This policy is applicable to all personal data processed by European Civic Forum (ECF), registered at 3 rue Juliette Récamier, 75007 Paris, France.
Any attempt by government agencies or private sector organisations to gain access to any information that you give us will be vigorously challenged.
The European Civic Forum (“ECF” or “we” or “us” or “our”) is committed to ensuring the privacy of all our users and visitors to our websites (https://civic-forum.eu and https://civicspacewatch.eu) and subscribers to our mailing lists. As defenders of the right to privacy and digital rights, we are committed to respecting your rights. This policy clearly explains how we treat your information and what your rights are related to this information.
By visiting our websites or subscribing to our mailing lists, you are accepting the practices, policies, and procedures described in this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree to the terms of this Privacy Policy, please do not visit our websites or subscribe to our mailing lists. We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect organisational changes or according to legal requirements. If you have any questions about this policy, please do not hesitate to contact us.
In some circumstances your information may be shared with us by third parties, but only where you have specifically consented. Examples include registering for an event which we are co-organising with our external partners, or registering your interest in joining our campaigns through Facebook, in which case, the platform will share information such as your name and email address with us.
Websites
We use encrypted browsing (https). Our websites are hosted on Hostinger servers, located in France. However, the ECF remains in control of the data processed via its website. We do not serve advertisements of any kind on our websites, nor do we sell products.
Cookies
In order to provide a more personalised service, our websites use cookies to collect and store information. A cookie is a text file automatically stored in users’ web browsers when they access certain websites. The cookie allows us and third parties to identify the web browser on the server, enabling the storage of information to improve user experience and analyse website performance.
Cookies can be classified as session cookies or persistent cookies. Session cookies expire automatically when the internet browser is closed. Persistent cookies remain in the internet browser until their expiration date or until they are deleted. Expiration dates vary for each cookie, with some expiring after a few minutes and others after several years.
When first accessing our websites, users are asked to confirm their cookie preferences. At any time, users can consult and edit their cookie preferences by clicking on the cookie button in the bottom left corner of their window.
We have no control over the tracking technologies that may be used by third-party services that we use on our sites, such as Spotify and YouTube.
ECF uses Google Analytics to collect data on the geography of our users, the browsers they use and the total number of visits on a page. All data collected is anonymous and is not merged with any other data that could serve to de-anonymise it.
The type and amount of information we receive and store depends on how you use our websites. You can access most of the pages on our websites without telling us who you are and without revealing any personal information.
Mailing lists
To send our newsletters and mailings, ECF uses Brevo, a direct mailing platform.
By signing up to our mailing lists, users consent to having their personal data (name and email address) stored in our account on Brevo. Through the platform, we also track the interactions with our emails, including whether or not a user has opened an email and if they have clicked on a link in the email.
If a user wishes to unsubscribe, they can do so at any moment by replying to an email, following the link at the end of each email, or by writing to contact@civic-forum.eu. We will then delete the user’s contact information from our list.
Legal basis for processing
Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), any entity that processes EU citizens’ data must explain clearly and concisely how they will use and store that data. For data to be collected, citizens must give free, informed, specific and unambiguous consent.
Consent
We require your consent to send you our communications, for example to send you emails to update you on our work and our campaigns and to request donations. We will only process your information in this way if you consent.
Retention of personal data
Personal data necessary for joining as a new member organisation will be retained for as long as the organisation wishes to maintain their membership.
Personal data processed for events registration and applications to jobs, grants, or any similar opportunity will be retained for three years, or for as long as necessary according to reporting or auditing requirements.
Other personal data collected will be retained for the period necessary to achieve the purpose for which they were collected, as described in this policy.
Security
We take appropriate security measures to ensure that we keep your information secure, accurate and up to date. Despite our best efforts to protect your personal information electronically, the security of information sent over the internet cannot be guaranteed and may be illegally intercepted or changed after it has been sent. The European Civic Forum cannot accept liability for this if this happens.
Access to and your rights over your personal information
The personal data stored in our servers belongs only to you, which grants you the following rights over it:
- To be informed how your data is being processed.
- To access your data.
- To rectify any data that is inaccurate.
- To ask us to delete your data.
- To restrict our processing of your data, which includes contacting you via email.
- To object to your data being stored.
If you wish to exercise any of these rights or have any questions about this policy you may contact us at contact[@]civic-forum[.]eu or at:
European Civic Forum
3 rue Juliette Récamier
75007 Paris
France
Complaints
In addition to any other administrative or judicial remedies, users have the right to file a complaint with the French Data Protection Commission, the Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL), or another competent supervisory authority under the law if they believe that the processing of their data by the ECF violates the current legal framework. Complaints can be filed here: https://www.cnil.fr/fr/agir/saisir-la-cnil