Privacy Policy

Who we are

This privacy policy retains to the Photonics Leadership Group and Photonics Leadership Ltd collectively referred to as the PLG

Our top level website domain address is https://photonicsuk.org

Photonics Leadership Ltd is registered in England as company number 04223669

The Photonics Leadership Group is a voluntary body representing the UK photonics industry and consisting of approximately 90 stakeholders who volunteer to attend PLG meetings and contribute to discussion of the industry impact and growth. Photonics Leadership Ltd is a not for profit company limited by guarantee for the benefit of its members which are drawn from the Photonics Leadership Group and confirmed at an annual meeting.   

Personal information collected and held on data subjects?

We collect and hold business contact data on individuals in relation only to their interaction with the PLG.  Information collected may include name, business email address, business telephone number, job title, place of work, work address, work website.

Data may be collected when making enquiry to the PLG on the activities and publications of the PLG, either through email, contact form on the PLG website, face-to-face, telephone or other form of meeting.

As data-subjects interact with our website we may automatically collect technical data via 3rd party website providers on browsing patterns, locations, and equipment 

We do not collect any special categories of personal data (e.g. race, ethnicity, beliefs, health,  biometric or personal financial data). Please do not provide any such data to us.

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 anonymised 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 if provided may be visible to the public in the context of your comment.

Media

If you upload images to the website, e.g. for directory entry or events listing, 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.

Events Listing

If you create, submit, import, save, or publish Event, Venue, or Organiser information, such information is retained in the local database including:-

  • Venue information: name, address, city, country, province, postal code, phone, website, geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude)
  • Organiser information: name, phone, website, email
  • Event information: website, cost, description, date, time, image

Directory

Organisations claiming an entry on the UK Photonics directory published on our website are responsible for the content of that listing. Public descriptions in listing entries do not contain personal information.

The email address of those claiming a directory listing is retained for length of time that a paid listing is maintained. And maybe used for informing the user about their listings including upgrades, renewals and expiry

No personal information is stored for any unclaimed directory listing.

Cookies

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 visit our login page, 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.

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 tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

How we use information and data?

Our collection of personal data is limited and proportionate to its legitimate purpose of the Photonics Leadership Group, which is business-related only.  Those legitimate interests include gathering inputs from the photonics community including PLG stakeholders, support and funding agencies and others on the impact of photonics, opportunities for and threats to photonics industry growth and methods of supporting individual and photonics sectors business development.

By data-subjects consent on becoming a PLG stakeholder/contributor, business contact data on PLG stakeholders/contributors is used to keep PLG stakeholders informed of PLG activities including funding competitions, government and business consultations, PLG and other stakeholder meetings. 

We do not share personal data with 3rd parties except: –

  • on an individual basis with the full knowledge and agreement of the data subject for purposes agreed by them, for example, facilitating business introductions.
  • where sub-contractors and/ or volunteers perform the operating functions of the PLG e.g. website delivery, organisation of meetings, compiling of business inputs.  Where volunteers or 3rd parties are used their use of PLG data is restricted to only performing the functions of the PLG and no additional use e.g. in marketing is permitted

We do not sell or transfer data, e.g. mailing lists, to 3rd parties for marketing purposes

We do not supply marketing or promotional information by direct mail to individuals through electronic or paper means.  Where information is provided about industry events, consultations or photonics sector activities this is provided without bias and for information purposes only.

Where data on companies or organisation is used, transferred, or published e.g. in sizing of the photonics industry or in the photonics directory, this relates only to the organisation. Where quantitative data is published this will only refer to aggregated data over multiple organisations and not be attributable to a single entity.

We undertake to store and process data securely, prevent unauthorised access and disclosure, avoid gathering and retaining excessive data.  We will report any data security breaches in a timely manner to the required authority and any data subjects impacted.

The PLG does not make use of any automated decision-making systems.

If the PLG wish to use your personal data for a new purpose, not covered by this Data Protection Notice, then we will provide you with a new policy explaining this new use prior to commencing the processing and setting out the relevant purposes and processing conditions. Where and whenever necessary, we will seek your prior consent to the new processing.

Storage and securing of data

PLG data is stored and backed-up using services provided by 3rd parties (e.g. Microsoft Office 365) the website and directory information in stored on Ionos servers which have been verified to be compliant with General Data Protection Regulation 2018.

How long we retain your data

If you leave a comment on the website where allowed the comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognise and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue

For users that register on our website, 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.

We record attendance at Photonics Leadership Group meetings and maintain an archive of interaction with the PLG for a period of 5 years.

What rights you have over your data

Data subjects including PLG stakeholders and any data subjects with interaction with the PLG, including those with an account on this site, including a directory account, or have left comments, 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. may request information on the data held on them at any time by application to the data controller

It is our policy to de-activate data as opposed to delete it to facilitate record to be kept of interactions with the PLG for a period of up to 5 years.  Data will be fully deleted earlier on request.

Request to access data held on you by the PLG, request its deletion or correction should be made to the PLG data controller, Dr John Lincoln  info@photonicsuk.org. We try to response to all legitimate requests within one month.

Where we send your data

We collect information about visitors who comment on oour site that use our Akismet anti-spam service. The information we collect includes the commenter’s IP address, user agent, referrer, and Site URL (along with other information directly provided by the commenter such as their name, username, email address, and the comment itself).

Payments and store

We collect information about you during the checkout process on our store.

What we collect and store

While you visit our site, we’ll track:

  • Products you’ve viewed: we’ll use this to, for example, show you products you’ve recently viewed
  • Location, IP address and browser type: we’ll use this for purposes like estimating taxes and shipping
  • Shipping address: we’ll ask you to enter this so we can, for instance, estimate shipping before you place an order, and send you the order!

We’ll also use cookies to keep track of basket contents while you’re browsing our site.

When you purchase from us, we’ll ask you to provide information including your name, billing address, shipping address, email address, phone number, credit card/payment details and optional account information like username and password. We’ll use this information for purposes, such as, to:

  • Send you information about your account and order
  • Respond to your requests, including refunds and complaints
  • Process payments and prevent fraud
  • Set up your account for our store
  • Comply with any legal obligations we have, such as calculating taxes
  • Improve our store offerings
  • Send you marketing messages, if you choose to receive them

If you create an account, we will store your name, address, email and phone number, which will be used to populate the checkout for future orders.

We generally store information about you for as long as we need the information for the purposes for which we collect and use it, and we are not legally required to continue to keep it. For example, we will store order information for XXX years for tax and accounting purposes. This includes your name, email address and billing and shipping addresses.

We will also store comments or reviews, if you choose to leave them.

Who on our team has access

Members of our team have access to the information you provide us. For example, both Administrators and Shop Managers can access:

  • Order information like what was purchased, when it was purchased and where it should be sent, and
  • Customer information like your name, email address, and billing and shipping information.

Our team members have access to this information to help fulfill orders, process refunds and support you.

What we share with others

We share information with third parties who help us provide our orders and store services to you; for example —

Payments

Where we accept payments through Woocommerce. When processing payments, some of your data will be passed to Woocommerce, including information required to process or support the payment, such as the purchase total and billing information.

Version 3 Nov 2022