Privacy Policy

AutoFinder.com

Effective Date: October 1, 2026

This version replaces the Privacy Statement effective December 20, 2015, as revised November 1, 2020.

1. About This Policy

This Privacy Policy describes how Detroit Trading Services, LLC, a Michigan limited liability company and a subsidiary of Detroit Trading Company (“Detroit Trading,” “we,” “us,” or “our”), collects, uses, discloses, sells, and shares personal information in connection with autofinder.com and the features and services offered through it (the “Site”).

Detroit Trading operates a digital automotive marketplace. Our business is connecting people who are shopping for vehicles with dealers, dealer groups, vehicle manufacturers, and other automotive businesses. We are paid for making those connections. This Policy explains what that means for your information.

This Policy applies to autofinder.com and the pages and features served under it. It does not apply to other Detroit Trading websites — including detroittrading.com, rydeshopper.com, carready.com, and mycarmatch.com — which have their own policies, or to the practices of dealers, manufacturers, lenders, or other third parties who receive your information or whose sites you visit. Terms defined in our Terms of Use have the same meaning here.

The Site is intended for residents of the United States. Information we collect is stored on servers in the United States.

2. Summary of the Key Points

We provide this summary for convenience. It does not replace the rest of this Policy.

• We collect the contact and vehicle-interest information you submit through our forms, and we collect information about your device and browsing automatically.
• We sell and share personal information. When you submit a request, we transmit your information to dealers, manufacturers, and other business partners for compensation, and they contact you. We also share information with advertising partners for targeted advertising.
• You can opt out. Section 10 explains how, including through the “Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information” link in the Site footer.
• We use cookies, pixels, session recording, and identity-resolution technologies. Section 11 lists them and explains how to limit them.
• You have rights over your information, including rights to know, delete, and correct. Section 9 explains how to exercise them.

3. Personal Information We Collect

3.1 Information you provide

When you complete a quote request, offer request, newsletter signup, contest entry, survey, or other form on the Site, or when you call a telephone number listed on the Site or email us, we collect:

• Identifiers — first and last name, postal address, ZIP code, email address, and telephone number.
• Vehicle interest information — the make, model, year, trim, body style, condition, and price or payment range of vehicles you are considering; your trade-in vehicle and its condition and mileage; your purchase timeframe; and whether you intend to buy or lease.
• Commercial and preference information — your financing preferences, the dealers you select, and the offers you request.
• Communications — the content of emails, chat messages, form comments, and, where calls are recorded, call recordings and transcripts, together with call metadata such as duration and disposition. Where we or a service provider record a call, you will be notified at the start of the call.
• Consent records — evidence of the consent you gave when you submitted a form, including the page you were on, the disclosure text displayed to you, and the date and time. We use a third-party consent documentation service for this purpose.

3.2 Information collected automatically

When you visit the Site, we and our service providers and advertising partners collect:

• Device and connection information — IP address, browser type and version, operating system, device type, screen characteristics, language, and internet service provider or mobile carrier.
• Usage information — pages and listings you view, searches you run, filters you apply, links and buttons you click, the referring page, and the date, time, and duration of your visit.
• Session activity — we use session recording and analytics tools that capture how you move through and interact with pages, including mouse movements, scrolling, clicks, and keystrokes entered into form fields. These tools are configured to mask sensitive fields. Section 11 names the tool we use and explains how to limit it.
• Location — an approximate location derived from your IP address. Where you grant your browser’s location permission, we receive your device location, use it only to determine your ZIP code, and retain only the ZIP code. We do not store the precise coordinates.
• Advertising and identity information — cookie identifiers, advertising identifiers, pixel data, and, through identity-resolution services, information that associates your device or browser with a person or household.

3.3 Information we obtain from others

We obtain personal information from data brokers and lead providers, from our affiliates and other companies within the Detroit Trading corporate group, from advertising and analytics partners, from dealers and manufacturers, from social media platforms when you interact with our content or register using a social account, and from publicly available sources.

We take reasonable steps to confirm that information we obtain from others was collected in compliance with applicable law, including that the consumer received proper notice and gave any required consent.

