1. Introduction
The Stock Connect takes its privacy obligations seriously and is committed to ensuring that it handles personal information in accordance with the Australian Privacy Principles contained in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Act). This policy sets out how The Stock Connect collects personal information. It also describes how it collects, stores, uses and discloses personal information.
2. What is ‘personal information’?
Personal information is information or an opinion about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable, whether the information or opinion is true or not, and whether or not the information or opinion is recorded in a material form.
3. Collection of your personal information and types of personal information collected
The Stock Connect may collect personal information including the following: your title, name, address, email address, telephone numbers, information reasonably necessary for The Stock Connect to provide services to you and information which is otherwise reasonably necessary for The Stock Connect to carry out its functions and activities, including providing you with the The Stock Connect newsletter if you are a subscriber.
You are able to use some of The Stock Connect’s services without providing any personal information (for example, when browsing our website) or by providing an alias.
When you visit our website (including to access and use our services) we and certain third parties such as Facebook may collect information about your visit. For example, in order to connect you to our service, our servers receive and record information about your computer, device, and browser, which may include your IP address, browser type, and other software or hardware information. If you access our services from a mobile or other device, we may collect a unique device identifier assigned to that device, geolocation data, or other transactional information from that device. The Stock Connect generally collects personal information directly from you when you communicate with The Stock Connect, including by requesting access to our private social media groups or pages. However, there may be circumstances where The Stock Connect collects information about you from third parties or via other methods. For example, we may supplement the information we collect about you with information from other sources. This may include information from publicly available sources (such as other published content) and data providers, as well as information from our business partners or related and affiliated companies in Australia or internationally.
4. Use and disclosure of your personal information
The Stock Connect may use or disclose your personal information:
(a) where it is lawfully entitled to do so;
(b) to manage our relationship with you, and provide you with newsletters and other services which you have subscribed to receive;
(c) to fulfil administrative functions associated with the services we provide to you;
(d) where required or authorised by or under an Australian law (including the Act) or court or tribunal order;
(e) if The Stock Connect reasonably believes that the use or disclosure is:
(i) reasonably necessary for an enforcement related activity conducted by or on behalf of an enforcement body;
(ii) necessary to lessen or prevent a serious threat to the life, health or safety of any individual, or to public health or safety, and it is unreasonable or impracticable to obtain your consent;
(iii) necessary in order to take appropriate action where Stockhead has reason to suspect that unlawful activity, or misconduct of a serious nature, that relates to its functions or activities has been, is being or may be engaged in; or
(iv) reasonably necessary in order to locate a person reported as missing;
(f) to a party involved in a sale, merger or transfer transaction where The Stock Connect sells all or part of its business or assets or The Stock Connect is involved in a merger or transfer of all or a material part of its business. The Stock Connect may also disclose your information prior to the sale, transfer or merger so that the party or parties involved can consider the transaction and complete any due diligence;
(g) if reasonably necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of a legal or equitable claim, or for the purposes of confidential alternative dispute resolution;
(h) with The Stock Connect’s related companies located in Australia, in which case such related companies may use your information in accordance with this policy;
(i) to allow service and content providers to assist us in providing and managing our services. These might include the providers of cloud services, website hosting services, direct marketing services and accounting services;
(j) for the purposes of hiring and recruitment, and onboarding new employees.
The Stock Connect may also share non-identifying information with third parties for research and analysis, demographic profiling, and other similar purposes.
5. Direct marketing and targeted advertising
The Stock Connect may from time to time send you marketing material that it considers will be useful to you. The Stock Connect may also send you material about its activities. If you do not wish to receive this information, you can notify The Stock Connect and the material will no longer be sent to you. This does not apply to information that The Stock Connect is legally required to send.
In addition, we (and our advertisers and advertising networks) may use the information we collect about you to provide you with relevant advertisements and editorial content when you use our services. We may also use your personal information so that relevant advertising can be provided to you when you use services or visit websites of other organisations.
We may combine information that we hold about you with information about you that we collect from other trusted businesses with whom you also have a relationship or from public sources and we may associate your browser and/or device with other browsers or devices you use. We may also share information we hold about you with those trusted businesses so that they can do the same thing.
