PRIVACY POLICY

You have a right to decide who should have access to your personal information. Respecting that right is as important to me as it is to you.

Of course, I want to keep in touch. Of course, I want to tell you about things you might like. But i'm always aware that i'm making contact with you at your invitation, and that you can withdraw that privilege at any time.

I've tried to keep clear of long-winded jargon, but it still runs to a sizeable read. So here's the condensed version. I do respect your right to privacy, and I won't do anything to compromise it. I don't gather any information from you without your permission, and I don't share anything you choose to tell me.

Security of Your Connection to My Website

Your connection to this website is via the https secure protocol using a sha256 signature. This protects your security in two ways:

I hold a certificate from a recognised SSL authority, which is digitally bound to the site. So you know that the site is genuine and hasn't been faked by a would-be hacker. Your browser recognises this certificate and will automatically warn you if something's not right.
All of your communications with the site, for example information you enter into a contact form, are encrypted using 256 bit encoding. This is the latest and most secure encryption currently available. It means that no one can intercept your communication and obtain information.

How I collect personal information

I don't collect any personally identifiable information about you unless I specifically request it, for example when you contact me. While my site uses cookies to work correctly, I don't receive any personally identifiable information this way. See my cookie policy below for more details on this. When you fill in a contact form you'll be asked for information like your name and e-mail address. I need these so that I can respond to your enquiry. You can enter your phone number as well if you wish, though this is optional.

Sharing your information

The purpose of my collecting personal information is to allow me to deliver what you ask of me. I do not share your information with any other organisation without your express permission. Short of being forced to comply with a legal order from the police or similar body to reveal information, I regard your personal details as strictly confidential.

Cookie Policy

In common with nearly every other website, this site uses cookies to work as you'd expect. There's nothing sinister about this, and none of what they do will damage your device or compromise your privacy. Cookies are tiny pieces of information stored either in memory or in a small file that is restricted to a specific, secured area on your device. You can see an example of a cookie at work in the alert that popped up when you first visited this site. If you click OK then a cookie is set on your device to say that you're happy to receive cookies from our site. If I didn't set this cookie then you'd have to click on the alert every time you went to a new page, which you probably wouldn't welcome!

I may also use a special kind of cookie called session variables. They're used to pass information from one page to another and they're automatically deleted when you leave the site. I don't receive or store any personally identifiable information this way, nor is any of the information stored accessible by other websites.

Tracking Cookies

In addition to my own cookies, I may also use Google Analytics and/or Google Adwords to analyse this site's performance and to track click-throughs from a Google search. These services set their own cookies that track your Internet use over other participating sites. This data is anonymous and I have no means of identifying you personally. Using the information gathered by these cookies I can tell that someone searched for, say, information about the Bristol Scout, clicked through to this site, viewed five pages and left, but I can't tell who it was. Neither do I receive any information on any other sites you may have visited. Google also uses these cookies, and may relate some of your activities to your Google account if you're signed in. They don't share any of this personal information with me. You can read about Google's cookie policy by clicking here.

I may place links to social media like Facebook or Twitter, who may use cookies to track the source of the link. You should check the privacy policies of such media.