Terms of Use

In these Terms, an individual visitor to the Website is referred to as “you” and Storm Digest is referred to as “Storm Digest”, “us” or “we”.

StormDigest.com website is a property of Diversis Digital d.o.o.

By proceeding to use the Website, you agree to be bound by these Terms, in their current form and as they may be amended by Storm Digest from time to time. If you do not accept these Terms, you must discontinue your use of the Website immediately.

Changes to these Terms and the Website We may revise these Terms of use at any time by amending this page. Please check this page from time to time to take notice of any changes we made, as they are binding on you.

Information published on the Website We take reasonable precautions to ensure that information published on the Website is accurate but we do not guarantee its accuracy. You should take appropriate steps to verify information displayed on the Website before relying on it. Downloading material from the Website is done at your own risk and any materials provided via the Website are provided on an “as is” basis.

We do not guarantee that the Website will be secure or free from bugs or viruses. You are responsible for configuring your information technology, computer programmes, and platform in order to access the Website. You should use your own virus protection software.

You must not misuse the Website by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material which is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorized access to the Website, the server on which the Website is stored or any server, computer or database connected to our Website. You must not attack our Website via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of-service attack. By breaching this provision, you would commit a criminal offense under the Computer Misuse Act 1990. We will report any such breach to the relevant law enforcement authorities and we will co-operate with those authorities by disclosing your identity to them. In the event of such a breach, your right to use the Website will cease immediately.

Liability We provide the Website without warranty of any kind. We make no representations, warranties or guarantees, whether express or implied, that the content on our Website is accurate, complete or up-to-date. Nothing in these Terms excludes or limits our liability for death or personal injury arising from our negligence, or our fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or any other liability that cannot be excluded or limited by Croatian or EU law. We will not be liable to any user for any loss or damage, whether in contract, tort (including negligence), breach of statutory duty, or otherwise, even if foreseeable, arising under or in connection with: use of, or inability to use, our site; or use of or reliance on any content displayed on our site. If you are a business user, please note that in particular, we will not be liable for loss of profits, sales, business, or revenue; business interruption; loss of anticipated savings; loss of business opportunity, goodwill or reputation. We will not be liable for any indirect or consequential loss or damage.

We will not be liable for any loss or damage caused by a virus, distributed denial-of-service attack, or other technologically harmful material that may infect your computer equipment, computer programs, data or other proprietary material due to your use of our Website or to your downloading of any content on it, or on any website linked to it. We assume no responsibility for the content of websites linked on our site. Such links should not be interpreted as an endorsement by us of those linked websites. We will not be liable for any loss or damage that may arise from your use of them. We do not guarantee that the Website will always be available or be uninterrupted and reserve the right to suspend access to the Website without notice.

Third-party Websites We assume no responsibility for the content of any websites linked on our Website or websites from which you have accessed our Website. Such links should not be interpreted as an endorsement by us of those linked websites. We will not be liable for any loss or damage that may arise from your use of them.

Intellectual property rights We are the owner or the licensee of all intellectual property rights on our site, and in the material published on it. Those works are protected by copyright laws and treaties around the world. All such rights are reserved. Nothing in these Terms operates to transfer, assign or grant any of those rights to you. You must not reproduce or use images, trademarks or names displayed on the Website other than for your personal use without written permission of the owner. Unless specifically prohibited by a notice published on any page, you may make a print copy of any parts of the Website that you require for your own personal use, provided that in doing so you do not remove or alter any trademark, copyright or other proprietary notices contained in that part of the Website. Our status (and that of any identified contributors) as the authors of content on the Website must always be acknowledged. You must not use any part of the content on our Website for commercial purposes without obtaining a licence to do so from us or our licensors.

Data and privacy Storm Digest is committed to protecting your privacy. Please see our Privacy Policy for details of how we treat information which you provide to us via the Website.

