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Last update 16th February 2021
This privacy notice has been compiled to help you understand why we ask you for your personal information when you use one of our websites and how we will store and use this information.
IDP Connect Limited, an IDP Education owned company, is the principal company and the Data Controller in the IDP Connect Group of companies (Hotcourses Pty Ltd (Australia), IDP Connect Inc (North America) and Complete University Guide).
At the heart of our work is helping you and other users find suitable courses and learning providers. This is defined as our Legitimate Business Interest. We process your personal data to help you make informative decisions when selecting courses and learning providers. We do that by:
This privacy notice applies to all our website and app users regardless of location, whether registered or not, including people responding to surveys, competitions and writing reviews. We refer to all registered users as “members of our community”.
Keeping your information safe and private is very important to us. All our services are designed with privacy and security in mind. We will never sell your personal information to any third party.
You can browse our websites without providing any personal information. However, to use some of our enhanced functionality we sometimes ask for additional information in order to process your request. Examples include:
The details we request for each piece of enhanced functionality will depend on what is required to perform the action. For example:
Details of why we collect each piece of information is displayed clearly next to the field used to enter the data.
A full list of the data collected by each website is available on the site-specific data collection notice.
We also collect some technical information while you use our websites. For example, information on the type of browser you use and your IP address. This information is used to maintain and monitor the performance of our websites.
We use cookies on our websites to provide login and preferences functions, and to collect anonymised data on user interactions. For example, we use cookies to:
Personal information is never held on any of our first-party cookies.
You can choose to have your computer block some or all cookies for you. You do this through your browser settings. Each browser is a little different, so look at your browser's Help menu to learn the correct way to modify your cookies.
If you disable cookies, some advanced features will be disabled and some of our services may not function as intended.
You can read more about how we use cookies on our Cookie Policy.
Occasionally, we will ask for additional information to help us monitor the reach and effectiveness of our services. For example, when creating an account, we may ask for your country of residence or postcode. This data will only ever be used in an anonymised format to help us demonstrate the effectiveness and improve the products and services we offer.
We use Google Analytics to log review aggregated use data across all our websites. No personal data is shared with Google Analytics.
As with all websites, your IP address is sent to us each time a webpage is viewed. For some functionality we use this, along with geo-location information provided by your browser to provide location-specific content within our websites and apps. When you browse our website or use our apps your IP address and location information is stored on our system anonymously unless you are a registered user in which case it will be possible to link it to your profile. This link will only exist temporarily and will be removed three months after your visit. We will not use this information to identify you personally. We use location data for analytics purposes, in order to understand the locations our products are successful in and to ultimately, deliver a better service. You can stop sharing this information by changing your browser settings.
We offer push notifications, location based services, and targeting advertising through our apps. When you first use one of our apps, you will be asked whether you want to turn-on these services. You can opt-out of these services at any time using the changing the permissions through your device settings.
The personal data you provide is stored in a secure hosting environment based in the UK. We employ a range of technology and procedures to ensure that this data is secure, including encryption, anti-virus and anti-malware software, intrusion detection, company-wide data usage policies, and mandatory security and privacy staff training.
Your data is not stored outside EU however it may be accessed by one of our principal companies based in USA, India or Australia if they need to provide you with a service on our behalf. To ensure your data is secure and we comply with our privacy obligation, we have data sharing agreements and security operational and technical measures in place with these companies.
We will keep your data for as long as we are required to, either:
Personal data is deleted in accordance with our internal retention policy. All identifiable personal data is deleted three years following your last interaction with this website, for users registering from within the UK, and after two years for international markets.
You can update the information we store on your behalf by logging into your website account and updating your profile. If you were not assigned a password when creating your account, you can request a new password online by selecting the 'forgotten password' option. If you do not have access to this account, you can request a data update by contacting the Privacy Manager.
In line with the privacy regulations across the world, including GDPR (European Union) and CCPA (California, USA), you have the following rights:
You have the right to be informed why and how we collect your personal data, how we will use this information, who we share it with, what are the security measures we take to protect this information and what are your individual rights. We will publish this information in this Privacy Notice.
You have the right to access the information we hold for you by logging into your online profile, if you require a permanent record you can download this information in PDF format from our website. Alternatively you can make an offline Subject Access Request by contacting the Privacy Manager.
You have the right for inaccurate or incomplete data we hold to be updated. You can make a request to have your data updated through the Privacy Manager.
You have the right to be forgotten at any point by contacting the Privacy Manager or emailing
You have the right to restrict processing when you have exercised one of the above rights and it may take some time to process that request. For example: when you contact us to update your details you have the right to request restriction until your details are updated.
For the processing activities where we have asked you for consent, you have the right to withdraw this consent at any point by clicking on the unsubscribe link in any email we send you, or by updating your profile in the application or by contacting the Privacy Manager.
You can object to the processing of your personal data at any point by contacting the Privacy Manager. There may be instances where we may not be able to fulfil those requests, but we will provide you with an explanation when replying to you.
None of our processing activities are purely automated. There are instances where we process data to analyse or predict behaviour but we will ask you for explicit consent when this processing will involve your personal data.
If you have provided us with your personal data with consent or under the contact obligations, you have the right to request the data you have provided to us in a machine-readable format should you decide to move to another data controller.
As industry experts, it is our primary objective to help you with your educational journey. As part of this, we offer a number of subscription options for you to choose from.
You have the following two marketing options sent directly from us:
Newsletters - inspiring emails from our editorial team, providing you with the latest university news, tips and guides.
