Privacy

The Making Connections website is maintained by the New South Wales Government's Office for Science and Medical Research. This Privacy Policy applies to all the publicly accessible pages on the Making Connections website located at www.spinalforum.com

The Office for Science and Medical Research does not have any responsibility for the privacy policies or practices of third party sites linked to the Making Connections site. If you have any questions about the Making Connections site, or the application of this Privacy Policy or a request for access to information held, please contact:

Making Connections
Office for Science and Medical Research
GPO Box 5341
SYDNEY NSW 2001
Email: spinalforum_editor@osmr.nsw.gov.au

Users of the Making Connections website are entitled to expect that any information as a result of that use will be treated within the terms of the New South Wales government's privacy responsibilities and obligations. The New South Wales government's privacy practices are regulated by the New South Wales Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998. The Act defines personal information as any information or opinion about an individual whose identity is apparent or can be readily identified from the information or opinion.

What information do we collect?
When you look at the pages on the Making Connections website, our computers automatically record information that identifies, for each page accessed:
• The IP (Internet Protocol) address of the machine which has accessed it;
• Your top-level domain name (for example .com, .gov, .au, .uk etc.);
• The address of your server;
• The date and time of your visit to the site;
• The pages accessed and documents downloaded;
• The previous site visited;
• The type of browser and operating system you have used.

Cookies are not used from the Making Connections website to collect information.

How do we use the information collected?
The information collected during each visit is aggregated with similar logged information and published in reports in order for the Office for Science and Medical Research to identify patterns of usage of the site. This will assist us in improving the Making Connections site and the services offered on it.

The Office for Science and Medical Research will not disclose or publish information that identifies individual machines, or potentially identifies sub-groupings of addresses, without consent or otherwise in accordance with the New South Wales Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998.

What exceptions are there to this rule?
The Office for Science and Medical Research will collect, use and disclose more extensive information than stated above in the following circumstances:
• Unauthorised attempts to access files which are not published Making Connections pages;
• Unauthorised tampering or interference with files published on the Making Connections site;
• Unauthorised attempts to index the contents of the Making Connections site by other sites;
• Attempts to intercept messages of other users of the Making Connections site;
• Communications which are defamatory, abusive, vilify individuals or groups or which give rise to a suspicion that an offence is being committed;
• Attempts to otherwise compromise the security of the web server, breach the laws of the State of New South Wales or Commonwealth of Australia, or interfere with the use of the Making Connections site by other users.

The Office for Science and Medical Research reserves the right to make disclosures to relevant authorities where the use of the Making Connections site raises a suspicion that an offence is being, or has been, committed. In the event of an investigation, Office for Science and Medical Research will provide access to data to any law enforcement agency that may exercise a warrant to inspect our logs.

Is the information stored securely?
Yes. Information collected is stored in an appropriately secure format and held by Office for Science and Medical Research for archival purposes. When the information is no longer required for the purposes for which it was collected it is deleted.

Users may provide personal details for the purpose of receiving a reply to their feedback. This information will only be used for the purpose for which it was provided. We will not add your email address or name to any mailing list. The Office for Science and Medical Research may publish aggregated information about feedback on the site, to the extent that it does not identify or cannot be used to identify individual users.

Will this policy be updated over time?
Due to the developing nature of privacy principles for online communication, this policy may be modified or expanded in light of new developments or issues that may arise from time to time. The amended policy will be posted to this site and will operate from the time it is posted.