Effective date: 28 March 2024

This Privacy Policy describes the policies and procedures of the World Federation of Neurology ("the WFN", "we", "our" or "us") on the collection, use and disclosure of your information on www.wfneurology.org (the "Site") and the services, features, content or applications offered by the WFN (collectively with the Site, the "Services").

The WFN receives information about you from various sources, including:

• if you register for the Site and the Services, through your user account with the WFN (your "Account");
• your use of the Services generally; and
• from third-party websites and services.

When you use the Services, you are consenting to the collection, transfer, manipulation, storage, disclosure and other uses of your information as described in this Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use.

What information does the WFN collect?

This Site does not collect personal information from you without your permission. You may give us information about you by filling in forms on the Site, for example:

• membership form
• grant application form
• mailing list subscription forms
• website user account registration.

The information you give us may be collected and stored by the team that administers the Services. This information is not shared with any third party outside of the organisation or outside of the purposes of the particular service.

If you give us information on behalf of someone else, you confirm that you have given them the information set out in this notice and that they have given permission for us to use their information as set out in this notice.

The WFN additionally use MailChimp as an email service provider.  More information about their specific privacy policies can be found here.

Your Personal Data

What we need

If you register for a user account on this Site, we need to collect basic personal data about you including your name, email address and whether you are a healthcare professional. 

Why we need it

We need to know your basic personal data in order to provide and oversee this service to you, notifying you of changes to your account, as well as enforcing access to restricted areas of this Site.

What we do with it

The information is not shared with anyone. We will not use your information for marketing purposes unless you have subscribed to our mailing list(s).

It is retained solely for the purposes of providing the services you subscribe to and in connection with the form you submitted requesting that information. However, for the purposes of IT hosting and maintenance, this information is located on servers within the European Union. No 3rd parties have access to your personal data unless the law allows them to do so.

How long we keep it

Personal data stored in connection with your user account is retained only as long as you have an account on the Site.  When you delete your account, any information connected to the account is also deleted. Some data may exist in backups. However, this information is encrypted and not accessible by anyone via normal channels. Your “Right to erasure (‘right to be forgotten’)” is not affected, however, we reserve the right to refuse excessive requests or charge a reasonable administrative fee to cover the cost of locating, recovering and deleting this data.

If you are a member society and make a payment for membership dues, the payment processing is carried out through WorldPay.  No data is transferred through the WFN website. Please note that we are required under UK tax law to keep your basic personal data (name, address, contact details) in connection with the payment within our internal accounting systems for a minimum of 6 years after which time it will be destroyed.

Is information about me secure?

HTTP, or hypertext transfer protocol, is the way a web server communicates with browsers like Internet Explorer®, Google Chrome™ and Mozilla Firefox®. HTTP lets visitors view a site and send information back to the web server.

The WFN website uses HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS).

HTTPS is HTTP through a secured connection. This means that the communication between your browser and the web server is encrypted using a technology known as Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and Secure Certificates. The encryption prevents third parties from eavesdropping on communications to and from the server. Even if somebody managed to break into the connection, they would not be able to decrypt any of the data which passes between you and the website.

Website user accounts

If you have created a user account on the website, your Account information is protected by a password for your privacy and security. You are responsible for preventing unauthorized access to your account and Personal Information by selecting and protecting your password appropriately, and limiting access to your computer and browser by signing off after you have finished accessing your account.

WFN endeavours to protect Account information to ensure that it is kept private; however, WFN cannot guarantee the security of any Account information resulting from unauthorized entry or use, hardware or software failure, and other factors that may compromise the security of user information.

Cookies

A cookie is a small text file that is stored in your web browser. They are used to:

• enable certain functions on a website such as login or security;
• provide analytics;
• store your preferences; and
• enable targeted content.

Cookies are used by your browser and by most websites to help personalise or improve your web experience. They are not computer programs, and they cannot be executed as code. They cannot be used to disseminate viruses or access the hard drives - a cookie cannot read other information saved on the device’s hard drive, or get a user's e-mail address etc. They only contain and transfer to the web server as much information as the users themselves have disclosed to a certain website.

Cookies can either be session cookies or persistent cookies. A session cookie expires automatically when you close your browser. A persistent cookie will remain until it expires or you delete your cookies. Expiration dates are set in the cookies themselves; some may expire after a few minutes while others may expire after multiple years. Cookies placed by the website you’re visiting are sometimes called “first-party cookies,” while cookies placed by other companies are sometimes called “third-party cookies.”

