Privacy Policy
Privacy Policy for Recruitment Activities
Last update: 01 June 2026
The original Privacy Policy for Recruitment Activities was prepared in both English and Japanese. While additional translations are available for your convenience, as a global company, candidates are expected to communicate in either of these languages. Consequently, the English and Japanese versions of this Privacy Policy are considered the sole authentic texts.
This Privacy Policy for Recruitment Activities (hereinafter referred to as this “Policy”) sets out how Rakuten Group Companies named in this Policy (“Rakuten”, “we”, or “us”) handle “Personal Information” of candidates for employment, including prospective job applicants, (each a “Candidate” or “you”) that is collected during the course of recruitment activities. For the purposes of this Policy, “Personal Information” is any information about you or your household, as well as a combination of pieces of information that could reasonably allow you or your household to be identified.
The Rakuten Group is a global group of companies, with its parent company Rakuten Group Inc., a company headquartered at Rakuten Crimson House, 1-14-1 Tamagawa, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, 158-0094 Japan. For more information about Rakuten Group, please visit: https://global.rakuten.com/corp/about/. The Rakuten Group Companies listed in Section 11. (“Companies in Scope”) below are within the scope of this Policy.
1. Data Controllers & Talent Community
When you apply for an available position at Rakuten or join our database as a Candidate interested in future job opportunities at Rakuten (collectively, our “Talent Community”), you acknowledge that your Personal Information will be used and shared as described in this Policy for the purposes of recruitment activities. Generally, this includes the use of our centrally managed recruiting platform (“Recruiting Platform”) to manage applications, interview feedback, candidate evaluation, dispositions, and our pool of prospective applicants, as described in more detail below.
This means that:
- ・ While each position is for a specific Rakuten Group Company, Candidate information is managed in our Talent Community, which is a shared database within Rakuten’s Recruiting Platform.
- ・ You can apply to any advertised position across these companies using the same profile.
- ・ Your application or profile will only be accessed by another Rakuten Group Company if you choose to apply for another position, remain in our Talent Community, or if we refer you to a position in another Rakuten Group Company.
- ・ If your application is rejected, we may contact you about other suitable job opportunities within Rakuten or ask if you wish to remain in our Talent Community for prospective future positions, as applicable.
- ・ Authorized individuals from Rakuten can access and use your Personal Information for recruitment purposes.
Furthermore, you acknowledge that our recruitment ecosystem encompasses a comprehensive suite of integrated systems and processes beyond the Recruiting Platform, including but not limited to: job posting mechanisms across various channels; candidate communication infrastructure (encompassing electronic mail systems and automated scheduling tools); virtual interview platforms including video conferencing solutions; third-party verification services for background screening and reference validation; offer management and documentation systems; and onboarding platforms.
These auxiliary systems, whether deployed uniformly across our global entities or implemented pursuant to regional specifications detailed in applicable addenda, constitute integral components of our recruitment activities and are governed by this Policy.
Rakuten Group Companies jointly control your personal information when you apply for positions, and when your application is shared across our group through the Recruiting Platform and Talent Community. This includes situations where your profile is referred between entities for matching positions, internal transfers, or other prospective opportunities within the Rakuten Group. Some decisions of the hiring process are primarily made by the group company to which you are applying, such as resume screening, conducting interviews or evaluating and assessing your applications. In the European Economic Area (“EEA”) and the Asia Pacific Region (APAC) the hiring group company may be separate controller for those specific purposes of the policy, as well as for applying specific retention rules in accordance with their local requirements. To exercise the data subject rights, please follow the instructions in section 10. Additionally, each Rakuten Group Company, or Companies within a particular business region, may process Personal Information for other recruitment purposes or using other tools and systems, and is an independent controller, bearing sole responsibility for the processing done for those purposes. These independent processing activities will be described in an addendum to this Policy (“Addendum”), as applicable. If the Rakuten Group Company to which you are applying has a specific Addendum (listed below), this will apply in addition to the main provisions of this Policy.
We may update the Addendum independently of this Policy to reflect changes in local law or practice.
