The NI Science Festival’s Privacy Notice concerns the personal information the charity collects and processes. The Festival takes the privacy of its audience and users very seriously. We offer a range of services, transactions and communications with may request data from you.

This Privacy Policy sets out how we do this and applies to anyone who visits our websites, or corresponds with us by phone, e-mail or in person.

Who we are

NI Science Festival is a registered charity (NIC100332), based at Botanic House, 1-5 Botanic Avenue, Belfast, BT7 1JG. We deliver an annual 11 day Science Festival in addition to a range of educational activities and one-off events.

What information do we collect?

NI Science Festival collects personal data from you when you:
● create an account with us
● register for a newsletter/e-newsletter
● buy tickets for our events
● make a donation/become a supporter
● as well as from any e-mail correspondence that you might send us.

When we ask you to provide your personal data, we will let you know why we are asking and how your data will be used by referring you to our Privacy Notice. Personal information may include but is not limited to your name, gender, postal address, e-mail address and a contact phone number. We only collect the personal information that is necessary to meet our business needs and to provide you with the services you have
requested.

What does NI Science Festival do with my personal information?
We collect personal data from you where there is a valid legal basis for doing so, such as to fulfill a contract with you or because you have given your consent. If you are purchasing tickets, this information is used to process the transaction and provide you with goods and services. It also allows us to notify you in case of cancellation, postponement or relocation of any events/shows/workshops.

We rely on your consent for our marketing communications. If you wish to hear from us about our Festival, Schools & Educators programme and one off events and have given us permission to contact you, we will send you information and updates on our work by your preferred channel (e-mail / post). We may also provide you with information on our fundraising work as a charity, including requests for support. We may also send you surveys for market research purposes or events from trusted partners we feel would be of interest to you. We will only contact you if we have received your permission and you can opt out of receiving communications at any time by contacting info@nisciencefestival.com or by clicking the unsubscribe button at the end of each email communication.

Who we might share your information with

We never disclose personal data to any third parties, other than data processors carrying out work on our behalf and working with us to provide a service. This includes mailing, processing orders and card payments, e-mail delivery and website hosting.

Examples of this include our Box Office provider, Visit Belfast. We also work with a bulk email distributor – MailChimp – to send out e-newsletters to subscribers. All of our data processors have their own data security processes and protocols in place, in compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998 and GDPR. We may share your access requirements with venue partners if you have given consent, in order to support your visit. We may also share anonymised data with GDPR compliant data companies to produce market research information.

Your data is never sold or shared commercially. It is only used by NI Science Festival. Our employees and data processors are legally obliged to respect the confidentiality of personal data.

How can I access the information about me?

You can make a Subject Access Request for a copy of the personal data that we hold about you. We require proof of identity before we can process this, such as a driving licence. We aim to provide such information within 40 days of the request. Please send to:

The Data Protection Officer
NI Science Festival
Botanic House
1-5 Botanic Avenue
Belfast
BT7 1JG

You may request that we correct or delete your personal information at any time by contacting info@nisciencefestival.com

Use of photographs
When a photographer commissioned by NI Science Festival is present at any of our events, we may use the resulting images on this website and in publicity materials. Permission to use the images for promotional purposes is requested from the subjects (or their parents/carers) at the time the photographs are taken. However, if you have a valid reason why and image should not be used, please contact us at info@nisciencefestival.com. You can request the removal of your image at any time by contacting info@nisciencefestival.com, in which case we will endeavor to remove the image where possible. Instances where this might not be possible are on social media if the image has already been shared, or in marketing materials that have already been printed.

Children’s privacy

Many of the events and information used by the NI Science Festival may be of interest to children and young people. Children under the age of 14 should request permission from a parent, guardian or teacher before making any type of online enquiry.

Our website

As many of our customers buy tickets online, our website has security measures in place to protect the information you provide us. We conform to the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard and use SSL (Secure Sockets Layer). Our website uses cookies - small text files that are placed on your computer by websites that you visit – in order to analyse visits, provide social media features and
personalise online content.

There are two types of cookies, session and analytical. Session cookies provide our online booking service, allowing us to link you to the website if you are logged in. These are created temporarily and once you log-out and close the browser – ending the session – the cookies are deleted. You can choose whether or not to allow cookies using the privacy settings of your browser. However, session cookies must be enabled in order for our online service to process your bookings.

We do use tools to monitor the effectiveness of our communications, including website and email tracking. Analytical cookies allow us to record page visits and sources so that we can measure the performance of our site. We use a service called Google Analytics and more details can be found at www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy. We also analyse when an e-newsletter is opened and what links contained in that email are clicked. All of this data is used in an aggregated and anonymised form to monitor, for example, opening rates (as a percentage) or the number of visitors to the website.

GDPR Statement

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) replaces the current Data Protection Act and becomes effective from 25.5.18. It includes a number of rights for individuals, including:

The right to be informed about how we collect and process data
The right to request to see full details of the personal information held
The right to ask us to stop processing your personal information and delete data
The right to withdraw consent at any time
The right to correct personal data if you feel it is inaccurate or incomplete

What do we do if there’s a data breach?

NI Science Festival and its data processors review the security of all data. If we are made aware of a breach of data, NI Science Festival will inform the Information Commissioner’s Office and, if required, inform the data subject.