The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) is committed to ensuring the privacy and confidentiality of members, potential members and users of our services. This policy sets out how we will treat your personal information.

Contents:

Who we are

The Wales, Ireland, Scotland and England Regional Administration of the Industrial Workers of the World is the Data Controller of your personal Data.

The IWW’s Data Protection Officer is Philip Le Marquand.

IWW members can view, modify and download their membership data record directly by visiting the ‘My Membership’ page of the IWW Members’ Area website (access to this area is restricted to members only and requires a password).

If you have any questions or concerns about our Data Protection and Privacy Policy or would like to request access, deletion or restricted use of your personal data, you can contact our Data Protection Officer as follows:

  • IWW members: click here to submit a request via the contact form in the IWW Members Area website (select the ‘Personal data requests’ category to contact the Data Protection Officer, or you can select ‘Technical question or request for IT resources’ to contact the IWW IT Committee for any technical help with our online resources). (Access to this area is restricted to members only and requires a password).

DATA CONTROLLER

IWW

PO BOX 5251

YEOVIL

BA20 9FS

Personal data we may collect.

Personal data we collect, via our websites or via any other online or offline method, will only be used for the stated purposes (or closely related purposes) for which it was collected and according to the principles laid out in this Privacy Policy.

We may record the IP addresses of visitors to our websites. We also may retain server logs which include the IP address of every request to our servers.

We may collect your personal information in the following ways:

    • Via website cookies (see ‘Cookies’ section below).
    • Via our online or paper membership application forms.
    • Via online contact forms for submitting queries.
    • Via postal, email, SMS, mobile/online instant messaging, or phone communications you have with IWW roleholders.
    • Via online or offline survey forms, questionnaire forms, email contact submission forms, casework consent forms, crowdsourcing or crowdfunding campaign forms, or petitions.
    • When you purchase items from our online shop.

We may use the personal data we collect as follows:

    • To administer the websites.
    • To improve your browsing experience.
    • To enable your use of the services available on the IWW websites.
    • To deal with enquiries and complaints made by you.
    • To process membership applications and membership data (see ‘How the IWW uses the personal data of its members and membership applicants’).
    • To conduct our organising activities and campaigns.
    • To provide support, advice and/or representation in an individual or collective case.
    • To process and ship anything you purchase from our shop.
    • To comply with legal requirements.
    • For research purposes to further the legitimate interests of the IWW.
    • For other trade union related purposes, objects or activities, including those set in the IWW Rule Book.

The lawful basis for processing this data is the IWW pursuing our legitimate interests as a trade union.

We will process any personal data we collect according to the principles set out in this Privacy Policy.

Whenever you submit your personal information to our roleholders via postal, email, SMS, mobile/online instant messaging, or phone communications, we will assume that you implicitly consent to the IWW collecting and processing your personal information according to this Privacy Policy.

Whenever we solicit personal information via forms, we will clearly explain our purposes for collecting the data and explicitly refer to this Privacy Policy.

Whenever we solicit personal data from non-IWW members via forms, we will ask the respondent to explicitly consent to the IWW processing their personal data according to this Privacy Policy.

Cookies

On our websites, data may be stored on a ‘cookie’. This is a tiny element of data that our site can send to your browser, which may then be stored on your hard drive. This small amount of information does not contain any private information stored on your computer.

Like most websites, the IWW uses cookies to improve our users’ experience. Our cookies policy explains which cookies we use and why, along with where you can find more information about cookies.

You can prevent the setting of cookies by adjusting the settings on your browser (see your browser Help for how to do this). Be aware that disabling cookies will affect the functionality of this and many other websites that you visit. Disabling cookies will usually result in also disabling certain functionality and features of websites. Therefore it is recommended that you do not disable cookies.

How the IWW uses the personal data of its members and membership applicants.

We collect and may process your personal data as a member for the following purposes:

    • The administration and management of your membership records
    • To provide you with information and updates about the IWW’s activities, campaigns, and services.
    • To conduct our organising activities and campaigns
    • To conduct elections and ballots
    • To administer branch and other meetings
    • To provide you with support, advice and/or representation in an individual or collective case
    • To process your membership subscription payments
    • To administer our members-only online websites and services
    • To comply with legal requirements 
    • For other trade union related purposes, objects or activities, including those set in the IWW Rule Book.

The lawful basis for this processing is the IWW pursuing our legitimate interests as a trade union.

By joining the IWW you should understand that we may use some or all of the personal data you have provided for the above purposes. Where other purposes apply, we will notify you when you provide your data.

Statutory data requirements

As a trade union, we have a statutory requirement to keep an accurate register of members’ names and addresses. If you wish to be a IWW member, you must provide this information to us.

Sharing of information

We may disclose information about you to IWW officers, staff, organisers, and workplace representatives, insofar as reasonably necessary for the purposes as set out in this privacy policy.

We may need to disclose limited information about you to Webarchitects, the web service cooperative that hosts our website, email list and email servers, in order to administer our websites and provide our online services for members.

If you make monthly recurring membership dues payments through our payment provider, you will be sharing your payment details with our third-party payment processor, GoCardless.

If you purchase items on our online shop, you may need to provide your payment details to PayPal or we may need to share your payment details with another card payment processor. We will also need to share your shipment address with the Royal Mail or other courier or postal services we might use to send you the goods you purchase.

The IWW will not disclose any of your personally identifiable information to any third party unless we have your explicit consent, or we are required to do so by law.

