Privacy Policy
We are Encounter Nature Ltd: we made the Encounter app and run the Encounter website. In this privacy notice, we’ll refer to the app and site as our ‘services’.
This privacy notice tells you what you can expect us to do with any personal information you choose to give us. If you have any questions, you can email privacy@encounter-nature.com.
By providing us with your data, you warrant to us that you are over 13 years of age.
Encounter Nature Limited is the data controller and we are responsible for your personal data (referred to as “we”, “us” or “our” in this privacy notice). We have appointed a Data Protection Officer who is in charge of privacy related matters. You can contact them via the email address above.
Full name of legal entity: Encounter Nature Limited, a company registered in England and Wales with registration number 14863417 with its registered address at 50 Princes St, Ipswich, IP1 1RJ. Our ICO registration number is ZB582532.
Firstly, we do not collect any sensitive data about you. Sensitive data refers to data that includes details about your race or ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, sex life, sexual orientation, political opinions, trade union membership, information about your health and genetic and biometric data. We do not collect any information about criminal convictions and offences.
“Personal information” means any information capable of identifying an individual. It does not include anonymised data. We will only collect or use your personal information when legally permitted.
We may collect or use the following personal information to provide our service:
Name, username, email address and a password
Website and app user information (including user journeys and cookie tracking)
Users’ photographs, including their avatars
Users’ journal entries along with the date and weather (‘metadata’)
Location co-ordinates relating to users’ journal entries (if users have native location settings switched on, which is optional)
User-selected tags relating to our database (species and natural phenomena) along with associated dates and co-ordinates, if permitted by the user
While no online service is 100% secure, we work hard to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, use, alteration, or destruction, and take reasonable measures to do so, and we monitor our service for potential vulnerabilities and attacks.
Users’ journal entries, photographs, metadata, tags and associated location co-ordinates (if provided) are stored on an encrypted, password-protected server to which only a limited number of closely monitored people have access. This information is not visible to other Encounter users, and nor is it available anywhere online. However, we advise against the storage of sensitive information such as financial data, passwords or health information within your Encounter journal.
We may use your personal information to:
Provide you with services and customer support
Respond to your requests, resolve disputes, and/or troubleshoot problems
Improve the services and personalise your experience
Communicate with you about the services
Monitor and analyse trends, usage, and activities in connection with our services
Detect, investigate, and help prevent security incidents and other malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity, and help protect rights and property of ours and others
Comply with our legal and financial obligations
We collect or use the following personal information for the operation of customer accounts:
Names, usernames, email addresses and a password
Account information, including registration details
We collect or use the following information for service updates or marketing purposes:
Names, usernames, email addresses and a password
Website and app user journey information
User-selected tags relating to our database (species and natural phenomena) including the date and location co-ordinates related to those tags
If you provide us with your email address via our website, we may use this to send you emails about Encounter. You have the right to withdraw consent to these at any time by clicking on the unsubscribe link on the footer of any email set by us or emailing us at privacy@encounter-nature.com.
We also collect some information automatically:
Log information: Like most online service providers, we collect information that web browsers, mobile devices, and servers typically make available, for instance browser type, IP address, unique device identifiers, language preference, referring site, the date and time of access, operating system, and mobile network information. We collect log information when you use our services – for example, when you log into your account or save a journal entry.
Device and usage information: We may collect your device type, your wireless carrier, your individual device ID, and how you use our services. In addition, in the event that our app crashes on your mobile device, we will receive information about your mobile device model software version and device carrier, which allows us to identify and fix bugs and otherwise improve the performance of our app.
Location information: We may determine the approximate location of your device from your IP address. We collect and use this information to understand where our users are located so we can identify which features might be meaningful to them.
Information from cookies and other technologies: Like many online services, we use cookies to collect information. A cookie is a string of information that a website stores on a visitor’s computer, and that the visitor’s browser provides to the website each time the visitor returns. Pixel tags (also called web beacons) are small blocks of code placed on websites and emails. You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of this website may become inaccessible or not function properly. The cookies we use are detailed by our Third Party website hosting provider SquareSpace. For detailed information please visit their cookie page.
We use Firestore Analytics (provided by Google) to help understand how users use the app. We do not combine the information generated through the use of Google Analytics with your personal information. Google’s ability to use and share information collected by Google Analytics about your use of our services is governed by the Google Analytics Terms of Use and the Google Privacy Policy.
Information we collect from other sources:
We may also get information about you from other sources. For example:
Third party account information: When you connect an account from another service we typically get some basic information about your account with them. For example, when you connect Encounter to your Apple or Google account in order to log in, we may access certain user data such as your name, user ID, email etc. to provide our services.
