This Privacy Statement is effective as of May 2018
At the Online Privacy Foundation we recognise the importance of protecting your personal information and are committed to processing it responsibly and in compliance with applicable data protection laws.
This policy explains what information we gather when you visit the Online Privacy Foundation website, and explains how that information is used.
What personal data we collect and why we collect it
Logging
In common with many websites, this site automatically logs certain information about every request made of it (see below for more details). This information is used for system administration, for bug tracking, and for producing usage statistics. The logged information may be kept indefinitely.
- The name or network address of the computer making the request. Note that under some (but not all) circumstances it may be possible to infer from this the identity of the person making the request. Note also that the data recorded may be that of a web proxy rather than that of the originating client
- The username, when known during authenticated (logged in) access to the site
The date and time of connection - The HTTP request, which contains the identification of the document requested
- The status code of the request (success or failure etc.)
- The number of data bytes sent in response
- The contents of the HTTP Referrer header supplied by the browser
- The content of the HTTP User-Agent header supplied by the browser
- Logging of additional data may be enabled temporarily from time to time for specific purposes. In addition, the computers on which the website is hosted keep records of attempts (authorised and unauthorised) to use them for purposes other than access to the web server. This data typically includes the date and time of the attempt, the service to which access was attempted, the name or network address of the computer making the connection, and may include details of what was done or was attempted to be done.
Relevant subsets of this data may be passed to computer security teams as part of investigations of computer misuse involving this site or other information assets owned or managed by the Online Privacy Foundation. Data may be passed to the administrators of other computer systems to enable investigation of problems accessing this site or of system misconfigurations. Otherwise the logged information is not passed to any third party except if required by law. Summary statistics are extracted from this data and some of these may be made publicly available, but those that are do not include information from which individuals could be identified.
[You should appreciate that a log is a record of what a server sees, not necessarily what was initially sent. If a request is sent via a proxy the log file will show the proxy’s address. If someone has forged your address the log file will show your address.]
A number of online forms are provided on this site.
Cookies
Our website uses cookies, as almost all websites do, to help provide you with the best experience we can. Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer or mobile phone and record specific interactions between you and this website, and in some cases, other websites.
Below is more detail about the cookies we use, what they record and who the information is shared with. You are of course free to disable cookies.
Our cookies help us:
- Make our website work as you’d expect
- Remember your settings during and between visits
If you leave a comment on our site you may opt-in to saving your name, email address and website in cookies. These are for your convenience so that you do not have to fill in your details again when you leave another comment. These cookies will last for one year.
If you have an account and you log in to this site, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.
When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.
If you edit or publish an article, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser. This cookie includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited. It expires after 1 day.
Comments
When visitors leave comments on the site we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.
An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service privacy policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.
Media
If you upload images to the website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website.
Embedded content from other websites
Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.
These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracing your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.
Analytics
We do not use analytics on this site.
Who we share your data with
We do not share data with anyone. However, if you leave a comment on this sites, that comment will be in the public domain and as such, anyone would be able to make and keep a copy.
How long we retain your data
If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognize and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.
For users that register on our website (if any), we also store the personal information they provide in their user profile. All users can see, edit, or delete their personal information at any time (except they cannot change their username). Website administrators can also see and edit that information.
What rights you have over your data
If you have an account on this site, or have left comments, you can request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, including any data you have provided to us. You can also request that we erase any personal data we hold about you. This does not include any data we are obliged to keep for administrative, legal, or security purposes.
Where we send your data
Visitor comments may be checked through an automated spam detection service.
For questions
Contact chris@onlineprivacyfoundation.org