. This includes information about your browser or device; approximate geographic location; and use of our websites (e.g., the pages of our websites you visit).
These technologies access and/or store information in your browser or on your devices to distinguish you from others, make your site navigation more efficient, help remember your preferences, enhance your browsing experience, and improve the use, security, and functionality of our websites. When third parties place their own cookies, they may create identifiers that they associate with you or your device. They may then combine this information with other data sources for analytics or advertising purposes.
For more information about these technologies and the rights you may have over this information, visit our Cookie Notice. To opt out of nonessential cookies or adjust your cookie settings, select “Your Cookie Choices” on the cookie banner, also located in the footer of our websites.
C. Information From Third-Party Sources
If you register as a survey respondent, we may collect and combine information about you from third-party data providers.This includes demographic information, such as your city or region, which we use to improve our data models and other products which MRI-Simmons’ customers use for market research and analytics.
In addition, we may combine information that we collect from our Services with information that our customers have about their consumers. We use this combined information to perform analysis or to create lookalike models and audiences, helping our customers understand their prospective customers.
Finally, we may analyze your Personal Information alongside that of other survey respondents to draw inferences about you. For instance, if you haven’t specified your favorite brands in your survey responses, we might supplement your profile by incorporating preferences from other survey respondents with similar sociodemographic or personal characteristics.
Rest assured, you are removed from lookalike audiences. We do not target you based on your survey responses, nor do we allow our customers to do so.
D. Other Uses of Personal Information
- To communicate with you, including to respond to your inquiries, provide instructions for completing our surveys, and deliver your Thank You Payments upon survey completion
- To monitor, protect, and maintain the security of our Services and our business
- To comply with applicable laws and regulations and respond to lawful requests for Personal Information
- To carry out corporate restructures, sales, and business transactions in which information held by us is among the assets transferred or is otherwise relevant to the transaction
- To protect our rights, privacy, safety, property and/or those of others
- To fulfill any other purpose explained to you at the point of collection, or with your consent
2. HOW WE DISCLOSE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
We may disclose your Personal Information for the purposes described in the “How We Collect and Use Your Personal Information” section above to our customers, corporate affiliates, service providers, and third parties that provide advertising and analytics services.
- Our Customers. As a survey respondent, if you complete our surveys, we provide data about and derived from your Personal Information to some of our customers. As described above, we develop lookalike advertising models, audiences, and segments and ensure that you (our survey respondents) are not targeted for direct marketing or sales purposes.
- Our Corporate Affiliates, which include our parent company and its subsidiaries listed here, the NIQ Group.
- Our Service Providers. We disclose your Personal Information to our service providers that provide business, professional, or technical support services to us, help us operate our business and the Services, or administer activities on our behalf. We require our service providers to only use your Personal Information in connection with providing services to MRI-Simmons.
- Analytics Providers. We make available information from our Services to allow our analytics providers to help us understand use of the Services and how to improve them.
In certain circumstances, we may disclose each category of your Personal Information to:
- Governmental, Regulatory, and Public Authorities. We may disclose your Personal Information to government and law enforcement authorities to comply with legal or regulatory obligations or requests.
- Relevant Third Parties as Part of a Corporate Transaction. In the event of a reorganization, merger, sale, joint venture, assignment, transfer, or other disposition of all or any portion of our business, assets, or stock (including in connection with a bankruptcy or similar proceeding), we may disclose or transfer your Personal Information to certain third parties, such as the acquiring entity and its advisers.
- Other Third Parties. We will disclose your Personal Information to other third parties at your direction or with your consent. Additionally, we will disclose your Personal Information as necessary or appropriate to: (a) comply with applicable law; (b) enforce our terms and conditions; (c) protect our operations; (d) protect our rights, privacy, safety, or property, and/or those of you or others; and (e) allow us to pursue available remedies or limit damages that we may sustain.
In addition, we may disclose your Personal Information for other reasons that we will describe at the time of information collection or prior to disclosing your information.
