Privacy Policy | Methode Electronics

Methode Electronics, Inc.

Privacy Policy

Last Updated: 2/27/2024

Methode Electronics Inc. and its subsidiaries (collectively “Methode”, “we”, and “our”) are committed to protecting your privacy and take the protection of your personal data very seriously. This Privacy Policy applies to you as a Methode customer or visitor (a “consumer”) to our website (the “Site”). This Privacy Policy is designed to assist you in understanding how we collect and use the personal data you provide to us, including when you visit our Site, and your choices regarding our use of that information. Please read this Privacy Policy very carefully. Methode is the entity responsible for processing information (i.e., the data controller) under this Privacy Policy.

Because Methode operates globally, this Privacy Policy takes into consideration various privacy regulations and frameworks governing the collection, use, maintenance, sharing and disposition (collectively, “processing”) of personal data. Our privacy practices may vary among the geographies in which we operate to reflect local practices and legal requirements.

Additional information relating to our practices and the rights of individuals located in specific geographies is provided at the end of the Privacy Policy in both the “Notice to Residents of the U.K. and European Union” and the “Notice to Residents of California” sections.

Personal Data

Throughout this Privacy Policy, we use the term “personal data” to describe information that can be associated with an identified or an identifiable person, household or device. Personal data includes, but is not limited to a name, an identification number, location data, or an online identifier.

Changes to the Privacy Policy

We ask that you read this Privacy Policy from time to time. We may modify it at any time in our sole discretion. If we make material changes to this Privacy Policy that increase our rights to use personal data that we have previously collected about you, we will notify and/or obtain your consent, where required by law, either through your registered email address or by prominent posting on this Site.

The following topics are covered below:

What Personal Data Does Methode Collect?
Where Does the Personal Data Come From?
Directly from You
Through Automated Means
How Is Your Personal Data Used?
When We Share Your Personal Data
Legal Basis for Processing Your Personal Data
How and When Do We Protect Your Personal Data?
How We Protect Children’s Privacy
Data Retention
Location and Transfer of Personal Data
Links to Other Websites
What Are Your Rights and Options?
Right to Opt Out of Marketing or Withdraw Consent
Complaints
Do Not Track
Notice to Residents of the U.K. and European Union
Notice to Residents of California
How You Can Contact Us
Cookie Policy

WHAT PERSONAL DATA DOES METHODE COLLECT?

We collect data about you when you interact with the Site, including when you undertake the user registration process or join our mailing list. The personal data we collect includes the following information:

Information We Have Collected In The Past 12 Months	The Source of The Information	What We Collect It For	Legal basis for processing of personal data
Personal Identifiers such as your name	Directly from consumer	Provide information about products and services that we offer, in accordance with applicable law. · Respond to your enquiries. · Send you information relating to investor relations that you request to receive.	We rely on our legitimate interests, namely, to communicate with customers and users of the Site in responses to your requests or communications.
Contact information such as your e-mail address, physical address, and phone number.	Directly from consumer	· Provide information about products and services that we offer, in accordance with applicable law. · Respond to your enquiries. · Send you information relating to investor relations that you request to receive.	We rely on our legitimate interests, namely, to communicate with customers and users of the Site in responses to your requests or communications.
IP address	From consumer through automated means as a result of web browsing activity	· Serve the functions of the Site. · Manage everyday business needs, such as administration and improvement of the Site. · Analyze the performance and functioning of the Site. · Analyze how you use the Site. · Prevent, protect against, and detect fraud, abuse or other unlawful activity. · Enforce the Site’s Terms of Use, other corporate policies, and industry standards. · Comply with all applicable laws and reporting obligations.	We rely on your consent (where required under applicable law).
Web Browser type and version	From consumer through automated means as a result of web browsing activity	· Serve the functions of the Site. · Manage everyday business needs, such as administration and improvement of the Site. · Analyze the performance and functioning of the Site. · Analyze how you use the Site.	We rely on your consent (where required under applicable law).

