Website Privacy Policy

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Last Updated: August 2023

Latham & Watkins (“Latham”) respects your privacy and is committed to collecting, maintaining and using personal information about you responsibly. This Privacy Policy (the “Policy”) applies to all of your use of www.lw.com (the “Site”) including services offered through related sites such as www.lathamdrive.com, which are together referred to as “Latham Sites”. To the extent that any of those services include specific privacy policies or terms and conditions, they will take priority over this Policy. Please note that separate privacy policies apply to www.lwcareers.com (Latham Careers) and www.lathamalumni.com (the Alumni Network).

This Policy describes how your personal information will be treated as you use the Latham Sites. This Policy does not apply to information provided to us in the course of our attorney-client relationships or which is protected by confidentiality, the attorney-client privilege, the attorney work product doctrine or any other applicable protection. Nothing in this Policy should be understood as creating an attorney-client relationship with visitors to the Latham Sites or, alternatively, to reduce of the protections resulting from such relationships.

1. Information We Collect From You When You Visit Latham Sites

Like many websites, our server logs capture, and we have in the past 12 months collected, the following internet or other electronic network activity information: information regarding Latham Site users’ operating systems, browser software, IP (Internet Protocol) addresses, and the full Uniform Resource Locator (URL) clickstreams to, through and from the Latham Sites, including date and time. We may use this information to improve the services we provide through the Latham Sites, to monitor and improve the performance of our servers, to administer the Latham Sites, and to protect and defend our rights, property or safety or that of our clients and other users of the Latham Sites. We also collect and have in the past 12 months collected, the fact that Latham Site visitors’ watched and when they watched programs on the Latham Sites. We log this information to determine which videos Latham Site visitors consider useful.

Latham Sites also use cookies. You can find out more about this in our Cookies Policy.

2. Information You Submit To Us Through the Latham Sites

You are not required to submit any information to the Latham Sites. However, you may choose to do so by completing forms available in several sections of the Latham Sites, including: Publications, Alumni, Careers and Events.  If you join one or more of our mailing lists or otherwise choose to provide personal information to us through the Latham Sites, we will collect, and have in the last 12 months collected, the following information about users of the Latham Sites, first name, last name, email address, phone number, postal address, personal and professional interests; and professional and employment information; and educational information.  We use that information for the purpose for which it was collected and in accordance with the privacy wording on the relevant part of the Latham Site. In addition, we may use this information to:

  • communicate with you about our business;
  • provide publications, products and services you request;
  • invite you to, and register you for, events;
  • add you to mailing lists and send you marketing materials we believe will be of interest to you;
  • process and respond to requests, enquiries and complaints; and
  • for other purposes and operations which are reasonably related, such as administering, monitoring and improving the Latham Sites, our products, and services.

Your information may be accessed by third party service providers who will process that information solely for our benefit and in accordance with our instructions – see Section 6 below for more information. However, we will not provide your personal information to or share it with any third party for their own marketing purposes except in connection with requests you make that clearly involve third parties. This might include publications produced by third parties or events that are presented or sponsored by third parties. This will be made clear to you before you sign up for the publication or event.

3. Your Rights to Access and Update Your Personal Information

Latham takes appropriate steps to avoid unauthorized changes to personal information you submit to Latham Sites. For so long as Latham elects to continue to provide the Latham Sites, and provided that you comply with all agreements concerning use of these sites, we will make all reasonable efforts to provide you with online access to your registration data and other personal information so that you may view, update or correct it. To protect your privacy and security, we will also take appropriate steps to verify your identity before granting you access or enabling you to make corrections.

We retain information that is collected through Latham Sites only for as long as needed for the purpose for which it was provided, or as otherwise required for our legitimate business purposes. Your information may be retained for longer periods if there are valid legal grounds, for example if required by law or court order or to defend or pursue legal claims.

You may opt out of receiving marketing and market research communications at any time by using the unsubscribe links provided or by contacting us at unsubscribe@lw.com. You may also change your preferences regarding the communications you receive from us here.

For further information on your Rights, see section 10 below.