3.4 Sensitive personal information

We do not collect government identification numbers, financial account numbers or credentials, racial or ethnic origin, religious or philosophical beliefs, union membership, health information, or information about sex life or sexual orientation, and we do not use any information we hold to infer characteristics about you of that kind.

Two categories require a qualification. First, where you grant your browser’s location permission, the location your device sends us is precise enough to be treated as sensitive personal information under some state laws. We use it for one purpose — to determine your ZIP code — and we retain and disclose only the ZIP code, not the coordinates. Second, we receive the contents of emails, chat messages, and form comments that you send to us — communications for which we are the intended recipient, which state privacy laws do not treat as sensitive on that basis. We do not read or collect your communications with anyone else.

We do not use or disclose sensitive personal information for any purpose other than performing the services you requested and the operational purposes permitted by law. If you believe you have provided sensitive information to us in an open text field, contact us and we will remove it.

3.5 Aggregated and de-identified information

We may aggregate or de-identify information so that it can no longer reasonably be linked to you or your household. Where we do, we take reasonable measures to ensure the information cannot be re-associated with you, we maintain and use it only in de-identified form, we do not attempt to re-identify it except as permitted by law to test our de-identification, and we contractually require any recipient to do the same.

4. How We Use Personal Information

We use personal information to:

• operate the Site and provide the services you request;
• transmit your request and your information to dealers, dealer groups, manufacturers, and other business partners so they can respond to you — this is our primary business purpose, and we receive compensation for it;
• contact you about your request and about vehicles, financing, and related offers, consistent with the consent you gave — this includes contact by the dealer or dealers for the brand and area you identified in your request;
• personalize what you see on the Site, including which listings and offers are shown to you;
• conduct marketing and advertising, including targeted advertising on other websites and apps, and measure its effectiveness;
• analyze and improve the Site, diagnose technical problems, and develop new features;
• create de-identified and aggregated insights about vehicle shopping;
• verify information, prevent and detect fraud and abuse, and protect the security and integrity of the Site;
• maintain records demonstrating consent and compliance with telemarketing, privacy, and consumer protection laws;
• comply with legal obligations, respond to legal process, and establish, exercise, or defend legal claims; and
• evaluate or conduct a merger, acquisition, financing, reorganization, or sale of assets.

We will not use personal information for a purpose that is unrelated to, or incompatible with, the purposes disclosed in this Policy without first providing you notice and, where applicable law requires it, obtaining your consent.

5. How We Disclose, Sell, and Share Personal Information

We want to be direct about this, because it is central to our business. State privacy laws define “sale” broadly to include disclosing personal information to a third party for monetary or other valuable consideration, and define “sharing” to include disclosing it for cross-context behavioral advertising. Under those definitions, we sell and share personal information.

5.1 Dealers, manufacturers, and other lead recipients

When you submit a request through the Site, we transmit your identifiers and vehicle interest information to the dealers, dealer groups, manufacturers, or other automotive businesses you selected or, where you did not select a specific dealer, to the businesses serving your area. We receive compensation for these transmissions. This is a “sale” of personal information under state privacy law.

We may transmit your information to more than one recipient, and a recipient may in turn transmit it to others, including other dealers and lenders. Once your information is with a recipient, that recipient’s own privacy policy governs how it uses your information. If you ask us to delete your personal information, we pass that request on: we direct the service providers, contractors, and third parties to whom we sold or disclosed it to delete it as well, as applicable law requires. You do not need to make a separate request for that. You may also contact those parties directly; the categories of recipients are described in Section 6, and you may ask us which of them received your information as part of a request to know.

5.2 Advertising and analytics partners

We disclose identifiers, device information, usage information, and advertising identifiers to advertising platforms, advertising networks, data analytics providers, and measurement partners, including through cookies and pixels on the Site. We may provide your email address or telephone number to these platforms in hashed form so that it can be matched to an account on the platform. This allows us and our customers to show you advertising based on your interests. This is a “sale” and a “share” under state privacy law.