You can choose not to provide personal data to Methode by refraining from, among other things, using our services and requesting information. You also may refrain from submitting information directly to us. However, if you do not provide personal data when requested, we may not be able to provide you with the full range of our products and services, or with information about our products, services, promotions, and other opportunities.

When you visit the Site, we place pieces of code, commonly referred to as “cookies,” or use similar technology (such as web beacons) on your devices. Where permitted by law, we begin collecting information as soon as you visit the Site, and by using the Site, you permit us to collect and use your information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

Cookies are small text files that are stored in a website visitor’s local browser cache and include an anonymous unique identifier and additional information necessary to optimize the website and to support the website’s intended functionality. We use cookies to set our Site visitor’s user preferences (for example, language selection) in order to provide the best possible web experience to you. You may adjust your internet browser to not accept or to delete our cookies at any time. However, if you set your browser to refuse cookies you may be unable to access certain parts of our Site. Unless you have adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies, our system will issue cookies when you direct your browser to our Site.

Please find more information about our use of cookies in our Cookie Policy below.

HOW IS YOUR PERSONAL DATA USED?

In addition to circumstances where you give us your written consent, we use the personal data we collect about you to do the following:

Communicate with you:

Provide information about products and services that we offer, in accordance with applicable law;
Respond to your enquiries;
Send you information relating to investor relations that you request to receive; and

Manage and improve our business operations

Serve the functions of the Site;
Manage everyday business needs, such as administration and improvement of the Site;
Prevent fraud;
Analyze the performance and functioning of the Site; and
Analyze how you use the Site.

Ensure a secure online environment and comply with legal requirements

Protect against and detect fraud, abuse or other unlawful activity;
Enforce the Site’s Terms of Use, other corporate policies, and industry standards; and
Comply with all applicable laws and reporting obligations.

Opt-Out Policy. If you no longer wish to receive communications from us, please follow the “unsubscribe” or “opt-out” instructions in the email you receive from us. We will process your request within a reasonable period of time.

When We Share Your Personal Data

We share your personal data with our affiliates and subsidiaries for the purposes of described in this Privacy Policy and with contractors, service providers and other third parties that support our business and perform functions on our behalf, as described below. Methode does not and will not sell, share or disclose your personal data to non-affiliated third parties.

Third parties providing services on our behalf. We engage third parties to perform services in connection with our business operations. These services may include (a) products and/or experience customization; (b) distribution of marketing and promotional material; (c) website evaluation; (d) data collection, storage, management, analysis and, where applicable, deletion; and (e) other services designed to maximize our business potential. These third parties have access to certain information, including personal data, to the extent necessary to perform their duties and functions.

Company security. We release information about our users, including personal data, when legally required to do so, at the request of government or public authorities conducting an investigation or in response to national security concerns, or to verify or enforce compliance with the policies governing our company and applicable laws. We also disclose such information when necessary to protect our rights, property or safety of Methode, our affiliates, business partners, customers or others, or to obtain legal advice.

Corporate change: We disclose, share or otherwise transfer user information, including personal data, in connection with a corporate merger, acquisition, consolidation, the sale of a portion of our business or the sale of substantially all of Methode’s assets, or other fundamental corporate change, whatever form it may take. You will be notified via email or prominent notice on our Site prior to a change of ownership or control of your personal data, if your personal data will be used contrary to this Privacy Policy. For clarification and the removal of doubt, Methode reserves the right to transfer or share a copy of personal data collected pursuant to this Privacy Policy, offline or otherwise, to the buyer of that portion of its business related to that data.

Aggregate data. We disclose aggregated, non-identifiable user statistics (such as the number of users who visited a page on the Site during a specific time period) to third parties for a variety of purposes, including describing our products to prospective partners and other third parties.

How We Protect Your Personal Data

Methode maintains physical and administrative controls to reasonably safeguard personal data. No website, internet transmission, computer system or network is completely secure, however. Therefore, Methode cannot guarantee that unauthorized access to information, data loss, or data destruction or alteration will never occur.

