Cint operates the Cint Exchange to which it may grant access for Buyers to conduct research and analytics and for Suppliers to monetize their audiences, respectively. Suppliers and Buyers are responsible to each other for quality and compliance regarding their activity within the Cint Exchange.
These standards are incorporated by reference into all contracts between Cint and Buyers or Suppliers. These standards do not create any rights or obligations for Cint, any Buyer or any Supplier, except when incorporated into a particular contract by reference. When incorporated into a particular contract, these standards create rights and duties only for the contracting parties and no beneficiary rights for any third parties. As the operator of the Cint Exchange, Cint disclaims all liability for Buyers’ and Suppliers’ acts or omissions, especially in terms of quality and compliance with Applicable Laws and industry standards. If there are inconsistencies with these Guidelines and stricter provisions within another contract, the stricter provisions will control.
The defined terms in your contract with Cint have the same meanings here as defined therein and are used throughout these Guidelines. Cint reserves the right, at any time and at our sole discretion, to update, revise, supplement and otherwise modify these Guidelines, and to impose new or additional rules, policies, terms or conditions on your access to or use of the Cint Exchange. Continued use of the Cint Exchange after any such changes shall constitute your consent to and acceptance of those changes. If you do not agree to any change, you must cease all use of the Cint Exchange.
1. ETHICAL STANDARDS
1.1. Buyers and Suppliers on the Cint Exchange must respect the customs, rules and practices that apply to our industry, some of which are described in these Guidelines. When acting as a Buyer or Supplier on the Cint Exchange, Cint adheres to these ethical standards as well.
1.2. Cint is strongly committed to maintaining high ethical standards in all areas of its business, and expect all your employees, customers, vendors, suppliers and other business partners to uphold these standards as well. As such, we expect all Buyers and Suppliers to:
a) protect the human rights and equal opportunities of its employees and comply with all Applicable Laws, as well as all ethical standards applicable in the industries and countries in which they operate.
b) prohibit and refrain from child and forced labor within your organizations.
c) maintain a healthy and safe work environment and strictly prohibit abuse (whether physical or verbal), harassment and discrimination.
d) not engage in corruption, extortion, embezzlement, money laundering or bribery.
e) avoid situations in which your own personal interest, or the interest of your family members, friends or acquaintances affect your ability to make decisions.
f) comply with United Nations sanctions and applicable sanctions under the laws of the European Union, the United Kingdom and the United States.
g) conduct your business in an environmentally sustainable way, by way of, for example, improved efficiencies or investment in sustainable products, services and technologies.
1.3. Suppliers shall take appropriate action, as requested by Cint, should their Participant state or allude they have or are planning to harm, abuse, or kill another person in a survey questionnaire. Appropriate action may include, but is not limited to, identifying the Participant, and/or reporting the offense to proper authorities.
2. ACCEPTABLE USE
2.1. On the Cint Exchange, Buyers and Suppliers shall not:
a) Share user IDs, passwords and/or API keys with any unauthorized third party and take reasonable precautions to protect this information and prevent unauthorized access to your accounts.
b) Use survey farms, bots or scrapers for any purpose.
c) Use copyrights, trademarks or any other intellectual property without proper ownership or license.
d) Download, submit or otherwise save sensitive or illegal content.
e) Attempt to circumvent the intent or purpose of the Cint Exchange.
f) Act in a way that is inconsistent with supporting market, opinion and social research.
g) Publish, post, upload, send, store or otherwise transmit material that is unlawful, harassing, libelous, defamatory, threatening or otherwise in violation of any third-party rights of privacy or other intellectual property rights.
h) Publish, post, upload, or otherwise transmit material containing software viruses, worms, trojan horses or other harmful computer code, files, scripts, agents or programs that are intended to interfere with or otherwise disrupt the integrity or performance of the Cint Exchange.
2.2. Buyers are prohibited from assigning a $0 or fraudulent Cost Per Interview for OTC Sample purchases.
3. SURVEY DESIGN AND QUALITY
3.1. Buyers shall maintain responsible survey design and quality measures in line with best practices to ensure a positive experience for Participants. Projects that fail to meet these standards are subject to review and may be suspended by Cint at any time. These standards include:
a) Excessive Profiling Questions
b) High Drop-Off Rates
c) Low Conversion Rates
d) Excessive Length of Interview
e) Insufficient Quality Control Measures
3.2. Buyers shall ensure that any third-party survey links are validated and secure prior to project launch and maintain accurate quota and order information in Cint and third-party systems.