5.3 Service providers

We disclose personal information to companies that provide services to us — website hosting, data storage, email and text message delivery, call handling and recording, customer relationship management, consent documentation, fraud prevention, analytics, and professional services such as auditors and attorneys. These companies receive information under contracts that require them to use it only for the purposes we specify, only on our instructions, and to keep it confidential. They are not permitted to use it for their own or anyone else’s benefit.

5.4 Corporate group

We disclose personal information within the Detroit Trading corporate group, including to Detroit Trading Company and its other subsidiaries and the other websites they operate, for the purposes described in this Policy.

5.5 Legal and protective disclosures

We disclose personal information when we believe it is required by law or legal process — including in response to a subpoena, court order, or other legal process — and where necessary: to establish or exercise our legal rights or defend against claims; to investigate or prevent fraud, security incidents, or illegal activity; to enforce our Terms of Use; or to protect the rights, property, or safety of Detroit Trading, our users, or others.

5.6 Corporate transactions

If Detroit Trading or the Site is involved in a merger, acquisition, financing, reorganization, bankruptcy, or sale of all or part of its business or assets, personal information may be among the assets transferred. We will seek to ensure that the recipient handles the information consistently with this Policy.

5.7 Categories disclosed in the preceding twelve months

In the twelve months preceding the Effective Date of this Policy, we collected, sold, and shared the categories of personal information described in Section 3, as summarized in the table in Section 6. We did not knowingly sell or share the personal information of any consumer under 16 years of age.

6. Categories, Sources, Purposes, and Recipients

The table below summarizes, by category, the personal information we collect, where we collect it, why, and to whom we disclose, sell, or share it. Categories track the California Consumer Privacy Act.

We retain each category for the periods described in Section 7. Inferences and geolocation are retained for the period applicable to the record they are derived from or attached to.

7. How Long We Keep Personal Information

We keep personal information for as long as needed for the purpose it was collected for, and then for any additional period required for legal, regulatory, or dispute-resolution purposes. The same information may be retained under more than one of the periods below; expiration of one period does not trigger deletion where another still applies.

8. Your Privacy Rights

Most U.S. states with comprehensive privacy laws give residents a similar set of rights. Rather than distinguish among them, we extend the rights described in this Section to every user of the Site, regardless of where you live. If the law of your state gives you a right that is not described here, that right applies to you and we will honor it; this Section is not a limit on your statutory rights.

These rights apply to information that can reasonably be used to identify you or your household. They do not extend to de-identified or aggregated information. Our ability to respond depends on your giving us accurate information with which to locate your records. Except in California, these rights apply to you as a consumer and not in a business-to-business or employment context.

8.1 Right to know and to access

You may request that we disclose the categories of personal information we have collected about you, the categories of sources, the business or commercial purpose for collecting, selling, or sharing it, the categories of third parties to whom we disclose, sell, or share it, and the specific pieces of personal information we hold about you. These are described generally in Sections 3 through 6.

8.2 Right to data portability

You may request a copy of the personal information you provided to us, in a portable and, to the extent technically feasible, readily usable format.

8.3 Right to delete

You may request that we delete personal information we collected from you. We may decline in the circumstances permitted by law, including where the information is needed to complete a transaction or provide a service you requested; to detect or prevent security incidents, fraud, or illegal activity; to debug and repair errors; to exercise free speech or another legal right; to comply with a legal obligation or to preserve records for a legal claim; to conduct public-interest research in accordance with applicable ethics and privacy law; or for internal uses reasonably aligned with your expectations.

Where we deny a deletion request in part, we will tell you which exception applies. We may ask you to confirm a deletion request before we act on it.

8.4 Right to correct

You may request that we correct inaccurate personal information we maintain about you. We may ask for documentation establishing the inaccuracy, and may decline where the totality of the circumstances indicates the information we hold is accurate.

8.5 Right to opt out of sale, sharing, and targeted advertising

You may direct us not to sell or share your personal information, and not to use it for targeted advertising. Section 10 explains how.