How We Protect Children’s Privacy

The Site is a general audience site and is not directed at or designed to be used by children under the age of 18. If we obtain actual knowledge that any information we collect has been provided by a child under the age of 18, we will promptly delete that information.

Data Retention

Methode will retain your personal data for as long as required to provide you with access to the Site and our services and for as long as necessary for the protection and pursuit of our legal rights and to fulfil obligations under laws applicable to our operations. After that time, Methode will destroy your personal data in accordance with Methode’s record retention schedule.

Links to Other Websites

Methode’s Site may contain links to other third-party websites that are not under our control and that we do not sponsor, endorse or maintain. Methode is not responsible for the content or the privacy practices of such websites, and they are not governed by this Privacy Policy or any other Methode policies or Terms of Use. Please consult the privacy policies of those websites for information about their privacy practices.

Do Not Track

Our Site does not collect personal data about your online activities over time and across third-party websites or online services. Therefore, “do not track” signals transmitted from web browsers do not apply to our Site, and we do not alter our data collection and use practices upon receipt of such a signal.

Right to Opt Out of Marketing or Withdraw Consent

In addition, you may at any time tell us not to send you marketing communications by email by clicking on the “opt out” or “unsubscribe” link within the marketing emails you receive from us or by contacting us as indicated below. We will apply your preferences going forward.

Where we rely on your consent to process your personal data, you have the right to withdraw consent at any time, without affecting the lawfulness of processing based on this consent before your withdrawal.

Complaints

If you are unhappy or have concerns about the way in which we have handled your personal data, please contact us (see “How You Can Contact Us”) so that we can try to resolve the issue. We encourage you to get in touch with us first; however, you also have the right to lodge a complaint with the applicable supervisory authority.

Location and Transfer of Personal Data

Our Sites are available in countries worldwide, and information you provide to us may be stored on servers and with third-party services providers in the United States and other countries in which we do business and whose data protection laws may differ from the jurisdiction in which you live. When we transfer the personal data of users who are located in the European Union and the United Kingdom to a location outside of the European Economic Area or UK (such as to the USA) for processing, we use an approved transfer mechanism, specifically standard contractual clauses. For more information or to obtain a copy of the relevant clauses, please contact .

Data Privacy Framework

Methode Electronics, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates Methode Development Company, Hetronic International, Inc., Hetronic USA, Inc., Dabir Surfaces, Inc., TouchSensor Technologies, LLC, Pacific Insights Electronics USA Corp, Nordic Lights NA Inc. and Grakon, LLC (referred to collectively as “Methode US” in this section of this Privacy Policy) also comply with the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (EU-U.S. DPF), and the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (Swiss-U.S. DPF) as set forth by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Methode US has certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (EU-U.S. DPF Principles) with regard to the processing of personal data received from the European Union in reliance on the EU-U.S. DPF. Methode US has certified to the U.S. Department of Commerce that it adheres to the Swiss-U.S. Data Privacy Framework Principles (Swiss-U.S. DPF Principles) with regard to the processing of personal data received from Switzerland in reliance on the Swiss-U.S. DPF. If there is any conflict between the terms in this Privacy Policy and the EU-U.S. DPF Principles and/or the Swiss-U.S. DPF Principles, the Principles shall govern. To learn more about the Data Privacy Framework (DPF) Program, and to view our certification, please visit https://www.dataprivacyframework.gov/ .

In compliance with the DPF principles, you have the right to choose whether your personal data is (i) to be disclosed to a third party or (ii) to be used for a purpose that is materially different from the purpose(s) for which it was originally collected or subsequently authorized by you (“opt-out”). If you wish to opt out please contact privacy@methode.com. Applicable law allows certain exceptions to your ability to opt out, but where applicable law permits us to retain and continue to use your personal data and we do so, we will do so only to the extent permitted or required by law. If you contact us to opt out, we will explain the options available and comply with your request as required by the DPF principles and applicable law.