General These Terms are governed by the laws of Croatia and EU and the Croatian courts have exclusive jurisdiction in any dispute arising out of or in connection with your use of the Website. To the extent that any part of these Terms is found to be invalid, unlawful or unenforceable by any court of competent jurisdiction such part shall to that extent be severed from the remaining terms all of which shall remain in full force and effect as permitted by law.

If you have any queries or complaints regarding the Website or these Terms, please contact us at Diversis Digital d.o.o., Miroslava Krleze 1/2, 42000 Varazdin, Croatia.

Secure Payment

To protect your credit card information, we have partnered with Braintree Payment Solutions and PayPal to offer you the most trusted financial transaction system on the Internet. Braintree’s system is both reliable and secure, so you will not need to worry about your credit card information. Storm Digest will never store your credit card information, so you will not need to worry about fraudulent charges. You may visit Braintree’s website for more information about payment security. For information about how PayPal can protect you from unauthorized payments with its 24/7 fraud monitoring, visit PayPal’s website.

Privacy Policy

Diversis Digital d.o.o. and its divisions, affiliates and subsidiaries, including Storm Digest and StormDigest.com (hereinafter “Storm Digest” “we”/”us”/”our”) respects the privacy and the integrity of any personal information that you provide in the use of our Web sites and System, whether you are an institutional user, a student or a professor/instructor. This Privacy Policy explains our policy regarding the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information.

This Privacy Policy will be continuously assessed against new technologies, business practices and our users” needs. As we update, expand and diversify our products and services, this Privacy Policy may evolve. Please check this Privacy Policy from time to time for updates by checking the date of the “Last Update” at the top of this document. We will post any Privacy Policy changes on this page and, if the changes are significant, we will provide a more prominent notice (including, for certain services, email notification of privacy policy changes). A link to our Privacy Policy will be provided on the home page of our Web sites and is accessible at http://StormDigest.com/legal. All changes will take effect within 30 days of being posted on our home page or otherwise notified to users unless a shorter period of time is required in order to comply with applicable laws. You acknowledge and agree that your access of our Web sites and your use of our services following any posted changes to the Privacy Policy indicate your acceptance of such changes.

We also encourage you to review the Terms of Service (the “Terms of Service”), the agreement between you and Storm Digest that governs your use of the Web site, as well as provides the terms and conditions under which Storm Digest provides, and you may use, the Storm Digest services and mobile applications in order to have access to our student engagement services and licensed content (the “Storm Digest Services”). The Privacy Policy is incorporated into and made a part of the Terms of Service.

Application of This Policy At Storm Digest, we are committed to protecting the privacy of our users, which is why we do not sell or rent any personal information (as defined in “What is Personal Information”) regarding our users to any third party. We hope this Privacy Policy will answer your questions regarding how we treat personal information gathered from visitors to our Web sites and users of the Storm Digest Services.

What is Personal Information For the purposes of this Privacy Policy, “personal information” means information that identifies a living individual or can be used to identify an individual, including but not limited to your name, address, e-mail address, country of residence, as well as other information when such information is combined with other information (e.g. name of education institution, student ID, grades, cell phone number). Personal information does not include business contact information (for example, if you are an administrative user on behalf of an educational institution, your email address at the institution might not be deemed personal information). Personal information also does not include “aggregate” information, which is data we collect about and through the use of our Web site and the Storm Digest Services and may include anonymized data which does not identify any individuals. Our privacy policy does not restrict or limit our collection and use of aggregate information or other types of non-personal information.

Consent You acknowledge and agree that by accessing our Web site, using our mobile applications or using the Storm Digest Services more generally you fully understand, accept and voluntarily consent to the collection, use, retention and disclosure of personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy. It is always your choice whether or not you provide us with your personal information; however, a decision to withhold personal information may restrict or prevent us from providing you with a particular product or service including access to any subscriber features of the Storm Digest Services. We will only collect, use, and disclose your personal information in accordance with this Privacy Policy, except where otherwise permitted or required by applicable law or regulatory requirement.

