Privacy Policy

 

At Ministry of Testing, we respect your right to privacy and care about the security of your personal information. This Privacy Policy sets out details of the information that we may collect from you when you use the MoT website ("Services", which consists of all content, products, services and pages located within the ministryoftesting.com web domain), and how we may store use and disclose that information. As used herein the term "use" or “using” shall mean use, access, purchase, sign into, download, visit or browse our Services.

This Privacy Policy should be read alongside, and in addition to, our Terms of Services and our Cookie Policy. If you do not understand any aspect of this Privacy Policy, please feel free to contact us at hello@ministryoftesting.com.

Please read this Privacy Policy carefully, by using our Services (whether as a visitor or a Member), you agree to its terms. If, for any reason, you do not agree to the terms of this Privacy Policy, please stop using our Services immediately.

 

 

Who “We” Are

References to “we” (“Ministry of Testing”, “MoT”, "us", or "our") are to Ministry of Testing Limited, a company incorporated in England and Wales (registered number 07403186) whose registered office is at 19 New Road, Brighton, East Sussex, BN1 1UF, UK, who will be the controller of any personal data processed as described in this Privacy Policy.

 

 

What Information We Collect

Depending on your use of our Services, we may collect certain information about you. The examples provided below should help you better understand the information we may collect about you based on your use of our Services.
 

Information You Give To Us

We collect information about you when you input it into our Services or otherwise provide it directly to us.

Account And Profile Information:

To access some of our Services you need to become a Member of MoT by creating an account and subscribing to one of our membership subscription plans, namely “Club Membership”, “Professional Membership” or “Team Membership”. When you register an account, we ask for your name, email address, a unique username and a password, we also ask if you’re an EU resident to comply with tax requirements.

If you purchase a paid membership (namely “Professional Membership” and “Team Membership”), we ask that you supply credit card or other payment details. By submitting such information to us, you grant us the right to provide this information to our third-party payment processing service providers for purposes of facilitating the completion of Purchases. You also have the option to provide your company’s billing information for invoicing purposes.

If you have a paid membership, we will collect your “Learning History” to allow you to track your progress and easily return to where you left off. Learning History comprises of select learning content that you have accessed and when you last accessed it.

Additional Profile Information:

As part of your membership, you can access our forum “The Club”. In addition to the information you provide during registration, in your Club Profile, you may voluntarily provide a profile picture, a website, your date of birth, plus other information that will help other members get to know you. Please note, all additional information that you voluntarily provide on The Club and your username are publically available.

Posting, Sharing And Communicating:

Some of our Services may allow you to post, publish or share content, and to interact or communicate with other Members (collectively referred to as “Shared Content”). We collect and store Shared Content which includes any information about you that you may choose to include. Shared Content may be publicly available or viewable by other Members depending on where it is shared. For instance, if you post Shared Content in open areas of The Club, your shared content will be publically viewable and if you post Shared Content in the Professional Members’ area of The Club, other Professional Members will be able to see your Shared Content.

Payment Information:

If you make any purchase through our Services, such as for merchandise or event tickets, we may collect certain information regarding your purchase (such as your email address, name and address) as necessary to process your order. You will be required to provide certain payment and billing information to us or directly to our third-party service providers, including but not limited to your name, credit card information or other payment information and billing address. We do not store your credit card information.

If you use our third-party service providers, the collection, use, and disclosure of your information will be subject to the privacy policies and other terms and conditions of such third-parties. You should review such privacy policies, terms, and other agreements before you submit any personal information to these third-party payment processing service providers.

Supporting You:

If you contact us for support or other issues regarding our Services, we may store your information, including but not limited to your name, e-mail address, any other information you provide us during such communications. We reserve the right to conduct further research and to obtain further information as necessary. We will use the information to respond to you and to research your communication, all in compliance with this Privacy Policy.
 

Information We Collect Automatically

We collect information about you when you use our Services, including browsing our websites and when you use specific features.     

Your Use Of Our Services:

We track certain information about you when you visit and interact with our Services. This information includes, but is not limited to, the features you use, for example, the content you view and how long you use our Services. We also track frequently used search terms and selected keywords to help us prioritise and source content on those topics.

Device And Connection Information:

We collect information about the device you use to access our Services. This device information includes device type, screen height and screen width. We also collect information about the operating system on the device and the browser you’re using to access our Services. This information is used to optimize our Services for the most popular devices and browsers, and to assist us with prioritising our testing. 

