SECURITY NOTICE

This web site is part of a Federal computer system used to accomplish Federal functions. The Department of Energy uses software programs to monitor this web site for security purposes to ensure it remains available to all users and to protect information in the system. By accessing this web site, you are expressly consenting to these monitoring activities. Unauthorized attempts to defeat or circumvent security features, to use the system for other than intended purposes, to deny service to authorized users, to access, obtain, alter, damage, or destroy information, or otherwise to interfere with the system or its operation is prohibited. Evidence of such acts may be disclosed to law enforcement authorities and result in criminal prosecution under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 and the National Information Infrastructure Protection Act of 1996, codified at section 1030 of Title 18 of the United States Code, or other applicable criminal laws. GENERAL DISCLAIMER This system is made available by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of originators expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof.

PRIVACY POLICY

The Office of Hearings and Appeals (OHA) is committed to maintaining your confidence and trust, and accordingly maintains the following privacy policy to protect personal information you provide online. This policy applies for all visitors to our web site; it does not apply to people who have filed cases with the Office of Hearings and Appeals.

Basic Confidentiality Policy

It is OHA policy that personal information, such as your name, postal and e-mail address or telephone number, is private and confidential. Accordingly, any personal information you provide to us via this web site is stored in a secure location, is accessible only by designated staff, and is used only for the purposes for which you provide the information, such as to reply to your request.

No Release of Information to Third Parties

Personal information will not be released to third parties except to further the purpose for which you provide the information, or if release is required by law or is pertinent to judicial or governmental investigations or proceedings.

No Computer Tracking of Identifiable Information

Our computer is not set up to track, collect or distribute personal information about its visitors. It does recognize the home server of visitors, but not e-mail addresses. For example, we can tell which Internet Service Provider (ISP) our visitors use (for example, "aol.com" if you use America Online as your ISP, or "yourschool.edu" if you connect from a university's domain), but not the names, addresses or other information about our visitors that would allow us to identify the particular visitors to our sites. However, if your computer has been assigned a static IP address (that is to say, the address of your computer does not change from time to time when you sign onto the internet), we can identify your computer. Static IP addresses occur mainly where computers access the internet via a company LAN or a cable modem, although this is not always the case. If you access our site via a dial-up service where you initiate a telephone call to access the internet, you in all likelihood do not have a static IP address. Rather, you have a dynamic IP address. In that case, we can only recognize your home server. In all cases, however, this information is used only for internal purposes by us.

Our web site does not install or use cookies. Cookies are small text files that some web servers install on your computer to personalize your visit to a particular site. A cookie may provide your identity and other information to a particular site, including your password, so you do not have to enter it every time you access a particular site, and preferences to personalize your visit to a web site. The OHA web site does not use cookies.

Finally, our web site software tracks information about the visits to our web site. This is commonly done throughout the Web via the use of access logs. For example, from time to time we compile statistics that show the daily number of visitors to our sites, the daily requests we receive for particular files on our web sites, and what countries those requests come from. These aggregated statistics are used internally to better provide service to the public and may also be provided to others, but again, the statistics contain no personal information and cannot be used to gather such information.