- Introduction
Animal-Free Science Advocacy (AFSA) has developed this Privacy Policy to explain how we may collect, retain, use, process, share and transfer your personal data when you visit our websites, use our services, or visit us in person. This Privacy Policy is designed to help you obtain information about our privacy practices and to help you understand your privacy choices when you use our websites, products and services.
AFSA complies with the Privacy Act 1988 and Privacy and Other Legislation Amendment Act 2024 in respect of the collection, management and disclosure of your information.
Our privacy commitments are fundamental to the way we run our organisation. These commitments apply to everyone who has a relationship with us – including customers, partners and website visitors – and mean that the policy is broad in its scope. AFSA is committed to providing you with the best overall experience in all of our products and services. We strive to strike the right balance between using your data to ensure the quality of those experiences and protecting your privacy.
- Definitions
Personal information’ is any information or an opinion about an individual who can be reasonably identified from that information or opinion, such as a person’s name, date of birth and phone number.
“Special Categories of Personal Data” pertains to personal data that reveals racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership and the processing of data concerning health or sexual orientation
– “Sensitive personal data” either indicates “special categories” (see above) or is personal data of which the sensitivity level has been assessed and classified, indicating potential severe impact on an individual when confidentiality of such data is breached.
“Anonymisation” is the deletion or changing of personal data in such a way that it can no longer be foreseeably assigned to a certain or ascertainable individual or only with a disproportionately high effort in terms of time, cost and work.
“Pseudonymisation” is the replacement of an individual’s name and other identifiable characteristics with a label to prevent identification of the individual by unauthorised parties or to render such identification substantially difficult. Pseudonymisation techniques include certain levels of masking, redaction, tokenisation and/or encryption of personal data.
“Consent” is any freely given, specific and transparently, unambiguous, well-informed indication of the will of the individual, whereby the individual agrees that his or her personal data may be processed.
- Scope
This policy applies to all information we collect directly, automatically, through cloud application/s and from third parties about you or your organisation.
- Personal, Anonymous and Aggregate Information
Examples of personal data include your: (i) Name, (ii) Mailing address, (iii) Email address, (iv) Phone number, (v) Date of birth or age, (vi) Credit/debit card number, (vii) Purchase information, (viii) Mobile device information, (ix) How you use our sites and mobile applications, (x) Geo-location related information, (xi) Social media information .
Anonymous information is information that does not identify you and cannot reasonably be used to identify you specifically; for example, anonymous whistleblower reports from those in the animal research industry. Finally, aggregate information is information taken from many people’s data and combined into anonymous groups or categories, for example, generic trends obtained from analysis of supporter feedback survey responses.
- The Personal Data We Use
We collect personal information from you when you:
- receive our products or services
- donate
- become a member, volunteer, advisor, committee member, contractor or employee
- apply for employment, as a committee member, volunteer to or to provide consultancy services
- provide us with products or services
- submit a query or request to us
- respond to a survey or fill in one of our forms
- interact with our internet or social media content
- engage or partner with us on a shared business, research, social, or other activity
- attend an AFSA webinar
- What happens if we can’t collect your personal information?
If you do not provide us with the personal information described above, some or all of the following may happen:
- we may not be able to provide the requested products or services to you, either to the same standard or at all.
- we may not be able to issue receipts for donations or payments
- we may not be able to appoint you as a contractor, advisor, volunteer, employee or committee member
- How We Use Personal Data
We use your information, including personal data, to provide you with the best products, service, and overall experience that we can. We may combine your information with other information that we have about you, that is publicly available and/or that we have obtained from third parties (either individually or in aggregate). We also may use your information for the following purposes:
- To share with our employees, contractors or service providers for the purposes of operation of our website or our organisation, fulfilling requests by you, and to otherwise provide products and services to you including, without limitation, web hosting providers, IT systems administrators, mailing houses, couriers, payment processors, data entry service providers, electronic network administrators, and professional advisors such as accountants, solicitors, business advisors and consultants;
- Government entities or other institutions for the purposes of campaigning petitions;
- any organisation for any authorised purpose with your express consent
- a member of AFSA who has the right to vote and has entitlement to inspect the members register (name and residing state. Except where required by law, no member of the Management Committee or the Association’s administration staff shall be entitled to divulge a member’s private details to a person other than the member, members of the Management Committee or the Association’s staff].
AFSA stores photographs and video. These may have been taken by staff during our events or through the course of their duties. This content may be used on our social media or for promotional purposes.
Where an individual or a small group of individuals are the focus of the photograph or video clip, we will gain verbal and/or written consent to use the material. You can request that a photograph or video clip of yourself be removed.
Where event images or footage are sourced from third parties, such as events where AFSA is an exhibitor, AFSA cannot guarantee consent, but will ask that the third-party provide a copy of their privacy policy in advance of confirming attendance at the event.
Audio or visual footage which includes podcast guests or webinar speakers may be used for AFSA publicity and educational purposes with acknowledgement of the speaker or podcast guest.
