Terms of use agreement
By using Canadian Blood Services’ websites (including but not limited to www.blood.ca, www.professionaleducation.blood.ca) and applications (e.g. GiveBlood app), or interacting with Canadian Blood Services on our social media accounts (each a “Platform,” collectively the “Platforms”), you agree to comply with and be bound by this Terms of Use Agreement ("Agreement"). If you do not agree with the Agreement, do not use the Platforms. The term "Canadian Blood Services" or "us" or "we" or "our" refers to Canadian Blood Services. The term "you" refers to the user or viewer of the Platform(s).
This Agreement may be amended by us without specific notice to you, by updating this content. This Agreement constitutes the entire and only agreement between us and you, and supersedes all prior or contemporaneous agreements, representations, warranties, and understandings with respect to the subject matter of this Agreement.
This Agreement applies to anyone who uses or interacts with our Platforms, including but not limited to blood (e.g., whole blood, plasma, platelets) donors and prospective donors, Donor Generations Program participants, participants in the Canadian Blood Services Stem Cell Registry (“Stem Cell Registry”) and participants in the Canadian Blood Services’ Cord Blood Bank (“Cord Blood Bank”), and patients supported by Canadian Blood Services Programs. Please review the applicable privacy notice and our information practices on https://www.blood.ca/en/legal-information, for additional information on how we collect, use and share personal information.
1. Use of the Platforms
Canadian Blood Services grants you a non-exclusive, non-transferable, limited license to access and use the Platforms for your personal use. The information provided through the Platforms is for informational and educational purposes only and is not intended to provide specific legal or health-related advice for any individual and should not be relied upon in that regard. For information on individual health questions, contact your health care provider.
2. Account set-up
To access certain features on our Platforms, you may be required to create an online account. Creating an account is voluntary and other options for scheduling appointments or registering for donation programs are available by contacting 1-888-236-6283 or feedback@blood.ca.
You agree that any information you provide to create your account is accurate and complete. To create an online account, you must be at least 17 years old. Each account is for your personal use only and not on behalf of any other person or entity. If you create a Partners for Life team, you agree that you have the express consent of your team members to collect, use and share their personal information for purposes of the Partners for Life program.
You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your password and agree not to use another person’s account at any time or allow the use of your account by any other person. You agree to notify Canadian Blood Services immediately if you suspect any unauthorized use of your account or access to your password. You are responsible for all use of your online account. Canadian Blood Services reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to terminate the account of any person it believes has violated this Agreement.
3. Personal information
Canadian Blood Services may collect your personal information when you use our Platforms or engage with us on social media platforms, such as Instagram or Facebook. This includes, but is not limited to, your contact and demographic information, and personal stories. You agree that Canadian Blood Services may use this personal information for reasons including, but not limited to, responding to your inquiries, contacting you about your participation or opportunities to participate in Canadian Blood Services events, contests, surveys and donation programs, contacting you about and sharing your personal story on our Platforms, through social media (e.g. Instagram or Facebook) or emails, and to send you newsletters and provide you information about Platform updates, and upcoming events.
Canadian Blood Services will not use or share the personal information that we collect about you for other purposes unless permitted or required by law, for other reasonable purposes, or in accordance with our privacy notice(s), as applicable.
4. Submitted content
Certain features of our Platforms allow users to post or submit personal stories, images, audio and videos or other types of content, which may include your personal information, for public viewing. You must be the age of majority in your place of residence to upload, post, publish, display or submit a story, image, audio, video or any other content or personal information on our Platforms (“Content”).
You are solely responsible for the Content you post or submit to us. You shall not post or submit any Content that you did not create or that you do not have permission to post or submit. You represent, warrant and agree that Content posted or submitted by you will not contain personal information of a third party without their express consent or violate or infringe upon the rights of any third party, including copyright, trademark, publicity, personality, personal or proprietary rights, or contain libelous, defamatory or otherwise unlawful or harmful material. You further agree that you will not post or submit any Content on our Platforms that is inappropriate, harmful, threatening, unlawful, defamatory, abusive, inflammatory, harassing, vulgar, obscene, fraudulent, invasive of privacy, publicity or personality, hateful, or discriminatory in any way.
