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Privacy Policy

We are the Science Museum Group and this Privacy and Cookies Policy gives detailed information as to when and why we collect personal information from you, how we keep it secure and how we use it.

The ‘Science Museum Group’ is the trading name of the Board of Trustees of the Science Museum. The museums within our group are the Science Museum in London, the Science and Industry Museum in Manchester, the National Science and Media Museum in Bradford, the National Railway Museum in York and Locomotion in Shildon. We also produce the Manchester Science Festival. This policy covers use of both personal information by the Board of Trustees of the Science Museum and our wholly owned trading company (called SCMG Enterprises Limited). We refer to ourselves within this policy as ‘we’ or ‘us’.

1. HOW WE COLLECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We collect information when you interact with us including (but not limited to) when you visit our websites, sign up for our emails, make a donation or buy tickets in any of our museums or book a visit (whether online or over the phone).

We also use certain publicly available information to help us reach out to potential supporters and we will collect and use certain information where you visit our websites or use our free Wi-Fi.

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2. WHAT PERSONAL INFORMATION WE COLLECT

We collect information that is necessary to perform the services you have requested, to keep you informed with what’s on at our museums and that is otherwise necessary for us to operate our museums as well as improve the experience of our visitors.

There are circumstances where you may limit the information you provide us with, but this may affect the service you receive or the information we provide to you.

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3. WHY WE COLLECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION AND HOW WE USE IT

We use the information we hold about you for a number of purposes including to provide information you have asked for, to provide a service (or goods) you have requested from us, to request additional information from you, to develop and improve our services and to raise money for and otherwise operate our museums. Below we describe how and why we use this information and how long we retain it.

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4. HOW WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION WITH THIRD PARTIES

The Science Museum Group will not share, sell or otherwise make available your personal information to third parties without your express prior permission.

We shall share your data with third parties who are performing services on our behalf (for example, where we use third party ticketing organisations), in order to comply with our legal obligations (for example fraud protection) or in order to enforce our rights, property or the safety of the Science Museum Group, our visitors or others.

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5. YOUR DATA PROTECTION RIGHTS

You have certain rights under data protection laws in relation to the personal information we hold and are using about you. To exercise your rights, please use the contact details provided under the ‘Contact Us about your personal information’ section below.

Your rights include asking for a copy of the information we hold about you, having any inaccurate information we hold about you corrected, or to request that we stop using your personal information in a particular way (for example, you may request that we stop emailing you). Your data protection rights are summarised under the tab immediately below.

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6. SECURITY OF YOUR PERSONAL DATA

The Science Museum Group is committed to keeping your data secure. We use a variety of security technologies and procedures to help protect your personal information from unauthorised access and use.

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7. OUR DATA PROTECTION REGISTRATIONS

The Science Museum Group has registered with Information Commissioner’s Office. These registrations are in the name of the Board of Trustees of the Science Museum Group (registration number Z3140818) and SCMG Enterprises Limited (registration number Z7613339).

8. CHANGES TO THIS POLICY

We keep this Privacy and Cookies Policy under review and will make changes from time to time. We may let you know about such changes by email, text, or another suitable method of communication. The latest version of this policy will always appear on this page.

9. CONTACT US ABOUT YOUR PERSONAL DATA

If you would like more information or would like to raise any queries, exercise your rights or make a complaint relation to our use of your personal information, you may contact our Data Protection Officer using the following details:

Emma Brooks
Data Protection Officer
National Science and Media Museum
Science Museum Group
Little Horton Lane
Bradford
BD1 1NQ

10. COOKIES AND SIMILAR TECHNOLOGIES

This section describes how we use cookies and similar technologies when you visit our websites, use our online games and apps or use our onsite Wi-Fi services.

We are testing a new cookies system to improve your experience on our websites. Once testing is complete, our cookies policy will be updated.

WHEN YOU VISIT OUR WEBSITES

The Science Museum Group operates a number of websites including (but not limited to) the following:

You can browse the Science Museum Group’s Websites without telling us who you are or revealing any personal information about yourself. If you have cookies enabled on your web browser, the Websites will collect information about your visit as you move through the Websites.

This may include: technical information, including the Internet protocol (IP) address used to connect your computer to the Internet, your login information (where applicable), browser type and version, time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform; information about your visit, including the full Uniform Resource Locators (URL) clickstream to, through and from the Website (including date and time); Event or Exhibition tickets you viewed or searched for; page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks and mouse-overs), and methods used to browse away from the page.

We use this data to inform the development of our service (for example, if we know which web browsers most of our visitors are using, we can allocate website development resources accordingly). Please see below for more information about cookies.

WHAT ARE COOKIES AND HOW DO WE USE THEM

Cookies are pieces of data that a website can transfer to a user’s web browser. The cookies may remain on your computer after you leave the website but you can manually delete them using most browsers. Most web browsers are pre-set to accept cookies. Some cookies store data just for the time you are on the website. These are called session cookies and are not stored on your computer after you have left the website.

A pixel tag (also known as a web beacon or clear GIF) is an invisible 1×1 pixel that is placed on web pages. When you access these web pages, pixel tags generate a generic notice of the visit and allow us to set or read our cookies. We use pixel tags in combination with cookies to track activity on our websites, particularly to track visits, times and dates of visits, pages viewed, country and city locations, devices used, purchases, sources visited before coming to our websites, demographics and email sign ups. We use these for reporting and for marketing purposes to retarget advertising and for lookalike modelling. This information is used to make our websites and advertising more relevant to your interests.

If you prefer not to receive cookies, you can adjust your web browser to refuse cookies or to warn you when cookies are being used. You can also use plugins and extensions that block the functionality of pixel tags. Most elements of the Science Museum Group’s Websites will still function if you disable cookies in your web browser settings.

When you visit Science Museum Group Websites, if your browser is using the standard settings and it is accepting cookies, you are giving consent for cookies on the Science Museum Group Websites to be stored on your computer. If you do not wish for this to happen, you can disable them in the settings of your browser. For more information on cookies and their uses, visit the cookies page on the Information Commissioner’s Office website.

In particular we use the following cookies and similar technologies:

Cookies