NSIN.MIL User Agreement

Version February 28, 2023

The following User Agreement (“Agreement”) governs the use of the National Security Innovation Network (“NSIN”) website, pages located at NSIN.MIL (“NSIN.MIL”), subdomains of NSIN.MIL, and any reasonably related pages. These sites, subdomains, and webpages will be collectively referred to as NSIN.MIL throughout this document. NSIN.MIL is a United States Department of Defense (“USDOD”) initiative from the Defense Innovation Unit (“DIU”).

Please read the rules contained in this Agreement carefully. This Agreement and its contained rules can be accessed in virtual form at any time on NSIN.MIL.

Your use of NSIN.MIL as well as acceptance of this Agreement and NSIN.MIL’s Privacy Policy is a legally binding agreement. Your use of any aspect of NSIN.MIL will constitute your consent to comply with this Agreement. If you cannot agree to comply with the rules contained in this Agreement, immediately cease use of use NSIN.MIL.

Special Rules and Conflicts with Other Documents: Certain parts of NSIN.MIL may have separate terms of use and privacy policies (“Special Rules”), which will govern your use of those parts of NSIN.MIL. At times when a portion of NSIN.MIL is governed by Special Rules, both the rules contained in this document and the Special Rules govern the use of said portion of NSIN.MIL. In the event that there is a conflict between the Special Rules and this Agreement or the NSIN Privacy Policy, the Special Rules shall govern.

Changes to this Agreement: NSIN reserves the right to modify this Agreement at any time. As a user of NSIN.MIL, it is your responsibility to ensure that you have the most up to date version of this Agreement. Your continued access of NSIN.MIL will constitute your acceptance of any changes or revisions to the Agreement. The date of the most recent revisions will appear on this page.

Non-Compliant Uses: Uses of NSIN.MIL not in compliance with this Agreement, any incorporated documents, or the rules contained in such will be deemed to be “non-compliant uses.” NSIN may restrict use of or deny access to users who use NSIN.MIL for non-compliant uses. NSIN may take this action without notice to the user.

IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT YOU ARE AWARE OF POTENTIAL SECURITY VOLATIONS WHEN YOU ARE USING NSIN.MIL. IT IS NEVER ACCEPTABLE TO TRANSMIT CLASSIFIED INFORMATION, FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY (FOUO) INFORMATION, SENSITIVE PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE INFORMATION, PROPRIETARY INFORMATION, PROCUREMENT SENSITIVE INFORMATION, TRADE SECRETS, LAW ENFORCEMENT SENSITIVE INFORMATION, AND OTHER PROTECTED INFORMATION ON NSIN.MIL. IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO BE AWARE OF THE CLASSIFICATION AND RELEASABILITY OF ANY INFORMATION THAT YOU TRANSMIT. IF YOU ARE A UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT OR UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE EMPLOYEE AND HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT ANY INFORMATION THAT YOU WISH TO TRANSMIT ON NSIN.MIL, PLEASE CONSULT YOUR SUPERVISOR OR AGENCY LEGAL COUNSEL. IF YOU ARE NOT A UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEE AND HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT ANY INFORMATION THAT YOU WISH TO TRANSMIT ON NSIN.MIL, PLEASE CONSULT YOUR OWN LEGAL COUNSEL.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF GOVERNMENT PROPERTY: NSIN.MIL IS THE PROPERTY OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNEMENT. AS SUCH ALL APPLICABLE RULES AND REGULATIONS APPLYING TO THE USE OF GOVERNMENT PROPERTY OF THIS KIND ARE INCORPORATED INTO THIS AGREEMENT. ADDITIONALLY, DEFACING OR MANIPULATION OF NSIN.MIL WILL BE PROSECUTED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAWS GOVERNING SUCH ACTIONS.

Introduction

The National Security Innovation Network (“NSIN”) including its website and pages located at NSIN.MIL (“NSIN.MIL”), are a United States Department of Defense (“USDOD”) initiative from the Defense Innovation Unit (“DIU”). NSIN.MIL is designed to enable innovation by providing information relating to national security innovation opportunities, including, but not limited to NSIN program offerings and information about NSIN (the “Services”).