Please see here for any applicable Addenda to this Policy depending on the positions you apply for:
| Rakuten International region companies and brands, including Rakuten Rewards, Rakuten Card-Linked Offer Network, Cartera, ShopStyle, Rakuten USA, Inc., Rakuten Marketing/Rakuten Advertising, Rakuten Viki (U.S.) and Rakuten Kobo. |
|---|
| Rakuten International Addendum |
2. Personal Information we collect and how
When you join our Talent Community and when we assess your suitability for a role, we collect and process your Personal Information in different ways and from different sources. Please keep in mind that we primarily collect the Personal Information that you provide to us in your application, resume, cover letter, or other form of inquiry about job opportunities. Therefore, the Personal Information we process about you may vary. Please do not submit Personal Information that you do not want to be processed by us. The following is a list of the categories of Personal Information we collect and how we obtain it.
2.1 Information that you directly provide to us
You provide Personal Information to us when you join our Talent Community. This includes:
Identifiers and Basic Information:
- ・ Personal details (name, postal address)
- ・ Contact details (phone number and/or mobile number, email address, postal address)
Characteristics of protected classifications:
- ・ Personal details (such as age, medical condition, physical or mental disability, race, gender, sexual orientation, marital status, and other characteristics of protected classifications under certain laws, such as California or U.S. federal law, if you choose to provide such information in your application or profile)
- ・ Residence-related information (such as information on your nationality or immigration or residence status in the location you are applying to)
Education information:
- ・ Educational background (such as education records, including schools attended, degrees awarded, dates of attendance, grades, transcripts, or any other information you choose to provide)
Professional or employment-related information:
- ・ Resume information (such as your CV, previous work experiences, including current and former employer(s), qualifications, professional memberships, licenses and certifications, language(s) spoken, skills and additional information you choose to provide)
- ・ Candidate information (such as reference letters, name and employer of referees, application letter and any additional information you choose to provide)
Audio, visual, or similar information:
- ・ Interview and video information (such as audio, electronic, visual, or similar information, including information collected via interview calls, videos, photographs you may provide in your application and any other information you choose to provide)
Communications-related information:
- ・ Interview scheduling communication, emails, phone calls and messages exchanged with Rakuten personnel
Financial information:
- ・ Previous salary information, where permitted by applicable law.
2.2 Information we collect via cookies and tracking technologies:
When you apply to our Talent Community, we may collect the following data using tracking technologies placed on our website. These data types are:
- ・ Identifiers for devices you have used to access our services:
- ・ IP address (from which your approximate location can be inferred);
- ・ Unique device identifiers or MAC identifiers
- ・ Advertising-related identifiers
- Internet activity information: information about your visits to our website and login sessions.
Further information about our use of Cookies and Tracking Technologies is available in the cookie policy of the website you are applying from.
2.3 Information about you we create and process throughout the Rakuten recruitment process:
Interview, Assessment & Hiring related information:
- ・ Interview transcripts of hiring managers and notes, if created.
- ・ Assessments of candidates (such as notes of recruiters and hiring managers, the outcome of assessments that we may ask you to conduct).
- ・ Skills and cultural fit assessments gathered and created during screening interviews
- ・ Offer letter and employment agreement details processed.
- ・ Onboarding documentation, such as tax forms, background checks, and contracts
- ・ Interaction records with potential candidates through talent sourcing and engagement platforms.
2.4 Information we collect about you from other sources:
Recruiter-provided information:
When you apply to our Talent Community via third-party services, such as recruiting companies, we collect Personal Information about you from these third parties, at your request, to enable you to join our Talent Community. The categories of information that we collect about you from these sources are (as described above):
- ・ Identifiers and basic information
- ・ Characteristics and protected classifications
- ・ Education information
- ・ Professional or employment-related information
- ・ Audio, visual, or similar information
- ・ Financial information
The use and collection of your data by these third parties is governed by their own Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.
University recruitment data
Collected through platforms used for university outreach and student engagement or other data collected through recruitment events.
2.5 Sensitive Personal Information
We may, in certain circumstances, collect certain types of Sensitive Personal Information. All Sensitive Personal Information provided by the candidate shall be processed in accordance with applicable law.
We may use the following categories of Sensitive Personal Information if a Candidate provides such information:
- ・ Criminal records
- ・ Health, age, and disability
If allowed by applicable laws, we may collect criminal records to safeguard our company’s security interests for certain positions. The provision of other sensitive information is optional, and we will only use it for the specified purposes. For example, if a Candidate requests accommodation related to any special needs or health conditions, we may be permitted or even required to collect and use such information to respond to such requests.
We kindly ask that you do not provide any of the following types of Sensitive Personal Information as part of your application, unless it is relevant for the position:
- ・ Political opinions or membership in a political association.
- ・ Religious beliefs, affiliations, or philosophical beliefs.