Collection of Personal Information In order to use certain features of our services you must first complete a registration process and establish an account (“Account”). During registration for your Account you will be required to provide basic information such as your first and last name, educational institution, valid email address for your educational institution and establish a password (“Account Information”). Storm Digest will retain Account Information and associate it with your Account. If you register via short message service (“SMS”) which is optional, your mobile phone number will also be recorded to allow you to submit responses via SMS and for password recovery purposes. We will not use your mobile phone number for any other purpose than responding to questions if you do not have the Storm Digest mobile application. In addition, you acknowledge that your educational institution may use poll and survey features of the Storm Digest Services to send you SMS messages. We do not control the educational institutions use of these features however, we will not use your mobile phone contact information to contact you for any non-Storm Digest Service related purposes, and we will not share it with third parties and if you have selected at any time not to receive communications by SMS or phone we will respect that choice..

For students, our servers automatically record information about your use of the System, such as when you log in and submit answers to questions or provide feedback to the instructor. We will associate that information with their account. The instructors may use those data for academic evaluation purposes. We store and maintain personal and associated account information in order to provide the System.

Storm Digest may conduct statistical analyses on students” performance to study the effectiveness of the Storm Digest Services and increase in-class learning. No identification of users will be revealed at any point to any third party. We do not sell, rent, trade or otherwise disclose personal and associated account information about our users.

In addition, to place an order for certain services (eg. access to licensed content), Storm Digest will require that you provide payment information such as credit card numbers and billing addresses and Storm Digest will also acquire your IP address. Credit card information, including the card number, expiry date and security code, is securely collected by us and passed directly to payment processors over a secure socket layer (see the section entitled “Payment Processor” below). Credit card data is not retained by Storm Digest in any form.

Use of Your Personal Information You acknowledge that Storm Digest may use personal information that you voluntarily disclose to us to:

Provide you with information about new products, services, newsletters, informative e-mails, and research on future product ideas or improvements; Assist us in creating or providing content that is relevant to you; Provide you with special offers that may be of interest to you (if you have opted-in to receive such marketing and promotional materials) and to improve your experience on our Web sites or with our System; Assist us in creating better products and services to meet your needs; Allow you to purchase and download products, obtain access to the System or otherwise engage in activities you select; Provide you with technical support; Help you quickly find software, services or product information important to you; Send transaction-related communications such as welcome letters, and product/service order confirmations. Storm Digest may also send you surveys or marketing communications to inform you of new products or services or other information that may be of interest; and Restrict the availability of some of the products, services and content to certain parts of the world, where required for legal reasons, by using your address, IP address and other information in order to enforce those restrictions. While using the Storm Digest Services, you may have opportunities to post reviews or other personal information in forums on the Web site at your own discretion. Please understand that when you post such information, it is made public and is not subject to our control. You should exercise caution when deciding to disclose any personal information in a publically available forum such as the Web site and agree to indemnify Storm Digest for any damages or claims resulting from any of your postings. Storm Digest is not obligated to monitor postings and at its discretion remove any content submitted.

Disclosure of Your Personal Information Except as otherwise disclosed to you, Storm Digest will not sell or rent your personal information to any other party and will only use and disclose your personal information for the purposes for which it was collected as described in this Privacy Policy. However, you agree that Storm Digest may disclose your personal information in the circumstances set out below:

