Guild Digital. (“Guild Digital,” “we,” “us,” “our”) is a nonprofit organization that develops technology for social good, and is the nonprofit fiscal sponsor for Tech Matters. We are committed to transparency and to protecting the privacy of your personal information. This Privacy Policy is designed to let you know how we collect, use, and disclose information through:
- Our websites guilddigital.co, and cht.guilddigital.co (the “Websites”);
- Our social media pages, including those on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram (collectively, our “Social Media Pages”);
- Email messages that we send to you that link to this Privacy Policy or other communications with you; and
- Offline business interactions you have with us.
Collectively, we refer to the Websites, Social Media Pages, emails, and offline business interactions as the “Services.” We want you to know that we do not sell your personal information, or share it with third parties, for commercial gain or marketing purposes.
Personal Information
“Personal Information” is information that identifies you as an individual or relates to an identifiable individual. The Services may collect Personal Information, including:
- Name;
- Title;
- Email address;
- Zip code and postal address;
- Country;
- Telephone number;
- Organization;
- Country of residence;
- Account information:
- Such as, username, password, preferred language, and area(s) of interest, or
- Current or future role, such as helpline leader, landscape partnership member, conservation professional, software developer, or other;
- Survey information (i.e., the Personal Information you include when you choose to respond to one of our surveys).
Collection of Personal Information
We and our service providers may collect Personal Information in a variety of ways, including:
- Through the Services.
- We collect Personal Information through the Services, for example, when you sign up for a newsletter, fill in a survey, subscribe to receive specific updates, submit a partnership request, make a donation, register an account on the Services, make a post on one of our forums or blogs, or contact us for assistance with the Services.
- From other sources.
- We receive your Personal Information from other sources, such as, publicly available databases or providers of demographic information.
- If you connect your social media account to your Services account, you will share certain Personal Information from your social media account with us, for example, your name, email address, photo, list of social media contacts, and any other information that may be, or you make, accessible to us when you connect your social media account to your Services account.
We need to collect Personal Information in order to provide the requested Services to you. If you do not provide the information requested, we may not be able to provide the Services. If you disclose any Personal Information relating to other people to us or to our service providers in connection with the Services, you represent that you have the authority to do so and to permit us to use the information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
Use of Personal Information
We and our service providers use Personal Information for the following purposes:
- Providing the functionality of the Services and fulfilling your requests.
- To provide Services’ functionality to you, such as, arranging access to your registered account and
- providing you with related functionalities, or customer service.
- To respond to your inquiries and fulfill your requests, for example, when you send us questions, suggestions, compliments, or complaints, or when you request other information about our Services.
- To send administrative information to you, such as changes to our terms, conditions, and policies.
- Providing you with our newsletter and/or other advocacy or fundraising materials and facilitating social sharing.
- To send you our newsletter and similar email updates.
- To request a donation from you.
- To facilitate social sharing functionality that you may choose to use.
- Accomplishing our purposes and supporting and furthering our mission.
- For data analysis, for example, to improve the efficiency of our Services.
- For audits, to verify that our internal processes function as intended and are compliant with legal, regulatory, or contractual requirements.
- For fraud and security monitoring purposes, for example, to detect and prevent cyberattacks or attempts to commit identity theft.
- For developing new products and Services.
- For enhancing, improving, or modifying our current products and Services.
- For identifying usage trends, for example, understanding which parts of our Services are of most interest to users.
- For determining the effectiveness of our fundraising and promotional campaigns, so that we can adapt our campaigns to the needs and interests of our users.
- For operating and expanding our organizational activities, for example, for understanding which parts of our Services are of most interest to our users so we can focus our energies on meeting our users’ interests.
We may aggregate and/or anonymize Personal Information so that it will no longer be considered Personal Information. We do so to generate other data for our use, which we may use and disclose for purposes related to our nonprofit mission and activities, as it no longer identifies you or any other individual.
