Privacy Policy

Privacy

COTA Queensland strives to act with the highest integrity and offer the best possible service to all who access our services, organisations and volunteers. If you have any questions or concerns about our policy, or our practices with regards to your personal information, please contact us at 07 3316 2999.

COTA Queensland complies with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles and takes reasonable steps to implement practices and procedures that will ensure compliance with Australian privacy laws. In addition, we also comply with the European Union General Regulations (GDPR) May 2018.

You can generally visit the site without revealing Personal Information, unless you choose to provide such information. The information received depends upon what you do when visiting the site.

Collection of personal and sensitive information

COTA Queensland collects personal and sensitive information that is reasonably necessary or directly related to, the performance of our services or activities. Reasons for collecting this information include:

to process your membership with COTA Queensland
to register your attendance at an event/workshop or for reimbursement of expenditure. This could include your contact details and financial information such as credit card or bank account details
for the purpose of sending information regarding the advocacy and activities that COTA Queensland is involved in. We may also send you information regarding upcoming events, forums or training activities that may be of interest.
to participate in research COTA Queensland may be undertaking. An individual’s personal and sensitive information will be de-identified and reporting aggregated
to tell promotional stories about what we do, such as on our website, e-news, annual reports, speeches, publications, media releases and social media posts
to improve our services, for instance via the collection of information about how individuals respond to our online engagement activities and how many take action through our website.

The specific types of personal and sensitive information COTA Queensland may collect and hold includes the following but not limited to the following:

Personal Information: name, contact details, date of birth, financial details for payment of services and/or refunds
Sensitive Information: biometric data, sexual orientation, religious or philosophical beliefs, racial or ethnic origin.

Use of personal information

Personal information will not be used for any other purpose without your consent, unless COTA Queensland is required by law to disclose that information.

We won’t sell, trade or exchange your information without permission being provided by the individual.

COTA Queensland will not pass on personal information to any other organisation, with some exceptions:

where required for financial transactions (e.g. to verify credit cards);
in certain circumstances, COTA Queensland may disclose personal information to third party service providers (such as IT service providers) who assist us to administer our operations, or
where the information to be passed on was collected for the purpose of passing that information on or is required by law.

From time to time, COTA Queensland participates in research projects, events or engages with external partners that may require the release of personal information to a third party. We will inform you if this happens and you can opt out at any time by contacting COTA Queensland.

For research projects COTA Queensland ensures that the release of information is in accordance with any instructions provided by academic ethical clearance committees; and is relevant to furthering COTA Queensland’s strategic vision and goals.

You may opt out of any or all of our communications at any time. In order to opt out you need to contact COTA Queensland.

What are the purposes for which we collect and hold personal information

We collect personal information reasonably necessary to conduct one or more of our activities or services. We will explain the purpose at the time we collect the information or as soon as practicable afterwards.

Site visit data

As is the case for nearly all web sites, this site makes a record of your visit, logging the following information for statistical purposes

your server’s address
the name of the top-level domain from which you access the Internet (for example, .gov, .com, .au, .nz, etc)
the date and time of the visit to the site
the pages accessed and documents downloaded
the previous Internet address from which you linked directly to this site. (In the cases where the referring site declines to pass this information on, these details are not obtained by the statistics server.)

We will not identify users or their browsing activities, except where a law enforcement agency (or a government agency) may exercise a legal authority to inspect the ISP logs (e.g. by a warrant, subpoena or notice to produce). This Web site contains links to other sites. The owner of this site is not responsible for the content and the privacy practices of other web sites and encourages you to examine each site’s privacy policy and make your own decisions regarding the accuracy, reliability and correctness of material and information found.

Cookies

A cookie is a piece of information that an Internet web site sends to your browser when you access information at that site. Parts of this site may store cookies on your browser in order to better serve you when you next visit the site. Cookies are optional for the user and your browser can be set either not to accept cookies or to prompt you to accept them or not case by case.

