SVRI Member and Website User Information Privacy Notice

South Africa’s Protection of Personal Information Act (often called the POPI Act or POPIA) serves to give people control over which information is processed about them, and what is done with that information.

POPIA does not prohibit the collection of personal data but requires us to inform you how we use the data we collect about you.

1. SVRI’s enhancement to your Privacy

Sexual Violence Research Initiative, SVRI NPC (2019/197466/08) (“SVRI”) respects the privacy of our members’ personal information which should be protected through the use and interaction with www.svri.org and all associated websites, mobile applications, products and services. We have prepared this SVRI Member Information Privacy Notice (“this Notice”) to notify you of: the type of personal information we collect from you, our members; how we will treat that personal information and; the circumstances under which we will share it with third parties.

2. Who is the SVRI Member?

A member is a person (individual or organisation) who has signed up to the SVRI listserv to receive news and information from the SVRI on a weekly basis (the sign-up form can be viewed here).

3. Consent from SVRI Members

SVRI will not collect or process member information without obtaining the member’s consent. Your consent is obtained through your membership submission on the SVRI sign up page. A copy of your membership is securely stored electronically with the SVRI.

SVRI members are included in the membership address book to receive weekly Updates from the SVRI ‐ members may request to have their name withdrawn from the address book by emailing us at svri@svri.org.

4. Who does this Notice apply to?

This Notice applies to:

• all members who are natural persons; and
• all members who are organisations.

5. What we collect about SVRI members

In general, personal information is information that identifies you as an individual. The SVRI collects the following personal information:

• Your first and last name, and your preferred pronoun;
• Your email address
• Information relating to the country you live in, the organisation you work; and
• Information relating to your field of interest.

Whilst you are making use of the SVRI website, we automatically collect certain personal information such as your IP address; browser type; operating system; mobile carrier; your ISP, URLs of sites from which you arrive or leave the SVRI website and sites that have embedded SVRI platform technology. Through cookies and other technologies, we can recognise you as an existing user of the SVRI website and are able to better service you as a result.

6. The use of your personal information

The SVRI uses your membership information to:

• Share with you up to date information from the field via the SVRI Update and an occasional Special Update.
• To reach out to you personally if your expertise and guidance are required by SVRI, or to ask your permission to place you in contact with another member who may need your expertise and guidance.

Please note that from time to time photos from SVRI events such as the SVRI Forum that may include members, may be posted on our website and /or social media pages ‐ members may request to not have any photo posted that includes them, by emailing us at svri@svri.org.

A member may instruct SVRI not to retain their personal information as was provided in the membership application form, by emailing us at svri@svri.org.

If at any future time a member wishes to instruct SVRI to remove their names from the email address book, not to post photos and /or to no longer store their information, they may do so at any time by emailing us at svri@svri.org.

7. Safeguarding your personal information

Maintaining the security of your personal information is important to the SVRI. Reasonable security safeguards have been implemented to protect your personal information. SVRI uses various methods to protect your information such as:

• Access to your personal information on the SVRI membership database will be password-protected.
• SVRI also regularly update our systems for possible vulnerabilities and attacks.
• SVRI maintains security internally to ensure that your personal information is protected against unauthorised access, accidental loss or destruction.

8. Sharing of your personal information

The SVRI will never share your personal information with third parties without your permission.

Personal information will only be shared when prior consent has been obtained from you to do so.

All future SVRI Updates and SVRI Special Updates will include a reminder that members may UNSUBSCRIBE with details on how to do so.

9. Right to amend this Notice

SVRI may, at any time, change this Notice by posting the amended Notice on www.svri.org. Unless otherwise stated, the current version will apply each time you access this website.

10. Date of Publishing

Last updated August 2021

11. Contact Details:

Information Privacy Officer email: svri@svri.org.