Participation

Eligibility – You attest that you are eligible to enter into this Agreement and you are at least of “Minimum Age” (defined below). To use the Services, you agree that: (1) you must be the Minimum Age or older; and (2) you are not already restricted from using the Services by NSIN or any other part of the United States Government. While NSIN. US is intended for use in the United States of America, “minimum Age” means (a) 18 years old for the People’s Republic of China, (b) 16 years old for the Netherlands, (c) 14 years old for the United States of America, Canada, Germany, Spain, Australia and South Korea, and (d) 13 years old for all other countries. NSIN uses the aforementioned definitions of Minimum Age for the purposes of this Agreement. Additionally, if applicable law requires that you must be older in order for NSIN.MIL to lawfully provide the Services to you (including the collection, storage and use of your information) then the Minimum Age is such older age. Regardless of age requirements set by any outside entity, the Services are not for use by anyone under the age of 13.

User – As a User, you promise that you will follow the law and the terms of this Agreement. You are responsible for anything that happens through your use of the Services.

Notices and Service Messages – You agree that NSIN may provide notices to you in the following ways: (1) a banner notice on the Services, (2) an email sent to an address you provided, or (3) through other means including mobile number, telephone, or mail. You agree to keep your contact information up to date. You agree that NSIN may use the most up-to-date contact information on file to contact you with important notices. You agree that you are responsible for maintaining this contact information by providing NSIN with updated information when changes are made. You acknowledge that if the information that you provide is not up to date, you may miss out on these notices. Also, you agree certain additional information can be shared with us.

Utilization

Restricted Information – All US Government, including USDOD, employee Users are bound by all applicable law, policies, directives, and guidances governing conduct on social media and other websites and related to the content that such Users transmittals. Information presented on the NSIN.MIL website is considered public information and may be distributed or copied unless otherwise specified. Information should not be transmitted that is non-public information, including but not limited to: Classified Information, For Official Use Only Information, Sensitive Personally Identifiable Information, Proprietary Information, Procurement Sensitive Information, Trade Secrets, Law Enforcement Sensitive Information; and, other protected information.

Appropriate Utilization – Appropriate utilization of NSIN.MIL, by you, will mean that you will comply with all applicable laws, including, without limitation, privacy laws, intellectual property laws, anti-spam laws, export control laws, tax laws, and regulatory requirements. In addition, you will provide accurate information to us and keep it updated and use the Services in a professional manner.

Inappropriate Utilization – Inappropriate utilization, which provides grounds for immediate termination of your use of NSIN.MIL means that you will not:

  • Disclose information that you do not have the right to disclose (such as confidential information of others (including your employer) or non-public information of the US Government and USDOD (as noted above);
  • Disclose any information that could compromise, in any manner, operational security of USDOD activities. All personnel (including families and friends of service members) have a responsibility to ensure that no information that might put our military members in jeopardy or would be of use to our adversaries is transmitted to websites, including NSIN.MIL, which are readily accessible to the public. Not surprisingly, that information includes, among other things, technical information, operation plans, troop movement schedules, current and future locations of military units and ships, descriptions of overseas bases, details of weapons system, or discussions of areas frequented by service members overseas. Other information that’s not as obvious but should also not be discussed in an open forum includes daily military activities and operations, equipment status, unit morale, and results of operations. Any of these topics, if released in an open medium, have the ability to provide our adversaries opportunities to harm our military members;
  • Act dishonestly or unprofessionally, including by transmitting inappropriate, inaccurate, or objectionable content;
  • Add any content that you do not own or have some other legal right to add;
  • Add content that is not intended for, or inaccurate for, a designated field;
  • Misrepresent your current or previous positions and qualifications;
  • Misrepresent your affiliations with a person or entity, past or present;
  • Misrepresent your identity;
  • Harass, abuse or harm another person;
  • Send spam or other unwelcomed communications to others;
  • Scrape or copy profiles and information of others through any means (including crawlers, browser plugins and add-ons, and any other technology or manual work);
  • Act in an unlawful, libelous, abusive, obscene, discriminatory or otherwise objectionable manner;
  • Violate intellectual property rights of others, including patents, trademarks, trade secrets, copyrights or other proprietary rights;
  • Violate the intellectual property or other rights of NSIN.MIL;
  • Transmit any unsolicited messages or unauthorized advertising, “junk mail,” “spam,” “chain letters,” “pyramid schemes,” or any other form of unauthorized solicitation;
  • Transmit anything that contains software viruses, worms, or any other harmful code;
  • Manipulate identifiers in order to disguise the origin of any message or content transmitted through the Services;
  • Provide content that promotes escort services or prostitution;
  • Creating or operate a pyramid scheme, fraud or other similar practice;
  • Copy or use the information, content or data of others available on the Services (except as expressly authorized);
  • Copy, modify or create derivative works of NSIN.MIL, the Services or any related technology;
  • Reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble, decipher or otherwise attempt to derive the source code for the Services or any related technology, or any part thereof;
  • Imply or state that you are affiliated with or endorsed by NSIN.MIL or the USDOD without express consent;
  • Rent, lease, loan, trade, sell/re-sell access to the Services or related any information or data;
  • Remove any copyright, trademark or other proprietary rights notices contained in or on our Service;
  • Remove, cover or obscure any advertisement included on the Services;
  • Share or disclose information of others without their express consent;
  • Use manual or automated software, devices, scripts robots, other means or processes to access, “scrape,” “crawl” or “spider” the Services or any related data or information;
  • Use bots or other automated methods to access the Services, add or download contacts, send or redirect messages;
  • Monitor the Services’ availability, performance or functionality for any competitive purpose;
  • Engage in “framing,” “mirroring,” or otherwise simulating the appearance or function of the Services;
  • Access the Services except through the interfaces expressly provided by NSIN.MIL;
  • Override any security feature of the Services; or
  • Interfere with the operation of, or place an unreasonable load on, the Services (e.g., spam, denial of service attack, viruses, gaming algorithms); or
  • User or interact with NSIN.MIL in any other manner that undermines the purpose of NSIN.MIL or NSIN.