4. Legal Basis for Processing Your Personal Information

The majority of the personal information collected by Latham is provided by you voluntarily on the Latham Sites, for example when you sign up to join a mailing list or register for an event, and is therefore collected with your permission. The remaining personal information is collected for Latham’s legitimate business purposes, for example to monitor and improve the quality of the Latham Sites and our services, and to protect and defend our rights, property or safety or that of our clients and other users of the Latham Sites.

5. Links

Links to web sites that are not operated by or for Latham (“Third Party Sites”) are provided solely as a convenience to you. If you use these links, you will leave the Latham Site. This Privacy Policy does not apply to Third Party Sites. We have not reviewed the Third Party sites, do not control and are not responsible for any of their content or their privacy policies, if any. We do not endorse or make any representations about them, or any information, software or other products or materials found there, or any results that may be obtained from using them. If you decide to access any of the Third Party Sites listed on or linked to from Latham Sites, you should understand that you do so at your own risk.

6. Sharing of Information

The entity responsible for the management and use of the Latham Sites and personal information collected from them is Latham & Watkins LLP in the United States. However, Latham operates worldwide through its international offices, partnerships and affiliates and may transfer personal information across national borders. Latham Sites are operated on servers located in various jurisdictions, including the United States. When you access or use Latham Sites, personal information about you may be transferred outside the country in which you are situated to these other locations.

Latham has adopted a set of Binding Corporate Rules (“BCRs”) which allow personal information originating in the European Economic Area (“EEA”) and/or the UK to be transferred globally within the firm. The BCRs ensure that such personal information is protected to the same standard when processed by any Latham entity or office around the world. For more information click here.

Latham may also disclose and/or transfer your personal information (i) to its trusted third party service providers (for example, companies that provide systems, web hosting including microsites of the Latham Sites and other IT services; internal and external advisors and auditors); (ii) if required by applicable law; (iii) in connection with a reorganization or combination of our firm with another firm, (iv) if it believes that such disclosure is necessary to enforce or apply its terms of use and other agreements or otherwise protect and defend Latham’s rights, property or safety or that of our clients and other users of the Latham Sites; (v) in order to comply with a judicial proceeding, court order or other legal obligation, or a regulatory or government inquiry; or (vi) with consent.

We have in the last 12 months disclosed for a business purpose the following categories of personal information: (i) Identifiers (name, email address, phone number, postal address, IP (Internet Protocol) address, personal and professional interests); (ii) Internet or other electronic network activity information (information regarding operating system, browser software, information regarding interaction with the Latham Sites, namely the full Uniform Resource Locator (URL) clickstreams to, through and from the Latham Sites, including date and time, and that programs on the Latham Sites were watched and when they were watched); and (iii) professional and employment information.

Whenever we share personal information about users of Latham Sites with our trusted third party service providers and this involves transferring data outside the EEA and/or the UK to a country that has not been granted “adequate” status by the European Commission, we will as required by applicable law put in place appropriate contracts containing standard data protection clauses approved by the European Commission to protect that information and the rights of individuals.  

7. Children’s Privacy

We are committed to complying with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). Latham Sites and services are not directed to children under the age of 16. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 16. If we receive personal information that we discover was provided by a child under the age of 16, we will promptly destroy such information. Schools and parents should supervise their children's online activities and consider the use of other means to provide a child-friendly online environment. Additional information is available on the Direct Marketing Association's home page at http://www.the-dma.org. If you would like to learn more about COPPA, visit the Federal Trade Commission home page at http://www.ftc.gov.

8. Security

Latham Sites use measures that are appropriate to protect your personal information against unauthorized access, improper use or disclosure, unauthorized or unlawful destruction or accidental loss, and all our employees and any third parties that process your personal information on our behalf are obliged to respect the confidentiality of your information., However, we cannot and do not provide any assurance that these measures will be sufficient to protect the information you choose to transmit to our Sites.