We and those trusted businesses do this in order to enable the development of consumer insights about you so that each of us can serve you better. This includes being able to better understand your preferences and interests, personalise your experience, enhance the products and services you receive, and to tell you about products and services. Where those insights are provided to others for their own marketing purposes, such insights do not contain any information that personally identifies you. We may also use third party service providers to undertake the process of creating these consumer insights.
In addition, we engage third-party advertising networks to help us target our messaging to you through interest-based and contextual means. Through these ad networks, we can track your online activities over time and across third-party websites and apps by obtaining information through automated means, as described above. This data collection takes place both on our sites and through marketing emails and newsletters which we send you, and on third-party websites and apps that participate in these ad networks. This process also helps us track the effectiveness of our marketing efforts.
6. Opting out
Cookies: You may refuse to accept cookies by activating settings on your internet browser. However, please note that if your select such settings you may be unable to access certain parts of our website.
Direct marketing: If you have subscribed on this website to receive material from The Stock Connect by email, and you no longer wish to receive such material, you can select “unsubscribe” in any email containing the material and the material will no longer be sent to you.
Online advertising: You can block certain advertisements by blocking or deleting cookies in your browser settings. However, we use cookies to provide some of our services and you may not be able to use these services if you do this.
7. Disclosure overseas
The Stock Connect may make your information available to certain third-party service and content providers who help The Stock Connect manage or provide services. This might include providers of cloud services, website hosting service providers and direct marketing service providers. These third parties may be located in a range of different countries including Australia, the United States of America, Ireland, the United Kingdom and Germany.
8. Storage and security of your personal information
The Stock Connect may hold your personal information in a number of different formats, including (but not limited to) software programs (located both onsite and offsite, including in the cloud), databases, ling systems and in offsite backup storage. The Stock Connect takes all reasonable steps to protect your personal information from loss, unauthorised access, modification, disclosure or other misuse, including the operation of secure data networks designed to protect your privacy and security.
9. Sensitive personal information
We ask that you not provide us with any sensitive information (such as information about your racial or ethnic origin, religious or other beliefs, health, criminal background or trade union membership) when using our site or services, or otherwise. If you do provide us with any sensitive information, you consent to us collecting and handling that information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
10. Access to and correction of your personal information
At any time you may request access and request corrections to the personal information about you that Stockhead holds by contacting the Privacy Officer at [email protected]. When doing so, please specify clearly what information you would like to access, review, correct or update. The Stock Connect will process your request within a reasonable time, and if The Stock Connect is unable to give you a copy of the information, the Privacy Officer will notify you of generally the sort of information that The Stock Connect holds about you or give you the reasons why your request has been refused.
11. Linked Services
The Stock Connect’s website may display links to sites operated by unaffiliated companies, and may carry advertisements or offer content developed and maintained by unaffiliated companies. The Stock Connect is not responsible for the privacy practices of these unaffiliated companies. Once you leave The Stock Connect’s website or click an advertisement you should check the privacy policy of that company to understand how it will handle your information.
12. Complaints about privacy
Please notify the Privacy Officer at [email protected] if you have any complaints relating to The Stock Connect’s handling of your personal information or you think The Stock Connect has breached the Privacy Act or other applicable privacy laws. When you contact The Stock Connect, please include your name and contact details (including your email address, address, and telephone number) and clearly describe your complaint. The Stock Connect may need to share your information with others who can assist in responding to your complaint. The Stock Connect will investigate all complaints and respond to you within 7 days to let you know the next steps in resolving your complaint and to obtain any further information The Stock Connect needs to consider your complaint. As soon as reasonably practicable and in any event within 30 days, The Stock Connect will let you know its decision.
If you are not satisfied with The Stock Connect’s response, you may refer your complaint to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (www.oaic.gov.au).
13. Changes to this policy
The Stock Connect may amend this policy from time to time, and the updated policy will be published on The Stock Connect’s website. The date at the bottom of this privacy policy tells you when it was last updated. Any changes to this policy become effective when we publish it online. If you do not agree with changes to this policy, you may be able to end your engagement with us.
14. Contact details and further information
If you have any questions in relation to privacy or to access or correct your personal information, please contact the Privacy Officer at [email protected]. For further information about privacy issues, see the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner’s website at www.oaic.gov.au.