No Endorsement – NSIN and the USDOD does not endorse, support, sanction, encourage, verify or agree with the comments, opinions, or statements transmitted via NSIN.MIL. Any information or material placed online, including advice and opinions, are the views and responsibility of those making the comments, and unless otherwise indicated by NSIN said information does not represent the views of NSIN. the US Government, the USDOD or any NSIN third party service providers. By transmitting a comment, you agree that NSIN.MIL, the U.S. Government, the USDOD and any NSIN third party service providers are not responsible, and shall have no liability to you, with respect to any information or materials transmitted by others, including defamatory, offensive or illicit material, even material that violates this Agreement.

License – By transmitting any information or content, the User acknowledges that he/she owns the rights to the information or content and grants NSIN, the US Government and the USDOD, a limited, royalty-free, worldwide, transferable and sublicensable right to copy, modify, distribute, correct, translate, publish, and process, information and content, in whole or in part, that you provide through our Services, without any further consent, notice and/or compensation to you or others to the extent necessary to support providing of Services on NSIN.MIL. Said license shall not apply to any information or content related to patent applications submitted prior to such transmitting or patents issued prior to such transmitting . If you do not own the rights to information or content transmitted, you must acknowledge appropriate credit to the owner of said rights.

Service Availability – We may change or discontinue any of our Services. NSIN does not promise to store, continue displaying, or continue using any information or content you have transmitted. We may change, suspend or end any Service, or change and modify prices prospectively at our discretion. To the extent allowed under law, these changes may be effective immediately or upon notice provided to you. You agree that we have no obligation to store, maintain or provide you a copy of any content or information that you or others provide, except to the extent required by applicable law and as noted in our Privacy Policy.

Other Content, Sites and apps – When you see, interact with, or use content and information transmitted on our Services, you do so at your own risk. Third parties may offer their own products and services through NSIN.MIL, and you agree to not hold NSIN responsible for actions taken and information transmitted by those third-parties. By using the Services, you may encounter content or information that might be inaccurate, incomplete, delayed, misleading, illegal, offensive or otherwise harmful. NSIN generally does not review all content provided by our Users. You agree that NSIN is not responsible for third parties’ (including other Users’) content or information or for any damages as result of your use of or reliance on it. You are responsible for deciding if you want to access or use third party sites that link from our Services and accept the risk of doing so.

Limits – NSIN reserves the right to limit how you connect and interact on our Services. NSIN reserves the right to limit your use of the Services, including the number of your connections and your ability to contact other Users. NSIN reserves the right to restrict, suspend, or terminate your use of the Services if we that you may be in breach of this Agreement or law or are misusing the Services (including violating this Agreement).

Reservation of Rights – NSIN reserves all of its intellectual property rights in the Services, including trademarks, service marks, graphics, and logos used in connection with NSIN.MIL that are trademarks or registered trademarks of NSIN. Other trademarks and logos used in connection with the Services may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

Disclaimer, No Warranty, and Limitation of Liability

Disclaimer – The reference on NSIN.MIL to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by NSIN, the US Government or the USDOD. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of NSIN, the US Government or the USDOD, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes. With respect to documents available from this server, neither NSIN, the US Government or USDOD, nor any of its US Government or USDOD service members or employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, including the warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose, 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.