8.6 Right to limit the use of sensitive personal information

You may direct us to limit the use and disclosure of sensitive personal information to what is necessary to provide the services you requested. As described in Section 3.4, the only information of this kind we receive is the device location you affirmatively permit your browser to share, which we use solely to determine your ZIP code and do not retain. You can withdraw that permission at any time in your browser settings, and you may also direct us to limit our use of it by contacting us as described in Section 9. We will honor any request we receive.

8.7 Right to opt out of profiling and automated decision-making

You may opt out of profiling in furtherance of decisions that produce legal or similarly significant effects concerning you. Detroit Trading does not extend credit, make lending or leasing decisions, underwrite, price, or determine anyone’s eligibility for any financial service, and no decision of that kind is made on the Site. We do use profiling to decide which listings, offers, and advertising to show you, and to route your request to dealers and partners in your area, and you may opt out of that as described in Section 10.

8.8 Right to non-discrimination

We will not discriminate against you for exercising a privacy right. We will not deny you services, charge you a different price, or provide you a different level of quality because you exercised a right. Exercising certain rights may, however, mean we can no longer provide you with a service or communication that depends on the information involved — for example, we cannot connect you with a dealer if you ask us to delete the request.

8.9 Right to appeal

If we decline your request, you may appeal by replying to our response or by contacting us as described in Section 9 with the word “Appeal” in your message. We will respond to an appeal within the period required by applicable law and, if we deny it, will provide you with a method to contact your state attorney general.

8.10 Notice of financial incentives

If we offer a program that provides a benefit in exchange for the use of your personal information — for example, a discount or entry in a drawing in exchange for joining a mailing list — we will describe the material terms of that program at the time we offer it, including how to opt in, how to withdraw at any time, a good-faith estimate of the value of your personal information to us, and the method we used to calculate it.

9. How to Exercise Your Rights

You may submit a request in any of the following ways:

Methods to Submit a Request:

• Via Email: To exercise any of the rights described in this Policy, email us at optout@autofinder.com with the subject line “Right to Request.” In the body of your email, clearly state the right you would like to exercise — for example, Right to Know or Access, Right to Delete, Right to Correct, Right to Opt Out of Sale or Sharing, Right to Limit Use of Sensitive Personal Information, or Right to Opt Out of Communications — together with the email address and telephone number you have used on the Site so that we can locate your records.
• Via Phone: To exercise any of these rights, call us toll-free at 1-833-621-0227 and clearly indicate that you would like to exercise your data rights. You will be asked which right you would like to exercise, so please be ready to state it — for example, Right to Know or Access, Right to Delete, Right to Correct, Right to Opt Out of Sale or Sharing, Right to Limit Use of Sensitive Personal Information, or Right to Opt Out of Communications.

Written correspondence about this Policy may also be sent to the Privacy Office at the address in Section 21.

Verification. We will ask you to verify your identity before we act on a request to know, delete, or correct. We do not require verification to act on a request to opt out of sale or sharing, or to unsubscribe from marketing. We will ask for information that lets us match you to the records we hold — typically the email address or telephone number you submitted to us, along with other details of your request. We use information you provide for verification only for that purpose. We may decline a request we cannot verify.

Authorized agents. You may use an authorized agent to submit a request. For a request to know, delete, or correct, the agent must provide written proof of your authorization, and we may ask you to verify your own identity with us and to confirm that you gave the agent permission. For a request to opt out of sale or sharing, we require only proof that you gave the agent permission to act for you, and we will not ask you to verify your identity. We may deny a request from an agent who does not provide that proof.

Response time. We will confirm receipt of a request to know, delete, or correct within 10 business days, and will respond substantively within 45 calendar days of receipt, extendable by an additional 45 days where reasonably necessary, in which case we will tell you within the first 45-day period. We honor requests to opt out of sale or sharing within 15 business days. We honor requests to revoke consent to marketing calls or text messages within 10 business days. Where a state law sets a different period, we will meet whichever period is shorter.

Limits. We may decline requests that are manifestly unfounded, excessive, or repetitive, or that are made for purposes of harassment or fraud. Where a law permits us not to search information that is not maintained in a searchable format, that we hold solely for legal or compliance purposes, and that we do not use commercially or sell, we will tell you what we did not search and why. We are not required to disclose certain specific pieces of information, such as government identification or financial account numbers; we do not collect those, but we will tell you by category if we hold them.

10. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information

You have the right to opt out of the sale and sharing of your personal information and of its use for targeted advertising. The “Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information” link in the Site footer brings you to this Section, which explains how to exercise that right. One request covers both the lead information you submit through our forms and the information collected about your browsing through cookies, pixels, and similar technologies. You do not need to submit more than one request.

10.1 How to opt out

Submit your request by email to optout@autofinder.com with the subject line “Right to Request,” or by calling us toll-free at 1-833-621-0227, and state that you wish to opt out of the sale or sharing of your personal information. Tell us the email address and telephone number you have used on the Site so that we can locate your records. We do not require you to verify your identity in order to opt out, and we do not require you to create an account.

We honor opt-out requests within fifteen (15) business days. When you opt out, we stop transmitting your lead information to dealers, manufacturers, and other business partners; we stop providing your identifiers to advertising platforms for matched-audience advertising; and we add your identifiers to a suppression list so that the opt-out persists.

10.2 What an opt-out does and does not do

An opt-out is forward-looking. Where we have already transmitted your information, we will, as part of any deletion request you make, direct the recipients to delete it as applicable law requires (see Section 5.1). Recipients may have their own legal bases for retaining information, so you may also wish to contact them directly.

Once you have opted out, we will not ask you to consent to the sale or sharing of your personal information again for at least twelve (12) months. If during that period you choose to submit a new request through a form on the Site, the form will tell you before you submit it that completing it means asking us to transmit the information in that form to the dealers or partners who will respond to you, and will ask you to confirm that separately. Your opt-out otherwise remains in effect, including as to all information we already hold.

10.3 Browser-based tracking

Cookies, pixels, and similar technologies operate in your browser, and an opt-out request tied to your name or email address cannot by itself stop a third-party tag from setting a cookie on your device. To limit tracking in your browser, in addition to opting out with us, you can use the controls described in Sections 11 and 12: your browser’s cookie and tracking-protection settings, the industry opt-out tools, and the advertising platforms’ own preference settings. Because those controls are stored in each browser, you will need to set them on each browser and device you use, and clearing cookies may reset them.

10.4 Do Not Track

“Do Not Track” is a browser setting for which no common standard was ever adopted. We cannot respond to Do Not Track signals.

10.5 Opting out of marketing communications

To stop marketing email, use the unsubscribe link in any marketing message. To stop text messages, reply STOP. To stop telephone calls from us, contact us as described in Section 9. We honor a request to revoke consent to calls or text messages within ten (10) business days. These opt-outs apply to communications from Detroit Trading; to stop communications from a dealer or other party who has your information, contact that party directly.

11. Cookies, Pixels, and Tracking Technologies

We and our partners use cookies, pixels, web beacons, local storage, and similar technologies on the Site. The technologies currently in use, by category, are:

• Strictly necessary — required to operate the Site, maintain your session, balance load, and protect against fraud and abuse. These include our own session and preference cookies and the consent-documentation script described below.
• Analytics and performance — used to understand how the Site is used and to improve it. These include Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager.
• Session recording — used to record and replay how visitors interact with pages, including mouse movement, scrolling, clicks, and keystrokes in form fields, so that we can find usability problems. We use Microsoft Clarity for this purpose. Clarity is configured to mask sensitive fields. You can opt out of Clarity recording at clarity.microsoft.com/privacy.
• Advertising and targeting — used to deliver advertising based on your interests on the Site and on other sites and apps, and to measure it. These include the Meta (Facebook) pixel, Microsoft Advertising (Bing) tags, and Google Ads tags.
• Identity resolution — used to associate a browser or device with a person or household so that we can recognize returning visitors and match activity to records. We use FullThrottle for this purpose.
• Consent documentation — used to create and retain a record of the consent you give when you submit a form. We use ActiveProspect TrustedForm for this purpose.
• On-site messaging — used to display notices, offers, and prompts on the Site. We use Wisepops for this purpose.

