We suspect you have received more than your share of GDPR related notifications in the past couple of weeks. Rather than send out another email on the subject, we thought it might be worthwhile addressing the issue in our weekly post. You have thoroughly reviewed every email you received with GDPR in the subject line, haven’t you? We thought not. For those who are not familiar with GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) [which took effect May 25, 2018], we recommend a quick review of the GDPR and you site. For those who need a reminder – Web Professionals (official business name World Organization of Webmasters) does not retain much in the way of personal information to begin with. We always take requests regarding data seriously and make every effort to keep said data secure.
Minors
If you are younger than 18 years, please use this website only with permission (and active involvement) of your parent/ guardian. Do not provide any personally identifiable information (such as your email address). Have a parent/ guardian contact us on your behalf when necessary.
Information we collect
As with many websites, we collect basic information about all visitors. This may include the date and time of your access, your IP (Internet Protocol) address, the website you visited before arriving at WebProfessionals.org and the website you go to when you leave our website. We track your operating system, screen resolution, and browser details. This is automatically collected. Such data is only used for high level analysis (unless you are trying to hack our website – in which case, such information will be provided to appropriate law enforcement).
We may use cookies and local storage to keep track of your session on our website. You can disable this in your browser if you do not want to have a customized experience when you visit our site.
You may initiate transactions on our website which involve credit cards, debit cards, online payment services and similar financial mechanisms. During those transactions, we will collect some information (such as your email address) and billing address so we can contact you in the event of questions. We do not store your credit card details (only a transaction code).
What we do with your information
We use the information collected to run our business. For example, we periodically send email news to our members. We use the email address you provided when signing up as a member to accomplish that. We do not provide customer data to third parties without your permission. You always have the option to opt out of any of our mailings.
There is one exception. We may (at our discretion) provide your information to law enforcement (or related government agencies) in the event of fraud investigations or other suspected illegal activities.
Login Credentials
Members create a username and password to access some restricted areas of our website. We recommend periodically changing your password (and keeping it long and complex). Your password is encrypted in our data stores and backups. We have no way of telling you what your password is. If necessary, we can issue you a new one (once you have properly identified yourself).
We also recommend logging out when you are finished reviewing that part of our website. If you are extremely concerned about this, we also recommend closing your browser when you leave our site.
Questions
If you ever have questions about what we do with any data collected or wish to have personal information removed from our data stores, please contact us.
As a member supported (and not for profit) organization, we take our responsibility to safeguard any information you provide as safely as possible. We have not (and will not) sell any of this collected information to any third party.
Best always,
Mark DuBois
Community Evangelist and Executive Director
