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Privacy policy

1. Introduction

1.1 We are committed to safeguarding the privacy of our website visitors.

1.2 This policy applies where we are acting as a data controller with respect to the personal data of such persons; in other words, where we determine the purposes and means of the processing of that personal data.

2. The personal data that we collect

2.1 In this Section 2 we have set out the general categories of personal data that we process

2.2 We may process data enabling us to get in touch with you ("contact data"). The contact data may include your name and email address. The source of the contact data is the contact form on this website. We accept this information in good faith, and assume that it is your information or that you have permission from the person whose data it is to supply it to us.

2.3 We may process information contained in or relating to any communication that you send to us or that we send to you ("communication data"). The communication data may include your name, e-mail address and the communication content and metadata associated with the communication. Our website will generate the metadata associated with communications made using the website contact form. We accept this information in good faith, and assume that it is your information or that you have permission from the person whose data it is to supply it to us.

2.4 We may process data about your use of our website and services ("usage data"). The usage data may include your IP address, geographical location, browser type and version, operating system, referral source, page views. The source of the usage data is our analytics tracking system, AWStats, which processes server logs.

3. Purposes of processing and legal bases

3.1 In this Section 3, we have set out the purposes for which we may process personal data and the legal bases of the processing.

3.2 Relationships and communications - We may process contact data and/or communication data for the purposes of managing our relationships, communicating with you (excluding communicating for the purposes of direct marketing) and complaint handling by email]. The legal basis for this processing is our legitimate interests, namely communications with our website visitors.

3.3 Direct marketing - We may process contact data for the purposes of creating, targeting and sending direct marketing communications by e-mail for marketing-related purposes. The legal basis for this processing is consent. This consent can be withdrawn by e-mailing privacy@theoriginofmachines.com, or by clicking the ‘unsubscribe’ link in any marketing e-mail we send to you.

3.4 Research and analysis - We may process usage data for the purposes of researching and analysing the use of our website. The legal basis for this processing is our legitimate interests, namely monitoring, supporting, and improving our website.

3.5 Legal claims - We may process your personal data where necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims, whether in court proceedings or in an administrative or out-of-court procedure. The legal basis for this processing is our legitimate interests, namely the protection and assertion of our legal rights, your legal rights and the legal rights of others.

3.6 Legal compliance and vital interests - We may also process your personal data where such processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which we are subject or in order to protect your vital interests or the vital interests of another natural person.

4. Providing your personal data to others

4.1 Our mailing list is provided by Intuit MailChimp. Your contact data is passed to MailChimp’s servers, based in the USA. For more information regarding how MailChimp process your data, please see their Data Processing Addendum: https://mailchimp.com/legal/data-processing-addendum/. Your personal data is not stored on our servers.

4.2 In addition to the specific disclosures of personal data set out in this Section 4, we may disclose your personal data where such disclosure is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which we are subject, or in order to protect your vital interests or the vital interests of another natural person. We may also disclose your personal data where such disclosure is necessary for the establishment, exercise, or defence of legal claims, whether in court proceedings or in an administrative or out-of-court procedure.

5. International transfers of your personal data

5.1 In this Section 5, we provide information about the circumstances in which your personal data may be transferred to a third country under UK data protection law.

5.2 The hosting facilities for our website are situated in the UK.

5.3 Our mailing list provider, Intuit MailChimp, is situated in the USA. The competent data protection authorities have made an adequacy determination with respect to the data protection laws of each of these countries. Transfers to each of these countries will be protected by appropriate safeguards, namely the use of standard data protection clauses adopted or approved by the competent data protection authorities, a copy of which can be obtained from MailChimp: https://mailchimp.com/legal/data-processing-addendum/

6. Retaining and deleting personal data

6.1 This Section 6 sets out our data retention policies and procedures, which are designed to help ensure that we comply with our legal obligations in relation to the retention and deletion of personal data.

6.2 Personal data that we process for any purpose or purposes shall not be kept for longer than is necessary for that purpose or those purposes.

6.3 We will retain your personal data as follows:

  1. contact data will be retained for a minimum period of 1 year following the date of the most recent contact between you and us, and for a maximum period of 6 years following that date];
  2. communication data will be retained for a minimum period of 6 months following the date of the communication in question, and for a maximum period of 1 year following that date];

6.4 Notwithstanding the other provisions of this Section 6, we may retain your personal data where such retention is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which we are subject, or in order to protect your vital interests or the vital interests of another natural person.

7. Your rights

7.1 In this Section 7, we have listed the rights that you have under data protection law.

7.2 Your principal rights under data protection law are:

  1. the right to access - you can ask for copies of your personal data;
  2. the right to rectification - you can ask us to rectify inaccurate personal data and to complete incomplete personal data;
  3. the right to erasure - you can ask us to erase your personal data;
  4. the right to restrict processing - you can ask us to restrict the processing of your personal data;
  5. the right to object to processing - you can object to the processing of your personal data;
  6. the right to data portability - you can ask that we transfer your personal data to another organisation or to you;
  7. the right to complain to a supervisory authority - you can complain about our processing of your personal data; and
  8. the right to withdraw consent - to the extent that the legal basis of our processing of your personal data is consent, you can withdraw that consent.

7.3 These rights are subject to certain limitations and exceptions. You can learn more about the rights of data subjects by visiting https://edpb.europa.eu/our-work-tools/general-guidance/gdpr-guidelines-recommendations-best-practices_en and https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-data-protection/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/individual-rights/.

7.4 You may exercise any of your rights in relation to your personal data by written notice to us, using the contact details set out below.

8. About cookies

8.1 A cookie is a file containing an identifier (a string of letters and numbers) that is sent by a web server to a web browser and is stored by the browser. The identifier is then sent back to the server each time the browser requests a page from the server.

8.2 Cookies may be either "persistent" cookies or "session" cookies: a persistent cookie will be stored by a web browser and will remain valid until its set expiry date, unless deleted by the user before the expiry date; a session cookie, on the other hand, will expire at the end of the user session, when the web browser is closed.

8.3 Cookies may not contain any information that personally identifies a user, but personal data that we store about you may be linked to the information stored in and obtained from cookies.

9. Cookies used by our service providers

9.1 Our service providers use cookies and those cookies may be stored on your computer when you visit our website.

9.2 We use Google's reCAPTCHA to reduce automated (‘spam bot’) submissions of our contact form. This service uses cookies for the purpose of providing its risk analysis. You can view the privacy policy of this service provider at https://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en. The relevant cookie is: _GRECAPTCHA.

10. Managing cookies

10.1 Most browsers allow you to refuse to accept cookies and to delete cookies. The methods for doing so vary from browser to browser and from version to version. You can obtain up-to-date information about managing cookies via these links:

  1. https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/95647 (Chrome);
  2. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products/firefox/privacy-and-security (Firefox);
  3. https://help.opera.com/en/latest/security-and-privacy/ (Opera);
  4. https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/safari/welcome/mac (Safari); and
  5. https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/microsoft-edge-browsing-data-and-privacy-bb8174ba-9d73-dcf2-9b4a-c582b4e640dd (Edge).

10.2 Blocking all cookies will have a negative impact upon the usability of many websites.

11. Amendments

11.1 We may update this policy from time to time by publishing a new version on our website.

11.2 You should check this page occasionally to ensure you are happy with any changes to this policy.

12. Our details

12.1 This website is owned and operated by The Origin of Machines.

12.2 You can contact us:

  1. using our website contact form; or
  2. by email, using the info@theoriginofmachines.com.