Panelist Privacy FAQs

If you join our Nielsen Television Audience Measurement Panel, we will ask you for your name and address and the names of the other members of your household. We will also ask you for some demographic details, which is general data about you and other members of your household, such as gender, age, occupation, region, and nationality (in line with local law). 

In addition, we will collect information about your TV viewing using our TV meter which collects the following information:- 

• TV status – on or off, 
• TV Channel being watched, if it is included in the list of measured channels,
• Which person is watching based on use of Nielsen meter remote control,
• If you broadcast from a streaming platform (Netflix, Apple TV etc.) on your TV, the meter collects data about the streaming service you use.
• We do not identify streaming content as long as it is not a TV Channel or program broadcasted by such channels during the last 7 days. The information collected is encrypted and sent back to Nielsen. 

Based on your agreement, streaming meter/s may additionally collect data about video consumption on your personal devices, like mobile phones, tablets, laptops, etc. Our metering software collects information about the time you are streaming content, the device being used, and the service from which you are streaming content.   The streaming meter can only identify the website of the streaming service being accessed by identifying the domain. It cannot identify the streamed content.  The streaming meter is not able to capture any content from a visited website or read the contents of transmitted information. This includes information such as usernames; passwords; account numbers; credit card numbers; email content; social media posts or secure internet sites (https://). 

We deeply value your trust, and we protect the identities of our panelists. We use tools and methods, including data aggregation, to make sure that there is no reasonable possibility of identifying an individual panelist from the data in the reports that we create for our clients. We will not use your data to advertise, promote, or market third-party goods or services directly to you, nor do we share your identifying data with our clients.  Any data shared with clients  cannot be  traced back to you.  This means that your personal viewing behavior and preferences will not be identified as yours.  

We may create scientific reports based on modeled information. “Modeled information” is data we have developed based on demographic and behavioral characteristics like your gender, age, TV watching habits, and the streaming services you visit to predict what people with similar or matching characteristics would watch or buy. We take precautions to ensure this data cannot be used to identify you.

Keeping information secure and protecting the identities of our panelists is essential to our success and credibility. We have established security measures, including encryption methods and internal and external access protocols, to help protect the security and confidentiality of your information while in our care.

We prefer to collect information about your entire household when you join a panel. Receiving information from your entire household provides a better understanding of consumer behavior.

We take the privacy of children very seriously. If we collect information about or get opinions from minor children (under 18), we do so only with the consent of the child’s parent or guardian, which can be withdrawn at any time.

Nielsen researches what consumers watch, their preferences, and their behaviors. The more our clients know about consumers, the better they can tailor content to what you want and prefer.

We are very protective of your information.  We are a global research  company and do not give your contact information to others for them to use for their own purposes.  We may share information with other parties for our business purposes and to satisfy our legal obligations or for audit purposes.  But If we work with other companies to perform market research or to develop new products, we do not share information that would identify you and they would not be given access to your contact information.  These companies are contractually required to keep this information confidential and secure and are prohibited from using this data for any purpose other than carrying out the services that they are performing for us.

When you are no longer an active panelist, we will continue to use data about your demographic characteristics as well as behavior and preference data for historical and statistical research, but this data will be kept separate from data that could be used to identify you.  Access to it will be strictly limited within Nielsen. All data will be permanently anonymised when we no longer need to identify you for panel management, audit, legal or related purposes. 

We may store former panelists’ information in its country of origin or abroad for such purposes, but we do so in accordance with local law and our privacy practices.

Participation in our panel is always voluntary. You may withdraw from our panel at any time by contacting your Nielsen Representative.  You can also contact us by email at   KSA.PanelCare@nielsen.com, asking to view or delete the information that we have about you at any time, however, this may require ending your participation as a panelist.  We may not be able to provide data about you that has been anonymised.  For further information about Nielsen’s approach to privacy, please see our Privacy Principles.