If you are a student, Storm Digest may disclose your personal information to administrators and instructors at your academic institution including your teachers and teaching assistants; Storm Digest may disclose your personal information with your prior consent; Storm Digest may be required by law to disclose personal information without your consent in the event of emergency situations or when required by government or other legal authority; Storm Digest may also disclose Account Information to the administration of any institution (at which you are a professor/instructor) for administrative purposes including the right for the institution to compile a list of instructors who use the Services and contact such instructors in order to obtain references to evaluate an implementation of the Services. Storm Digest may also disclose personal information to third parties in connection with a corporate re-organization, merger or amalgamation, or the sale of all or substantially all of our assets, provided that, where appropriate, any party to whom the information is disclosed is bound by agreements or obligations, and required to use or disclose your personal information in a manner consistent with the use and disclosure provisions of this Privacy Policy, unless you consent otherwise; or Storm Digest may share your personal information with service providers who perform services on our behalf. For example, we may hire other companies to handle the processing of payments, collect debts, to provide data storage, to host websites, to fulfill orders, to assist in direct marketing, to conduct audits, etc. Those companies will be permitted to obtain only the personal information they need only as necessary to provide services to us. Each company is bound by agreement or obligations with Storm Digest to implement and maintain reasonable security procedures and practices in order to use and disclose your personal information in a manner consistent with the use and disclosure provisions of this Privacy Policy, unless you consent otherwise. These service providers are located in Europe or other countries and, as a result, your personal information may be stored, processed or transferred into or out of these countries. We take all reasonable measures and precautions to protect your personal information when it is being handled by our service providers. If you wish to obtain more information on our use of service providers and our policies and practices regarding such service providers, please contact us as set forth below. How to Opt-Out / Withdraw Consent You can withdraw your consent for the use of your personal information at any time by requesting the deletion of your Account or by providing written notice to us of that withdrawal. However, you acknowledge that information may be retained by Storm Digest for audit or archival purposes or as required by applicable federal, state and provincial laws. You can also review and update your personal information yourself through the user features in your account (see further Access to Your Personal Information).

If you opted-in to receive marketing communications but at any time you do not wish to continue receive marketing communications, you may follow the “unsubscribe” instructions included within each e-mail communication or by selecting or deselecting (depending on the service) the appropriate option in your Account settings. Please keep in mind that, even if you choose not to receive marketing communications, you cannot opt-out of receiving transactional or account communications related to services or products that you have requested (e.g. purchase confirmation e-mails and receipts) or important updates from us from time to time relating to the Storm Digest Services or updates to the legal terms that govern your use of the Storm Digest Services.

Retention of Personal Information Storm Digest maintains information about you for as long as we provide services to you, and for as long as it remains necessary for identified purposes or as required by law which may extend beyond the termination of our relationship with you. We may retain certain data as necessary to prevent fraud or future abuse, or for legitimate business purposes, such as analysis of aggregated, non-personally-identifiable data, account recovery, or if required by law. All retained personal information will remain subject to the terms of this Privacy Policy. If you request that your name be removed from our databases, it may not be possible to completely delete all your Personal Information due to technological and legal constraints.

Safeguards We Have in Place Storm Digest stores and process your personal information on our servers principally in the United States as well as internationally. Accordingly, your data may be available to government bodies or their agencies in those jurisdictions under a lawful order, irrespective of the safeguards we have put in place for the protection of your personal information. Storm Digest employs reasonable managerial and technical measures to ensure that your personal information is secure. In addition, our dedicated team of information technology professionals works to maintain data accuracy and prevent unauthorized access to sensitive information. Unfortunately, no security system can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. Accordingly, we cannot guarantee the security of your personal information and do not assume any liability for improper access to it. The Internet is not a secure medium and you acknowledge and agree that the privacy of your e-mail communication and personal information can never be guaranteed as any e-mail communication may be lost, intercepted or altered. By using our Web sites, or providing personal information to us through any means, you agree that we can communicate with you electronically regarding security, privacy, and administrative issues relating to your use of our Web sites and our services.

Compliance with FERPA For US users, please note that Storm Digest’s data protection and privacy policies are structured to be FERPA-compliant. For further information about FERPA compliance, please contact us at privacy@tophat.com.

Minors This Web site and Storm Digest Services are intended for tertiary level students. They are not intended for use by children, especially those under age 13. No one under age 13 is allowed to register for the Storm Digest Services or provide any personally identifiable information or use our social, community and public discussion areas, photo and video galleries, bulletin boards, forums, chats, blogs, personal/job search and other classified ads, and elsewhere. Minors between the ages of 13 and 17, inclusive, must get the permission of their parent of legal guardian before making purchases, including subscriptions, on the Storm Digest Services.