When we disclose Personal Information, we take contractual, technical, and organizational measures that are designed to limit the recipients’ use to specific purposes that are consistent with this Notice and in accordance with applicable law.
We may deidentify or aggregate Personal Information so that it will no longer be considered Personal Information and no longer governed by this Notice. Once deidentified, we do not attempt to reidentify the data and ensure it will not be reidentified by implementing strict technical and organizational measures to prevent reidentification and by ensuring that third parties adhere to the same non-reidentification commitments.
3. AUTOMATED DECISION MAKING AND PROFILING
We use automated processes to infer information about you and to create lookalike audiences that our customers use for interest-based advertising. To the extent that these activities constitute automated decision making or profiling, we take steps to do so in a fair and non-discriminatory manner. We do not process your Personal Information for profiling that produces a legal or similar significant effect, such as a decision to approve or deny your application for a loan.
4. DATA AUTHORIZATIONS AND THANK YOU PAYMENTS
Your participation in our surveys is always voluntary. You may stop participating and/or providing Personal Information at any time. If you withdraw your consent to the processing of your Personal Information, you will no longer be eligible for studies and consequently, any future incentives and compensations we may offer to other survey participants.
Notice of Financial Incentive: Your Voice Matters — And We Thank You for It!
Your opinions matter, and so does your Personal Information. That’s why we offer “Thank You Payments” (TYP) when you participate in our surveys – it’s our way of saying thanks for your time and insights.
When you share your feedback, you’re helping us better understand what people want – from shopping habits to personal preferences. This helps us improve our products, create new ones, and build stronger relationships with our customers.
While we don’t assign a specific dollar value to your Personal Information, the rewards we offer reflect the value your input brings – balanced against the cost of collecting data and providing TYP. The amount you receive may vary depending on the survey and your location, but your contribution is always appreciated.
Thank you for helping us grow – and for letting us thank you in return!
- Opt In Consent: We invite survey respondents to participate in our surveys – and for some of them, respondents may receive a Thank You Payment once a survey is completed.
- Withdrawing Consent: Survey respondents can withdraw their consent at any time by simply exiting their browser or choosing not to return the survey booklet.
5. PRIVACY RIGHTS AND CHOICES
A. Explanation of Privacy Rights and Choices
In accordance with applicable law (and subject to certain exceptions), you may have certain rights over your Personal Information, including the right to:
- Access your Personal Information (including access in a portable format). You may have the right to request a privacy report detailing the Personal Information collected, disclosed, sold, and shared about you and the purpose for doing so, unless your request proves impossible or would involve disproportionate effort to fulfill. We may not be required to respond to your requests “to know” or access specific pieces of Personal Information more than twice in any 12-month period.
- Request a list of third parties with whom we have shared or sold your Personal Information. However, we are not required to provide the names of our customers or other trade secrets.
- Delete your Personal Information, that we maintain about you, subject to certain exceptions.
- Correct inaccurate Personal Information that we maintain about you, subject to appropriate verification.
- Opt out of sales, sharing, and targeted advertising (as these terms are defined in applicable law). You may request to opt out of the sale or sharing of your Personal Information at any time by navigating to Your Privacy Rights, also located in the footer of our websites, or you can email us at privacy@mrisimmons.net with the subject line “Privacy Rights.” Because we do not process your Personal Information for targeted advertising purposes, we do not offer an ability to opt out/withdraw consent of targeted advertising. In addition, we will treat requests sent through the GPC as a valid request to opt out of the sale or sharing of Personal Information linked to that browser. If you use different browsers or browser profiles, you may need to enable the signal on each browser or profile.
- Limit use or disclosure of Sensitive Personal Information, or withdraw consent to process your Sensitive Personal Information, subject to certain exceptions.
- Appeal a decision we have made in connection with your privacy rights request. Please contact us via Your Privacy Rights or by email to privacy@mrisimmons.net. You also may have a right to complain to your state’s Attorney General or supervisory authority.
