Privacy Disclosures
Privacy Policy
Last Updated: May 15, 2026
Hills Bank and Trust Company (“Hills Bank,” or “we,” “us,” and similar) respects privacy and is committed to protecting our customers’ personal information. This Privacy Policy (the “Policy”) describes the types of personal information we collect when you use our website (located at hillsbank.com), how we use that information, who we disclose it to, and certain rights and options you may have regarding your personal information.
As a financial institution, we are also required to provide you specific details regarding how we use and disclose nonpublic personal information in connection with our banking activities pursuant to applicable law. For more information, please review our Bank Privacy Disclosure.
Personal Information We Collect or Receive About You
Personal Information
For the purposes of this Policy, “personal information” is any information that, either alone or in combination with other information, identifies, relates to, or can be used to contact a particular individual. The types of personal information we may collect include the following categories.
Contact information: First name, last name, email address (personal or business), address (personal or business), and telephone number (personal or business).
Job applicant information – Details about your employment history, education history, and other information that you would find on a resume, demographic information, as well as information needed to verify your identity or for tax purposes, such as your date of birth, social security number, and driver’s license, state ID, or passport information.
Marketing information: Details regarding promotional materials you may have requested or received from us, your engagement with such promotional materials, the services in which you are interested, your receipt of promotional communications, information on your marketing or communication preferences, and developing marketing profiles.
Online account details: Username, account password, contact information, passcodes, secret words and other information that we may request or that you may provide relating to your online account.
Communication information: Details and copies of communications or inquiries you have submitted to us, including through email, calls, service session information, chat functionalities on our website, forms, social media, or other means. Please note that we may leverage artificial intelligence technologies in connection with chat features available on our website. Unless the communication you receive contains some indication that you are interacting with a natural person, you may be interacting with one of our AI-powered agents.
Device, usage, interaction, and preference information: Details regarding how and when you use our website, including details about the device used to connect to the website (such as your device type, device ID, and browser and operating system), your IP address, your location based upon your IP address, your internet service provider, click events, interaction sequences, the frequency and duration of your usage, the websites, emails, or search terms that referred you to the website, and information about your interaction with the website, such as click events, engagement metrics, and similar behavioral or interest information. We also collect information regarding the content viewed and issues queried while on our website (e.g., pages visited, issues searched for, etc.).
We collect this information when you access, use, or navigate our website, fill in forms via our website, request information from us, communicate with us (including by phone, email, chat, or otherwise), interact with any chat or similar features available via our website, or otherwise provide us with personal information.
If you do not provide us with certain information, then certain features of our website may not function as intended. For example, if you do not provide us with your username and password, you may not be able to log into our online banking portal. Please note that we may aggregate or anonymize the foregoing types of information such that they are no longer capable of identifying you, in which case they are no longer considered “personal information.”
Automatically Collected Information
Like most websites, we use various technologies to collect information about the users of our digital properties. Note, that the third parties who supply pixels, tags, web beacons, cookies, and the other tracking technologies discussed below, as well as the third party who supplies our website chat feature, collect your personal information at the same time as we receive that information. They may also use such personal information for their own or others’ purposes.
The technologies we use on our digital properties include:
Pixels, tags, web beacons, gifs, and similar technologies. These technologies are small pieces of code that run when a digital property page or an email is loaded. They are used to monitor the behavior of the visitor or email recipient—such as what icons were clicked or whether links in an email were opened—and gather analytics and details about the interaction. For example, when you open our homepage, a pixel may run and generate information based on the visit (e.g., your IP address and what day and time you were on the homepage), and then this information is processed by us or our vendors. Pixels and tags work in conjunction with cookies to let us know what portions of our digital properties are of interest to you and to help us provide you with tailored information. Even if you have disabled or turned off cookies (discussed below), the pixels, tags, and web beacons we use may still detect and collect certain information about your interaction with our digital property; in other words, these kinds of technologies may disregard any cookie-prohibitive markers or signals.
Cookies: Cookies are small text files that can be used by websites to make a user’s experience more efficient. Our website uses different types of cookies to, among other things, automatically recognize you when you return to our site, power customer service interactions, determine our marketing effectiveness, store information regarding your profile, preferences, and interests, and analyze traffic to our site. Please note that where cookies are essential to the operation of our site, if disabled, you may not be able to enjoy certain features of the site. For further information about cookies, including how to refuse cookies, please visit www.allaboutcookies.org. We do not honor “Do Not Track” signals.
Log Files and Device Identifiers. We use log files to track actions occurring on our digital properties and to collect data about visitors and identify returning customers, including IP address, browser type, Internet service provider, referring/exit pages, visited pages and accompanying tags, date/time stamps, and device identifiers.
Analytics. Our digital properties may also deploy third-party analytics tools, such as Google Analytics, Siteimprove Analytics and Q2 Discover. You can find more information about how data is collected and processed in connection with the Google Analytics service at https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites. You can also read Google’s privacy policy at https://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en, Siteimprove Analytics’ privacy policies at https://www.siteimprove.com/privacy/ and Q2’s privacy policy at https://www.q2.com/privacy-policy.
