Privacy Policy

The Vancouver Bar Association (“VBA”), as a non-profit organization, is committed to serving lawyers and the legal community in the Vancouver area.

This Privacy Policy (this “Policy”) sets out how the VBA collects, manages, and uses personal information, whether such information is collected via our website, including https://vancouverbar.ca/ (“Website”) or otherwise, including through our services and events (the “Services”).  VBA is committed to protecting your right to privacy when you provide us with personal information.

This Policy explains what personal information we obtain from you in your use of the Website and the Services and the steps we take to secure that personal information.  The VBA will not collect, use, or disclose your personal information in a way that is incompatible with applicable federal or provincial legislation or this Policy.  In this Policy, the terms “we”, “our” and “us” refer to the VBA.  In this Policy, the terms “you”, “user” and “your” refer to a visitor of the Website or user of the Services.

Please read this Policy carefully.  By submitting personal information to us or by otherwise using the Website or participating or enrolling in any of our Services, you agree that you have read, understood and agree to be bound by this Policy and hereby consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information in accordance with this Policy.  If you do not agree with some or all of this Policy, please do not use the Website or our Services.

Collection of Personal Information

In this Policy, “personal information” means information about an identifiable individual, such as their name, personal contact details and other information about that individual that can be used to identify them.   Personal information does not include “Business Contact Information”, which means your business position, name or title, business address, business telephone number, business email address and business fax number.

The type of personal information we collect will vary depending on your interactions with us and the Services we provide to you, but may include the relevant person’s name, address, telephone number, email address, date of birth, occupation or other employment information, professional information, health, lifestyle and medical information, credit card information, bank account information or account information.

If you provide us with personal information about another person, you represent and warrant to us that you have obtained their consent to provide us their personal information and, in the case of any children who are minors, the consent of their parent or guardian.

How We Collect Your Information

In the course of providing Services, both virtually and in-person, through our Website and in connection with our other organizational activities, we may collect your personal information.  We will only collect personal information as permitted under the applicable federal and provincial privacy legislation.

We may collect personal information in a variety of ways, including where you:

• create an account on our Website;
• request us to provide you information about the VBA or any of our Services;
• submit an application to become a member of the VBA, provide us with your personal information or updates to your personal information, in relation to our Services and when we provide those Services to you;
• participate in any of the VBA’s activities and/or Services;
• send us an inquiry through our Website or directly by email;
• contact us by telephone; and
• provide feedback in an online survey.

In certain circumstances, we may obtain personal information about you from third parties.  By way of example, we may receive your personal information from your employer or a law firm you provide services to in order to enroll you as a member of the VBA or for you to participate in the Services.

We may also collect aggregate information which tells us about visitors to our Website and users of our Services, but not the identity of those visitors.  For example, we may collect information about the date, time and duration of visits and which pages of our Website are most commonly accessed.  We may also collect information from your devices (including mobile devices) and any applications you use to access our Website and Services, which may include the device identification number and type, browser information, location information, and connection information.

The purpose of collecting this aggregate information is to help us administer and improve our Website.  Data collected through our Website and Services on an anonymous and aggregated basis helps us measure interest in and use of our Website and Services.  We reserve the right to provide our analyses based on such anonymous and aggregated data to third parties.

How We Use Your Information

Personal information collected by us is used only for the purposes described in this Policy, or for other purposes which are disclosed to you and to which you consent.

We generally use personal information for purposes related to managing and developing our operations, including to:

• establish and manage our relationship with you, including to offer, provide you with information about, process your application and determine your eligibility for and provide our Services;
• establish and collect fees;
• verify your identity and the accuracy of your personal information as may be required;
• create and administer your account on our Website;
• communicate with you about our Website and Services, fulfill your requests, request feedback through online surveys, notify you of changes to these Services and, where we have your consent, sent materials for marketing purposes;
• provide, monitor, personalize and improve our Website and Services;
• manage and develop the VBA’s operations, including ensuring the quality of our Services, process and respond to applications for enrolment, compile statistics, analyze business results, perform internal data management and analytics, perform administrative and record keeping activities and conduct marketing and research;
• protect our rights and the rights of VBA’s members;
• investigate security breaches, protect against, detect, investigate and prevent potentially fraudulent, unauthorized or illegal activities or cooperate with government and law enforcement authorities in connection with legal matters;
• aggregate and anonymize the personal information; and
• for other purposes related to our relationship, where you have provided your consent or as otherwise permitted or required by law.

How We Share Your Personal Information

We may disclose or share your personal information in the following circumstances;

• with third party service providers and partners that help us to provide our Website and Services, including, third party technology partners providing website hosting, data warehousing, data analysis, event logging and other information technology, customer service, payment processing, user analytics and email delivery and messaging;
• to third parties such as affiliated organizations and preferred suppliers;
• to third parties to verify your identity and provide you with Services, as may be required;
• in connection with protecting our rights and property, including for security breach, loss or fraud prevention, investigation or mitigation purposes;
• if a law, regulation, search warrant, subpoena or court order legally requires or authorizes us to do so;
• protecting the safety of a person or group of persons; and
• other purposes identified in other sections of this Policy or where your personal information is collected and such disclosure is permitted or required by law.

Links

Our Website may contain links to the websites of other organizations which may be of interest to you.  Similarly, you may be directed to the websites of other organizations to perform certain functions provided on our Website.  Linked websites are operated by third parties who are responsible for their own privacy practices.

Articles on our Website may include embedded content (such as videos, images and articles).  Embedded content from other websites behaves in exactly the same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.  These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking technology and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged into that website.

We are not responsible for these websites or the manner in which they collect, use or disclose your personal information, so it is important to familiarize yourself with the privacy policies of these websites before providing your personal information to them.