Disclosure of Personal Information
We do not sell, trade, or share Personal Information with third parties for their own fundraising or marketing purposes nor do we use Personal Information we collect to send fundraising or marketing mailings on behalf of other organizations, except as indicated in this Privacy Policy.
We disclose your Personal Information to our third-party service providers, to facilitate services they provide to us.
These can include providers of services such as website hosting, data analysis, payment processing, information technology and related infrastructure provisions, customer service or related benefits (including special promotions), email delivery, auditing, and other similar services.
By using the Services, you may elect to disclose Personal Information.
On message boards, chat, profile pages, blogs, and other Services to which you are able to post information and content (including, without limitation, our Social Media Pages). Please note that any information you post or disclose through these Services will become public and may be available to other users and the general public.
Through your social sharing activity. When you connect your Services account to your social media account, you will share information with your friends associated with your social media account, with other users, and with your social media account provider. By doing so, you authorize us to facilitate this sharing of information, and you understand that the use of shared information will be governed by the social media provider’s privacy policy.
Other uses and disclosures.
We may also use and disclose your Personal Information as necessary or appropriate, especially when we have a legal obligation or legitimate interest to do so:
- To comply with applicable law and regulations.
- This may include laws outside your country of residence.
- To cooperate with public and government authorities.
- To respond to a request or to provide information we believe is necessary or appropriate.
- These can include authorities outside your country of residence.
- To cooperate with law enforcement.
- For example, when we respond to law enforcement requests and orders or provide information we believe is important.
- For other legal reasons.
- To protect our (and/or your and others’) legal rights, privacy, safety, security, or property.
- To enforce the terms of use of our Services.
- In connection with a transfer or proposed transfer of our assets or all or any part of our organization.
- We have a legitimate interest in disclosing or transferring your Personal Information to a third party in the event of any reorganization, merger, sale, joint venture, assignment, transfer (including shifting of Tech Matters nonprofit activities to a different nonprofit fiscal sponsor, or an independent nonprofit organization), or other disposition of all or any portion of our business or assets (including in connection with any bankruptcy or similar proceedings).
Other Information
“Other Information” is any information that does not reveal your specific identity or does not directly relate to an identifiable individual. The Services collect Other Information, such as:
- Browser and device information;
- IP address (we may also derive your approximate location from your IP address);
- Information collected through cookies, pixel tags, and other technologies;
- Demographic information and other information provided by you that does not reveal your specific identity; and
- Information that has been aggregated in a manner such that it no longer reveals your specific identity.
Collection of Other Information
We and our service providers may collect Other Information in a variety of ways, including:
- Your browser or device. Certain information can be collected through most browsers or your device, such as your computer or device type, screen resolution, operating system name and version, language, Internet browser type and version, and the name and version of the Services you are using. We use this information to ensure that the Services function properly.
- Cookies. Cookies are pieces of information stored directly on the computer that you are using. Cookies allow us to collect information, such as browser type, time spent on the Services, pages visited, language preferences, and other traffic data. We and our service providers use the information for security purposes, to facilitate navigation, to display information more effectively, and to personalize your experience. We also gather statistical information about use of the Services in order to continually improve their design and functionality, understand how they are used, and assist us with resolving questions regarding them. We do not currently respond to browser do-not-track signals. If you do not want information collected through the use of cookies, most browsers allow you to automatically decline cookies or be given the choice of declining or accepting a particular cookie (or cookies) from a particular website. You may also wish to refer to http://www.allaboutcookies.org/manage-cookies/index.html. If, however, you do not accept cookies, you may experience some inconvenience or loss of functionality in your use of the Services.
- Tracking and other similar technologies. Tracking technologies. These technologies (known as web beacons, clear GIFs, page tags, and pixel tags) may be used to, among other things, track the actions of users of the Services (including email recipients), measure the success of our marketing campaigns, and compile statistics about usage of the Services and response rates. Analytics. We use analytics tools which use cookies and similar technologies to collect and analyze information about use of the Services and report on activities and trends. These tools may also collect information regarding the use of other websites, apps, and online resources. We may use Google Analytics to perform these functions, but may also use others. You can learn about Google’s practices by going to www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/, and exercise the opt-out provided by Google by downloading the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on, available at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.