Access to Your Personal Information You are responsible for updating and maintaining the truth and accuracy of the personal information you provide to us relating to your Account. If you want to update the personal information, you have provided to us, you should do so by visiting: http://StormDigest.com/my-asccount. You must be signed in to access your Account and the privacy link above.

Collection of Non-Personal Information You acknowledge and agree that from time to time Storm Digest, its service providers and business partners may collect non-personal information from your use of our Web site and services such as server log files, environmental variables (such as MAC address, computer type (Windows or Macintosh), screen resolution, OS version, Internet browser, and Internet browser version) and from scanning navigational data to collect non-personal information about our users in order to help us deliver better service and user experience. Such non-personal information could include the IP addresses or areas of site being clicked on most frequently. Storm Digest and our service providers (including ad servers, outbound email vendors, affiliate vendors and search engine advertising agencies, and providers of web analytics tools) and business partners may also use “cookies” as well as so-called “pixel tags,” “web beacons,” “clear GIFs” and other similar technologies to help us deliver better service and user experience and to facilitate your ongoing access to and use of our services. Cookies are files saved to your computers through your Web browser to enable websites or service providers systems to recognize your browser and capture and remember certain information. Storm Digest, like many other Web services, uses cookies to understand and save your preferences for future visits and to compile aggregate data about site traffic and site interaction, so that we can offer better site experiences and tools in the future. If you do not want information collected through the use of cookies, there is a simple procedure in most browsers that allows you to automatically decline cookies, or to be given the choice of declining or accepting the transfer of a particular cookie, or cookies from a particular website, to your computer. If you choose to reject all cookies, you may not be able to access the services. To learn more about cookies, please visit http://www.allaboutcookies.org/. You may find more information about opting out of most third-party service cookies at www.networkadvertising.org or other related sites.

You may opt out of the DoubleClick cookie by visiting the Google advertising opt-out page or you may opt out of Google Analytics by visiting the Google Analytics opt-out page. Google has additional information available about their Remarketing Privacy Guidelines, and Restrictions.

Privacy Policy Information If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or concerns about how we manage your personal information, please contact us by mail or email at:

Diversis Digital d.o.o. Miroslava Krleze 1/2 Varazdin 42000 Croatia

support@diversisdigital.com

We will endeavor to answer your questions and advise you of any steps taken to address the issues raised by you.

Hyperlinks Our Web sites are connected by “hyperlinks” to other websites. You acknowledge and agree that Storm Digest makes no representation, warranty, covenant, or claim regarding, and Storm Digest expressly disclaims and denies any responsibility or liability for, directly or indirectly, the privacy practices on any third-party website or resource accessible by hyperlink from our Web sites. You agree that the inclusion of any such hyperlink does not suggest, represent, warrant, covenant or imply that Storm Digest monitors, endorses or exerts any control over such website or linked resource whatsoever. You agree that Storm Digest provides these hyperlinks to you only as a convenience, and the inclusion of any hyperlink does not suggest, represent, warrant, covenant or imply affiliation, endorsement or adoption by Storm Digest of any such website or linked resource whatsoever.

When you leave our Web sites, you acknowledge and agree that our terms and policies do not govern your access to, and use of, other websites. You acknowledge our recommendation to review the applicable privacy and data gathering practices, of any website or linked resource to which you navigate from our Web sites.

Social Media Widgets Our Web site may include Social Media Features, such as the Facebook button and Widgets, such as the Share this button or interactive mini-programs that run on our Web site. These features may collect your IP address, which page you are visiting on our Web site, and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. Social Media Features and Widgets are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on our website. Your interactions with these features are governed by the privacy policy of the company providing it.