These technologies may be set or controlled by use (first-party technologies) or they may be set or controlled by third-party vendors or partners (third-party technologies). Further, these technologies can be categorized as follows.
Essential: These technologies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. Examples include: cookies that allow pages to load correctly and technologies used to power our chat services.
Performance: These technologies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of website and mobiles application. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors interact with and move around the digital properties. Examples include: technologies we use for analytics.
Functional: These technologies are not strictly necessary for the website to function but help us improve your experience and understand your interests and how our site is used. Examples include: cookies and pixels that analyze your browser settings and preferences, tagging webpages based on interest,
Advertising: These technologies support features like understanding our customers better across sessions and based on interests, and evaluating our marketing performance, both on the website and as directed to you. These technologies may collect personal information and may track your activity across other websites.
The information collected through these technologies may be combined with personal information or aggregated with other information on website visits. We may share information about your use of our website with our advertising and analytics partners, who may combine it with other information that you previously provided to them.
Please see the Section titled “Your Choices About Your Personal Information” for more information about options you may have to configure pixels, tags, cookies, and similar technologies on our website.
Information from Other Sources
We obtain both personal and non-personal information about you from our vendors, affiliates, business partners, contractors, suppliers, and other third parties and add it to other information we have collected. We, and the third parties we engage, may combine information we collect from you with information obtained from other sources. For example, we may purchase consumer data from publicly available sources and use that information to supplement the information we have collected about your activities directly. This helps us improve the information’s overall accuracy and completeness, and also helps us better tailor our marketing efforts and interactions with you.
We may provide you the ability to log in to our website through certain third-party accounts. When you use these single sign-on protocols to access our services, tokens from the sign-on protocol to help identify you in our system and confirm you successfully authenticated through the applicable sign-on protocol. You can direct the deletion of any single sign-on data, but then you may be required to use other means to log in to your account.
Social Media
If you interact with us on any social media platform: (i) depending on your social media privacy settings, the personal information that you submit on the social media platform may be read, collected, or used by us as described in this Policy, and (ii) where we respond to any interaction with you on social media, your account name/handle may be viewable by any and all members or users of our social media accounts. Social media platforms operate independently from us and we are not responsible for the personal information that you choose to submit or link on any social media platform. We encourage you to review the privacy policies and settings of any social media platform with which you interact to help you understand their privacy practices.
How We Use Your Personal Information
We (or service providers acting on our behalf) may use the personal information identified above for the following purposes:
Providing and optimizing your experience on our website and ensuring that our content is presented to you in the most effective manner across multiple sessions.
Managing our interactions and relationship with you, including our client engagements and services, and performing our services for you.
Reviewing and responding to any inquiries or communications submitted through our website.
Communicating with you and communicating regarding our services, your questions, and other issues.
Sending you promotional or informational communications and solicitations, tracking your marketing preferences , email and website engagement, and for our internal marketing purposes.
Analyzing market and customer behaviors, interests, and trends and developing financial, product, or customer profile insights based on your information. This includes scoring potential leads based on their interactions with our website, engaging in cross-session behavioral tracking, and creating audience segments and personalized advertisements based on your interactions with our website, advertisements, and marketing emails.
Managing customer service issues, including issues relating to the performance of our services and client feedback.
Developing, updating, and improving our website, user service, and user experience, and otherwise improving our knowledge and insights regarding clients .
Preventing and detecting fraud, financial crime, hacking activities, security breaches, and other unlawful activities in connection with our services.
Complying with our legal or regulatory obligations, and defending or advancing legal claims.
If you are a job applicant, to process your application to our company, including facilitating and scheduling interviews and any other follow up items.
Notifying you about changes to our website or services, or material changes to this Policy.
Providing you with surveys or otherwise soliciting feedback from you.
Performing other functions as otherwise described to you at the time of collection or to which you otherwise consent.
For more information about your options relating to your personal information and your communication preferences, see “Your Choices About Personal Information” below.
Disclosure of Your Personal Information
When the information we collect about you is aggregated, anonymized, or otherwise does not identify you, we may use that information for any purpose or disclose it to third parties, to the extent permitted by applicable law.
In addition, we may disclose your personal information to the following types of individuals or entities:
Service providers we use to facilitate our business, including IT and system administration providers, vendors that support the website and functionality on the website, including customer service options, and data storage providers.
Marketing and advertising vendors that may assist with lead generation and engagement, marketing segmentation, hosting and analyzing information relating to clients and potential clients, marketing automation, advertisement placement and targeting, and marketing campaigns and communications, which may include the use of artificial intelligence technologies.
Analytics vendors in order to understand our website traffic and usage patterns, optimize our website, understand our current customers, and identify potential new clients.
Our professional advisors, such as lawyers, accountants, and other similar advisors.
