Privacy Statement
Effective: February 1st 2024
Summary of Privacy StatementThis policy covers how WaterAlerts.ie treats Personally Identifiable Information (“PII”) that is collected, stored and processed through the service. WaterAlerts.ie is used to send alerts and notifications to subscribers based on their account preferences. Preferences include an ability for subscribers to set geographic areas of interest to ensure they only receive localized notifications within WaterAlerts.ie are issued as either email, app or SMS text messages. At all times the subscriber is in control of what information they receive, the locational relevance of alerts, as well as an ability to quickly unsubscribe from the service in a few easy ways. This privacy statement sets out how WaterAlerts.ie and Pin Point Alerts Ltd (the company that owns the service and is the Data Controller and Data Processor) processes subscriber personal data, secures this personal data, and the various company policies that adheres to General Data Protection Regulation. |
The following Personally Identifiable Information (“PII”) is gathered from registered users (“subscribers”):
1. Email Address
WaterAlerts.ie uses your email address for two core reasons; (i) the email acts as the username to log into the service and (ii) the email address is used to disseminate alerts & notifications to the subscriber. The email address is a unique entity in the WaterAlerts.ie database and it is also used to reset your account password, if you forget it. In extremely rare cases your email address is used to send out service updates, policy changes and changes to the WaterAlerts.ie terms and conditions if further consent is required.
2. Irish Mobile Number (optional)
WaterAlerts.ie includes an optional feature to contact subscribers by SMS text message for certain alerts (e.g., severe weather warnings). The subscriber must add and validate their mobile number in their account panel on the WaterAlerts.ie website as an optional feature.
3. Password
You need to authenticate with WaterAlerts.ie to access your account. Passwords are created at registration and they are salted/hashed on the WaterAlerts.ie server – passwords are never stored in plain text and are unseen by the service providers. For good password management, it is recommended to use unique passwords for each web service you access and WaterAlerts.ie is no different.
4. At least one preferred mapped location / Eircode
WaterAlerts.ie offers focused alerts that are locally relevant to subscribers. To make this happen, WaterAlerts.ie allows you to add mapped locations for which you want to receive alerts. A minimum of one location is required while it is possible to add up to three mapped locations. It is up to the subscriber to map their location on the system and to provide the level of accuracy they are satisfied with. It is not necessary to map exactly to a home location – the centre of a town or townland is usually sufficient to ensure you get the alerts that interest you. WaterAlerts.ie stores coordinates statically in a database after they are updated by the subscriber and WaterAlerts.ie does not track your location at any time. Coordinates are stored as a Latitude Longitude pair.
5. IP address
An Internet protocol (“IP”) address is the unique number assigned to your Internet communicator device or Internet Service Provider (“ISP”). WaterAlerts.ie may track such IP addresses for system administration, site tracking, to prevent our servers from being abused and for other uses described in this Privacy Policy.
6. Name
WaterAlerts.ie uses Stripe for payment processing and your name will be made available to WaterAlerts.ie via the Stripe account interface. However, names are not stored in the WaterAlerts.ie database at any time.
Summary of how we use the information we gather:
We use the personal information (PII) to allow you to manage your unique WaterAlerts.ie account and experience. We require your contact and location details to correctly send you notifications, and we require a unique username (email address) for you to create and access your account. Your password is also used to access your WaterAlerts.ie account. To send you accurate, localized alerts and notifications we require coordinate information about your preferred location(s) - this can be accurate to your town/city and not necessarily to your exact home location. In the case of poor behaviour on our site (e.g., web scraping) we may use your IP Address to identify any potential threats or insulting behaviour and to block it from accessing WaterAlerts.ie.
The people that are given access to your personal information:
WaterAlerts.ie (Pin Point Alerts Ltd) is the sole owner of the WaterAlerts.ie user database. We will solely use your PII details for the purposes of identifying if you should receive any alerts/notification and, subsequently, we will use your contact details to correctly deliver the information to you through a preferred channel (eg email, app or SMS). At no time is the WaterAlerts.ie subscriber database made available to external 3rd parties, nor is it foreseen to engage with external companies that can access the subscriber database at any time. If this policy changes then all subscribers will be notified by email. If WaterAlerts.ie engages 3rd party agencies for any IT development work then it will take place on a cloned version of WaterAlerts.ie with an empty subscriber database.
