UKCQSSA
中文

Privacy Policy

Effective date: 31 August 2026

The UK Chongqing Students and Scholars Association ("UKCQSSA", "we") respects and protects your personal information. This policy explains how we collect, use, share and protect personal data through our website (ukcq.org) and related services, and your rights under the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018.

Data controller: UK Chongqing Students and Scholars Association. Contact: [email protected].

1. What we collect

  1. Account information: name, email address and password (stored only as a cryptographic hash).
  2. Member profile: details you provide at registration or in the member centre, which may include gender, date of birth, home district, city of residence, university, major, education and work history, WeChat ID, phone number and emergency contacts (some fields optional).
  3. Verification documents: proof required by certain membership types (e.g. student ID), used solely for membership review.
  4. Payment information: membership fees, event fees and donations are processed by Stripe; we keep payment records (amount, time, status) but never store your full card details.
  5. Event data: registrations, check-ins and benefit redemptions.
  6. Technical data: IP address, access logs, essential cookies (session and security) and Cloudflare Turnstile verification data.

2. Purposes and lawful bases

  1. Membership and services (contract): processing applications, managing membership, issuing the digital membership card, running events and benefits, handling payments.
  2. Security and operations (legitimate interests): protecting the site and accounts, preventing abuse and fraud, improving our services.
  3. With your consent: appearing in the member directory (on by default — name, city, university, major and industry only, never contact details; switch off any time in the member centre), optional profile fields, event photos, newsletters (unsubscribe at any time).
  4. Legal obligation: retaining financial and tax records as required by UK law.

3. Sharing

We never sell your personal data. We share it only with:

  1. Processors: Alibaba Cloud (hosting, London, UK), Cloudflare (CDN and security), Stripe (payments) and Tencent Exmail (transactional email), each processing data only on our instructions.
  2. Partner merchants: when you redeem a member benefit, the merchant sees only the minimum needed to verify you (name, membership number, membership status).
  3. Legal requirements: disclosures required by law or lawful requests from courts or regulators.

4. Storage and international transfers

Your data is stored primarily on servers located in London, UK. Where overseas providers are involved, we apply appropriate safeguards such as contractual clauses.

5. Retention

  1. Account and profile data: for as long as your account exists.
  2. Deletion: you may request account deletion in the member centre; the account is deactivated immediately and anonymised within 30 days (you may withdraw the request during this period).
  3. Financial records: retained as required by UK law (generally six years), with necessary financial links preserved on anonymisation.
  4. Verification documents: kept only as long as necessary after review.

6. Your rights

Under the UK GDPR you may access, rectify or erase your data, restrict or object to processing, request portability, and withdraw consent at any time. In the member centre you can export your data (JSON), edit your profile or request deletion yourself; you can also email [email protected]. We respond within one month. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ico.org.uk).

7. Cookies

We use only cookies essential for login sessions and security. No third-party advertising or tracking cookies are used.

8. Children

Our services are intended for people aged 16 and over; we do not knowingly collect data from children under 16.

9. Security

We protect your data with HTTPS encryption, access controls, auditing of sensitive operations and private storage of verification documents; administrators access only what their role requires.

10. Changes

We may update this policy from time to time and will announce significant changes on the website. Questions? Contact [email protected].