Privacy Policy

updated March 2025

Statement of intent

Ethos VO Ltd fully endorses the Principles of Data Protection, as detailed in the Data Protection Act 1998, and the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) 2016.

What this document is about

This Policy explains when and why we collect personal information about people who visit our websites, or those we work with, how we use it, the conditions under which we may disclose it to others and how we keep it secure.

We may change this Policy from time to time so please check this page occasionally to ensure that you’re happy with any changes. By sharing data with us, you’re agreeing to be bound by this Policy. Any questions regarding this Policy and our privacy practices should be sent by email to [email protected]

Who are we?

We are EthosVO Ltd, a network of social entrepreneurs and innovators who turn complex problems into initiatives with positive social, environmental and economic outcomes. Our projects and businesses include SkillsPlanner, BuildForce, BuildLondon, Team Army/Team Ethos, and any data collected on behalf of these organisations/websites or by Ethos and its employees for business or marketing use, is covered by this privacy policy.

We need your permission!

Our primary purpose is to improve individuals’ lives through better work, living and well-being. In order to do this we need your active consent to hold your personal data.

However we engage with you (face to face, telephone, email, online) we are completely supportive of the importance of an individual being in control of their own personal data.  Practically speaking, this will mean asking (and possibly re-asking) for permission to hold and process  your personal data. You will see something like this and you will have to make a choice.

☐ – Yes, please keep my details on file. Keep trying to improve my working, living and well being (link to current privacy, security and data sharing policy)

☐ – No – remove all records about me. Other than those needed legally

☐ – Somewhere in between (manage my personal data. Subscribe to mailers, see what Ethos has on me!)

How do we collect information from you?

We obtain information about you when you use our websites, for example, when you complete a registration form, contact us about our services, or if you register to receive one of our email newsletters.

We may also gather information from you directly at events or meetings we both attend. This may be via dialogue through the Value Exchange process.

What type of information is collected from you?

The personal information we collect might include your name, address, email address and other personal information as required by our projects. Also see the Value Exchange section below.

How is your information used?

We may use your information to:

  • to carry out our obligations arising from any contracts entered into by you and us;
  • seek your views or comments on the services we provide;
  • notify you of changes to our services;
  • send you communications which you have requested and that may be of interest to you. These may include information about campaigns, appeals, events, and promotions of our associated companies goods and services
  • process a service registration, event invitation or job application
  • participate in Value Exchange discussions and processing (see blow)

We review our retention periods for personal information on a regular basis. We are legally required to hold some types of information to fulfil our statutory obligations (for example for project evaluation purposes). We will hold your personal information on our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity, or as long as is set out in any relevant contract you hold with us.

Who has access to your information?

We will not sell or rent your information to third parties.

We will not share your information with third parties for marketing purposes.

Third Party Service Providers working on our behalf: We may pass your information to our third party service providers, agents subcontractors and other associated organisations for the purposes of completing tasks and providing services to you on our behalf (for example to process job or placement applications or training course registrations and send you mailings). However, when we use third party service providers, we disclose only the personal information that is necessary to deliver the service and we have a contract in place that requires them to keep your information secure and not to use it for their own direct marketing purposes. Please be reassured that we will not release your information to third parties beyond the Ethos network of organisations and initiatives for them to use for their own direct marketing purposes, unless you have requested us to do so, or we are required to do so by law, for example, by a court order or for the purposes of prevention of fraud or other crime.

We may transfer your personal information to a third party as part of a sale of some or all of our business and assets to any third party or as part of any business restructuring or reorganisation, or if we’re under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation or to enforce or apply our terms of use or to protect the rights, property or safety of our supporters and customers. However, we will take steps with the aim of ensuring that your privacy rights continue to be protected.

Your choices

You have a choice about whether or not you wish to receive information from us. If you do not want to receive direct marketing communications from us or our products and services, then you can select your choices by ticking the relevant boxes situated on the form on which we collect your information.

We will not contact you for marketing purposes by email, phone or text message unless you have given your prior consent. You can change your marketing preferences at any time by contacting us by email: [email protected]

How you can access and update your information

The accuracy of your information is important to us. We’re working on ways to make it easier for you to review and correct the information that we hold about you. In the meantime, if you change your email address, or any of the other information we hold is inaccurate or out of date, please email us at: [email protected]

You have the right to ask for a copy of the information Ethos holds about you.

 

VALUE EXCHANGE PILOTS

We are in the middle of building automated and semi-automated Value Exchange pilots.  These pilots will ultimately collect information concerning participants’ lived experiences, mission, goals and social networks. This personal information will be collected via the tools mentioned in this privacy statement.  By participating in our pilots users agree that their information may be processed by humans and AI in order to share generic insights, non attributable, via AI clustering and sharing attributable personal insights with other participants of the pilots where we consider sharing to be beneficial to participants and the pilot.

 At any time, participants may request one or more of their value exchanges to be removed from sharing with pilot cohorts or to be deleted either via appropriate user selections or by emailing [email protected]  with your specific requests.

As always, we aim for users to be in complete control and to have ownership of their data and this is an area we are working on with participants.

Currently our small team led by Rob and Annabelle are working to ensure a trustworthy ecosystem that balances these permissions against an intent that in a “100% trustworthy world” (which we recognise does NOT exist today) a philosophy of working out loud will be of benefit for all.

 

Security precautions in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of your information

When you give us personal information, we take steps to ensure that it’s treated securely. Any sensitive information, such as CVs or employment details, is acquired via an encrypted web connection and stored on a secure server. Only authorised users are able to access this data, as and when required to provide the services to which you have subscribed, in accordance with our privacy policies and again only over secure connections.

In most web browsers you can check that you are using a secure connection, typically indicated as a padlock icon in the address bar.

Third party applications

We use the Google Drive, Clickup and Slack applications to transfer, share and store information including data files when necessary. Clickup, Slack and Google Drive protect user files with encryption (Clickup uses utilizing AES-256). Our Google Drive system also has two-step verification enabled, which requires an extra code texted to the user’s phone to access the account, making it harder for hackers to access a user’s data. Both services use perfect forward secrecy, which prevents hackers from using old session keys to hack files stored in the cloud. Please be aware that these services are provided by US based organisations.

Non-sensitive details (your email address etc.) are transmitted normally over the Internet, and this can never be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your information, we make our best effort to ensure its security on our systems. Where we have given (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our websites, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone.

Profiling

We may analyse your personal information to create a profile of your interests and preferences so that we can contact you with information relevant to you. We may make use of additional information about you when it is available from external sources to help us do this effectively.

Links to other websites

Our website may contain links to other websites run by other organisations. This privacy policy applies only to our website‚ so we encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit. We cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of other sites even if you access them using links from our website.

In addition, if you linked to our website from a third party site, we cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of the owners and operators of that third party site and recommend that you check the policy of that third party site.

16 or Under

We are concerned to protect the privacy of children aged 16 or under. If you are aged 16 or under‚ please get your parent/guardian’s permission beforehand whenever you provide us with personal information.

Review of this Policy

We keep this Policy under regular review. This Policy was last updated as per the heading above. Please also see our Cookie Policy for further privacy information.

*Websites owned and managed by EthosVO, and covered by this privacy policy

 

EthosVO.org

SkillsPlanner

BuildLondon

Ethos Smart/GEOmii