We update this list when the technologies on the Site change. The date at the top of this Policy reflects the most recent update.

You can control cookies through your browser settings, including blocking third-party cookies, enabling tracking protection, and deleting cookies already stored. Blocking cookies may prevent parts of the Site from working. Most opt-out mechanisms, including those in Section 12, are themselves stored as cookies tied to a browser, so clearing cookies, using private browsing, or switching browsers or devices may reset your choices and require you to opt out again.

Your device may offer additional controls — “Limit Ad Tracking” on iOS, or “Opt Out of Ads Personalization” on Android. Please consult your browser or device documentation or help function for more information.

12. Interest-Based Advertising

As you browse the web, you may see advertising for the Site or for our customers that is based on your earlier activity. You can opt out of interest-based advertising from participating companies through the Digital Advertising Alliance at optout.aboutads.info, the Network Advertising Initiative at optout.networkadvertising.org, and, for mobile apps, the DAA AppChoices tool at youradchoices.com/appchoices.

Some advertising you see is based on a matched audience rather than on information we hold about you. In those cases, a platform serves an advertisement to an audience with certain characteristics, and we do not receive the identities of the individuals who see it. Those platforms have their own controls — for example, Meta’s Ad Preferences and Google Ad Settings. If you click through to the Site, your interactions with us become subject to this Policy.

13. Browser Permissions

The Site may ask your permission to collect certain information, such as your location, or to send you notifications. You choose whether to grant each permission and for how long. You can review and change these choices in your browser’s site settings; instructions are available in the help documentation for Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari, and Opera. If you revoke a permission in your browser, we retain the information collected before you changed the setting, consistent with the descriptions above.

14. Security

We maintain administrative, technical, and physical safeguards designed to protect personal information in our possession against loss, theft, and unauthorized access, use, disclosure, or modification, appropriate to the nature and sensitivity of the information. We use encryption in transit for information submitted through the Site. No system is impenetrable, and we cannot guarantee the security of any network, server, or database we or our service providers operate.

15. Children

The Site is not directed to children and is not intended for use by anyone under 18. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18. We do not knowingly sell or share the personal information of any consumer we know to be under 18, and we have no actual knowledge that we sell or share the personal information of consumers under 16. If you are a parent or guardian and believe a child has provided personal information to us, contact us as described in Section 9 and we will delete it.

16. California “Shine the Light”

California Civil Code § 1798.83 permits California residents to request information about the personal information we disclosed to third parties for their own direct marketing purposes in the preceding calendar year. To make a request, contact us as described in Section 9 with the words “Shine the Light” in your message.

17. Nevada Residents

Nevada residents may submit a verified request directing us not to sell certain covered personal information as defined by Nevada law. Send your request to optout@autofinder.com with the words “Nevada — Right to Request” in the subject line, or call us toll-free at 1-833-621-0227. This right is separate from, and in addition to, the opt-out described in Section 10, which we extend to all users.

18. Other Websites and Links

This Policy applies only to the Site. The Site contains links to, and forms that transmit information to, websites operated by dealers, manufacturers, advertisers, and other third parties. We are not responsible for their content or their privacy practices, and we encourage you to review the privacy policy of any site you visit.

19. Changes to This Policy

Our business changes, and this Policy will change with it. When we make changes, we will post the revised Policy on the Site and update the Effective Date above. Where a change is material, we will provide more prominent notice, which may include a notice on the Site or, where we have your contact information and you have consented to receive communications from us, an email.

Your continued use of the Site after a revised Policy is posted constitutes acceptance of it.

20. Disputes

This Policy and any dispute relating to it or to our handling of your personal information are governed by the laws of the State of Michigan and are subject to the dispute resolution provisions of our Terms of Use, including the arbitration agreement and class action waiver in Section 17 of those Terms and your right to opt out of them. Where the class action waiver is not enforceable, that provision shall be severed from Section 17 and the remainder shall apply.

21. How to Contact Us

If you have questions about this Policy or our handling of your personal information, wish to lodge a complaint, or wish to reach our Privacy Officer, contact us at:

We will address your concern promptly and work toward a satisfactory resolution.