California Users In accordance with California Civil Code 1798.83, California residents are entitled to know that they may file grievances and complaints at California Department of Consumer Affairs, 400 R Street, Suite 1080, Sacramento, CA 95814, or by phone at 916-445-1254 or 800-952-5210; or by email to dca@dca.ca.gov.

United Kingdom and European Union Residents If you are a resident of the United Kingdom or the European Union, the applicable data protection legislation permits you to request that we tell you what personal information we hold about you and how we process it and that we provide you with a copy of that information. You are also entitled to access, rectify, change, update, delete, revoke, or improve upon your personal information at any time. You can exercise this right free of charge. We may ask you to provide further information to confirm your identity before considering your request. To make such a request, please send an email or write us using the contact information under “Privacy Policy Information”. In addition, for purposes of providing the Website and services, you acknowledge that Storm Digest may transfer your personal data to servers located in Croatia or other countries outside of the UK and the European Economic Area which provide for a different level of data protection. By using, and continuing to use the Website and services you agree to that transfer.

Payment Processor Storm Digest uses BrainTree (http://braintreepayments.com/) and PayPal (http://paypal.com) as payment processor for our services. You acknowledge and agree that Storm Digest may disclose personal information to BrainTree or PayPal such as your name and email address so that BrainTree or PayPal may contact you directly for personal information such as credit card information. Storm Digest provides payment processors with the minimal set of personal and billing information required to process your payment and minimize fraudulent payment risk.

You acknowledge and agree that Storm Digest makes no representation, warranty, covenant, or claim regarding, and Storm Digest expressly disclaims and denies any responsibility or liability for, directly or indirectly, the privacy practices in regard to any personal information that we disclose on your behalf or you provide to Braintree, PayPal or Stripe directly or any other party in relation to purchasing a product or service from our Web sites.

You acknowledge and agree that our terms and policies do not govern any other party. You acknowledge our recommendation to review the applicable privacy and data gathering practices, of any third party to which you provide personal information.

Interpretation of this Privacy Policy This Privacy Policy does not create or confer upon any individual any rights, or impose upon Storm Digest any obligations, in addition to any rights or obligations imposed by Croatian and EU applicable privacy laws. Should there be any inconsistency between this Privacy Policy and Croatian and EU applicable privacy laws, this Privacy Policy will be interpreted to comply with the applicable privacy laws.

Unless otherwise stated above, any services provided by Storm Digest is controlled and operated by us from Croatia, and we do not intend that the Storm Digest Services subject us to the laws or jurisdiction of any state, country or territory other than that of Croatia. We do not represent or warrant that the services, or any part of the Storm Digest Services, are appropriate or available for use in any particular jurisdiction. Those who choose to access the services do so on their own initiative and at their own risk, and are responsible for complying with all local laws, rules and regulations. We may limit the Storm Digest Services” availability, in whole or in part, to any person, geographic area or jurisdiction we choose, at any time and in our sole discretion.

Refund Policy

Storm Digest provides customized services involving substantial human labor and therefore does not offer refunds for part of the budget used for any services that have already begun. Services usually begin the next business day after order placement, but sometimes immediately upon order placement. Storm Digest reserves all rights in determining whether an order is eligible for a full refund on grounds of order commencement. Orders that are no longer eligible for a refund, but still pending completion may be terminated without refund per request of a customer or refund can be issued partially.

Storm Digest expressly does not honor full refund requests for the following reasons (because Storm Digest can’t control site-related activities performed by 3rd parties):

1) Search engine ranking drops, fluctuations, or changes as reported by any data source.

2) Google Webmaster Tool Warnings (Unnatural Link Notices, etc).

Storm Digest will consider full refund requests for the following reasons:

1) Inability to deliver the service in a reasonable time-frame.

2) Rejection of order due to client sites in unacceptable niches (e.g. adult, pharma, gambling, etc.).

Storm Digest will consider partial refunds for the following reasons:

1) Order cancellation after work begins.

Partial refunds can be approved only for the amount of credits not used already in the current billing period. We don’t require any specific reasons for partial refunds.