Storage of data

We will keep your personal data only for the period necessary to enable us to fulfil the purpose(s) for which we collected it, to comply with our legal obligations and/or whilst we maintain a legitimate interest in retaining it.

By default, contents that you have emailed, posted or uploaded yourself via Wobchat, the InterWob Forum, the IWW Owncloud file repository, IWW email accounts and email lists, or any other IWW communications platform, will remain indefinitely  stored and visible on those platforms, even if you are no longer a member, unless you delete them yourself or explicitly request for their deletion.

Emails to members

Emails that we send to our members from our membership database are tracked. This helps us to ensure that you only receive emails from us that are of interest to you. You can unsubscribe from general information emails at anytime by clicking the email opt-out link at the bottom of our emails.

If you choose to opt out from general information emails, we will retain the right to send you important emails for the purposes of pursuing the legitimate activities and interests of the IWW as a trade union.

Updating and accessing your information

You have the right to access the personal data we have kept on record about you. You also have the right to correct the personal data we hold on you or change how we process your data or contact you. You are entitled to restrict the data we use about you, and how we use it. You can also ask us to erase all the personal data we hold about you.

IWW members can view, modify and download their membership data record as well as your Wobchat, InterWob Forum, IWW Owncloud file repository and IWW Email account data directly by visiting the ‘My Membership’ page of the IWW Members’ Area website (access to this area is restricted to members only and requires a password).

You can also contact our Data Protection Officer to view or modify the data we have about you. Links and methods for contacting the Data Protection officer are provided in the first section of this Privacy Policy text, at the top of this page.

You have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office if you think the IWW has breached your Data Protection and Privacy rights.

Data security

We will keep your personal data confidential and will take appropriate measures to protect it against loss, theft or misuse and to safeguard your privacy.

IWW uses industry standard efforts to safeguard the confidentiality of your personally identifiable information, such as firewalls and SSL (secure socket layers). We make every effort to protect the loss, misuse and alteration of information under our control. However, data transmission over the internet is inherently insecure, and we cannot guarantee the security of data sent over the internet. Your IWW membership information is password protected so that only you can access it and view the information contained in your account. You are responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your passwords.

Transfers overseas

We do not routinely transfer your data outside of the UK or the European Economic Area. Where this is necessary, we ensure appropriate data protection measures are in place.

User-posted contents and media

IWW members can post contents to the public facing website (which must be approved by site editors before it is published). Members can also post contents to internal members-only discussion areas, such as Wobchat, the InterWob Forum, or any IWW email lists they may be subscribed to. Members can upload files to the IWW Owncloud file repository. IWW roleholders may be granted IWW hosted email accounts from which they can send and receive emails.

All IWW members will be able to see and download any content that you post or upload to Wobchat, the InterWob Forum, the IWW Owncloud file repository or any other members-only IWW websites. IWW email list subscribers will be able to see and download any content that you post to those lists. Any content you post to the public website (once site editors publish it) will be publicly visible and can be downloaded by any visitor to the website.

Please only post content you are comfortable sharing with these audiences. Please do not post content revealing someone else’s personal data without their prior consent. When using IWW websites and communications tools, members are expected to abide by IWW rules concerning communications and data protection (access to that page is restricted to members only and requires a password). The IWW retains the right to revoke your access to any IWW email accounts and access its contents, including personal IWW email accounts.

If you upload images to the websites you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website.

Please note that once you have sent an email, the recipient(s) of that email, including the subscribers of any IWW email list(s) you post to, will be able to read that email and download its contents, and this cannot be undone nor deleted from the IWW email list’s message archive.

By default, contents that you have emailed, posted or uploaded yourself via Wobchat, the InterWob Forum, the IWW Owncloud file repository, IWW email accounts and email lists, or any other IWW communications platform, will remain indefinitely  stored and visible on those platforms, even if you are no longer a member, unless you delete them yourself or explicitly request for their deletion.

Members can directly download, amend or delete any content they have posted on Wobchat, the InterWob Forum, IWW’s Owncloud, or that is stored in their IWW email accounts by visiting the ‘My Membership’ page of the IWW Members’ Area website (access to this area is restricted to members only and requires a password).

Public website contributors can amend their posts themselves and can contact website editors or the IWW IT Committee or IWW Data Protection Officer to publish the amended content.

Members can ask their local branch officers or contact the IWW IT Committee to subscribe or unsubscribe their email address(es) to/from their local branch’s email lists. IWW roleholders can contact the IWW Communications Administrator for support with subscription or unsubscription on IWW roleholder email lists.

If you require assistance with any of the above, including requests for your data to be completely wiped from Wobchat, the InterWob Forum, the IWW Owncloud file repository, or IWW Email accounts, please click here to submit a request via the contact form in the IWW Members Area website (select the ‘Personal data requests’ category). (Access to this area is restricted to members only and requires a password).

Social media

The IWW and its various bodies use social media websites such as Twitter, Youtube and Facebook to promote their activities. We do not collect any personal data from social media profiles. We do not use your member data to target our social media posts or any social media advertising. We do not provide or sell members’ data to third parties for the purposes of social media marketing.

Occasionally, posts on our websites may contain social media buttons or links to social media sites. When you click on these buttons or links, these sites will be registering that action and may use your information.

You should check the respective policies of each of these social media sites to see how exactly they use your information and to find out how to opt out, or delete, such information.

Amendments to this policy

We may amend this policy at any time by posting a revised version on the website at www.iww.org.uk/privacy