- ・ Membership in a trade association, or trade union.
- ・ Genetic or biometric data.
- ・ Sexual preferences or practices.
- ・ For non-U.S. positions - Race or ethnic origin.
We do not knowingly collect information from minors under 16 years of age.
3. Purposes for using your Personal Information
We use your Personal Information for the following specific purposes:
- ・ Receiving and processing applications: We collect and process your identifiers, basic information, characteristics and protected classifications, education information, and professional or employment-related information when you apply through our career websites, external platforms, or via third-party agents for processing your application.
- ・ Resume screening: We review your educational background, professional experience, and other relevant information to determine whether your profile aligns with our current job requisitions and assess your suitability for the position.
- ・ Conducting interviews: We use your Personal Information to organize and conduct interviews, including your interview responses and assessment-related information. This may include audio and visual information from video interviews. We create interview feedback to share with recruiters and hiring managers involved in the selection process.
- ・ Evaluating and assessing applications: We process all Personal Information gathered throughout the recruitment process to comprehensively evaluate your application and determine your fit with both the specific role and our company culture.
- ・ Onboarding and hiring: Should we offer you a position, we use your Personal Information to facilitate your integration into Rakuten, including processing necessary documentation and, depending on your location, supporting visa applications and assessing English language qualifications.
- ・ Background checks: We may conduct background verification processes to safeguard our company’s security interests, where permitted by the applicable laws. Specific procedures may vary, if applicable, according to regional requirements as outlined in the applicable addendum.
- ・ Managing Personal Information for future recruitment: With your consent, we may retain your name, contact information, and resume after the current recruitment process concludes to consider you for future opportunities.
- ・ Analysis; Developing and Improving recruitment practices: We analyze recruitment data to enhance our practices and improve the efficiency and accuracy of our assessments through reports and metrics dashboards, though these are primarily created for statistical purposes.
- ・ Recruitment events: We collect and process Personal Information from Candidates who attend our recruitment events and have expressed interest in opportunities at Rakuten, in order to maintain contact regarding suitable positions.
Use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Recruitment
Depending on your location, we may use automated tools to assist in the recruiting process. Those technologies help our recruiters and/or managers identify the best matches for open positions. Please refer to the addendum applicable to your location.
Final hiring decisions are made exclusively by authorized human personnel who are trained to use these AI tools. They have access to the raw data and can review and correct AI outputs to ensure accuracy and fairness, as well as to conduct the human review.
Our AI systems are tested for their accuracy, reduce bias, and all Personal Information processed by AI is handled securely and retained only for as long as necessary for recruitment purposes.
4. Legal basis for processing your Personal Information
We always need a proper reason to process your data. In some countries, this is referred to as a legal basis. The legal basis can vary depending on your location, so please read carefully.
We rely on several legal grounds to process your personal information throughout the recruitment process. If you have questions about which legal basis applies to your specific situation, please contact us as described in Section 10 ("Contact us"):
- ・ Consent: We process your Personal Information for the purposes outlined above based on your consent when you submit your application through our career website or external recruitment platforms. This forms our primary legal basis for processing, particularly in APAC region where we rely on consent for most of the purposes outlined above. Additionally, we seek your consent when collecting your Personal Information at recruitment events where you have indicated interest in joining Rakuten or if you wish for us to retain your Personal Information for future opportunities after the current recruitment process ends. During interviews, if we use AI transcription tools such as Zoom AI or Teams AI, we will specifically request your consent—please note that declining this will not affect your candidacy in any way. We may seek your consent to process special categories of data where applicable to your recruitment, if required by applicable law.
- ・ Performance of contract (mainly pre-contractual measures): In the EEA region, the UK, Brazil, and other regions where similar legal basis apply, we process your Personal Information based on performance of contract and processing that is required prior to entering into the employment contract. This includes assessing the completeness of your application, initiating the hiring process, screening your resume to ensure your profile matches our job requisitions, and evaluating your suitability for the position you applied for. If you accept an offer, we process your information to complete the onboarding process and, where applicable, support visa applications and assess your English language qualifications.
- ・ Legitimate interest: In the EEA region, the UK, Brazil, and other regions where similar legal basis apply, we process your personal data based on our legitimate interests to conduct interviews and create interview feedback for our recruiters and hiring managers. We may employ technological solutions, including AI screening tools, to improve the efficiency and accuracy of our recruitment process. Your information also helps us develop our recruitment practices through the creation of reports and metrics dashboards accessible to hiring managers. While these are primarily for statistical purposes; they may include Personal Information. We also rely on legitimate interest when conducting background checks, though specific procedures vary by region.