We collect information about your referer to our services and which page you initially land on. We use your IP address in order to help us tailor our Services to your location. How much of this information we collect depends on the type and settings of the device you use to access our Services.

Cookies And Other Tracking Technologies:

We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to collect information about your interactions with our Services in order to help us to improve user experience. We also use Google Analytics cookies to help us understand how you arrived to our site and what you spent your time looking at. For more information about cookies, please see our Cookie Policy.
 

Information Collected by Third-Party Services

We collect information about you from third-party services that we work closely with to provide, promote, and improve our Services. These third-parties include, but are not limited to, Stripe, Shopify, Tito, Slack, and CrowdCast. If you use a third-party service or platform or click on third-party links, the collection, use, and disclosure of your information will be subject to the privacy policies and other terms and conditions of such third-parties. You should review such privacy policies, terms, and other agreements before you submit any personal information to these services.

 

 

How We May Use Your Information

How we use the information we collect depends in part on how you use our Services. Rest assured, where we collect your personal information, we’ll only process it:

  • to perform a contract with you, or
  • in accordance with a legal obligation, or
  • where we have your consent, or
  • where we have legitimate interests to process the personal data and they’re not overridden by your rights.

The following purposes provided below should help you better understand how we may use the information we collect about you.
 

To Provide Our Services

Primarily, we use your personal information to operate our Services, fulfil any contractual agreement between you and us, and provide you with any service you’ve requested, including services provided by our third-party service providers.

We also use your personal information to manage our relationship with you and to personalise our Services.
 

To Communicate With You

If you become a Member, we use your contact information to send transactional communications via email and from within our Services, including, but not limited to, confirming your purchases, reminding you of subscription expirations, providing customer support, and sending you notices and updates. We also send you communications as you onboard to our Services to help you become more proficient in using our Services. These communications are part of our Services and in most cases, you cannot opt-out of them. If an opt-out option is available, you will find that option within the communication itself.

Depending on your settings, we send you email notifications when you or others interact on the Services, for example, when you are @mentioned on The Club. You can opt-out of these communications or change your communications preferences in your Club account settings.

You will be sent communications about any service you’ve requested, including services provided by our third-party service providers, for example, if you purchase a TestBash ticket, you’ll be sent purchase confirmations, your ticket(s) and communications from the TestBash team. These communications are part of the requested service and in most cases, you cannot opt-out of them. If an opt-out option is available, you will find that option within the communication itself.
 

To Provide, Maintain And Improve Customer Service

We use your information to resolve technical issues and other issues relating to our Services, whether by email, within our Services or otherwise.
 

For Research And Development

We may use your information to keep on improving our Services, for example, by tracking and monitoring your use of our Services, we can conduct technical analysis and collective learnings to optimise your user experience and develop new useful features.

Occasionally, we may invite you to share your opinions and experiences of using our Services and use this alongside trends and activity pattern data to prioritise content development to meet your needs.
 

For Safety And Security

We use information about you and how you use our Services to verify accounts and activity, to detect any malicious or fraudulent activity, and make sure that everyone is using our Services in accordance with our Terms of Service.
 

To Protect Our Legal Rights

We may use your information to comply with legal and regulatory requirements.
 

To Market, Promote And Drive Engagement

We use your contact information and information about how you use our services to send you marketing and promotional information that we think may be of interest to you. These communications are aimed at helping you get the most out of our Services and could include information on our events, new features, survey requests and new content. In most cases, there is an opt-out from these communications. If an opt-out option is available, you will find that option within the communication itself.
 

To Analyse, Aggregate And Report

We may use your information to produce aggregated and anonymised analytics and reports; the learnings from which we may share publicly, for example, we may share awesome infographics about our TestBash events. We would share this information with the aim of advancing the testing craft, improving the lives of those working in software development and creating an awareness of all that we do.
 

With Your Consent

Where you have given us consent, we may use information about you for a specific purpose that is not mentioned above. For example, we may publish testimonials, scholarship stories or your papers from the continuous call for papers.  

 

 

How We May Share Your Information

There will be times when we need to share your information through our Services and with third-parties, but rest assured we are not, and never have been, in the business of selling information about you to advertisers or other third-parties. We only disclose information we collect about you in the ways discussed below.
 