Other parties for any purpose we disclose at the time you provide the information.
Buyers or other successors prior to or in the event of a merger, acquisition, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution, or other sale or transfer of some or all of our assets, whether as a going concern or as a part of bankruptcy, liquidation, or similar proceeding, where the information is among the assets being transferred.
Regulatory and governmental authorities, law enforcement agencies, courts, and other third parties, as necessary to comply with applicable laws and regulations, respond to a subpoena, search warrant, or other lawful request for information, or to otherwise protect our rights or the rights, property, or safety of others.
Note, the technology vendors we use to make our website available to you may collect your personal information instantaneously and simultaneously with us collecting the same information. Use of our website, and the features therein, does constitute consent to such processing by third parties.
Our Marketing Efforts
We may send you direct marketing communications from time to time via physical or electronic mail, including news, updates, and other announcements relating to our services and business activities. We will only send marketing messages where the law allows us to do so and, in the event that you no longer wish to receive marketing communications from us, then you can always unsubscribe from our marketing communications using the functionality in the communication you have received or by contacting us at the information below.
You may also receive tailored advertisements when using our website. Please review your device and browser settings to learn more about how you can control advertisements delivered via a web page.
Your Choices About Your Personal Information
Tracking Technologies and Advertising
Depending on your browser or device, you may have the option to set the browser to accept all cookies, reject all cookies, notify you when a cookie is set, or delete cookies. Each browser and device are different, so we recommend you evaluate the tools and settings available in your browser or device, as well as any available instructions for the same. Please note that if you disable or delete cookies, you may not be able to access or use certain features of our website.
The National Advertising Initiative also makes resources available to assist consumers in opt-out of certain tailored online ads, which you can access at https://optout.networkadvertising.org/?c=1.
Marketing Communications and Emails
You may choose to opt out of marketing emails by using the “Unsubscribe” link found at the bottom of such emails. You can configure your device settings to disable push notifications. You can opt out of receiving certain communications by contacting us at the “Contact Us” information below.
Analytics
As discussed above, we use Google Analytics, Siteimprove and Q2 Discover in connection with the website. If you would like to refrain from having your data collected by Google Analytics, Google has developed an opt-out browser that you can access at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en-US. You can find more information on how Google uses information it collects at https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites, and more information on how Siteimprove uses information it collects and Siteimprove Analytics’ privacy policies at https://www.siteimprove.com/privacy/. You can find more information on how Q2 Discover uses information it collects and Q2’s privacy policies at https://www.q2.com/privacy-policy.
Updating Your Information
We take reasonable steps to keep your personal information accurate and complete. You can access or update your personal information, including contact or account information, by contacting us at the “Contact Us” information below.
Declining to Provide Information
You can choose not to provide us with information we may request, but that may result in you being unable to use certain features of our website, request information about our services, or initiate other transactions with us. For example, you can choose to not provide us with your IP-based location
Do Not Track Mechanisms
Please note that our website and application do not honor “Do Not Track” signals, and such signals will not impact the operation of our website. Do Not Track signals are different than the Global Privacy Control (more information about GPC can be found at https://globalprivacycontrol.org/).
Privacy of Children Online
Our website is intended for use by a general audience. We do not knowingly collect the personal information of any individual under the age of 13. Should we discover that a child under the appropriate age provided his or her personal information, we will use that information only to respond to that child and inform him or her that we must have parental consent before receiving such information.
Data Retention
We retain personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or other mandatory reporting requirements. To determine the appropriate retention period, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal information, the potential risk of harm from unauthorized use or disclosure, the purposes for which we process it, whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements. We also consider any specific limitation periods under applicable law.
Information Security
We use appropriate administrative, technical, and physical measures to protect your personal information from loss, theft, and unauthorized use, disclosure, or modification. Please be aware that no data transmission over the Internet is 100% secure. While we strive to protect your personal information, we cannot ensure or warranty the security of any information you transmit to us and you do so at your own risk.
Links to Third-Party Websites
Our website may contain links to third-party digital properties (e.g., social media sites and sites that support services available through our website). Such third-party digital properties have separate privacy policies that you should review. We cannot and do not take responsibility for the content of linked websites or those companies’ data-handling practices.
Changes to the Privacy Policy
While we always aim to provide complete and transparent information about how we process your personal information, we reserve the right to amend or update this Policy from time to time or to create additional policies in order to accurately reflect changed circumstances or new legal requirements.
Please note that we may change this Policy from time to time. If there are changes to our Policy, we will post them here and update the “Last Updated” date at the top of this document. Continued use of the website after any changes is deemed to be acceptance of those changes. Accordingly, we encourage you to check the Policy periodically for updates.gs.
Contact Us
If you have any questions regarding our information handling practices, you may contact us at:
Email: hillsbank@hillsbank.com
Toll-Free Phone: 1-800-445-5725 (1-800-HILLSBK)
Postal Address:
Hills Bank, Attn: Marketing,
PO Box 160, Hills, IA 52235