- ・ Compliance with legal obligations: We process certain information to comply with our legal requirements, such as collecting social security or national insurance numbers for mandatory government reporting and obtaining tax identification information for withholding obligations.
5. Security
We have strict security measures in place in accordance with high security standards to ensure that your account and your data are safe with us. Some of these are technical, like password rules and monitoring of log-in patterns. Others are organizational, like having proper processes and access rules in place. We do so to prevent unauthorized access or unauthorized disclosure of your information, to maintain the accuracy of such information and, when necessary, to ensure its proper deletion.
When collecting or transferring your Personal Information, we employ data encryption technology and restrict access only to those persons who require it to fulfil their job responsibilities. We conduct periodic reviews of our practices to ensure that our safeguards are properly implemented and remain state of the art. We make sure to always keep up with the latest developments. For more information, please refer to the website below:
Information Security at Rakuten
6. Retention
We will retain your Personal Information for as long as your application process is ongoing and/or for as long as you remain part of the Talent Community, in order to contact you about relevant job opportunities. Retention periods may vary depending on applicable local laws and regulations. We also retain your Personal Information as required to comply with legal or regulatory obligations and where necessary to protect or assert our legal rights, in accordance with applicable law. Subject to the applicable data protection laws, you can request deletion of your Personal Information by contacting us using the contact information in Section 10. (“Contact Us”).
The Rakuten Group Companies may retain de-identified statistical data about Candidates to help improve recruitment activities and processes. The retention and use of such de-identified data may also be subject to local legal requirements. For more detailed information on retention periods and local legal considerations you can contact us as described in Section 10. (“Contact Us”) of this policy.
Method of Destruction
Your data will be scheduled for destruction without delay once the purposes of collecting and using Personal Information has been achieved.
For data that has achieved its primary purpose but must be retained for secondary purposes, as described above, such data is stored for a certain limited period of time, in accordance with our internal policies based on relevant laws, in a way that limits its access within our systems, and then destroyed.
Your data stored in electronic file format is deleted using technical methods to render the data unrecoverable and unreadable. Your data stored in physical paper format is destroyed by way of shredding in accordance with our internal rules on physical paper destruction.
7. Data Sharing
We share data for the above-mentioned purposes as follows:
7.1 Within the Rakuten Group:
As part of our joint recruitment activities, your Personal Information is incorporated into the Rakuten Group Talent Community. Such data sharing are governed by our Binding Corporate Rules (“BCRs”), which ensure protection equal to or greater than the standards described in this policy and consistent with applicable data protection laws. You can review the BCRs here. We ensure that any data shared is handled in compliance with applicable data protection regulations and Rakuten’s privacy and security regulations and that only authorized personnel have access to the required information.
If you apply for a position, your Personal Information specified in Section 2. (“Personal Information we collect and how”) is jointly used by the entities specified in Section 11. (“Companies in Scope”) to achieve the purposes stated in Section 3. (“Purposes for using your Personal Information”). In this case, Rakuten Group, Inc. is responsible for the management of the jointly used Personal Information. In addition, your information may be shared with other subsidiaries and affiliates of Rakuten Group, Inc. established in Japan for their recruitment activities.
7.2 To Service Providers and Partners:
Personal Information collected by us in the recruiting process may be disclosed to:
- ・ Outside Service Providers that we engage to process Candidates' Personal Information on our behalf. We ensure they only have access to information that is strictly necessary to provide the Services. These parties are required to secure the data they receive and to use the data for pre-agreed purposes only, while ensuring compliance with all applicable data protection regulations. These outside providers are used for the purpose of facilitating the hiring process by providing the required technology for the application and interview management, interview-related travel booking and expenses, hosting the recruitment platforms, sending communications to Candidates and facilitating relocation.
We share data with other partners where this is necessary for performing specific services or where you choose to provide data to those parties for the recruitment and onboarding process:
- ・ Outside parties that we have hired in order to perform pre-employment checks (in accordance with applicable law).
- ・ Recruitment agencies were selected by us to handle the recruitment process.
- ・ Immigration advisors, including lawyers and consultants.
- ・ Any outside party as necessary to comply with applicable law, legal or regulatory obligations or regulatory inquiries or requests.
- ・ Law enforcement bodies where we are required to share data or with a court if necessary to enforce our claims or other legal rights, according to local law.
