Privacy

The collection and handling of personal information is regulated by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth). Personal information is information that identifies you or could identify you.

Important information

The department is bound by the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) under the Privacy Act 1988 with respect to collection, use and disclosure of personal information. The department's Privacy Policy contains detailed information about the department's privacy obligations.

Personal information

The personal information that we collect from you through our website is limited. Personal details, such as your email address or phone number, are collected when you use the website to subscribe to receive emails from us via our mailing lists.

We may also collect personal information from a third party if you have consented, if you would reasonably expect us to collect your personal information from a third party, or if we are required to collect your personal information by law.

Use and disclosure of personal information

We only use your personal information for the purposes you give it to us, and for purposes which are related to our functions and activities.

We will not disclose your personal information to other government agencies, organisations or third parties unless one of the following applies:

• you have consented;
• you reasonably expect us to disclose your personal information;
• we have told you we will disclose the information to a third party; or
• if the disclosure is required, or authorised by law.

Information we record

When you use the NatHERS website, our servers automatically record information that your browser sends whenever you visit a website. These server logs may include information such as your server address, your top level domain name (for example, .com.au, .net.au, .gov.au, etcetera), the date and time of visit to the site, the pages accessed and documents viewed, the previous sites visited, and the browser type, browser language, and one or more cookies that may uniquely identify your browser.

Cookies

A cookie is a small file containing a string of characters sent to your computer that identifies your browser. It contains information that your web browser sends back to our website server whenever you visit it again. We use cookies to 'remember' your browser between page visits. In this situation, the cookie identifies your browser, not you personally. No personal information is stored within the department’s cookies.

Google Analytics

The department uses Google Analytics to collect information about visitors to this website. Google Analytics uses first-party cookies and JavaScript code to help analyse how users use the site. It anonymously tracks how our visitors interact with this website, including how they have accessed the site (for example from a search engine, a link, an advertisement etcetera) and what they did on the site. The information from the cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States. Google will use this information for the purposes of compiling reports on website activity and providing other services relating to website activity and internet usage. You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser.

Your choices

You may access personal information that we hold about you, and you can ask us to correct personal information we hold about you.

If you are on our mailing lists, you may opt out by selecting the ‘unsubscribe’ option in all emails.