Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

HOPE Research Group (“HRG”, “we”, “our”, or “us”) is a Caribbean and Latin American market research firm with over 40 years of regional experience serving Fortune 500 clients. HRG is headquartered at 12555 Orange Drive, Davie, FL 33330, United States, with regional offices in Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago.

This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, share, and protect personal data when you join the HRG AI research contributor panel through hoperesearchgroup.com/join-panel or participate in any related research project. HRG is the data controller for the information you provide to us.

2. What personal data we collect

We collect only the data we need to invite you to appropriate research projects and compensate you fairly for your contributions.

• Identification: Your name and email address.
• Location: The country where you live (and, if you select “Other,” the specific location you tell us).
• Demographic context: Age bracket, preferred language, and any other project-eligibility fields you choose to provide.
• Device and contact preferences: Whether you can contribute voice, video, photo, or survey data; your preferred payout format.
• Consent record: The date and version of this Privacy Policy you agreed to at signup.
• Communication history: Emails you exchange with us about research opportunities.
• Project data: Audio, video, photo, text, or survey submissions you provide for a specific research project you accept.
• Technical data: Standard web server logs (IP address, browser type, pages viewed) collected automatically when you visit our website.

3. How we use your data

• Match you to research projects you are eligible for based on country, language, and contribution type.
• Contact you by email with project invitations, instructions, and status updates.
• Process payment to you via your chosen reward platform once a task is completed and approved.
• Verify the quality and authenticity of submissions you provide for projects you accept.
• Keep internal records of our research for quality assurance and audit purposes.
• Comply with legal obligations in jurisdictions where we operate.
• Investigate and respond to suspected fraud, misuse, or breach of our contributor terms.

We do not sell your personal data to third parties, and we do not use your signup data for advertising profiling.

4. Our lawful basis for processing

We rely on the following lawful bases to process your personal data, as recognized by the data protection laws of the jurisdictions in which you may reside:

• Your consent for your initial signup and any marketing communications. You give this consent through the checkbox on our signup form and may withdraw it at any time (see Section 9).
• Performance of a contract once you accept a specific research project — we need your data to deliver that project and pay you.
• Legitimate interests for operating our business responsibly, including quality assurance, fraud prevention, and system security, balanced against your rights.
• Legal obligation where applicable, including tax reporting and responding to lawful requests from authorities.

5. Who we share your data with

We limit sharing to parties necessary to run the panel and deliver your compensation.

• Research project clients (such as AI model developers and brand research sponsors) who receive the data you contribute for a specific accepted project. Where possible we deliver this data in a form that does not identify you by name.
• Payment platforms (such as Tremendous and card, gift-card, or bank-transfer providers) that process your payouts. These providers receive only the information required to deliver your chosen reward.
• Cloud infrastructure and software providers that host our website, database, email systems, and analytics, under written data-processing terms.
• Professional advisors (lawyers, auditors, accountants) under duties of confidentiality.
• Government or law enforcement where we are legally required to disclose data, or to protect our rights or the safety of others.
• A successor entity in the event of a merger, acquisition, or asset sale, subject to equivalent protections.

6. International data transfers

HRG is headquartered in the United States and operates offices in Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago. When you provide data to us, it may be transferred to and stored on servers located in the United States, as well as processed by our offices or service providers in other jurisdictions.

Where your home country's law requires, we rely on contractual safeguards with our processors and limit transfers to recipients that commit to protection standards comparable to those required in your jurisdiction.

7. How long we keep your data

• Active contributor profiles: for as long as you remain available for research projects.
• Dormant profiles: if you do not accept a project or respond to our communications for 24 consecutive months, we will either anonymize your profile or delete it, unless law requires longer retention.
• Project-specific submissions (voice, video, photo, text, survey responses): retained for the duration of the specific project and for the period required by the project client's contract, after which they are returned, destroyed, or anonymized.
• Payment records and other tax or audit documentation: retained for the period required by applicable law in the United States and in the country where you reside, typically up to seven years.
• Consent records (date and policy version you agreed to): retained for as long as we hold any of your other data, as evidence of your consent.

8. How we protect your data

We maintain administrative, technical, and physical safeguards designed to protect your personal data against loss, misuse, and unauthorized access, including encrypted connections for data in transit, access controls that limit staff access to need-to-know, and periodic review of our security practices. No system can be guaranteed to be completely secure, and we encourage you to use a strong, unique password for your email account and to report any suspected compromise of your contact information to us promptly.

9. Your rights

Subject to the data protection law of your country, you have the right to:

• Access the personal data we hold about you and request a copy.
• Correct inaccurate or incomplete data.
• Delete your data where there is no overriding legal reason for us to keep it.
• Withdraw consent at any time, where consent is the basis of our processing.
• Object to processing based on our legitimate interests.
• Restrict our processing in certain circumstances.
• Portability: receive your data in a commonly used machine-readable format where applicable.
• Lodge a complaint with the data protection authority in your country (see Section 14).

To exercise any of these rights, email us at admin@hoperesearchgroup.com. We will respond within 30 days, or sooner where required by your local law. There is no charge to exercise your rights.

10. Cookies and tracking

Our website uses a small number of cookies and similar technologies that are necessary to operate the signup form and measure aggregate traffic (for example, which pages are visited and how often). We do not use third-party advertising cookies on this website. Where we receive you from a paid advertising campaign on a platform such as Meta, that platform may set its own cookies according to its own privacy policy; those cookies are governed by the policy of the platform that set them.

11. Children's privacy

The HRG contributor panel is intended for adults aged 18 and above. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children under 18 through the signup form. If you believe we may have collected data from a child under 18, please contact us at admin@hoperesearchgroup.com and we will promptly delete it.

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The effective date and version number at the top of this page will change when we do. For material changes, we will contact you by email at the address you provided and ask you to review and, where required, re-confirm your consent. Prior versions of this policy are available on request.

13. How to contact us

For any question about this Privacy Policy or how we handle your data, please contact us:

14. Country-specific supervisory authorities

If you are unable to resolve a concern with us directly, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the data protection authority in your country. The following authorities are relevant to our primary contributor markets:

• Trinidad and Tobago: Office of the Information Commissioner
• Jamaica: Office of the Information Commissioner (ODPO)
• Barbados: Data Protection Commissioner
• Cayman Islands: Office of the Ombudsman — Data Protection
• Curaçao: Comisión Toezicht Bescherming Persoonsgegevens
• Suriname: Ministry of Home Affairs — Sector-specific data protection oversight

Contact details for each authority can be found on their respective official government websites. HRG will cooperate fully with any formal inquiry from these authorities.