University Updates- emails sent from us providing news and updates of course information, open days, events and scholarships from universities and partners that match your interests. You will receive these newsletters based on your course, institution or location search history. We will not share your personal data with these institutions. We will only partner with carefully selected education sector institutions that have compatible activities and can help you with your journey. You can withdraw your consent at any point by logging in to our website and going to your profile page.
When you use our applications you may also be invited to subscribe to our partners’ (Universities) marketing directly. When this option is available there will be a consent box on the relevant form with a link to the partner’s Privacy Notice. Before subscribing please read the Privacy Notice of the partner as they are acting as a separate data controller and may have different processing activities and retention schedules to our own.
If you give consent to a University, you will need to contact the University directly to subsequently withdraw your consent or change your preferences. You can find out which universities you have subscribed to by accessing your profile page when you are logged in to your account.
For more details please contact us via the contact details provided in this Notice.
To be able to offer you beneficial services and products, or to advise our partners on your educational preferences, we often run focus groups, surveys and market research campaigns which you can choose to take part in.
Market research is a very important part of what we do. We gather data on trends, needs, experiences and expectations from current and prospective students and present results in an aggregated format to help other students make informed choices or shape the education sector and the opportunities available to you in future. We may conduct market research on behalf of trusted partners but we will never share your data with them unless you have given a specific consent. These partners can be from the education, the employment or the government sector and we will specify the details in the invitation so you can identify these campaigns and make informative choice if you wish to take part. If you opt in to take part in our surveys we will keep your information for three years and in the majority of cases we will use your personal data to send you an invitation only. Invitations will be based on the answers you provided when you registered with us or when you left a university review. You can opt-out from surveys at any point by logging to your account profile or by clicking on the unsubscribe link available in every survey invitation email you receive from us. More information on your subject rights is available in “Your rights” section of this notice.
Our market research results are presented in a format that can not identify individuals directly. All your personal data will be anonymised after three years.
The data collection, use and storage of data will vary depending on the focus of the research. Before supplying any personal information and for more details on the research we are conducting, please read the privacy note included on each survey or survey invitation you receive from us.
We currently run surveys using 3rd parties platforms Typeform and Qualtrics.
For market research and focus groups, we may engage a specialist company to conduct the research on our behalf and they may have access to your personal data. We will take all steps necessary to protect your personal data throughout the research period and either randomise it or delete it when it is no longer required.
To reward people for taking part in our surveys, focus groups, market research or social media engagement campaigns we often run competitions. If you would like to take part in such a competition, we will ask you to enter an email address. We will only use this information to contact you if you are the competition winner and to arrange prize delivery. We will delete all personal information collected as part of a competition 1 month following the competition closing date.
As part of multimedia production activities, IDP Connect processes personal data on the basis of consent. There are a number of instances when we may ask you to take part in a video or appear in a photograph:
Student Events (organised or attended by our team)
Video and photo materials recorded at the event are used to stream the event live and/or promote future events. Some of these events will be featured in an article published on our websites and use video and photographic material from the event.
Promotional Video Production Events (commissioned by our clients)
These videos and photographs are used to promote a specific university and highlight certain aspects of the facilities the university has to offer.
Review videos (recorded by our review collection team or supplied by you directly)
These videos are produced to give our users an independent view of your student experience.
Each time we record a video, or take a photograph, we will ask for your consent and provide you with a form containing specific information about the filming/photoshoot event. Please read all the information before signing.
We use social media to make our editorial content more accessible and interact with you. You can engage with us by reading, sharing and commenting on our posts. You can also share any article that has that option on your social media page. When creating a post or leaving comments on a post, please do not leave any personal details as these posts are made public and anyone can see them. Instead, if you need to ask a more specific question, please send us a private message. Private messages will be stored for 1 year and will not be shared with anyone outside our company.
When you log in to our websites using Facebook credentials, we will create a user account for you using your details from Facebook. This is necessary as some of the features like making an enquiry or downloading prospectuses are only available to registered users.
You can stop sharing this information with us directly from your Facebook account. Please note this will not delete the data we have already received (name, email address or profile picture).
When contacting us via social media platforms please familiarise yourself with the privacy notice of that platform.
We work with a range of learning providers that either advertise courses on our platforms or offer services relevant to your educational research journey.
Your personal data will only be shared with learning providers you have chosen to engage with via our websites. For example, when you make an enquiry or a prospectus request to an institution, your details relating to that enquiry will be provided to the institution so that they may answer your enquiry directly.
We also provide anonymised site usage data to providers to enable them to monitor enrolment from users who use our websites.
If you take part in one of our market research campaigns or surveys, we will never share your personal data with our partners, we only share aggregated data that cannot identify you individually.
Our data handling procedures ensure your personal data is protected through the service you receive from us. Furthermore, we have data sharing agreements in place with our partners to make sure they apply security operational and technical measures when processing your personal information.
On our website, there are lots of links to course provider websites. This privacy notice does not cover these links. We encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit.
The date of the most recent version will appear on the top of this page. From time to time we may be updating this Privacy Notice, please review it each time you are to submit personal information. If we make any significant changes to this notice we will send you an email informing you of these amendments. If you do not agree with these changes please do not use our websites to provide personal information. You can also delete your account at any time - please see your rights section
If you have any questions or complaints regarding your personal data, please contact the Privacy Manager at the address below:
If you feel the Privacy Manager has not dealt with your enquiry promptly or correctly, you have the right to complain to the ICO https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/