Consent

It is important to us that we collect, use or disclose your personal information only where we have your consent to do so or as provided in this Policy.  Depending on the sensitivity of the personal information, your consent may be express, implied or deemed.  Express consent can be given orally, electronically or in writing.  Implied consent is consent that can reasonably be inferred from your action or inaction.  For example, when you enroll in one of our Services, we will assume your consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information for purposes related to your enrolment or for other purposes identified to you at the relevant time.  Deemed consent is consent we assume in the event that you do not exercise an opt-out mechanism offered to you.

By submitting your personal information to us or enrolling in any Services, you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information in the manner described in this Policy.  To the extent that we are required by applicable laws to obtain your explicit consent for the collection, use or disclosure of your personal information in accordance with this Policy, such consent will be required at the appropriate time.  Further, if we plan to use or disclose your personal information for a purpose not previously identified (either in this Policy or separately), we will advise you of that purpose before such use or disclosure.  However, we may collect, use or disclose your personal information without your knowledge or consent where we are permitted or required to do so by applicable law or regulatory requirements.

You may change or withdraw your consent at any time, subject to legal or contractual restrictions and reasonable notice, by contacting our Privacy Officer using the contact information set out below.  In some circumstances, a change or withdrawal of consent may limit our ability to provide Services to you or your ability to access certain areas of our Website.

We assume, unless you advise us otherwise, that by receiving a copy of this Policy or by continuing to deal with us, you have consented to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as explained in this Policy.

Security

We use reasonable and appropriate measures, including encryption software, designed to help you secure your personal information against loss or accidental, unauthorized or unlawful access, use or disclosure. Only our officers, employees, contractors, volunteers, advisors, and agents, applicable sponsors and service providers who have a legitimate business purpose for accessing the personal information collected by us are authorized to do so. Unauthorized use of personal information by anyone affiliated with VBA is prohibited and constitutes grounds for disciplinary action.

Unfortunately, no data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed as completely secure. While we strive to protect such information, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information transmitted to us and you do so at your own risk.

You are solely responsible for ensuring that you do not disclose your account access information to third parties.  This includes but is not limited to not disclosing such information to anyone, ensuring that sufficient security software is installed and running on your device, that your network firewall is of sufficient quality and that your wireless connection is encrypted to a degree that will prevent third party access.  We are not responsible for any failure by you to secure your own device and its access to the Internet or your use of public, unsecured networks. We are also not responsible for any failure by you to eliminate malware.  These failures and others can make you vulnerable to privacy breaches and would put you and your data at risk.

Location of Personal Information

Personal information we collect is stored and processed by us primarily in Canada. However, we also use third party service providers, such as payment processors, insurance carriers and technology partners, that may use, process and store your personal information in another country.  Personal information provided to third parties outside of Canada is subject to the laws of those jurisdictions and may not be afforded the same legal protections that are available in Canada.  In those cases, we will put appropriate contractual and other controls in place to protect your personal information, as required by applicable laws.

By using the Website, enrolling for one of our Services or otherwise submitting your personal information to us, you hereby consent to the transmission, processing and/or storage of personal information outside of Canada.

Cookies and similar technologies

When you visit the Website or access certain online Services, a cookie or similar technology may be stored on your device.  A cookie is a small amount of data that is transferred to your browser by a web server and can only be read by the website that gave it to you.  It functions as your identification card.  It is not a program and cannot be executed as a code or deliver viruses.

We may use cookies and other technology to help us track use of the Website and online Services by users, including casual visitors to our Website – such as the number and frequency of visits to our pages, which parts of the Website are visited and interaction with any advertising content.  The Website may also use cookies to provide users with certain features and preference settings.  This information provides us with constructive feedback about the Website so that we can identify the most effective areas and generally improve the Website on an ongoing basis.

Cookies may also be used to customize the Website to store your personal information – like passwords and user IDs.

Most browsers are initially set to accept cookies.  You may be able to configure your browser to restrict or block cookies.  However, if you disable cookies, this may affect your ability to use certain parts of the Website and/or online Services.

Direct Marketing

We are committed to complying with Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation. Where we have your consent or it is lawful to do so, we may provide you with direct marketing communications about our Services which may be of interest to you. Such information may be sent to you by post, email, telephone or SMS.

If you have consented to receiving marketing materials from us, you can withdraw your consent to receiving those communications at any time by:

• using the “unsubscribe” mechanism in our emails;
• if you have created an account on our Website, logging into your account and changing your contact preferences; or
• contacting our Privacy Officer using the contact information provided below.

Even if you opt-out of these marketing messages, we reserve the right to send you transactional or informational emails such as customer service communications in connection with the Services you have enrolled in or changes to our Website, your account or our policies.

Access to and Corrections of Your Information

You have the right to know what personal information we have about you and correct any inaccuracies.  If our Website allows you to create an account, your personal information is available when you log in to your account and you may correct this information at any time.  Otherwise, please direct any such requests by email to privacy@vancouverbar.ca.

Data Retention

We may retain your personal information as long as is necessary in order to manage our relationship with you (or fulfil the purposes for which it was collected) or as otherwise permitted by law.   We will destroy personal information when it is no longer required for the purposes for which it was collected or as required by applicable law.

Changes to this Policy

We may update or modify this Policy at any time by posting our revised Policy on our Website.  We include an “Effective Date” in this Policy displayed on our Website to identify when this Policy was last updated.  We strongly encourage you to refer back to this Policy periodically to ensure that you stay up to date with our practices and procedures.

Contacting Us

If you have any questions or comments about this Policy, your information, or your consent choices, please contact our Privacy Officer at privacy@vancouverbar.ca.

Effective Date: July 1, 2022