3.3. Buyers may not create custom questions on the Cint Exchange intended to derive answers containing personally identifiable information (PII) or other sensitive data. Buyers should not create custom questions if a suitable question already exists. Buyers should not create leading questions encouraging a Participant to qualify for a survey through misrepresentation.
4. SURVEY CONTENT
4.1. Buyers are responsible for ensuring that all questions and other Survey Content complies with these Guidelines in general and especially the ethical standards set out herein. As a Buyer, you are responsible regardless of whether you are conducting research on your own behalf or on behalf of your client, and regardless of whether or not you have created the Survey Content. Before running a project on the Cint Exchange, you must take all reasonable measures to ensure that these Guidelines are adhered to. Projects that fail to meet these standards are subject to review and may be suspended by Cint at any time.
4.2. Surveys may not have questions or other Survey Content that:
a) Ask or answer questions using vulgar, abusive or inappropriate language or content in ways that do not conform with industry guidelines and policies. Sensitive content includes Survey Content of an offensive or especially personal nature.
b) Ask or answer questions about sensitive financial information, including but not limited to, bank account and credit cards or government-issued identification numbers.
c) Ask minors to answer questions without obtaining necessary parental consent, as defined under Applicable Laws.
d) Fundraise, advertise or make solicitations. This includes recruitment projects or offers to download applications or register on third-party websites.
e) Ask or answer leading questions that are intended to coach, guide or bias specific responses.
f) Use copyrights, trademarks or any other intellectual property without proper ownership or license.
g) Solicit Participants to take fraudulent or otherwise illegal surveys.
4.3. It is especially important that Buyers familiarize themselves with local laws, customs and standards. The types of questions not allowed under applicable local laws or that are considered offensive or contrary to public order and morals vary significantly in different parts of the world and also between different demographic groups. Buyers must be particularly careful and well-informed when including questions or other Survey Content relating to:
a) Sexual orientation, preferences or practices or sexually explicit content.
b) Religion including religious symbols.
c) Political topics, views, affiliations and political parties.
d) Ethnicity, including racial and cultural belonging.
e) Physical or mental disability or illness.
4.4. If a Buyer intends to conduct a survey that includes collecting information intended to make identification or recontact of Participants possible, PII Collection must be selected on the Cint Exchange or indicated in your Order for Managed Services.
4.5. If a project is subject to regulatory requirements, such as adverse events reporting or other circumstances that may require re-contact with Participants, the Buyer must:
a) collect all necessary consents directly from the Participant within the survey questionnaire,
b) collect the Participant’s email or other necessary re-contact information in the survey questionnaire,
c) and as such, must select PII Collection on the Cint Exchange or indicate it in your Order for Managed Services.
4.6. Buyers acknowledge that Cint and Suppliers are not required to facilitate re-contacts, and in some cases are unable to.
5. PARTICIPANT QUALITY
5.1. Suppliers are required to maintain responsible practices and quality measures in line with best practices to ensure high quality Participants for Buyers and a positive experience for Participants.
5.2. Suppliers shall:
a) Not misrepresent the source of sample in any way.
b) prevent survey bias and sampling errors by not exposing qualifying information, including but not limited to age, gender, location or subject of study (“Study about Brand X”) to your Participants.
c) Not coach, lead or instruct your Participants as to the responses required in order to be included in the sample for a survey.
d) manipulate the responses of your Participants to purposely bias or alter the quality of your sample.
5.0. Cint reserves the right to select the Participants who will receive a survey invitation or those Participants who will be offered the opportunity to take part in a survey.
5.1. Buyers are also entitled to limit the Suppliers that are offered to provide sample for specific survey opportunities.
6. CHILDREN AND MINORS
6.1. Cint generally does not allow minors under the age of 13 to participate in survey opportunities or other activities conducted on the Cint Exchange.
6.2. Suppliers and Buyers must obtain verifiable parental consent for the collection of any data from minors and children, as required by Applicable Laws. If Suppliers or Buyers exclude minors from surveys opportunities, you must ask about birth dates in neutral ways (e.g., “when is your birthday?”) and not in ways that could induce minors to overstate their age (e.g., “are you 18 or older?”). If a Supplier or Buyer knows a minor completed a survey, the Supplier and Buyer must confirm and verify parental consent in accordance with the Applicable Laws protecting such minor.
7. QUALITY IMPROVEMENT PROGRAMS
7.1. Buyers and Suppliers are expected to participate in the Quality Improvement Programs created by Cint to enhance the overall quality of the Cint Exchange.
