Privacy Policy

Be clear about personal data: Your personal data is unique, and Monitor Systems has always been careful to respect your information, but it makes sense that you should have control over it too.

The new law (25th May 2018) will give you more clarity over how your personal information is managed. It's called the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and it will replace the Data Protection Act. The Data Protection Act 1998 (c 29) is a United Kingdom Act of Parliament designed to protect personal data stored on computers or in an organised paper filing system.

The new rules mean that Monitor Systems, like other businesses in the UK, will be making sure that we're even clearer about how we handle your data. When people talk about technology and digital developments, there’s always a focus on data. But what data do they mean? GDPR aims to protect any personal data a company holds about you – including your name, address, email address etc. It may also cover more sensitive data such as your sexual orientation, your political views or any trade union memberships.

(GDPR) General Data Protection Regulation: Monitor Systems Scotland Ltd is focused on GDPR compliance efforts. During the implementation period for the new Regulation, we evaluated new requirements and restrictions imposed by the GDPR, and have taken any action necessary to ensure that we handle customer data in compliance with the law.

For the purpose of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the 'Data Controller' is Monitor Systems Scotland Ltd. We may collect and process the following data about you:

• Information that you provide by filling in email forms on our web site. This information will only be used to contact you by email or phone, and it will not be stored on a database without your consent.

• Data requested to sign-up for our newsletter (your name and email address). This will be stored on a third party server for the automation of our e-marketing newsletter. You can unsubscribe from this database at any time, or update your details.

• If you contact us, we may keep a record of that correspondence on our secure network, email platform, server to contact you.

• We may monitor click through data, activity and trends when sending out our e-monthly newsletter.

• Details of your visits to our site including, but not limited to, traffic data, AWSTATS activity, location data, whether this is required for our own purposes or otherwise.

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The EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the most important change in data privacy regulation in 20 years.

Arguably the biggest change to the regulatory landscape of data privacy comes with the extended jurisdiction of the GDPR, as it applies to all companies processing the personal data of data subjects residing in the Union, regardless of the company’s location. Previously, territorial applicability of the directive was ambiguous and referred to data process 'in context of an establishment'. This topic has arisen in a number of high profile court cases. GPDR makes its applicability very clear - it will apply to the processing of personal data by controllers and processors in the EU, regardless of whether the processing takes place in the EU or not. The GDPR will also apply to the processing of personal data of data subjects in the EU by a controller or processor not established in the EU, where the activities relate to: offering goods or services to EU citizens (irrespective of whether payment is required) and the monitoring of behaviour that takes place within the EU. Non-Eu businesses processing the data of EU citizens will also have to appoint a representative in the EU.

Anyone who collects and processes personal data (defined by the GDPR as a Data Controller) will be required to comply with the new regulations to a certain degree. As well as organisations who run websites or apps, this also includes any organisations who use internal databases, CRMs or even just plain old email. Under the GPDR a data subject has the right to erasure of their data. This means that if an individual asks you to remove their data from your systems you have to comply. 

Consent: The conditions for consent have been strengthened, and companies will no longer be able to use long illegible terms and conditions full of legalese, as the request for consent must be given in an intelligible and easily accessible form, with the purpose for data processing attached to that consent. Consent must be clear and distinguishable from other matters and provided in an intelligible and easily accessible form, using clear and plain language. It must be as easy to withdraw consent as it is to give it.​

Privacy by design: Privacy by design as a concept has existed for years now, but it is only just becoming part of a legal requirement with the GDPR. At it’s core, privacy by design calls for the inclusion of data protection from the onset of the designing of systems, rather than an addition. More specifically - 'The controller shall..implement appropriate technical and organisational measures..in an effective way.. in order to meet the requirements of this Regulation and protect the rights of data subjects'. Article 23 calls for controllers to hold and process only the data absolutely necessary for the completion of its duties (data minimisation), as well as limiting the access to personal data to those needing to act out the processing

Right to be forgotten: Also known as Data Erasure, the right to be forgotten entitles the data subject to have the data controller erase his/her personal data, cease further dissemination of the data, and potentially have third parties halt processing of the data. The conditions for erasure, as outlined in article 17, include the data no longer being relevant to original purposes for processing, or a data subjects withdrawing consent. It should also be noted that this right requires controllers to compare the subjects' rights to "the public interest in the availability of the data" when considering such requests.

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Newsletter: what data do we collect and how can I opt-in / opt-out?

Company News:  When you sign up to our company news we only need to know your full name and e-mail address. This allows our database to automate an email to your email address in your name. You do not need to provide us with any other personal data, and we will never ask you for this. Your name and email address will NOT be given out to anyone. Your name and email address will be held on our host server, which you can automatically delete in full at any time by clicking unsubscribe in the footer of any of our newsletters. You can also click on preferences in the footer of our company news to update your email address.

Email Contact Form: what data do we collect and how is it protected?

When you send us an email using these forms, we only ask you for basic information about you. This information is only used to return the email, it may be kept on our contact database, but it will not be copied to any third party database. This basic information is archived in our internal email client software and can be removed at any time by emailing the 'data controller' at Monitor Systems Scotland Limited.

Our forms are 'Captcha' configured. Captcha is an acronym for "Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart" Captcha is a type of challenge response test used in computing to determine whether or not the user is human. The test does not check the ability to give correct answers to questions, only how closely answers resemble those a human would give. In compliance with Spam, we use Captcha on our email form, it protects 'everyone' from Spam.

Cookies: what are they and how do they affect me?

Google Analytics: Monitor Systems may use Google Analytics on its website. Google Analytics is a web analytics service provided by Google. Google Analytics collects (first party cookies), which are text files placed on your computer to collect standard Internet log information and visitor IP behavior. This information is sent to Google and is used to evaluate activity on our website. This enables Monitor Systems to monitor statistical reports. Monitor Systems does not have the ability to collect any (PII) personally identifiable information of visitors to our website. Google Analytics doesn’t identify who you are, nor can it identify you or (PII), it simply tracks your activity on our website.

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