Any other support questions or issues are dealt with on a case-by-case basis. Please contact Storm Digest and Diversis Digital d.o.o. support at support@diversisdigital.com.

GDPR

Storm Digest is a part of Diversis Digital d.o.o.

GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) applies from May 25, 2018. Storm Digest is committed to having had introduced all appropriate and necessary changes in the app, on the website, and on the blog by that time. Here’s what Storm Digest will do to comply with the regulation, and what Storm Digest clients need to know about GDPR.

What is Storm Digest doing to comply with GDPR?

Storm Digest sets out to meet all the GDPR requirements that relate to protecting the privacy concerns of our app clients, website and blog visitors, as well as email lists subscribers.

Here’s what we are going to do before the regulation becomes binding:

• familiarise ourselves with the full text of the regulation (COMPLETED)
• attended training sessions (COMPLETED)
• nominate Data Protection Specialist (COMPLETED)
• track data flow at Storm Digest to make sure we can identify where the data is stored in Storm Digest (COMPLETED)
• assess the threats of the data breach or any other incident at our company (COMPLETED)
• make necessary changes to our Privacy Policy, Cookie Policy and Terms of Service documents (COMPLETED)
• make a list of all the business areas that need to be taken care of to comply with the regulation (COMPLETED)
• implement necessary changes in our business to make sure all staff comply with GDPR when sending emails from Storm Digest (COMPLETED)
• make a list of all the areas on the website and blog that need to be taken care of to comply with the regulation (COMPLETED)
• implement necessary changes to the website and blog to make sure they abide by all the GDPR rules (COMPLETED)
• make sure the personal data of Storm Digest clients and email lists subscribers are protected (COMPLETED)
• educate the clients about GDPR in relation to email outreach (COMPLETED)
• prepare a GDPR compliance statement (COMPLETED)
• come up with the ways of responding to a data breach (In Progress)
• Ensure we provide customers with a secure system for data transfer (In Progress)

What kind of a role does Storm Digest have in data protection?

Storm Digest is defined as:

1) data administrator in relation to Storm Digest clients and email lists subscribers;

2) data processor and data sub-processor in relation to the data owners whose personal data is uploaded to third-party systems offered by Storm Digest and used in emails sent from third-party systems and by its clients.

It means that as a company, we oversee a couple of matters:

• Storm Digest needs to inform its clients and email lists subscribers whenever a third party takes part in processing their personal data.
• Storm Digest is obliged to immediately inform the data administrator (the client) in case a person from the client’s prospect list contacts Storm Digest to stop the marketing
• Storm Digest openly informs about the ‘right to be forgotten’ and the ‘right to assist in data deletion’ on a special request. As Storm Digest client or email list subscriber, you may request your personal data change or deletion. The detailed instruction on how to exercise those rights can be found below in the sectionAdequacy, relevance, limitedness of the GDPR Compliance.
• Storm Digest will address any violation of GDPR submitted at support[at]StormDigest[dot]com.

Due Diligence:

Storm Digest undertakes to use a commercially reasonable selection process by which it evaluates the security, privacy and confidentiality practices of proposed sub-processors that will or may have access to or process Service Data. Please find a list of all suppliers we have checked in our GDPR Supplier Check.

What is GDPR?

The General Data Protection Act (GDPR) is being introduced by the European Union to regulate how personal data can be processed. It’s intended to reinforce data protection of the people who live in the EU.

Why is there a need for GDPR?

EU data protection rules haven’t been updated for over two decades. There are at least two reasons why the EU legislative branch decided to improve the existing data protection regulations.

• Technological progress has a global reach – personal data processing is so ubiquitous in today’s online sphere that existing regulations were becoming obsolete;
• Answering the need of EU citizens – according to Eurobarometer, 75% of people that have been asked in the 2011 survey want to exercise their so-called right to be forgotten. 90%, however, believes that it’s necessary to standardize the rights concerning personal data protection (source).

What kind of information falls under its protection?

