EPA privacy and data security policy 

The EPA complies with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and other regulation regarding the processing of personal data and privacy. The EPA respects your privacy and is committed to safeguarding the confidentiality of your personal information. The EPA will use your personal data only for the purpose for which you have given permission. The EPA will not sell, rent, loan, trade or lease any personal information collected online or offline.

This policy explains how and why the EPA collects and uses the personal information of its members, users and website visitors, and how the EPA protects your privacy. It also describes your choices regarding the use, access and correction of your personal information.

When disclosing your personal information to us by registering to an EPA activity (e.g. application to participate in a school), applying for membership, or signing up to access on line educational material and courses  or to stay informed about our activities, you consent to the collection, storage and processing of your personal information as stated in this policy. You can withdraw this consent at any time. 

The personal information that we collect from you shall be obtained, processed and transmitted in compliance with applicable data protection legislation including the GDPR and, as our office is located in France, the French GDPR Implementation Act. 

We may change this policy by updating this page. We advise you to check this page from time to time to ensure that you are happy with any changes (latest version: 01 April 2019). 


Controller

The EPA is responsible for all personal data collected and processed by the EPA directly.  

The EPA has its registered seat at:  

European Psychiatric Association
15 Avenue de la Liberté
67000 Strasbourg
France 
Tel: + 33 3 88 23 99 30


Contact for questions or requests relating to privacy: privacy@europsy.net. 


1. Processing of personal data 

1.1 Personal data

The EPA processes information obtained on the basis of your consent. The EPA only collects the personal data needed to fulfil our stated purposes (see Use). Which personal data is gathered and processed depends on the purpose – for instance:

When applying for membership, or participation in an EPA activity, the mandatory personal data the EPA collects are: 

Nominative Information - Title, first name(s), surname(s): Your nominative details are needed to properly identify you, to communicate with you, to provide you with the services you have requested. 

Full postal professional and/or private address: The postal address is needed when items will be sent to you by post (e.g. paper journals). A full postal address is always requested, even when not needed to send you items, to save asking for it specifically when needed for a particular transaction and because it helps to correctly verify your identity (where other persons have the same or a similar name). 

Date of birth, nationality and country: Your date of birth is used to help us correctly identify you and avoid duplicate records. Your date of birth, nationality and country are used where specific rules or fees apply which depend on age and/or nationality/country, to determine eligibility for these categories/activities. 

E-mail address: Electronic communication is for most purposes the EPA’s preferred method of communication because it is generally convenient, swift, environmental friendly and efficient.  In the frame of membership management, because we only permit a particular e-mail to be used once in our system , it reduces the possibility of duplicates and allows “Forgot Password” to be handled in an automated secure way. 

Professional details: We also ask you for a CV and for information about your past and current position (job title, institute, address, phone) and psychiatry-related training (diploma, school, place, year) to enable us to determine your eligibility for membership or participation in a specific activity. 

When registering for an activity, we also ask you for some more general background information to better organise the activity (for example: food preferences). This information is optional; you can choose whether or not to provide the information.

When signing up for access on-line educational material and courses  or subscribing to an EPA newsletter, such as EPA Minds Online, the mandatory personal data collected by the EPA are limited to: first name(s), surname(s), e-mail, and country.

In some cases, we ask you for additional information if this is needed for the services provided by the EPA. For example, the EPA processes payment information provided by you, if such information is necessary to pay your membership fee, course fee, or registration fee for a school. 


1.2 Use

The data is collected and stored only for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by the EPA as listed in its Statutes) and the execution of our services in this context:

  • to enable a proper functioning and management of the website and platform
  • to enable member registration and administration
  • to enable the organisation of European Congresses of Psychiatry, other meetings and EPA activities including such as, but not limited to, courses (e.g. Summer Schools) or exchange programmes, and the attribution of research prizes and similar
  • to enable the distribution of our journal
  • to enable the circulation of scientific information related to Psychiatry to our community through, for instance, online newsletters (e.g. EPA Minds Online) 
  • to carry out our obligations required by law
  • as otherwise described to you at the point of collection


1.3 Storage 

Personal information is only kept for a reasonable period of time, dependent upon the nature of the information and its intended use, but subject to 

  • a maximum of one year after your last interaction with us in the frame of a specific activity (e.g. course) 
  • a maximum of five years after resignation or non-renewal of membership if you are an EPA member. As long as you are a member, your information will be kept in the EPA system (the Extranet), even if you do not use the EPA website or services during that time.