No Warranty – This is our disclaimer of legal liability for the quality, safety, or reliability of our Services. TO THE EXTENT ALLOWED UNDER LAW, NSIN, THE USDOD, AND THE US GOVERNMENT (AND THOSE THIRD PARTIES THAT WORK TO PROVIDE THE SERVICES), (A) DISCLAIM ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES AND REPRESENTATIONS (E.G. WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, ACCURACY OF DATA, AND NONINFRINGEMENT); (B) DO NOT GUARANTEE THAT THE SERVICES WILL FUNCTION WITHOUT INTERRUPTION OR ERRORS, AND (C) PROVIDE THE SERVICE (INCLUDING CONTENT AND INFORMATION) ON AN “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” BASIS. SOME LAWS DO NOT ALLOW CERTAIN DISCLAIMERS, SO SOME OR ALL OF THESE DISCLAIMERS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.

Exclusion of Liability – These are the limits of legal liability we may have to you. TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED UNDER LAW, NSIN, THE USDOD, AND THE US GOVERNMENT (AND THOSE THIRD PARTIES THAT WORK TO PROVIDE THE SERVICES) SHALL NOT BE LIABLE TO YOU OR OTHERS FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR ANY LOSS OF DATA, OPPORTUNITIES, REPUTATION, PROFITS OR REVENUES, RELATED TO THE SERVICES (E.G. OFFENSIVE OR DEFAMATORY STATEMENTS, DOWN TIME OR LOSS, USE OR CHANGES TO YOUR INFORMATION OR CONTENT). THIS LIMITATION OF LIABILITY IS PART OF THE BASIS OF THE BARGAIN BETWEEN YOU AND NSIN AND SHALL APPLY TO ALL CLAIMS OF LIABILITY (E.G. WARRANTY, TORT, NEGLIGENCE, CONTRACT, LAW) AND EVEN IF NSIN HAS BEEN MADE AWARE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF ANY SUCH DAMAGE, AND EVEN IF THESE REMEDIES FAIL THEIR ESSENTIAL PURPOSE. SOME LAWS DO NOT ALLOW THE LIMITATION OR EXCLUSION OF LIABILITY, SO THESE LIMITS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU.

Termination

NSIN or you may terminate this Agreement at any time with notice to the other. On termination, you lose the right to access or use the Services. The following shall survive termination:

  • Our rights to use and disclose your feedback;
  • Other NSIN.MIL users’ and NSIN’s rights to further re-share content and information you shared through the Service to the extent copied or re-shared prior to termination;
  • Any other rights that NSIN.MIL may continue to have under this Agreement.

Dispute Resolution

In the event of a legal dispute concerning this Agreement, you agree that the venue of said dispute will be the courts of the District of Columbia. You also agree that the dispute will be governed by the laws of the United States of America and the District of Columbia.

General Terms

If a court with authority over this Agreement finds any part of it not enforceable, you agree that the court should modify the terms to make that part enforceable while still achieving its intent. If the court cannot do that, you agree to ask the court to remove that unenforceable part and still enforce the remaining sections of this Agreement. This Agreement (including additional terms that may be provided by us when you engage with a feature of the Services) is the only agreement between us regarding the Services and supersedes all prior agreements for the Services. In the event that a breach of this Agreement occurs and NSIN does not take action in response to said breach, NSIN does not waive its right to take action in response to said breach, take action in response to breaches of the Agreement, or take action to enforce this Agreement in the future. You may not assign or transfer this Agreement (or your use of Services) to anyone without written consent from NSIN. You agree that NSIN may assign this Agreement to its affiliates or a party that buys it without your consent. There are no other third party beneficiaries to this Agreement.

We reserve the right to change the terms of this Agreement and will provide you notice if we do and we agree that changes cannot be retroactive. If you do not agree to changes made to this Agreement, you must immediately stop using the Services.

You agree that the only way to provide us legal notice is at the addresses provided in this Agreement.

Complaints Regarding Content

We respect the rights of others. We require that information transmitted by Users be accurate and not in violation of the intellectual property rights or other rights of third parties. Also, as noted, unprofessional, false, misleading, profane or defamatory comments are not appropriate for this site. We provide a policy and process for complaints concerning content transmitted by our Users.

How to Contact Us

To send NSIN notices or service of process, please contact us via email at: media@NSIN.MIL or by physical mail at: National Security Innovation Network, 2121 Crystal Drive, Suite 500, Arlington, VA 22202 USA.

NSIN.MIL User Agreement – Version February 28, 2023