GDPR is supposed to protect natural persons and their rights. It does not protect businesses, entities or organizations, and processing of their data.

It protects processing personal data, such as name, age, address, phone number, but also indirect identifications that influence their identity including physiological, mental, physical, genetic, economic, cultural and social identity. Basically, any information based on which one can identify the individual.

What does ‘processing’ mean?

‘Processing’ relates to personal data “collection, recording, organization, structuring, storage, adaptation or alteration, retrieval, consultation, use, disclosure by transmission, dissemination or otherwise making available, alignment or combination, restriction, erasure or destruction,” as in Article 4 (2) of the regulation.

What is the lawful basis for data processing?

To safely and legally process personal data in the light of GDPR, you should abide by several principles. Those are lawfulness, fairness, transparency, adequacy, relevance, limitedness, accuracy, storage limitation, integrity, and confidentiality.

Below you will read about how Storm Digest abides by those principles and what actions you should, or shouldn’t, take to use Storm Digest in accordance with GDPR.

Lawfulness, fairness, and transparency

As a data processor, Storm Digest remains transparent and legitimate when processing data of its clients and subscribers. All Storm Digest clients and subscribers get notified upon the signup process that the personal data they provide will be processed in ways specified by Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.

As data administrator, you should make sure your actions are transparent and the purpose of processing data is legitimate. It means you should be always able to prove that you had legitimate reasons to process personal data of EU citizens. You also need to be able to describe the whole process of obtaining the personal data you use.

Adequacy, relevance, limitedness

As a data processor, Storm Digest processes only the data necessary in relation to the purposes for which it is processed. We do not collect or process any sensitive data such as gender, race, ethnic background, political views, etc.

Storm Digest processes its clients’ data as long as they have a Storm Digest account (either trial account or a premium account), or until they express their wish for their personal data to be removed from our client base.

Storm Digest clients can also request deletion of their data by contacting the support team at support[at]StormDigest[dot]com

How we apply GDPR to cold email campaigns

If, at Storm Digest, we decide to contact an EU citizen, who has not been a Storm Digest client or email list subscriber, we will do so only if we have a clear reason to claim that this is a contact relevant to our business purposes and that at the same time, this contact could be beneficial to the contacted person.

If a person asks us to stop contacting them, Storm Digest we will always respect that request and stop further contact immediately.

As data administrator, you can process personal data of EU citizens who have granted you permission to process their data by subscribing to one of your mailing lists. GDPR does not forbid cold emailing though, as long as you follow the data processing rules described in the regulation.

If you decide to contact a person who has not subscribed for email correspondence, and has not been in any business relationship with you before (cold email), you should have a clear reason to claim that this will be a contact relevant to your business purposes, and that at the same time this contact could be beneficial to the contacted person. If you place an offer in your cold email, the offer should be logically connected to the specifics of your prospect’s business.

You are required to inform your cold email recipient that you’re processing their data and how you process it. The email should also contain a clear and easily available information about how your prospect can request change or removal of their personal data.

You are obliged to immediately stop contacting prospects who expressed their wish not to be contacted again. If a prospect of yours demands that their data gets removed from your contact lists, you are obliged to remove it (in accordance with the ‘right to be forgotten’.)

You should process only the personal data that are necessary in relation to the purposes for which you process it. That means you should remove from your contact base all the personal data that are irrelevant to your email campaign, or be able to justify why a specific type of data is necessary for the goal you are trying to accomplish.

Storage limitation

Storm Digest will keep every client’s personal data no longer than it’s necessary for the purposes for which the personal data are processed. At the same time, each data owner can request an exact time limit of their data processing.

As data administrator, you need to make sure you don’t keep personal data of your prospects longer than it’s necessary for the purposes for which the personal data are processed.

In case of cold email campaigns, you shouldn’t process a non-responsive prospect’s data longer than it may be assumed to be necessary, namely one month after you tried to contact the person for the first time. That means you should always keep your prospect base updated.