By posting or submitting Content, you voluntarily and without compensation grant Canadian Blood Services an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, fully paid, royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable and worldwide license to use the Content in the advertising, publicity, recruitment, or other business purpose of Canadian Blood Services. These rights include, but are not limited to, the right to copy, publish, display, reproduce, edit, combine, paraphrase, reformat, translate, excerpt, store and distribute such Content, all as Canadian Blood Services may determine without restriction, on, or in connection with, the Platforms, social media, and through email or other promotional materials.
Canadian Blood Services is not responsible for the privacy or security practices of other websites or social media platforms. You understand that by posting or submitting Content, you are allowing the public to access and use that information, and to associate it with you (e.g. your name, image, story). You understand and agree that Canadian Blood Services may delete or remove, without notice to you, any Content in its sole discretion, for any reason from the Platforms.
5. Cookies and web analytics
A cookie is a small text file that is stored on your device when you visit our Platforms. They enable us to track your use of the Platform and to improve user experience. We may use cookies to help us recognize repeat Platform users, to monitor usage and web traffic routing, to customize and improve our Platforms, to assist with marketing and recruitment efforts, and to personalize content. Please refer to your web browser manufacturer (e.g. Google Chrome) for information relating to cookie management.
Our Platform servers and operations are hosted and managed in-house and include logging and analyzing transaction data from page visits. We use Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity to collect certain information about web traffic. To learn more about how Google or Microsoft use data when you visit our Platforms, please review Google's Privacy and Terms and Microsoft’s Privacy Statement.
We may also collect the following information when you visit our Platforms:
Information about your devices (partial (truncated) Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, geographic location, browser type and version, device type and operating system); and
Information about your browsing preferences and habits (date and time of visits, pages viewed, time spent on our Platforms; and the websites you visited just before our Platform.
This information is collected for data analytics, improving recruitment, improving Platform performance, tracking Platform usage and for security purposes. In addition, our advertisers and ad serving companies may use web beacons, spotlights, or clear gifs to determine which advertisements and promotions visitors have seen and how they responded to them.
6. Contact preferences, account and content deletion
If you wish to change your contact preferences, you can do so through your online account or GiveBlood application, or by contacting 1-888-236-6283 or feedback@blood.ca. If you wish to delete your account on any of our Platforms, your Donor profile remains active, if applicable, but you will no longer be able to log into your account on the Platform.
Please note that opting out of communications or deleting your account does not delete your personal information from our systems, which remains subject to our privacy notices, as applicable.
You may request to remove your Content from our Platforms at any time except (i) to the extent that it has been shared with or by others, and they copied or stored it outside the Platforms, and (ii) for the reasonable time to remove it from the Platforms. However, Canadian Blood Services may retain archived copies of your Content.
7. Website linking
Links to other websites and social media platforms, or references to other organizations, products, services, or publications do not constitute endorsement or approval by Canadian Blood Services, including where Platforms contain advertising and sponsorships. Canadian Blood Services is not responsible for the illegality or any error, inaccuracy or problem in the advertiser's or sponsor's materials, and makes no representations whatsoever about any other websites or social media platforms which you may access through our Platforms. Canadian Blood Services cannot and does not warrant the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, non-infringement, merchantability, or fitness for a particular purpose of any information available through these links and disclaims any opinions expressed on such websites. If you choose to access any such other websites or social media platforms, you do so at your own risk.
8. Third party service providers
We may use third party service providers, including service providers outside of Canada. In some cases, those service providers may collect your personal information directly from you and your personal information may be subject to their privacy policies. All providers are contractually obligated to protect your personal information and to only collect, use and share the personal information they require for the purposes of providing these services to Canadian Blood Services.
9. Live chat
Our Platforms may have a live chat tool to provide technical support for online account users, appointment booking, and to answer general questions. Use of the live chat tool is voluntary. Chat transmissions are encrypted; however, it is not recommended that you use our live chat tool to send personal information.
10. Security
Canadian Blood Services implements physical, technical and administrative safeguards to prevent unauthorized access to your information and to maintain data security.
