Managing privacy
This section describes the personal information that Rapid Recovery can collect, what that information is used for, and how you can control the privacy of that data.
Topics include:
General Data Protection Regulation compliance
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is legislation crafted to strengthen and unify data protection for all individuals within the European Union (EU). It also addresses the export of personal data outside the EU, which makes it relevant to software manufacture in the US and other countries. It updates rules governing the handling of individuals' personal data. GDPR is being widely adopted throughout the software industry.
To comply with the GDPR, the collection of any personally identifiable information (PII) by Rapid Recovery has been carefully considered. Data collection has been streamlined, and the information collected and how it is used is clearly documented.
When installing the Rapid Recovery Core or running the Rapid Recovery Info Gathering Tool, you are provided a description of the information Rapid Recovery collects and our purposes for collecting the information.
If you accept the stated use of personal data, you can then associate a license (running in standard "phone-home" mode) with your Core. If you choose to decline the use of personal data described in the privacy policy, you must request a special "non-phone-home" license. After you receive that license and associate it with your Core, your PII will not be used, and certain functions (auto update, and enabling integration between the Core and the QorePortal) are disabled.
Regardless of the privacy option you selected during installation, from the Core General setting Agree to use of personal data, you can change this setting. To switch between phone-home and non-phone-home modes in either direction, you must have access to the appropriate license.
For more information about the GDPR, see the EU General Data Protection Regulation website at https://eugdpr.org/the-regulation/.
For more information about managing your privacy, see the following topics in the Rapid Recovery 6.3 User Guide:
- Certain business rules apply when changing between phone-home and non-phone-home mode using the Agree to use of personal data general setting. For more information, see the topic Configuring Core general settings.
- To see what information Rapid Recovery collects, in which circumstances, and why the information is collected, see How Rapid Recovery uses personal information.
- To see what functions you cannot perform when using a non-phone-home license, see the topic Non-phone-home license restrictions.
- To download a phone-home license, log into the Rapid Recovery License Portal. From the navigation menu, click Licensing, and from the drop-down menu on the top right, select License Key.
- To learn how to obtain a license in non-phone-home mode, see the topic Obtaining and using non-phone-home licenses.
How Rapid Recovery uses personal information
As detailed in the Rapid Recovery 6.3 Installation and Upgrade Guide topic "Managing licenses," Rapid Recovery uses three types of software licenses: subscription, perpetual, and trial licenses.
There are two modes in which licenses can be used:
- Phone-home mode. All licenses are issued in phone-home mode unless otherwise requested. If you register a phone-home license with theRapid Recovery License Portal , Rapid Recovery collects some personally identifiable information (PII). The information it collects, and how the information is used, are described below.
- Non-phone-home mode. Even when connected to the internet, if you obtain and register a non-phone-home license, Rapid Recovery will not share your PII. Using this mode precludes you from performing certain functions, as described in the topic Obtaining and using non-phone-home licenses.
Subscription licenses can only be used in phone-home mode. Perpetual and trial licenses can be used in either phone-home or non-phone-home mode.
If you register a phone-home license, you give Rapid Recovery permission to collect the following PII:
- The IP addresses and hostnames of hosts that run on or interact with Rapid Recovery Core and Agent.
- The email addresses associated with Rapid Recovery licenses; and
- The consumption of licenses against the amount of licenses in the license pool.
This information is sent to Quest Software Inc. for the following purposes:
- To properly apply the appropriate license terms for the product;
- To provide customer support; for example, when you run the Info-Gathering Tool, logs and diagnostic data you specify is gathered to a local folder to send to Quest, or may be uploaded to Amazon, accessible only to Quest Data Protection Support.
- To notify users of available updates (if the Update settings on your Core specify an option other than Never check for updates); and
- To allow communication between your Core and the QorePortal. This communication can be enabled or disabled using the QorePortal setting on the Core. This portal lets licensed users with a current Support contract monitor the health of Cores and protected machines, manage multiple Cores, and generate reports on demand for the relevant Cores and protected machines.
You have the right to choose whether or not to share this information with Quest. First, when installing or updating the Rapid Recovery Core, you can choose whether to share this information on the Privacy Policy page of the installer. Also, if you decide not to share information with Quest, you can change the Core general setting Agree to use of personal data. Changing this setting prompts you to enter a license. If you enter a non-phone-home license, auto-update is disabled, as is your connection to the QorePortal.
For more resources on this topic, see the following related links.
- For more information about the functions you cannot perform when using non-phone-home mode, see the topic Non-phone-home license restrictions.
- For more information about obtaining a license that uses non-phone-home mode, contact the Quest licensing team by web form, as described in the topic Obtaining and using non-phone-home licenses.
- For more information about changing your general settings, including the sharing of PII, see the topic Configuring Core general settings.
- For more information about viewing licensing information for a single protected machine, see .
- For more information about the types of licenses available, see the Rapid Recovery 6.3 Installation and Upgrade Guide topic "Managing licenses" and its subtopics. For example, for more information about updating license key or file information, see "Updating or changing a license." To see how to add a license to an appliance, see "Adding a license." For more information about contacting the license portal server, see "Contacting the Rapid Recovery License Portal Server." In this release, these topics all appear only in the Rapid Recovery 6.3 Installation and Upgrade Guide.
- For additional topics regarding the management of licenses, see the Rapid Recovery License Portal User Guide.
Non-phone-home license restrictions
Registering a Rapid Recovery license in non-phone-home mode precludes the Core from sharing your personal information. This includes email address, IP addresses, and license consumption information.
After you register a non-phone-home license, you will not be able to do the following:
- View license server information from the Settings page on the Core Console (since your Core is not permitted to communicate with the Rapid Recovery License Portal).
- Manage the consumption of licenses from the Core Console.
- Submit information to Quest Data Protection Support from the Rapid Recovery Info Gathering Tool.
- Monitor the health of Cores and protected machines, manage multiple Cores, and generate reports on demand for the relevant machines on multiple Cores from the QorePortal.
- Use the auto update feature to update a new version of Rapid Recovery Core (your Core is not notified that new versions are available).
- Use the auto update feature to directly update protected Linux machines using package managers such as yum, zypper, or apt (you can still download an installation package from an internet-accessible Linux machine and move installation files to the secured computer manually).