We share information about you in limited circumstances, and with appropriate safeguards to protect your privacy. These are spelled out below:
Third party vendors: We may share information about you with third party vendors, consultants, and advisors who help us provide our services or who otherwise perform services for us. This includes vendors who help us provide our services to you (like cloud storage services and customer chat and email support services that help us communicate with you), those who assist us with our marketing efforts (like sending emails to our marketing list), those who help us understand and enhance our services (like analytics providers), those who make tools to help us run our operations (like programs that help us with task management, scheduling, word processing, email and other communications, and collaboration among our teams), and other third-party tools that help us manage operations. We require vendors to agree to privacy commitments in order to share information with them.
Subsidiaries: We may disclose information about you to a current or future parent company, any subsidiaries, joint ventures, or other companies under a common control (collectively, “Affiliates”), in which case we will require our Affiliates to honour this privacy policy.
Business transfers: In connection with any merger, sale of company assets, or acquisition of all or a portion of our business by another company, or in the unlikely event that we go out of business or enter bankruptcy, user information would likely be one of the assets that is transferred or acquired by a third party. If any of these events were to happen, this privacy policy would continue to apply to your information, and the party receiving your information may continue to use your information, but only consistent with this privacy policy.
Legal, regulatory and other obligations: We may disclose information about you if we believe in good faith that such disclosure is necessary to (a) resolve disputes, investigate problems, or enforce our Terms of Service; (b) comply with relevant laws, or warrants, subpoenas, court orders, and other enforceable legal process; or (c) protect the property or rights belonging to Encounter Ltd, you, third parties, or the public at large.
With your consent: We may share and disclose information with your consent or at your direction.
Anonymous information:
We reserve the right to disclose anonymous information – defined as data that cannot reasonably be used to identify you – publicly without restriction. This may be done for purposes such as research, marketing, or analytics. We ensure that any disclosed information is aggregated and does not compromise your privacy or allow for individual identification, and we comply with all applicable data protection laws in these disclosures.
Lawful bases and data protection rights:
Under UK data protection law we must have a “lawful basis” for collecting and using your personal information. There is a list of possible lawful bases in the UK GDPR. You can find out more about lawful bases on the ICO’s website: www.ico.org.uk. Which lawful basis we rely on may affect your data protection rights, which are set out in brief below. You can find out more about those rights, and the exemptions which may apply on the ICO’s website.
Your right of access: You have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information. You can request other information such as details about where we get personal information from and who we share personal information with. There are some exemptions which means you may not receive all the information you ask for.
Your right to rectification: You have the right to correct or to ask us to correct or delete personal information you think is inaccurate or incomplete.
Your right to erasure: You have the right to ask us to delete your personal information.
Your right to restriction of processing: You have the right to ask us to limit how we can use your personal information.
Your right to object to processing: You have the right to object to the processing of your personal data.
Your right to data portability: You have the right to ask that we transfer the personal information you gave us to another organisation, or to you.
Your right to withdraw consent: When we use consent as our lawful basis you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time.
If you make a request, we will respond to you without undue delay and in any event within one month. To make a data protection rights request, please contact us using the email address at the top of this privacy notice.
Our lawful basis for collecting or using personal information to provide services and goods, for the operation of customer accounts and guarantees, and for service updates or marketing purposes is consent: we have permission from you after we gave you all the relevant information. All of your data protection rights may apply, except the right to object. You have the right to withdraw your consent at any time.
How long we keep information:
We store your information for as long as it is necessary in order for us to provide our service to you. Information associated with your account will be deleted when you delete your account. We keep web server logs for a few months. We retain the logs for this period of time in order to, among other things, analyse traffic and investigate issues if something goes wrong.
You can delete your data by using the ‘Delete my account’ function within the app or by emailing hello@encounter-nature.co.uk with the subject line “Delete my account”. You can stop all collection of information by the Encounter app by uninstalling it. You may use the standard uninstall processes as may be available as part of your mobile device or via the mobile application marketplace or network.
Sharing information outside the UK:
Where necessary, we may transfer personal information outside of the UK. When doing so, we comply with the UK GDPR, making sure appropriate safeguards are in place. For further information or to obtain a copy of the appropriate safeguard for any of the transfers below, please contact us using the contact information provided above.
Organisation name: Netguru (www.netguru.com)
Category of recipient: Software development
Country the personal information is sent to: Poland
How the transfer complies with UK data protection law: Poland is covered under the UK adequacy regulations. These set out in law that the legal framework in that country, territory, or international organisation has been assessed as providing ‘adequate’ protection for people’s rights and freedoms about their personal data.
Encounter may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. Changes will apply to your use of our website and app from the date they are published.
How to complain:
If you have any concerns about our use of your personal data, you can make a complaint to us using the contact details at the top of this privacy notice. If you remain unhappy with how we’ve used your data after raising a complaint with us, you can also complain to the ICO:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Helpline number: 0303 123 1113