How to prevent cookies

If you wish to restrict or block the cookies which are set by WFN websites, or indeed any other website, you can do this through your browser settings. Please be aware that restricting cookies may affect some of the functionality of the website.

The Help menu on the menu bar of most browsers will tell you how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie and how to disable cookies altogether. Additionally, you can disable or delete similar data used by browser add-ons, such as Flash cookies, by changing the add-on's settings or visiting the website of its manufacturer.

You can find more information about deleting and controlling cookies from the AboutCookies.org website.

Cookies we use on our Site

We do not use cookies to collect personally identifiable information. However, in order to provide Services to you through the Site, it is necessary to gather information that will enable the Site to personalize, improve and to operate such Services. In connection with certain aspects of the Services, we may request, collect and/or display some of your Personal Information on the web page.

Below are cookies that are set when you first visit our Site.

Google Analytics

The WFN uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc.

Google Analytics stores information about:

• the pages you visit on wfneurology.org
• how long you spend on each wfneurology.org page
• how you got to the site
•  what you click on while you’re visiting the site.

These cookies do not collect or store your personal information (for example your name or address) so this information can’t be used to identify who you are. We don’t allow Google to use or share our analytics data.

The following cookies are set by Google Analytics:

Our website uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc.

Google Analytics uses a set of cookies to collect information and report site usage statistics without personally identifying individual visitors to Google. ‘_ga’, the main cookie used by Google Analytics, enables a service to distinguish one visitor from another. Any site that implements Google Analytics, including Google services, uses the ‘_ga’ cookie. Each ‘_ga’ cookie is unique to the specific property, so it cannot be used to track a given user or browser across unrelated websites.

• Learn more about how Google Analytics uses cookies.

Vimeo

WFN videos are stored on the Vimeo.com server and integrated within the Site. No cookies are set by us or Vimeo if you view these videos through the Site.

If you visit the Vimeo website directly, Vimeo may place a number of cookies in your browser. Some of the cookies will only be used if you use certain features or select certain preferences, and some cookies will always be used. The WFN have no control over cookies set by external websites including Vimeo. You can find out more about Vimeo cookies by viewing their current cookie list.

YouTube

We sometimes embed video content from our official YouTube channel using YouTube's privacy-enhanced mode. This mode may set cookies on your computer once you click on the YouTube video player, but YouTube will not store personally identifiable cookie information for playbacks of embedded videos using the privacy-enhanced mode.

• Learn more about YouTube's Privacy Policy.

Bitly and Goo.gl

The WFN may post links to the WFN and external websites through its Facebook and Twitter pages or LinkedIn group. These posts will sometimes use the Bitly or Goog.gl utility to create shortened uniform resource locators ("URLs" or web addresses).

Bitly and Goo.gl collect information about accesses (such as clicks) of every shortened URL created through the Services. This information includes, but is not limited to:

• the IP address and physical location of the devices accessing the shortened URL;
• the referring websites or services;
• the time and date of each access; and
• information about sharing of the shortened URL on Third Party Services such as Twitter and Facebook.

Bitly, Goog.gl and its partners may use these metrics and analytics to improve their websites and services by, for example, providing value-added features.

• Learn more about how Bitly uses cookies
• Learn more about the Google privacy policy

Following a link to another website

When you go to another website, read the privacy policy on that website if you want to know what it does with your information. WFN does not pass on any of your personal information to other websites and will never sell this information to any third party.

What happens when there are changes to this Privacy Policy?

WFN may amend this Privacy Policy from time to time. Use of information we collect now is subject to the Privacy Policy in effect at the time such information is used. If we make material changes in the way we collect or use information, we will notify you by posting an announcement on the Services or sending you an email and we will indicate when those changes will become effective. You are agreeing to be bound by any changes to the Privacy Policy when you use the Services after those changes become effective.

What if I have questions or concerns

If you have any questions or concerns regarding privacy using the Services, please send us a detailed message to info@wfneurology.org. We will make every effort to answer your concerns.

If at any point you believe the information we process on you is incorrect, you have the right to request to see this information and even have it corrected or deleted.

If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data, you can contact our Data Protection Officer who will investigate the matter.

If you are not satisfied with our response or believe we are processing your personal data not in accordance with the law you, can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).

Our Data Protection Officer is Carlos Hunte and you can contact him at carlos@wfneurology.org.