Varsity Online Privacy Policy

1. Statement of intent
From time to time, you will be asked to submit personal information about yourself (e.g. name and email address etc) in order to receive or use services on our website. Such services include email bulletins, automated responses and SMS updates.

By entering your details in the fields requested, you enable Varsity and its service providers to provide you with the services you select. Whenever you provide such personal information, we will treat that information in accordance with this policy. Our services are designed to give you the information that you want to receive.

2. Information on visitors
During the course of any visit to Varsity Online, the pages you see, along with something called a cookie, are downloaded to your computer. Most websites do this, because cookies allow the website publisher to do useful things like find out whether the computer (and probably its user) has visited the site before. This is done on a repeat visit by checking to see, and finding, the cookie left there on the last visit.

Any information that is supplied by cookies can help us to provide you with a better service and assists us to analyse the profile of our visitors.

Ocula, our software provider, gathers non-personal data and anonymous aggregate statistics regarding the visitors to our site on our behalf using cookies and code which is embedded in the site. Both the cookies and the embedded code provide non-personal statistical information about visits to pages on the site, the duration of individual page view, paths taken by visitors through the site, data on visitors' screen settings and other general information. Varsity uses this type of information, as with that obtained from other cookies used on the site, to help it improve the services to its users.

3. Use and storage of your personal information
When you supply any personal information to Varsity (e.g. for competitions) we have legal obligations towards you in the way we deal with that data. We must collect the information fairly, that is, we must explain how we will use it (see the notices on particular web pages that let you know why we are requesting the information.) Any information you provide to Varsity will only be used by us. No information will ever be supplied to anyone outside Varsity without first obtaining your consent, unless we are obliged or permitted by law to disclose it. Also, if you post or send offensive or inappropriate content anywhere on Varsity Online, and Varsity considers such behaviour to be serious and/or repeated, Varsity can use whatever information that is available to it about you to stop such behaviour. This may include informing relevant third parties such as your employer, college or e-mail provider about the content and your behaviour.

We will hold your personal information on our systems for as long as you use the service you have requested, and remove it in the event that the purpose has been met.

If you are notified on the Varsity site that your information may be used to allow Varsity to contact you for "service administration purposes", this means that Varsity may contact you for a number of purposes related to the service you have signed up for. For example, we may wish to provide you with password reminders or notify you that the particular service has been suspended for maintenance.

4. Access to your personal information
You have the right to request a copy of the personal information Varsity holds about you and to have any inaccuracies corrected (We charge £10 for information requests). Please address requests to the Data Protection Officer, Varsity Publications Ltd, 11-12 Trumpington Street, Cambridge, CB2 1QA