Privacy notice and cookie policy

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Cookies

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Our website uses cookies in two ways: to collect anonymous information about visitor numbers; and, in the secure part of our site, to manage your secure session.

The anonymous information is collated and reported using Google Analytics. This prevents us from seeing any individual records: we can only see summary and trend information.

We are working on allowing you the choice of opting in or out of this.

The secure part of our website will always need a cookie in order to maintain the security. This cookie only lasts as long as your current session and is not saved on your computer's hard disk. This cookie cannot be made optional without compromising your security

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SISI Privacy Notice

This Privacy Notice explains our commitment to your privacy. It details how and why we collect your information, how we store it and dispose of it and your rights to control the data we hold.

Who are we?

The Scottish Invasives Species Initiative is a partnership project, NatureScot is the lead partner in the project and is the data controller for the personal information we process and hold in and for the project.

In addition, the local Fishery Trust partner in the Scottish Invasive Species Initiative, relevant to your location, is also a data controller of your personal information and will hold and process your data using their own data protection policy.

N.B. This privacy notice relates to NatureScot as data controller for the Scottish Invasive Species Initiative.  (Please refer directly to the relevant Fishery Trust for their own privacy notice)

Why do we collect your personal data?

We will only ever collect, store and use your personal data when we have identified purpose and reason to do so. The Information Commissioners Office (ICO) refers to this as the ‘lawful basis’. Further information about why we collect your personal data is outlined below;

1) To enable you to volunteer with us.

  1. We process your personal data so that we can administer your registration and keep in touch with you. For example – inform you of volunteering events, changes to planned activities, invite you to thank you events etc.
  2. We also collect personal data to facilitate your volunteering. For example – your skills, interests, attendance, accidents and near miss reports.
  3. Where you support our activities through surveying or reporting wildlife sightings, for example species records, we will collect your name and contact details as a required component of the record.

As defined by the ICO, the lawful basis for processing your data for these purposes is of ‘legitimate interest’, in that we have identified a genuine and legitimate reason for processing the data, which does not override your rights or interests.

2)    To enable us to administer and manage our project. We collect your personal data to enable us to contact you where you are directly involved in hosting or allowing our activities on your land or working in partnership with us to deliver activities.  We use the ICO’s definition of “legitimate interest” for the lawful basis for processing your data for this purpose.

3)    We will also use your personal data for sending you our e-newsletters, where you have opted-in to receive these. This is classed as ‘direct marketing’ and we do this under the lawful basis of “Consent”.

4)    For our own project reporting purposes, we will use your personal data to create summarised, anonymous datasets, which will be presented to our project funders and published in public reports. We use the ICO’s definition of “legitimate interest” for the lawful basis for processing your data for this purpose.
 

How did we get your information?

Most of the personal information we process is provided to us directly by you, for one of the following reasons:

  • You have enquired about becoming a volunteer
  • You have registered as a volunteer
  • You wish to attend, or have attended an event
  • You subscribe to our e-newsletter
  • You are representing your organisation
  • You are hosting or allowing our activities on your land
  • You have submitted a species record or sighting

Data may be collected from; any forms you fill out, verbal data collection and photographs, video or audio recordings.

You may have provided your data to one of our Fishery Trust partners, who have passed it us, as a data controller for the project.

What kind of data do we collect?

We mostly collect your basic contact information (name, contact details etc). We also collect information you may have provided to us to help us to get to know you better e.g. your skills, training interests etc.

1)    Sensitive personal data 
We do not normally store sensitive personal data about you (such as health, beliefs or political affiliation). However, if you are volunteering with us we will ask you to provide us with additional personal data;

  1. Details of emergency contacts
  2. Medical / dietary information

2)    Criminal offence data
When registering with us as a volunteer, if you have indicated that you have an unspent criminal conviction we will discuss this with you, in complete confidence, to enable us to make an informed decision as to whether this would impact on other volunteers or vulnerable people involved in our project.

We do not process criminal conviction or offence data, nor do we store any criminal conviction or offence data.

How we store your data

In order to safeguard the personal information that we collect and prevent unauthorised access or misuse we have put in place suitable physical, electronic and managerial security procedures. 

Electronic data is stored on secure computer systems within NatureScot. Third parties that provide us with contracted services may also receive personal information and we require them to maintain security measures similar to ours with respect to such information.  

How long do we keep your data?

The Scottish Invasive Species Initiative is a 4-year project, which is scheduled to finish in October 2021.  There may be a project extension – potentially of up to 1 year - if funds allow.  We will hold your data until the end of the project in October 2021 or to any project extension date.

At the end of the Scottish Invasive Species Initiative the data we hold will be destroyed. 

Sharing your information

On your registration with the project, your data will be shared with the relevant partnership Fishery Trust, who will be the provider of the volunteering or mink control activity.  The Fishery Trust will also be a data controller and hold this information in line with their own data protection policies.

When you report an invasive species sighting to us directly or via the project website, we collect personal data which is an essential component of the record. Your name and contact details will be shared with the relevant partnership Fishery Trust who will be the person directly responding to your information. They may need to contact you to help verify the sighting or to help take action more effectively in response to your sighting.

 All invasive species records are also shared with the National Biodiversity Network (NBN) - the UK's central biodiversity database.  Each NBN Atlas record shows the name of the record provider but no other personal or contact information is included. 

Your data may also be shared with government authorities and/or law enforcement officials if mandated by law or if needed for the legal protection of our legitimate interests in compliance with applicable laws. Personal data may also be shared with third party service providers who will process it on behalf of SISI for the purposes above. Such third parties include, but are not limited to, providers of website hosting, maintenance, call centre operation and identity checking.

During the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic your contact information will be used to enable NHS Scotland to contact you should you have been participating in activities around the same time as someone who has tested positive for coronavirus. In order to assist in the containment of the virus, we will only share your data when it is requested directly by NHS Scotland. We will only share your contact details and no health or other information will be shared with NHS Scotland.

We will not share your personal data with any other third party.

Your rights

Under data protection law, you have rights we need to make you aware of. They are;

  • Privacy information; you have the right to be informed about the collection and use of your personal data, this privacy notice does that.
  • Subject access; you have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information
  • Rectification; you have the right to ask us to update information you think is inaccurate or incomplete
  • Right to be forgotten; you have the right to ask us to erase your personal information
  • Restrict processing; you have the right to request to limit the way your personal data is used
  • Data portability; you have the right to receive your data from us for your own purposes
  • Right to object; you have the right to ask to be excluded from marketing activity

For more information on your rights please see the Information Commissioners’ Office

Links to other websites

Our website may contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. 

Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy notice. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.

Controlling your personal information

We will not sell, distribute or lease your personal information to third parties unless we have your permission or are required by law to do so. We may use your personal information to send you promotional information about third parties which we think you may find interesting if you tell us that you wish this to happen.

You may request details of personal information which we hold about you under the Data Protection Act 2018. This information will be provided free unless the request is manifestly unfounded or excessive when a small fee will be payable. 

If you would like a copy of the information held on you please write to the Scottish Invasive Species Initiative at:

Data Protection Officer
NatureScot – Scottish Invasive Species Initiative
Battleby House
Redgorton 
Perth
PH1 3EW

Should you have any queries regarding this Privacy Notice, our processing of your personal data or wish to exercise your rights you can contact the Scottish Invasive Species Initiative Data Protection Officer using this email address:  [email protected] .  If you are not happy with our response, you can contact the Information Commissioner's Office at https://ico.org.uk/ 
 

 

Updated; November 2020

 

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