Membership databases, email management, online forms and other collection of personal information

Your email address will only be recorded if you choose to send a message. It will only be used for the purpose for which you have provided it and will not be added to a mailing list unless at your request. Your email address will not be disclosed without your consent. If the owner of this site acts on behalf of a third party this party is considered, in partnership with the owner of this site, to be the co-collector of such data. This site maintains records of its members and uses the web site to gather or update member details. These details are collected and stored purely for the business of the owner of this site and are not divulged to any third party.

Discussion groups, mailing lists, online forums, bulletin boards

This site may host discussions groups, which allow discussion via posts on a web site, or by email. Some may allow chat using IRC. Some of these services have a publicly accessible web archive. Where there is a web archive, subscribers are informed. If you subscribe to one of these services you should be aware that your complete email, including your email address, may be available across the web to anyone who searches through the archive.

Security of personal information

COTA Queensland will take all reasonable steps to protect against the loss, misuse and/or alternation of the information under its control including through appropriate physical and electronic security strategies. Only authorised COTA Queensland personnel are provided with access to personal information.aware that your complete email, including your email address, may be available across the web to anyone who searches through the archive.

Storage of information outside of Australia

COTA Queensland may transfer to and store information through third parties with whom we may share your personal information in countries other than Australia.

If you are a resident in the European Economic Area, then these countries may not have data protection or other laws as comprehensive as those in your country. We will however take all necessary measure to protect your personal information in accordance with this privacy policy and applicable law.

Third-party websites

COTA Queensland site may contain information on third parties that are not affiliated with us and which may link to other websites, online services or mobile applications. We cannot guarantee the safety and privacy of data you provide to any third parties. Any data collected by third parties is not covered by this web privacy policy. COTA Queensland are not responsible for the content or privacy and security practices and policies of any third parties, including other websites, services or applications that may be linked to or from the COTA Queensland sites. You should review the policies of such third parties and contact them directly to respond to your questions.

Accuracy of personal information

COTA Queensland will take all reasonable steps to ensure that any personal information collected is accurate, complete and up to date.

If you believe that the information, we hold is inaccurate or out of date, you can contact COTA Queensland and we will update the relevant information accordingly.

Remain anonymous/use of a pseudonym

It is your choice to provide your personal information to us. Wherever it is lawful and practicable, you have the option not to identify yourself or to use a pseudonym when interacting with us. You can remain anonymous when using some parts of the COTA Queensland website or sites administered by COTA Queensland.

If you do not provide us with the information requested or provides us with incomplete or incorrect information, we may not be able to provide our services to you.

Accessing information

This information may be requested by contacting the Chief Executive in writing and we will make your information available within 30 days of the receipt of the request.

Under the Australian Privacy Principles, we can refuse a request of personal information. If we do refuse a request, we will provide the individual with a written notice that sets out the reason (unless it would be unreasonable to do so).

Data breaches that cause serious harm

A person can be seriously harmed when there is a data breach to do with:

sensitive information, such as information about someone’s health
documents commonly used for identity fraud, such as a Medicare card or a passport
financial information
a combination of types of personal information that together allows more to be known about the person.

If we are involved in a personal information data breach that is likely to cause serious harm to someone, we will follow the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner’s (OAIC) guidelines for Notifiable Data Breaches. A Data Breach Notification Plan is considered best practice. It we decide we need a Data Breach Notification Plan; we will develop one following OAIC guidance.

Breach of privacy

If there is no satisfactory outcome the individual can make a complaint to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.

Changes to how we manage your privacy

We may change this privacy statement at any time in line with any changes we decide to make to our Privacy Policy. The updated version will be indicated by an updated “Revised” date and the updated version will be effective as soon as it is accessible. If COTA Queensland make material changes to this web privacy policy, we may notify you either by prominently posting a notice of such changes or by directly sending you a notification. We encourage you to review this privacy policy frequently to be informed of how we are protecting your information.