In compliance with the DPF principles, Methode US commits to resolve complaints about our collection or use of your personal information. EU and Swiss individuals with inquiries or complaints regarding our DPF policy should first contact Methode US at privacy@methode.com.

Methode US has further committed to cooperate with the panel established by the EU data protection authorities (DPAs) and the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner (FDPIC) with regard to unresolved complaints concerning human resources data and non-human resources data transferred from the EU and Switzerland.

With respect to Personal Data received or transferred pursuant to the DPF, Methode US is subject to the investigatory and enforcement powers of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The independent dispute resolution body designated to address complaints and provide appropriate recourse free of charge is the panel of European Union Data Protection Authorities, as set out above. EU and Swiss residents may also lodge complaints with their competent supervisory authority. Under certain conditions, you may have the right to invoke binding arbitration under the DPF to resolve complaints not resolved by other means, as described in Annex I to the DPF principles.

Methode US is responsible for the processing of Personal Data it receives under the DPF or subsequently transfers to a third party acting as an agent on its behalf, except where Methode US is not responsible for the event giving rise to the damage.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding our DPF certification, please contact privacy@methode.com.

Notice to Residents of the U.K., European Union and Switzerland

Methode processes personal data for the purposes described above. In some situations, the processing of personal data may be required for the operation of our Site or to provide you with information about our products and services. If we use personal data in ways other than described in this Privacy Policy, we will provide you with specific notice at the time of collection.

Legal Basis for Processing Your Personal Data

We process personal data only when we have a legal basis to do so (as outlined above).

If we intend to use personal data that we have collected for one purpose for processing related to a different purpose, we will provide you with information about this secondary purpose and any additional information necessary to ensure fair and transparent processing, before we engage in further processing.

Your Rights

If you are located in the U.K, the EU or Switzerland., you have certain rights regarding the personal data that we maintain about you, which in certain circumstances you will be able to exercise. These rights are as follows:

You may request a copy of the personal data that we maintain about you. If we maintain your information based on your consent or so that we could enter into a contract with you, you can also request that we provide you a copy of your data in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format.

If your personal data is incorrect, you may request that we correct, amend, or delete personal data that is inaccurate or incomplete.

You may request that we erase or restrict the processing of your personal data.

You may object to the processing of your personal data in certain circumstances when we process your data for the purposes of our legitimate interests.

Some of these rights can be exercised online via your account. For example, you can review, modify, and delete certain information relating to your use of our Site and unsubscribe to email messages. If you are unable to manage your request via your online account, then please contact us at privacy@methode.com.

Notice to Residents of California

This section supplements our Privacy Policy and applies if you reside in the state of California.

For more information about the specific pieces of personal information we collect, the sources of the personal information, or who we share the information with, please read the section “What Personal Data Does Methode Collect,” “Where Does the Personal Data Come From?,” and “How Is Your Personal Data Used?”

Methode does not and will not sell, share or disclose your personal data to non-affiliated third parties.

Your Rights Under the CCPA

Under California law, California residents have certain rights, including the right to know what personal information is collected, used, shared or sold, the right to request deletion of personal information, the right to opt out of the “sale” of personal information, and the right to not be discriminated against for exercising your rights.

Exercising Your CCPA Rights

Your Rights to Request Know and to Access Personal Information

If you want to know the personal information we have collected about you in the last 12 months, you may submit a verifiable consumer request to us, and subject to our verification of that request, we will provide you with the following information:

the categories of personal information we have collected about you;
the categories of sources from which the personal information is collected;
the business or commercial purpose for collecting, disclosing or selling, if applicable, the personal information;
the categories of third parties with whom we have shared or sold, if applicable, your personal information; and
the specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you except as prohibited from doing so by law.