7.2. Buyers are responsible for good faith reconciliations for completes as set out in the Reversal Policy. Acceptable reasons for reconciling completes include poor response quality and inattentive, incomplete, or inappropriate responses. A detailed explanation of valid reasons for reconciling completes can be found in the Reversal Policy available at cint.com/legal.
7.3. Buyers should use Cint-recommended Survey Hosting Tools and comply with best practices to help avoid fraudulent activity on the Cint Exchange, such as employing additional security measures (e.g. Sha-1, notch, S2S) and ensuring links from the Cint Exchange to the Survey hosting platforms used by you and any links back to the Cint Exchange are secure.
8. PRIVACY AND COMPLIANCE
8.1. Suppliers and Buyers are responsible for compliance with data privacy laws that apply to your collection of Personal Data via the Cint Exchange and any subsequent use or other processing of such data. Suppliers must ensure Participants receive sufficient notice and information about how they, Cint and Buyers collect and use their data. Suppliers and Buyers must determine whether they need to obtain consent under Applicable Laws.
8.2. Suppliers must inform and obligate Buyers regarding any restrictions on their use of data that are based on promises or other statements that the Supplier may have made in privacy policies or invitations to take surveys.
8.3. Specifically for the processing of Personal Data of European Union data subjects:
a) Suppliers acknowledge and agree that they are controllers of Participant information they provide on the Cint Exchange,
b) Buyers acknowledge and agree that you are controllers of the Personal Data collected in your surveys,
c) Cint acts as the controller of Personal Data collected by Cint from Participants on the Cint Exchange.
8.4. When Buyers and Suppliers control and process Personal Data provided by Cint, Buyers or Suppliers shall become a separate and independent controller of such data with Cint and be responsible for having a lawful basis to control and process such data. To the extent Buyers or Suppliers provide profiling data or identifiers to Cint containing Personal Data, Cint shall become a separate and independent controller of such data.
8.5. Cint may also process Personal Data on behalf of Buyers and Suppliers for purposes of performing Cint’s contractual obligations.
9. DATA SECURITY, RESIDENCY AND LOCALIZATION
9.1. Suppliers and Buyers are responsible for compliance with Applicable Laws (i.e. data security laws) and should meet or exceed the following technical and organizational data protection measures that Cint applies to its operation of the Cint Exchange:
a) Security Access Control: Implement suitable measures in order to prevent unauthorized persons from gaining access to data processing equipment and premises; limit access to employees and service providers with a legitimate need to know and subject to adequate written confidentiality and data security agreements.
b) Transmission Control: Implement SSL for Internet transmissions and other measures to reduce the risk that data is read, copied, altered or deleted by unauthorized parties during the transmission thereof or during the transport of the data media.
c) Data Handling: Have adequate security protection, procedures and protocols in place to ensure data is used, stored, maintained, protected, transferred, deleted or archived, as necessary and required by Applicable Laws.
d) Data Access, Correction, and Deletion: Disclose, correct, delete, or redact data on request from data subjects, where required by Applicable Laws.
9.2. Buyers and Suppliers are responsible for compliance with data residency and localization laws, including but not limited to, laws in Russia, Kazakhstan, the People’s Republic of China and Indonesia that require certain categories of data collected from individuals in such jurisdictions must be processed on primary systems in such countries. This may require additional technical steps in the context of the data collection but does not typically preclude use of the Cint Exchange.
9.3. Cint operates the Cint Exchange on servers in the EU and the United States and does not maintain local presences outside of these jurisdictions to satisfy data residency or localization requirements.
10. AUDIO AND VIDEO
If surveys are conducted with audio or video, Suppliers and Buyers must ensure Participants are adequately informed about the implications of being identifiable and comply with all industry guidelines, including legal and compliance requirements relating to processing of data with audio and video. Buyers are ultimately responsible for ensuring appropriate consents for such activities.
11. BREACHES OF THESE GUIDELINES
11.1. Failure to adhere to these Guidelines shall be considered a material breach of the terms and conditions between Cint and such Buyer or Supplier, as applicable.
11.2. Where Cint becomes aware of, or reasonably suspects a Buyer or Supplier acting in violation of these Guidelines, Cint reserves the right to suspend all access to the Cint Exchange until the affected Buyer or Supplier has provided Cint with satisfactory evidence showing compliance with these Guidelines.
Version: 2024:01
Date: 1 April 2024