General Policy

NAFN Data and Intelligence Services and Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council (The Host Authority) respects your privacy. The information that you provide us with, or that is gathered automatically helps us to monitor our service and provide you with the services that you are entitled to as a member of NAFN. Please bear in mind that any personal information that you submit through the online discussion groups/forums may be seen by others. All other emails/forms are treated in the same way as other communications with the organisation.

If you have any concerns, questions or comments please contact the webmaster.

Email newsletters and Alerts

We distribute email newsletters and alerts to different groups; in all cases you will have to 'opt out' to these. We will use the email address and department you registered - this is used to update you on new services as well as, changes to existing services. We do not give our email lists out to other non-registered parties. If at any time you wish to unsubscribe from our newsletter you may do so by following the instructions on the bottom of the email and use the unsubscribe facility.

Registration and Authentication

Our site requires you to register and be authenticated with us. This is to allow access to the services that we provide for you e.g. Authorised Officer, RIPA Single Point of Contact and General enquiries.

Access to the members-only area of this web site is restricted. In order to gain access to this area of the site a user must first complete the registration form. During registration a user is required to give their contact information (including their full name, e-mail address, business telephone number, business fax number, organisation name). It is optional for the user to provide the name of their manager.

This information is stored in a secure database and may be used for several purposes including:

• authenticating a user's access rights to restricted areas of the web site
• identifying and recording the use of interactive site features (i.e. Discussion Forum, Sanction Information Database, etc.)
• processing enquiries/transactions
• providing default (auto-completed) values in form fields
• contacting the user to facilitate data sharing between member organisations.

When a user attempts to log-in to the member's area of the web site certain information is recorded including their IP address, username, browser type, and the date/time. This information is recorded for security reasons.

Third party sites

Some of our services are provided through partnerships with other organisations. We may, on occasion, share non-personal aggregated information to these third parties.

Cookies

A cookie is a piece of data stored on the user's hard drive. Cookies used on this site are generated automatically and are anonymous. They are used for user session management and to collect aggregated data for statistical purposes. You can set your browser to notify you before you receive a cookie, giving you the chance to decide whether to accept it. You can also set your browser to turn off cookies. Please note that disabling cookies may adversely affect your use of parts of this web site.

The web server automatically logs your IP address, which may also be used for statistical purposes. This information log is not linked to any personal information.

Surveys

On occasion we may conduct online surveys. This is used to gauge our service, collect demographic information and other information that we may find useful. These surveys are optional. We may share non-personal, aggregated information with third parties.

Affiliates

Many of our pages contain links to sites operated by third parties. The content on these sites are not under our control. If you have any questions concerning these sites and the usage of them we suggest that you contact the webmaster of the site directly.

Security

While we strive to keep the information that you supply directly or indirectly secure, please be aware that the Internet is not a fully secure medium. We use secure servers for sensitive information and this may in the future, be used for the capture of all personal information.

This information is restricted within our host local authority offices and only employees who need the information to carry out specific functions are granted access to personally identifiable information. All employees are kept up to date on our security and privacy practices. The servers that we store personally identifiable information on are kept in a secure environment.

Usage and sharing of information

NAFN Data and Intelligence Service is the sole owner of the information collected on this site. We will not sell, share, or rent this information to others in ways different from what is disclosed in this statement. NAFN collects information from our users at several different points on our web site.

This web site contains a number of online enquiry/feedback forms that ask the user to provide personally identifiable information. The provision of this information may be optional or required as indicated on the form. This data may be used for several purposes including:

• contacting the user by way of a reply to their enquiry or feedback
• processing the enquiry / transaction
• keeping a record of the enquiry / feedback
• quality monitoring / statistical purposes

This data may be stored in a secure database or via an automatically generated e-mail.

We may share aggregated statistical information with our partners and associates. This information is not linked to any personal information that can identify any individual person. We use a number of external organisations to process enquiries. These organisations do not retain, share, store or use personally identifiable information for any secondary purposes.

If requested we may submit your information to law enforcement or government authorities.

Corrections/updates

NAFN protects the quality and integrity of our user's personally identifiable information. If a user's personal information changes (such as a telephone number), or if a user no longer desires our service, we will endeavour to provide a way to correct, update or remove that user's personal data provided to us.

A manager who has been selected by a user has the functionality to activate, update and deactivate a user account. This can be done within the member's area of the web site by selecting the 'Amend User Accounts' facility.

A user has the ability to amend their personal account using the 'Maintain Account' facility. This allows personal registration details to be amended online, i.e. name, e-mail address, telephone number, fax number, etc. Alternatively, an email can be sent to NAFN using the general feedback form.

Please note: All accounts where requests have been submitted to NAFN are retained for audit, recharging and legal purposes. These are removed inline with our data retention policy.

If at any time you wish to unsubscribe from our email newsletters or alerts you may do so by following the instructions on the bottom of the email and use the unsubscribe facility.

If you have any problems please contact the webmaster.

Policy Changes

By using our site you agree to accept this privacy policy and are aware that our policy may change with time. Any changes to this policy will appear on this web page.

Information Governance Policy

To operate efficiently, we must collect and use information about people with whom we work. Having accurate, relevant and accessible information is vital to the efficient management of NAFN and the Host Authority, which values records and information as important corporate assets. NAFN and the Host Authority must balance its aim to be open in its provision of information to the public and stakeholders wherever possible, on which much confidence and trust is founded, with its obligations and duties around confidentiality and data protection. All personal information must be handled and dealt with properly, no matter how it is collected, recorded and used, and whether it is on paper, in computer records or recorded by any other means. We all have a responsibility for its safe handling.

This balance requires NAFN and the Host Authority to create and manage all records efficiently, to make them accessible when needed, to protect and store them securely and to dispose of them safely at the appropriate time. Effective information management brings many benefits to NAFN and the Host Authority by facilitating and supporting more efficient working, better decision making, improved customer service and business transformation. A key component of information management is effective information governance and security, which is the subject of this policy document (0.37MB). This policy lays the framework for a formal information governance programme and is the central part of a suite of information management procedures which have been adopted by NAFN and the Host Authority which apply to all officers (including all agency workers and contractors).