Uses and Disclosures of Other Information
We may use and disclose Other Information for purposes related to our nonprofit mission and activities, except where we are required to do otherwise under applicable law. If we are required to treat Other Information as Personal Information under applicable law, we may use and disclose it for the purposes for which we use and disclose Personal Information as detailed in this Policy. In some instances, we may combine Other Information with Personal Information. If we do, we will treat the combined information as Personal Information as long as it is combined.
Security
We seek to use reasonable organizational, technical, and administrative measures to protect Personal Information within our organization. Unfortunately, no data transmission or storage system can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. If you have reason to believe that your interaction with us is no longer secure, please immediately contact us at Privacy@guilddigital.co.
Choices and Access
We give you choices regarding our use and disclosure of your Personal Information for marketing purposes. If you no longer want to receive marketing-related emails from us on a going-forward basis, you may opt out by contacting us at Privacy@guilddigital.co or using the “Unsubscribe” option included in our marketing emails.
Please note that if you opt out of receiving marketing-related emails from us, we may still send you important administrative messages, from which you cannot opt out.
How you can access and update your Personal Information
If you would like to update your Personal Information, you may contact us at Privacy@guilddigital.co. We will respond to your request consistent with applicable law, and also follow the process noted below.
In your request, please make clear what Personal Information you would like to have updated. For your protection, we may only implement requests with respect to the Personal Information associated with the particular email address that you use to send us your request, and we may need to verify your identity before implementing your request. We will try to comply with your request as soon as reasonably practicable.
Please note that we may need to retain certain Personal Information for recordkeeping purposes and/or to complete any transactions that you began prior to requesting a change or deletion (e.g., when you make a donation, you may not be able to change or update the Personal Information provided until after the donation is processed).
Third-Party Services
This Privacy Policy does not address, and we are not responsible for the privacy, information, or other practices of any third parties, including any third party operating any website or service to which the Services link. The inclusion of a link on the Services does not imply endorsement of the linked site or service by us or by our affiliates.
In addition, we are not responsible for the information collection, use, disclosure, or security policies or practices of other organizations, such as Meta (previously known as Facebook), Apple, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, or any other app developer, app provider, social media platform provider, operating system provider, wireless service provider, or device manufacturer, including with respect to any Personal Information you disclose to other organizations through or in connection with our Social Media Pages.
Third-Party Payment Service
The Services may provide functionality allowing you to make donations to us using third-party payment services with which you have created your own account. When you use such a service to make a payment to us, your Personal Information will be collected by such a third party and not by us, and will be subject to the third party’s privacy policy, rather than this Privacy Policy. We have no control over, and are not responsible for, this third party’s collection, use, and disclosure of your Personal Information.
Use of Services by Minors
The Services are not directed to individuals under the age of eighteen (18), and we do not knowingly collect Personal Information from individuals under eighteen (18).
Jurisdiction and Cross-Border Transfer
Your Personal Information may be stored and processed in any country where we have facilities or in which we engage service providers.
Our Services are controlled and operated by us from Uganda and are not intended to subject us to the laws or jurisdiction of any state, country, or territory other than that of Uganda.
Sensitive Information
Unless we request it, we ask that you not send us, and you not disclose, any sensitive Personal Information (e.g., Social Security numbers, health, biometrics or genetic characteristics) on or through the Services or otherwise to us.
Updates to this Privacy Policy
The “Last Updated” legend at the top of this Privacy Policy indicates when this Privacy Policy was last revised. Any changes will become effective when we post the revised Privacy Policy on the Services.
Contacting Us
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at Privacy@guilddigital.co or Guild Digital, 834, Bahai Road, Kampala, Attn: Tech Matters Privacy. Because email communications are not always secure, please do not include credit card information or other sensitive information in your emails to us.