The security measures we have in place to protect your personal information:
We have put in place reasonable and appropriate physical, electronic, and managerial procedures to help safeguard information we collect through WaterAlerts.ie. However, you should know that no company or web service, including WaterAlerts.ie (Pin Point Alerts Ltd), can fully eliminate security risks associated with Personally Identifiable Information (PII). To help protect yourself, please use a strong password, do not use the same passwords to access your WaterAlerts.ie accounts that you use with other accounts or services, and protect your user names and passwords to help prevent others from accessing your accounts and services.
Deleting/Closing your Account to remove all personal data:
A subscriber can choose to delete their account at any time and they will be instantly removed from the live WaterAlerts.ie database. Accounts that are deleted are done so in a self-service manner by the subscriber on the WaterAlerts.ie website and this is an irreversible step. Account details cannot be recovered once an account deletion is triggered. However, PII we collect will be contained in secure backups for a maximum of 14 days after a subscriber has unsubscribed from the system. The 14-day period is part of Pin Point Alerts Ltd’s corporate backup strategy and is within a reasonable time to remove the subscriber. Accidental account deletions cannot be recovered from backups. The sole purpose of backups is to restore the complete service from a backup, if necessary.
What Choices Do We Give You and How Can You View, Correct or Review Your Personal Information?
i. Login to WaterAlerts.ie to manage or delete your account
WaterAlerts.ie allows subscribers to login and manage their account with the username (email address) and password they created during the registration process. The login area is accessed from www.wateralerts.ie/login. After a subscriber logs into the WaterAlerts.ie website they can use the Account Manage menu section to navigate to the Account Close/Delete item. Clicking into this menu item will ask for confirmation before the account is instantly deleted.
ii. Subject Access Requests
To make Subject Access Requests (SAR) easier, subscribers can use the Contact form on the website, and indicate that they are interested in a Subject Access Request. They will be assisted from here by Pin Point Alerts staff.
Our use of cookies:
The WaterAlerts.ie website makes use of first party cookies which are small digital files that are stored in your web browser that enable us to track your return visits to our website. We use cookies to ensure an improved user experience and to provide feedback on how the service is used. The purpose of cookies on www.WaterAlerts.ie is also used to speed up the load time for web pages on subsequent visits to the website. Your browser settings may allow you to block these cookies, which is fine and the service will continue to operate, but we recommend you have them enabled to help us personalise your experience of the WaterAlerts.ie website and ensure a smooth user experience.
Third Party Analytics:
We may provide anonymous data to third party analytics companies (i.e. no PII data is transferred) to help us understand how WaterAlerts.ie is being used and to help us make improvements. The WaterAlerts.ie website may use Google Analytics for its website analytics management.
Where does the Personally Identifiable Information (PII) database and backups reside?
All aspects of WaterAlerts.ie including databases and websites are hosted within the European Union. At no stage is PII transferred to a 3rd country outside of the European Union. Backups are fully encrypted and stored securely in Ireland for a maximum period of 14 days before self-deleting. We are happy to share further information on our storage and security practices with our paid clients and paid subscribers at any time.
Questions and Complaints
If you believe WaterAlerts.ie maintains your personal data (PII) incorrectly then you may direct any inquiries or complaints concerning our Data Protection and GDPR compliance to
How We May Update Our Privacy Policy
From time to time, we may collect and use Personally Identifiable Information (PII) in ways not previously disclosed in our Privacy Policy. For example, if new alert channels come on board that require WaterAlerts.ie to store further PII then we will advise you about this. Therefore, if our information practices change we will post any adjustments to our policy on this website and change the “Last Updated” date above. Unless additional notice or further consent is explicitly required by applicable laws, this will serve as your notification of these changes. You will not be “auto-consented” into any new parts of WaterAlerts.ie that require additional PII. If you are concerned about how your information is used, bookmark this page on your web browser and check back periodically.