B. Exercising Privacy Rights and Choices
To submit privacy rights requests (subject to limitations and exceptions under applicable law), you can select Your Privacy Rights, also located in the footer of our websites, email us at privacy@mrisimmons.net with the subject line “Privacy Rights,” or call our toll-free number at 1-800-551-6425. Submitting a privacy rights request does not require you to create an account with us.
We may take steps to confirm your identity before responding to your request by asking you a series of questions about your previous interactions with us. We may decline a request (other than an opt-out request) if we are unable to confirm your identity (or an agent’s authority to make the request) and confirm the Personal Information we maintain relates to you.
We will not discriminate against you if you decide to exercise your privacy rights.
C. Authorized Agent Requests
Only you, or someone legally authorized to act on your behalf, may submit a request related to your Personal Information.
In accordance with applicable law, you may authorize someone to make a privacy rights request on your behalf (an “Authorized Agent”). To confirm their authority, Authorized Agents will need to demonstrate that you’ve authorized them to act on your behalf. Authorization must be done in writing and signed, and the writing must identify the agent and explain what request they are authorized to make. Your Authorized Agent must include a copy of this writing or a copy of a valid power of attorney with the request. MRI-Simmons retains the right to request confirmation directly from you, confirming that the agent is authorized to make such a request, or to request additional information that is necessary to identify you.
Submit Authorized Agent requests at Your Privacy Rights uploading the authorization documentation or submit the complete request with attachments via email to privacy@mrisimmons.net with the subject line “Authorized Agent Privacy Rights.”
6. EXTERNAL LINKS
Our Services may contain links to third-party sites and services, such as social media websites, which may have privacy policies that differ from our own. We are not responsible for the practices of these third-party sites and services. We encourage you to review their privacy information to learn more about their practices.
7. PERSONAL INFORMATION OF CHILDREN
Our Services are not intended for use by nor directed toward individuals under the age of 18. We only process the Personal Information of individuals under age 18 to the extent permitted by law and with prior consent of the parent or legal guardian where necessary. If we learn that we have inadvertently collected or received Personal Information from individuals under 18, we will delete the Personal Information or take other steps to comply with applicable law.
We do not knowingly sell or share directly identifiable Personal Information about individuals under the age of 18. Parents or guardians may opt-out of this processing on behalf of individuals under age 18 at any time by navigating to Your Privacy Rights, also located in the footer of our websites, emailing us at privacy@mrisimmons.net, or calling our toll-free number at 1-800-405-0170.
8. DATA SECURITY
We maintain a comprehensive information security program with administrative, physical, and technical safeguards to maintain the confidentiality, integrity, and accessibility of your information. However, as no transmission of information over the internet is absolutely secure, we cannot guarantee the safety of your information.
9. REVISIONS TO THIS PRIVACY NOTICE
We reserve the right, in our sole discretion, to change, modify, add, remove, or otherwise revise portions of this Notice at any time, for example as our Services develop and evolve, to comply with legal requirements, or to address changes in our business practices. When we do, we will post the revised Notice to our websites. Your continued participation as a survey respondent or use of our websites following the posting of changes to these terms means you accept these changes. If we change the Notice in a material way, we will provide appropriate notice to you and update the date at the top of the Notice.
10. HOW TO CONTACT US
MRI-Simmons is committed to protecting your Personal Information. If you have any questions or concerns about this Notice, our privacy practices and the protection of your Personal Information, or the privacy rights and choices available to you as described in this Notice, you may contact us in the following ways:
| Contact Method | Details |
|---|---|
| Webform | Your Privacy Rights |
| privacy@mrisimmons.net | |
| Subject | Privacy Rights |
| Toll-Free Phone | 1-800-551-6425 |
| U.S. Postal Mail |
MRI-Simmons 200 W. Jackson Blvd Ste 26, Chicago, IL 60606 Attn: Privacy Rights |
| Data Protection Officer |
niq@hewardmills.com Attn: MRI-Simmons |