The recipients of these disclosures may be located in countries where data protection laws may not provide an adequate level of protection in comparison to applicable data protection laws in your region. In such cases, we will implement appropriate safeguards (such as Standard Contractual Clauses) for any transfers in compliance with applicable data protection laws.
8. International transfers
As a global business, your Personal Information may be transferred to other Rakuten Group companies and service providers located in different countries. Please refer to https://global.rakuten.com/corp/privacy/link/data-transfers/ for information about legal systems in different countries. We have implemented measures to protect your Personal Information during these transfers, ensuring that we only work with trustworthy partners.
Within the Rakuten Group, we apply Binding Corporate Rules (BCRs), which are a set of internal privacy standards designed to protect Personal Information across all Rakuten companies. These BCRs, which have been approved by the relevant Data Protection Authorities in Luxembourg and the United Kingdom, facilitate secure Personal Information transfers within the Group. You can review the BCRs here.
9. Your choices
9.1 Privacy Rights
The rights and choices about your Personal Information are different depending on your location.
If you apply from Japan, you may have rights in accordance with the applicable laws:
- ・ access to your Personal Information.
- ・ correct any information that is wrong.
- ・ delete your Personal Information.
- ・ cease of utilization of your Personal Information.
- ・ suspend the third-party data transfer of your Personal Information.
If you apply from other countries, you may have other rights in accordance with the applicable laws. This includes, but is not limited to, the right to request:
- ・ access to your Personal Information; to know what Personal Information we have about you.
- ・ correct any information we have that is inaccurate.
- ・ delete your Personal Information.
- ・ get a copy of your Personal Information in a machine-readable format (right to data portability).
- ・ restrict how we use your Personal Information (for example, while we verify the accuracy of your data or assess an objection you have raised).
- ・ ask us where we got certain Personal Information about you, how we use it and with whom we share it.
- ・ withdraw your consent easily; if you do so, the lawfulness of processing based on your consent before its withdrawal will not be affected.
- ・ Depending on your location, you can request meaningful human review of any hiring decision involving AI tools, including a clear explanation of how AI contributed to the decision, the opportunity to provide additional context or challenge the outcome, and a substantive reassessment by an authorized recruiter.
9.2 Exercising Your Privacy Rights
You can always ask us to exercise these rights without having to be afraid of discrimination or retaliation for exercising any rights you may have. If you want to request any of this from us, please get in touch with us by using the contact form at the bottom of this page.
In addition, you may check, change, and update the Personal Information you have provided to create your profile and submit your application at any time by logging into the recruitment platform for Candidates. For any specific application, the documents provided during the application process cannot be changed once they have been submitted. However, you may at any time take back the application and request deletion of your Personal Information.
Contact us in the Section 10. (“Contact us”) of this policy to exercise your privacy rights, including to correct any information in your profile or to withdraw your consent to our processing of your Personal Information where applicable.
If you signed up to receive communications from us by email about potential future job opportunities, contact us in the Section 10. “Contact us” of this policy in order to stop receiving these communications, or you can also opt-out or withdraw your consent to receive these communications by following the instructions in any such email communication from us.
We will contact you if we need additional information from you in order to honor your privacy rights requests.
10. Contact us
For any questions or concerns, or if you want to exercise your rights, feel free to contact us through the form below.
* Click here if the Inquiry Form does not display.
You may also contact our Data Protection Officer at rakuten-privacy@mail.rakuten.com. Please note that when you contact us, we may require further information to verify your identity and respond to your request appropriately.
If you have any complaints, we hope we can work with you to achieve a good solution. If we are not able to, you can contact your local data protection authority. If you are in the European Union, you can contact the data protection authority of Luxembourg here.
In South Korea, if you need to report or consult about other Personal Information infringements, please contact the following organizations.
- ・ Personal Information Infringement Reporting Center (https://privacy.kisa.or.kr/main.do / 118 without area code)
- ・ Cyber Investigation Division, Supreme Prosecutors' Office (https://www.spo.go.kr/site/spo/main.do / 1301)
- ・ Cyber Bureau of the National Police Agency (https://ecrm.police.go.kr/minwon/main / 182 without area code)
11. Companies in Scope
The following Rakuten Group Companies are in scope of this privacy policy:
12. Changes to this policy
This privacy policy may be updated to follow our recruitment practices. The date of the last update is always present at the top of the privacy policy; please refer to it for your complete information.