If you have registered to use online services on one of the Latham Sites, your account details will be password protected. It is your responsibility to keep your password confidential and secure, and to sign out once you have finished browsing. Latham Sites are not designed to store sensitive personal information such as financial, health, criminal, racial or ethnic origin or political affiliation and you should not use Latham Sites for that purpose.

9. Agreement, Changes

By submitting your personal information on the Latham Sites you agree to the collection and use of your personal information on the basis described above. If you do not agree, please do not provide any personal information via the Latham Sites. If we decide to update our Privacy Policy, we will indicate this next to the Privacy Policy link on the front page of our Site. If there are material changes to the Privacy Policy, we will prominently post and/or communicate such changes prior to implementing them.

Any information collected under previous versions of our Privacy Policy will then become subject to the terms of our new Privacy Policy.

10. Contacts, Rights

In certain circumstances, subject to certain exceptions and applicable law, you may have the following rights in relation to personal information about you:

  • the right to know (i) the specific pieces of personal information collected; (ii) the categories of personal information; (iii) the categories of sources of the personal information: (iv) the business or commercial purpose for collecting the personal information; (v) the categories of personal information disclosed for a business purpose; and (vi) the categories of third parties with whom the personal information is shared;
  • the right to have personal information corrected, for example if it is incomplete or incorrect;
  • the right to opt out of receiving marketing communications at any time;
  • the right to request that personal information is deleted;
  • the right to restrict or object to the processing of personal information;
  • the right to receive a copy of personal information which you have provided to the firm, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format (known as “data portability”);
  • where you have provided personal information voluntarily, or otherwise consented to its use, the right to withdraw your consent;
  • the right not to be discriminated against if you exercise any rights conferred on you by the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018;
  • the right to complain to a Data Protection Authority (see further below).

If you have an online account, you may access, update and correct your personal information – including your marketing choices – using the account management facilities. You may also opt out of receiving marketing and market research communications at any time by contacting us at unsubscribe@lw.com.

Latham does not and will not sell your personal information as defined under the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018.

If you have a query about this statement or wish to exercise your rights, please contact Latham's Global Data Privacy Office at GlobalDPO@lw.com. California residents may also call our toll-free number (866) 596-3896.  You may also appoint an agent to submit a request on your behalf.

Once we receive your request, a member of the firm’s Global Data Privacy Office will contact you or your agent within the timeframe specified by applicable law to confirm receipt of your request and, if needed, to gather more information about your request. Depending on the nature of the request, additional information may be requested. You or your authorized agent may need to provide the following:

  • Proof of identity and address (e.g., a copy of your driving license or valid passport); 
  • If you are acting as an authorized agent, express notarized permission from the individual on whose behalf you are acting;
  • A description of the right(s) you want to exercise and the information to which your request relates.

Please note, we may not be obligated to provide access to personal information or delete any data to the extent that we cannot verify that the person making the request is the person about whom we collected information, or is someone authorized to act on that person’s behalf. Any personal information we collect from you to verify your identity in connection with you request will be used solely for the purposes of verification.

You also have the right to complain to a Data Protection Authority if you believe that your personal information has been collected or used in breach of relevant privacy legislation or Latham’s Binding Corporate Rules. If you are located in the European Union, this will be the Data Protection Authority in the country in which you are located. Alternatively you may contact the Hesse Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (Hessischer Beauftragter fuer den Datenschutz und die Informationsfreiheit), PO Box 3163, 65021 Wiesbaden, Germany. Further information and contact details can be found at https://datenschutz.hessen.de/. Further information about making a complaint, either to Latham or to a Data Protection Authority, can be found in the Latham Data Privacy Complaints Procedure.

11. Data Controller

The data controller for this website is: Latham & Watkins LLP, 555 West Fifth Street, 8th Floor, Los Angeles, California 90013 United States.

If you have any questions about your privacy or this policy, including if you need to access this policy in an alternative format, please contact Latham's Global Data Privacy Office at GlobalDPO@lw.com. In accordance with applicable law, we have appointed a Data Privacy Officer (DPO) for our German offices. Our DPO, Dr. Sebastian Kraska, can be reached at +49.89.189.1736-0 or skraska@iitr.de.