Sharing With Other Service Users

We share certain information about you with other users who use our Services whether as a visitor or a Member, collectively herein as “Service Users”.

The Club Forum:

Most areas of The Club are publically accessible, with the exception of the area for Members with Paid Subscriptions only. Depending on where you post your Shared Content, please be aware that any information you provide on The Club, including your username, any additional profile information you add to your Club profile, and any information about you in your Shared Content, may be read, collected, and used by members of the public or Members who access our Services. Please consider the sensitivity of any information you input into these Services, we are not responsible for how others use information that is available or accessible to other Service Users.

Team Accounts And Administrators:

If you have a Team Membership account through your organisation, certain information about you including, but not limited to, your name, email address and Learning History is accessible to your organisation’s Team Administrator.

With Your Consent:

We share information about you with other Service Users when you give us consent to do so. For example, we will pass on your contact details and other personal information you provide to  the relevant Service Users when you submit a job application through our Jobs Board
 

Sharing With Third-Parties

We share certain information about you with third-parties that help us support the delivery, functionality, or marketing of our Services.

Service Providers:

We may share your information with third-party services providers where necessary in order to provide services that you have requested including, but not limited to, payment processing. Some examples of these third-party services providers include, but are not limited to, Tito and Stripe. When we employ a third-party to perform a service, we only provide them with the information that they need to perform their specific service and abide by policies and procedures designed to protect your information.

Service Partners:

We partner with members of the testing community to deliver services that you have requested (“Service Partners”) and we may share your information with them. For example, we may share your information with instructors, trainers & event hosts for courses, workshops and events that you have registered for. This information may include, but is not limited to, your name and the course, workshop or event that you have registered for. If you communicate with a Service Partner, depending on your method of communication, that person may be able to access, but is not limited to, your name, location and Shared Content.

Third Party Links:

For your convenience only, our Services include links that direct you to other services and websites whose policies may differ from ours. If you decide to access any third-party links through our Services, you do so at your own risk. Your use of those third-party sites falls under their terms and privacy policies, not ours. Please check these policies before you submit any personal information to these services and websites.

With Your Consent:

We share information about you with third-parties when you give us consent to do so. For example, when you submit a paper to our Continuous Call for Papers, we share your anonymised information with Members to help us review your paper and we share identifiable information with our Service Partners supporting relevant events.

Compliance With Legal Obligations:

We will disclose your information if we are under a duty to disclose or share your information to comply with any legal obligations, or to protect our rights. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organisations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction.

Business Transitions:

If we sell all or a portion of our assets or buy any business or assets, in which case we may disclose or transfer your information to the prospective seller or buyer of such business or assets, provided they continue to use your information substantially in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Policy.

 

 

How we store your information

All your information that we collect and use through our Services is stored on our secure servers hosted by our third-party data hosting service providers located in the United States.
 

How We Secure Your Information

Security is a priority for us when it comes to your information. When you register for MoT membership, we will ask you to choose a password which enables you to access Members-only content on our Services. You are responsible for keeping this password confidential and we ask you to not share this password with anyone. If your password is compromised for any reason, you should change it immediately and contact hello@ministryoftesting.com with any concerns.

We have put in place appropriate technical and organisational security measures to prevent the loss and/or unauthorised access to your personal information that is in our possession and/or control. However, no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of storage is completely secure and therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.
 

International Transfer

When we share data to third-parties, it may be transferred to, and processed in, countries other than the country you live in. These countries may not have equivalent privacy and data protection laws to the country in which you reside. Rest assured, where we disclose personal data to a third-party in another country, we put safeguards in place to ensure your personal data remains protected.

In the event that a dispute arises with regards to the international transfer of data, you agree that the courts of England and Wales shall have exclusive jurisdiction over the matter.
 

How Long We Keep Your Information

We retain personal information we collect about you for as long as we have a relationship with you and for a period of time afterwards where we have an ongoing need to do so, for example, to comply with applicable legal and accounting requirements. In addition, we may retain your information where we have an ongoing business need to retain it, in accordance with this Privacy Policy and our data retention practices. Following that period, we will delete or anonymize your information, for example, if you delete your account, some of your Shared Content you have provided will remain in The Club in order to allow other Service Users to make full use of the service.

 

 

How to access and control your information

You have certain rights available to you when it comes to accessing and controlling your information. Below is a summary of those rights and how to exercise them.