- Opting Out of Data Usage
We strive to let you know in advance what will happen to your personal data. We will not use your personal data for a purpose that is materially different from the purposes listed in this policy, or disclose it to a third party acting as a controller not previously identified, without first offering you the opportunity to opt out of such uses and/or provide disclosures. If we intend to use your personal data for a purpose not identified in this policy, we will reach out to you to get your explicit consent before doing so.
- Direct Marketing
We may send you direct marketing communications and information about our work that we consider may be of interest to you. These communications may be sent in various forms, including mail, SMS and by post, in accordance with applicable marketing laws, such as the Spam Act 2003 (Cth). You consent to us sending you those direct marketing communications by any of those methods when providing your contact details such as email address or mobile number and either become an AFSA member, signing up to receive our e-news online or when you opt-in to receive our newsletter when purchasing an AFSA product online. In addition, at any time you may opt out of receiving marketing communications from us by contacting us or by using opt-out facilities provided in the marketing communications and we will then ensure that your name is removed from our direct marketing list.
- Third-Party Processing
We use third parties to provide you with the best products, services and experiences. We may share the information we collect with our business partners and other third parties for (1) Non-marketing purposes, (2) Joint marketing purposes and (3) When we provide personal information or other personal data to our business partners and other third parties, we require them to exercise reasonable care to protect such information and restrict the use of such information to the purposes for which it was provided to them.
AFSA do not sell any personal data to third parties for any purpose; neither do we purchase marketing lists from third parties.
Personal data will not be entered into generative artificial intelligence platforms.
- Retention of Personal Data
AFSA keeps your personal data for as long as your subscription is active or as needed to provide you with services, such as maintaining your membership or donations or sending updates on our work. AFSA follows all applicable laws governing the retention of your data. The factors that influence how long we retain your data include:
- Which information is needed to provide products, services and experiences to you,
- Which information is needed to ensure secure payment, contact you and the data needed to serve any advertising based on personal interests and preferences.
- The sensitivity of the information
- Which information is needed to maintain records required for employment and governance purposes
- Minimal holding periods to meet tax and accounting requirements
- Ensuring record keeping for bequest correspondence due diligence
We will routinely delete records and historical personal data in line with the above considerations.
- Restriction on Children’s Information
We do not knowingly collect personal data online from children under the age of 13 or sell their personal information. Adults who interact with AFSA should take care not to provide any information about children under the age of 13. If we learn that we have received information directly from a child who is under the age of 13 we will take appropriate action in accordance with applicable law. To learn more about the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) please visit the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) website at https://www.ftc.gov/
- Adequate Protection
AFSA maintains up-to-date software to protect our computer systems from unauthorised access and takes all reasonable steps to ensure that your data is stored and processed securely per this policy.
Electronic files have limited employee access and are secured with password protection. All paper-based personal information is held securely in a locked storage facility. Our hard drive information is encrypted. When you enter sensitive information (such as credit card numbers) on our website, we encrypt that information using secure socket layer technology (SSL).
The terms and conditions set out in this privacy statement only cover the domain name of Animal-Free Science Advocacy. Whilst we take all reasonable measures to ensure the security of the AFSA website, as our website is linked to the internet, and the internet is inherently insecure, we cannot provide any assurance regarding the security of transmission of information you communicate to us online. We also cannot guarantee that the information you supply will not be intercepted while being transmitted over the internet. Accordingly, any personal information or other information which you transmit to us online is transmitted at your own risk. Links on the AFSA site to external entities are not covered within this policy. By accessing the AFSA website or services, you consent to the conditions of this privacy policy.
If there is a breach of the privacy of your data, AFSA will follow a defined privacy breach process which will include informing the impacted parties. This process will be escalated for special categories of sensitive data and sensitive data.
- Conflicts between Law and this Policy
If there is a conflict between this policy and an applicable law, applicable law will apply to you.
- Impact of Automated Decisions
We will not take any action that will have a significant impact on you based solely on automated decision-making (a process that uses machines, data, and algorithms to make decisions) unless we have a lawful basis for doing so and we have notified you.
- Information Sharing with Authorities
AFSA will cooperate with law enforcement and regulatory officials. AFSA will disclose personal data in response to lawful requests by public authorities.
- Complaints
If you believe that your privacy has been breached, please contact our Operations Officer using the contact information below and provide details of the incident so that we can investigate it.
We request that complaints about breaches of privacy be made in writing to info@animalfreesci.org.au so we can be sure about the details of the complaint. We will attempt to confirm as appropriate and necessary with you your understanding of the conduct relevant to the complaint and what you expect as an outcome. We will inform you whether we will conduct an investigation, the name, title, and contact details of the investigating officer and the estimated completion date for the investigation process.
After we have completed our enquiries, we will contact you, usually in writing, to advise you of the outcome and invite a response to our conclusions about the complaint. If we receive a response from you, we will assess it and advise if we have changed our view. Should the issue not be resolved to your satisfaction, you have the right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority.
- Your Right to Your Data
It’s your data, so you should know what data we have about you and how you can access it. For certain types of data, you can contact us and ask to know what information we have about you. You can also ask us to update incorrect information, delete it, object to our use of it, or get a copy of it.
- Contact Details
1800 486 263
Date of Review: This Policy will be reviewed in January 2027