The Maldives Independent collects different types of information about our users for two main reasons:
- To help us to monitor and improve the services we offer.
- To use anonymous details about our users to sell appropriate advertising space on the site. This might mean showing an advertiser how many users we have on the site; it does not mean sharing an individual’s details with an advertiser. Where we collect registration information from an individual, we will never share that individual’s information with a third party, including an advertiser, without that user’s explicit permission.
Our principles
We are absolutely committed to protecting your privacy. Our policy can be summarised in one sentence: we will not share your information with others without your prior consent. We have also established the following principles:
- The security of any data users provide to us is important and we will do our utmost to
protect user privacy through the appropriate use of security technology.
- We will respect your email privacy. If you provide us with your email address, you will not receive unsolicited marketing emails from Maldives Independent and/or from third parties screened by us unless we have obtained your permission. We may, however, email you occasionally with information or queries about your registration, your subscription account or postings, for example, with reminders, warnings or copyright requests.
- We will not pass on any individual user details (including your email address) for third party use unless we have your prior consent.
- We always ensure that contractors we use in connection with the running of the website and services (for example hosting providers) are subject to strict contractual obligations. They are only able to process data on our behalf and in accordance with our principles and instructions and not for any other independent purpose.
- Otherwise, we will only share anonymous aggregate statistics about our users, sales and traffic patterns with our advertisers.
- Our site is accessible via the Internet and so may potentially be accessed by anyone around the world. Other users may access the site from outside the Maldives. This means that, where you choose to post your data on the site, this could be accessed from anywhere around the world and therefore a transfer of your data outside of the Maldives may be deemed to have occurred. You consent to such transfer of your data for and by way of this purpose. Where we or our contractors transfer data outside of the Maldives this is only ever done with the relevant protections.
What information do we collect?
We collect information on our users as follows: through cookies, through registration and where you choose to disclose data in postings.
The minimum information we need to register a user is an email address and a password. We will ask further questions for different services, including competitions. Unless stated, all registration questions are compulsory.
We also ask some further, voluntary questions so we can gain a clearer understanding of our users. Your responses help us to sell appropriate advertising space and so keep the site free. We do not share this information with third parties unless you have specifically consented to this.
Will we disclose the information we collect to third parties?
We will not sell, trade or rent your personal information to others unless you have given us your permission. With your permission we will only share your information with carefully chosen, reputable and trustworthy third parties.
Also, we may provide aggregate statistics about our customers, sales, traffic patterns and related site information to reputable third-party vendors, but these statistics will include no personally identifying information.
Maldives Independent follows the relevant legal requirements and uses all reasonable precautions to ensure only responsible third parties see the information, however we are not responsible for any breach of security or any actions of any third parties who receive the information.
Please note that we reserve the right to access and disclose individually identifiable information to comply with applicable laws and lawful government requests, to operate our systems properly and to protect both ourselves and our users.
Any data processors with access to your data in providing services on our behalf are subject to contractual restrictions to ensure that your data is protected, and not used independently by such third party.
Advertising and affiliate links
Our editorial content on Maldives Independent is not influenced by advertisers or affiliates, nor is it produced for the purpose of promoting goods or services, except where clearly identified as a ‘sponsored feature’. However we may use affiliate link services on Maldives Independent, such that provided by Google, from which we may earn revenue.
Changes to privacy policy
Should we elect to change our privacy policy we will post the changes here. Where the changes are significant, we may also choose to email all our registered users with the new details.