In addition to these disclosures, you may submit a verifiable consumer request up to two (2) times in a twelve (12)-month period for access to your personal information. When you submit an access request, we can request us to deliver the information by mail or electronically. If you elect to receive the information electronically, to the extent it is technically feasible for us to do so, we will provide the requested information in a portable and readily useable format that allows you to transmit this information to another entity.

Right to Request Deletion

If you want us to delete the personal information, we have collected from you, you can send us a verifiable consumer request requesting that we delete some or all of the information we have collected from you, subject to certain exceptions. Once we receive and confirm your personal information request, we will delete such personal information from our active records, unless an exception applies. We will also notify any service providers and third parties with whom we have shared your personal information of your request.

We are not required to, and do not have to agree to delete your information where preserving the information is necessary for us to:

Complete the transaction for which the personal information was collected, provide a good or service requested by the consumer, or reasonably anticipated within the context of a business’s ongoing business relationship with the consumer, or otherwise perform a contract between the business and the consumer;

Detect security incidents, protect against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity; or prosecute those responsible for that activity;

Debug to identify and repair errors that impair existing intended functionality;

Exercise free speech, ensure the right of another consumer to exercise his or her right of free speech, or exercise another right provided for by law;

Comply with the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act pursuant to Chapter 3.6 of Title 12 of Part 2 of the Penal Code;

Engage in public or peer-reviewed scientific, historical, or statistical research in the public interest that adheres to all other applicable ethics and privacy laws, when the businesses’ deletion of the information is likely to render impossible or seriously impair the achievement of such research, if the consumer has provided informed consent;

To enable solely internal uses that are reasonably aligned with the expectations of the consumer based on the consumer’s relationship with the business;

Comply with a legal obligation; or

Otherwise use the consumer’s personal information, internally, in a lawful manner that is compatible with the context in which the consumer provided the information.

If any of these exceptions apply, we are not required to delete your personal information. In the event that we deny your request to delete based on any of these exceptions, we will inform you, in writing, of the reason.

How You Can Submit a Verifiable Consumer Request for a Request to Know, Access, or Delete

In order for us to process a request made pursuant to the CCPA, it is necessary for us to verify your identity. We cannot fulfill your request if we cannot verify your identity.

We will acknowledge receipt of a consumer request to know, access or delete within ten (10) business days of receipt. However, it may take up to forty-five calendar (45) days to fulfill your request, or up to a total of ninety calendar (90) days if additional time is needed. In the event that we cannot complete your request within the initial forty-five calendar (45) day period, we will notify you in writing within the initial forty-five calendar (45) day period.

To request exercise one or more of your CCPA rights, please submit a verifiable consumer request:

1-833-765-3342; or

Only you or a person registered with the California Secretary of State that you authorize to act on your behalf may submit a personal information request. You may also make a personal information request on behalf of your minor child.

All verifiable consumer requests must:

Provide sufficient information that allows us to reasonably verify you are the person about whom we collected personal information, or an authorized representative.

For a request by the actual person, we will typically require any email or physical address you have submitted to us and a valid phone number belonging to the individual making the request. If we require any additional information from you in order to verify your identity, we will contact you. Any additional information you provide for verification purposes will be deleted within a reasonable period of time after responding to your consumer request.

For an authorized representative, we require a copy of the agent’s registration with the California Secretary of State, a valid power of attorney, court appointment document or signed authorization from the individual on whose behalf the agent is acting demonstrating the agent’s ability to act on that person’s behalf. Once we receive a personal information request from an authorized agent, unless that agent has a power of attorney issued pursuant to California Probate Code Sections 4000 to 4465, we may contact the person to whom the request relates in order to, among other things, verify their identity, confirm the agent’s capacity to act on that person’s behalf, and if applicable, respond to or deliver information requested pursuant to the personal information request.

For a request related to a household, all members of the household must submit the request, and each must provide information sufficient for us to verify their identity. Typically, that will include, any email or physical address that may have been submitted to us and a valid phone number belonging to the individuals making the request. We may deny a request from a household if we cannot verify that the individual(s) making the request are part of the same household.