Your Rights

You have the right to request a copy of your information, to object to our use of your information, to request the deletion or restriction of your information, or to request your information in a structured, electronic format. Below, we describe the processes for making these requests.

  • You have the right to access certain information we hold about you and to make sure it’s correct and up-to-date. You can access and edit this information from within our Services or by contacting us. For example, you can edit all your personal information on your Membership Account Profile and Club Profile at any time with the exception of your chosen username which cannot be edited by you. To change your username you will need to contact us through our Services or by email at hello@ministryoftesting.com. Additionally, you may also email us in order to access, correct, delete or update any of your personal information on our systems. We will answer every request as promptly as possible.

  • You have the right to contact us to find out what information we hold about you and to request portability of your personal information as an electronic copy that you can move from one service provider to another. Depending on the context, this applies to some of your information, but not to all of your information. When you make such requests, we may need time to investigate and facilitate your request.

  • You have the right to delete certain information that we hold about you. You may request deletion by contacting us using the contact information below under “Contact Us” heading. Please note, however, that we may need to retain certain information where we have an ongoing business need to do so or to comply with our legal obligations. When you make such requests, we may need time to investigate and facilitate your request.

  • You have the right to object to continued processing of your information where we are using your information for a legitimate interest to do so by contacting us using the contact information below under “Contact Us” heading. Please note, this will not affect the processing that has already taken place and may mean you no longer use our Services. When you make such requests, we may need time to investigate and facilitate your request.

  • Where you gave us consent to use your information for a specific purpose, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. Withdrawing your consent will not affect the processing that has already taken place, nor will it affect further processing of your personal information conducted in reliance on other lawful processing grounds other than consent. To withdraw your consent, you will need to contact us through our Services or by email at hello@ministryoftesting.com. We will respond to every email as promptly as possible.

  • You have the right to opt out of receiving marketing communications from us by either unsubscribing from within the communication itself or by contacting us using the contact information below under the ‘Contact Us” heading. Please note, you will still receive communications about any service you’ve requested, including services provided by our third-party service providers.

  • For any dispute between you and us, you should first attempt to resolve it with us by contacting us using the contact information below under the ‘Contact Us” heading. However, you have the right to complain to your local data protection authority (DPA) about our collection and use of your information. For more information, please contact your local DPA. Many local DPAs can be found on the European Commission Website.

  • You have the right to choose to provide any information to us but if choose not to provide certain information you may not be able to use certain features of our Services. This includes the right to turn off browser based cookies, to find out further details see our Cookie Policy.

 

 

Other Important Privacy Information
 

Notice to Team Members

If you have a Team Membership account through your organisation, your Team Administrator has certain access to and control of your personal information and membership subscription, including, but not limited to, access to your Learning History and control to cancel your Paid Subscription. If you have any concerns or data privacy question regarding your Team Administrator’s access or control, please direct your data privacy questions to your Team Administrator, as your use of our Services is subject to that organization's policies. We are not responsible for the privacy or security practices of an administrator's organization, which may be different than this policy.

Children's Privacy

We believe in protecting the privacy of children. In line with this belief, we do not knowingly collect or maintain personal information from persons under 16 years of age, and no part of our Services is directed to persons under 16 years of age. If you are under 16 years of age, then please do not use or access our Services at any time. If you are a parent or guardian and you are aware that your child has provided us with personal information, please contact us (hello@ministryoftesting.com). If we become aware that we have collected personal information from a child under age 16 without verification of parental consent, we take steps to remove that information from our servers.

Legal Notice

We will at all times only collect and process your personal information in accordance with the Data Protection Act 1998, and the EU General Data Protection Regulation 2016 and any other applicable data protection legislation.

Updates & Amendments to this Privacy Policy

We may update or amend this Privacy Policy from time to time, to comply with laws or to meet any change in business requirements, with or without notice to you. Members will be notified by email of any updates or amendments to this Privacy Policy. Where a change is significant, we will inform our Members through our Services. You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. By continuing to use our Services, you agree to be bound by the terms of these updates and amendments.

Contact Us

If you have any questions, comments or complaints about this Privacy Policy, please contact us using the details below:

Ministry of Testing Limited
19 New Road
Brighton
East Sussex
BN1 1UF
United Kingdom
Email: hello@ministryoftesting.com

 

Effective as of 23rd May 2018