11. Intellectual property
Unless otherwise indicated, all material on our Platforms (including but not limited to texts, images, videos, articles, photographs, documents, forms, tools, etc.) (“Materials”) is property of Canadian Blood Services. The Material is protected under applicable copyrights, trademarks and other proprietary (including but not limited to intellectual property) laws and may not be copied, used, reproduced, republished, distributed, modified or communicated, in whole or in part, in any form whatsoever, except as expressly provided in this Agreement, without the prior written consent of Canadian Blood Services.
Canadian Blood Services authorizes you to view or download a single copy of the Materials, but not any trademark, logo or other visual representation on the Platform, solely for your personal non-commercial use. Materials on our education Platforms, including but not limited to professionaleducation.blood.ca, may also be viewed, downloaded, reproduced or translated for educational, research or healthcare purposes but not for any commercial purposes. Any use of the Materials must include the following copyright notice: 'Copyright © Canadian Blood Services. All rights reserved.' Images and videos on our Platforms may be used in conjunction with media pieces. These images and videos must not be altered or digitally enhanced, and their use must be in accordance with the Copyright Act and this Agreement. Any other use of the Material is strictly prohibited without our prior written permission and the permission of applicable rights holder(s). If you violate any of these terms, your permission to use the Materials automatically terminates and you must immediately destroy any copies you have made of any portion of the Materials.
12. System integrity
You may not use any device, software or routine to interfere or attempt to interfere with the proper working of Canadian Blood Services’ Platforms. You may not take any action, which imposes an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on Canadian Blood Services’ infrastructure.
13. Warranties
We do not represent or warrant that the Platforms will be error-free, free of viruses or other harmful components, or that defects will be corrected. We may make changes to the features and functionality of the Platform at any time. We reserve the right in our sole discretion to edit or delete any documents, information, or other content appearing on the Platform. Canadian Blood Services assumes no responsibility to the user or any third party for the consequences of any errors or omissions.
Except to the extent legally required, Canadian Blood Services specifically disclaims all expressed and implied representations, warranties and conditions of any kind, including but not limited to those regarding accuracy, completeness, timeliness, non-infringement, merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose.
14. Release and Indemnification
You agree to indemnify, defend and hold Canadian Blood Services and our partners, agents, officers, directors, employees, subcontractors, successors, assigns, third party suppliers of information and documents, advertisers, product and service providers, and affiliates harmless from any liability, loss, claims, damages, actions, costs and expense, including reasonable legal fees, arising out of or in connection with your use, reliance on or reproduction of the Platforms or your violation of this Agreement.
15. Limitation of liability
When using the Platforms, information will be transmitted over a medium that may be beyond the control and jurisdiction of Canadian Blood Services. As such, we assume no liability for or relating to the delay, failure, interruption or corruption of any data or other information transmitted in connection with the Platforms. Canadian Blood Services will not be liable if, for any reason, all or any part of the Platforms is restricted to users or unavailable at any time or for any period.
Except to the extent legally required, Canadian Blood Services shall not be liable to you and/or any third party under any circumstances for any damages of any kind arising out of or relating to the use of or your ability to access or use, or reliance upon, our Platforms including, but not limited to, any lost profits, lost opportunities, special, incidental, direct, indirect, consequential or punitive damages.
16. Unlawful activity
We reserve the right to investigate complaints or reported violations of this Agreement and to take any action we deem appropriate, including but not limited to reporting any suspected unlawful activity to law enforcement officials, regulators, or other third parties and disclosing any information necessary or appropriate to such persons or entities relating to your use of the Platforms.
17. Governing law
All matters relating to this Agreement, including all disputes, shall be governed by and interpreted in accordance with the laws in force in the Province of Ontario. Unless otherwise prohibited by law, any dispute arising out of or relating to this Agreement, including a question of whether a matter is arbitrable, shall be determined by binding arbitration in Ontario. The arbitrators shall have exclusive jurisdiction to determine all issues between the parties and the arbitrators’ decision shall be final and binding with no right of appeal to any court. The parties hereby agree to carry out any decision or order made by the arbitrators in good faith. If any provision in this Agreement is held invalid, illegal, or unenforceable, such determination shall not affect the validity, legality or enforceability of the remaining provisions of this Agreement.
18. How to contact us
Should you have any questions or concerns about this Agreement or your personal information, please contact us at legalnotification@blood.ca.