How You Can Contact Us

Please contact us if you have any questions or comments about our privacy practices or this Privacy Policy. You can reach us online at . You can also write to us at:

Chief Information Officer
8750 W. Bryn Mawr Ave
Suite 1000

Chicago, IL 60631

Cookie Policy

This Cookie Policy explains what cookies are and how and why they may be stored on and accessed from your device when you use or visit our Site. This Cookie Policy should be read together with the rest of our Privacy Policy.

By consenting to the use of cookies, you agree that we can store and access cookies as described in this Cookie Policy.

What are cookies?

A cookie is a small text file that can be stored on and accessed from your device when you visit our Site, to the extent that you consent. This allows our Sites to distinguish your device from those of other users of the Sites. You can find more information at www.allaboutcookies.org and www.youronlinechoice.eu.

How do our Sites use cookies?

When you first visit our Site, we will ask you to consent to our use of cookies in accordance with the terms outlined in this policy.

We may use cookies to identify you, remember your preferences and track your use of our Sites. We also may use cookies to control access to certain content of our Sites, protect the Sites, and to process any requests you make.

To administer our Sites and for research purposes, we contract with third-party service providers to track and analyze statistical information about usage of, and volume of traffic on our Sites. These third-party service providers may use persistent cookies to help us improve the user experience, manage content on our Sites, and track user behavior.

First- and Third-Party Cookies

First-party cookies are cookies that belong to Methode and that Methode places on your device. Third-party cookies are cookies that another party places on your device through our Site.

We use the following types of cookies:

Persistent Cookies. We use persistent cookies to improve your experience on the Site and to track how you use it. This includes recording your acceptance of our Cookie Policy to remove the cookie message that appears when you first use the Site.

Session Cookies. Session cookies are temporary and are deleted from your device when your web browser closes. We use session cookies to help us track internet usage, as described above.

We use the following types of cookies for the described purposes:

Cookie Type	Purpose
Strictly Necessary/Technical	These cookies are necessary to allow us to operate our Site so you can access the Site as you have requested. These cookies, for example, let us recognize that you have created an account and have logged into that account to access Site content. They also include cookies that enable us to remember your previous actions within the same browsing session and secure our Site.
Analytical/Performance	These cookies are used by us or our business partners to analyze how our Site is used and how they are performing. For example, these cookies track what pages are most frequently visited and from what locations our visitors arrive. If you subscribe to a newsletter or otherwise register with our Site, these cookies may be correlated to you.
Functionality	These cookies let us operate our Site in accordance with the choices you make. These cookies permit us to “remember” you between visits. For instance, we will recognize your user name and remember how you customized our Site by, for example, adjusting text size, languages, fonts, and other parts of the Site that are alterable, and provide you with the same customizations during future visits to the Site.

How do I refuse or withdraw my consent to the use of cookies?

If you do not want cookies to be dropped on your device, you can adjust the setting of your internet browser to reject the setting of all or some cookies and to alert you when a cookie is placed on your device. For further information about how to do so, please refer to your browser ‘help,’ ‘tool,’ or ‘edit’ section or visit www.allaboutcookies.org. Please note that if you use your browser settings to block all cookies (including strictly necessary cookies) you may not be able to access or use all or part or certain functionalities of our Site.

If you want to remove previously-stored cookies, you can manually delete them at any time. However, this will not prevent our Site from placing cookies on your device in the future, unless and until you adjust your internet browser setting as described above.

For more information about the development of user profiles and the use of targeting/advertising cookies, please see www.youronlinechoices.eu, if you are located in the EU.

In addition, you can find out how to control cookies by clicking “help” on your browser’s menu or by taking the following steps, depending on what browser you use:

On Microsoft Internet Explorer: Select Tools > Internet Options > Privacy > Settings

On Google Chrome: Select Settings > Advanced > Privacy and Security > Content Settings > Cookies

On Safari: Select Preferences > Privacy