Privacy

Who’s behind One Million Boot Steps

This policy sets out the position on the privacy of personal data and relates to the entirety “One Million Boot Steps” (on all platforms and formats).

One Million Boot Steps is a personal blog written by me, Marie T Smith. A storybook which documents my training towards a charity challenge and beyond. I have no commercial interest and am not a business nor an enterprise engaged in economic activity. But I am committed to ensuring that any of your information I can see is secure.

In reality I have no need to directly request your personal information. For example, some blogs might use contact forms for things like newsletter subscriptions, monetised advertising apace etc. But I don’t do any of that. So, you see, I process almost zero personal data directly.

This is my statement on the data which is gathered behind the scenes when you choose to interact with my blog.

What data is collected – how and why

Direct communications

While I don’t operate as a business, I recognise that you might choose to contact me by e-mail or by social media messaging services. In doing so you are opening up dialogue about my experience which is a legitimate reason for staying in touch. I will retain your contact details for as long as that dialogue is relevant, after which they will be deleted. I will never use your contact details for any other purpose except for the reason you chose to get in touch. If I want to contact you for any other purpose I will ask you first.

Information you provide directly to my website

Blog Comments

By choosing to comment on a blog you should understand that you have opted to submit said comments along with your name, e-mail address, website (if applicable) and an IP (Internet Protocol) address. This data is disclosed to, and remains visible to me as part of the comment which was left. You will input that when you log in to comment – so you have full control over whether you are happy to submit that data at the time of entry.

Should you decide at a future date you no longer want that data held against your comment, then you have a legal right to ask for that data to be deleted – in the full understanding that in order to do so your comment will also need to be removed.

Information collected automatically

Cookies and similar technology

This website does not use cookies or similar tracking technology

Information you share publicly

It sounds obvious but information that visitors choose to make public is PUBLIC. That means, of course, that information such as visitor comments and “likes” are all available for anyone viewing my blog to see. That might include information about the visitor that is displayed in connection with a comment or “like” (e.g. a visitor’s WordPress.com username, a Gravatar). So choose your comments wisely – I cannot be held responsible for you choosing to share sensitive information about yourself in a comment which is then discovered by a search engine.

While copyright expressly forbids reuse of my blog content without permission (you can read the copyright statement on our About Us page) public information can be indexed by search engines or seen by third parties.

Your rights

You have a number of legal rights to control what is done with your information.

1. you can ask us to indicate what information we have about you and get a copy of it
2. request we correct or update information that is wrong
3. ask us to stop using your information in certain circumstances
4. request to stop sending you marketing material (which we don’t do)
5. request or send some of your data to someone else for them to use

I do hope that my readers are reassured by my limited use of (and indeed access to) data. But if you feel you need to follow up on any of the above, please contact me directly by e-mail here. Bear in mind I will need to verify your identity to ensure your data isn’t passed to someone who shouldn’t have it.

Our Legal Right to Disclose

I may disclose information about you in response to a legal request, court order, or other governmental request.

I may also disclose information about you when I believe in good faith that it is reasonably necessary in order to protect my property, me, third parties, or the public in general.

Third Party Services

I am not responsible for the practices employed by other websites or content linked to from this website. So when you use a link to go from this website to another website, you have now passed into another “room” – a room which should have its own secure privacy policy in place. In a nutshell, this privacy policy no longer applies. I would always advise reading over the policy of any third party website before proceeding to browse or interact there. Generally I will have explored the validity of the link and provided it in good faith as being of value to the article being written and to our readers.

The same applies to your use of the social media icons to share a story. Of course, it’s great  when you like or share on social media. However once you have exited this website you are then operating within the new site’s terms and privacy policy.

And, I am not responsible for republished content from this blog on other blogs or websites.

Transferring information overseas

I do not transfer any personal data overseas.

Marketing

I do not collect data for the purposes of direct sales marketing. Neither do I share, sell or lease any such data to third parties.

How long your information is kept

Data collected at the time a comment is submitted remains on the server until such time as comments are removed or the website closed and deleted entirely.

Privacy Policy Updates

This privacy policy is subject to change without notice so you are advised to check back from time to time. If you have any questions feel free to contact me directly here: marie@gallowhillcottage.co.uk

Last updated: 21st May 2018