We may need to keep certain information for legal purposes (e.g. accounts receivable records and invoices containing personal data, or information needed to prevent identity theft, legal disputes and misconduct) even if deletion has been requested. In all cases, data will only be kept for the relevant French statutory retention period.


1.4 Processors/third parties 

Personal data is only shared with processors and/or third parties if this is necessary to carry out services. 

We share personal data with: 

- our congress management service provider for the organisation of the EPA annual Congress and the maintenance of the EPA Congress website 

- other partners such as hotels in order to be able to organise meetings and other activities; 

- EPA committee members to review applications for EPA activities, abstracts, symposia proposals etc. 

- our IT providers in order to be able to store and access the data; 

- the publisher of the journal European Psychiatry, in order for them to be able to send our members a copy of the journal. 

- our payment providers, in order to carry out a payment for membership or other activity or service. 

- online platform service providers, e.g. for the management of our e-newsletters.

If we share your personal information with a processor, we make sure the processor complies with the GDPR by signing processing agreements. All our processors are based either in the EU or within a country deemed to have adequate privacy protection (European Commission Adequacy decision), such as the US or Israel. Other third parties have no access to personal data. 


1.5 Security 

All personal data is stored on secure servers, and appropriate technical and organisational measures are implemented to ensure an appropriate level of security. 


2. Your rights 

In accordance with articles 15 to 21 the GDPR, you have the right to request access to and rectification or erasure of your personal data and/or restriction of processing of your data and/or to object to the processing of your data on the basis of article 6 (1)(f) GDPR, as well as the right to data portability (where processing is based on consent or a contract and carried out by automated means). 

Note that if you are an EPA member, you can have access to your personal data and adjust it by going to your account on the EPA Extranet.

If you intend to exercise any of your above given rights, please contact the EPA Office at privacy@europsy.net. 

If you feel the EPA is violating your rights, please contact the office. You also have the right to file a complaint with the French Data Protection Authority (contact information can be found on https://www.cnil.fr/fr/plaintes/). 



3. Newsletter(s)

The e-mail address submitted when signing up for a newsletter will be used by the EPA for the purpose of sending digital information you might find interesting. The EPA respects the privacy of personal e-mail addresses and complies with the current European legislation on e-mail communication. The objective is not to send you unwanted messages. 

You can unsubscribe from any newsletter at any time by using the "Unsubscribe" link provided in all communications. 



4. Cookies 

To operate the EPA website EPA e-learning platform, we may use cookies or server-side sessions in which data can be stored. Cookies are small pieces of data that are stored on your hard drive by a website so that your computer is automatically recognised the next time you visit a website and the use of the website can be tailored to you. Some of the cookies are deleted again at the end of the browser session (session cookies). Other cookies remain on your device and allow the browser to be recognised during a later visit to our website (persistent cookies). You can set your browser so that you are informed about the setting of cookies and can decide each time whether to accept them or you can refuse the acceptance of cookies in certain cases or in general. Please note that if cookies are disabled you may not be able to use some features of the website. You can also clean your browser history. This will automatically delete the cookies.  


Analytic Cookies

The EPA website and EPA e-learning platform also use Google Analytics. This is a so-called ‘analytics’ service that collects statistics regarding the use of the website and platform. Analytics cookies are placed through the EPA website. Through Google Analytics, all data is anonymised. Cookies in and of themselves do not personally identify users, although they do identify a computer. The anonymised information is passed to Google and stored on servers in the United States. The collected data will not be made available to third parties, except if Google or the EPA are legally obligated to do so. More information about Google Analytics and their privacy policy can be found here. You can turn off all Google Analytics cookies via this link. 


Social Media Widgets

The EPA website EPA e-learning platform include some social media features, such as a Facebook “like” button, and widgets, such as a “share” button. These features may collect your Internet Protocol address, which page you are visiting on the site, and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. Social media features and widgets are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on the Site. Your interactions with these features are governed by the privacy statement of the companies that provide them.



5. Social media links and social sharing

We have our own social media sites with third-party providers that can be reached via links from the EPA website and EPA e-learning platform. When you use the links, you access the respective websites of the third-party providers (e.g. Facebook, Twitter) and can also share our contents. In this case there is no data transfer when you access our website. Once you have accessed the third-party website, you are subject to the terms and conditions of the respective third party, including their privacy statement and data use policy. More information on the latter under the respective links provided here: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+



6. Contact 

If you have any questions or requests, please contact the EPA Office at privacy@europsy.net.