Privacy Policy

Half Hour News Hour Pty Ltd

(A.B.N. 47 601 651 334)

35 Easey Street

Collingwood, Victoria 3066

Half Hour News Hour Pty Ltd (is committed to protecting your personal information. Our Privacy Policy sets out how we collect, use and disclose "personal information" about you.

“Personal information” is defined under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (“Act”) to mean information or an opinion about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable:

1.  whether the information or opinion is true or not; and
2.  whether the information or opinion is recorded in a material form or not.

This may include your name, your likeness, home address, email address, your interests or other information that identifies you.

We will also collect “sensitive information” from you in certain circumstances.

“Sensitive information” is a type of personal information and includes information on any individual’s health, racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, member of a political association, professional or trade association or trade union, religious beliefs or associations, philosophical beliefs, sexual orientation or practices and criminal record.

We want to make sure that these types of information are treated in a way that complies with the Australian Privacy Principles under the Act.

How we may collect personal information

We may collect personal information from you in various ways.  This includes personal details contained in your applications to participate on our programs and in further interviews or auditions, or appearances on the program. This information required will be reasonably necessary for fulfilling the purposes of producing a television program or other project.

It may also include information you submit when booking audience tickets, by sending us any online information or in other communications or interactions with you (including social media), or by submitting your details to one of our databases.

Sensitive information will be collected with your consent and where reasonably necessary for producing a television program or other project.  This information helps us learn more about you and screen your character for the particular program or project including considerations such as your suitability for media exposure including national (and if applicable overseas) television broadcast and other media communication to the public.

Personal information may be collected directly by the Producer or indirectly from another person or entity where it would be unreasonable or impractical for the Producer to collect it directly.

We may need to collect your personal information from another person, employer or agency.  For example, we may ask you for permission to contact a friend or family member or another person known to you for an opinion or observation or information about you including for reference purposes (eg to verify your employment status), or we may need to collect information from third party organisations or agencies for the purpose of character or background checks where the information must be provided directly from that third party.  We may also ask for your consent to police and or child employment checks as part of a program’s application process.

We may collect personal information from you through third party providers appointed to manage our subscriber databases (including social media), ticketing information and other transactions from time to time.

We may also collect non-personal information and data through the standard operation of our Internet servers or through the use of “cookies”.  "Cookies" are small amounts of information which are transferred to your browser and stored on your computer. They assist us to track information about the use of our website(s), for example, the number of "hits" on the site in a day. They may also be used to store information about your user preferences, to enhance the visual elements and/or functionality and your enjoyment of the site and the security of the site. You may turn "cookies" off or highlight them by adjusting your browser.  You should note that if you disable “cookies” you may not be able to access certain features of our websites.

If you submit personal information via a dedicated program website, the site may be owned and/or operated by the broadcaster of that program or another third party. You should refer to the specific privacy policies and terms of use which apply to that particular site.  Collection of personal information via a website owned or controlled by a third party is not covered by this policy.

How we may use your personal information

Generally, personal information which we collect from you will only be used for the primary purpose for which it was intended, but we may from time to time use your personal information for another purpose described in this Policy or related purposes that you would reasonably expect (or directly related purposes for sensitive information within the meaning of the Act).

If you are applying to be a participant in one of our programs, we may ask you to supply particular personal information to enable us to effectively consider your application and to assist in our selection process. We will use the results of police and background checks as part of that assessment.

When you join our mailing lists or provide your contact details to us (whether directly or indirectly), we may use that personal information to provide you with direct marketing communications about upcoming programs, features of our websites and other events and promotions. You may inform us at any time during the course of these activities or on receipt of this information that you do not wish to be contacted by us or provided with marketing or promotional material.  We will give you the opportunity to opt out of any marketing or promotional activities.  We may also use your personal information for the purposes of market research to learn more about our customers, audience and users of our websites. We will de-identify your information where reasonable to do so for research purposes.

By interacting with us on social media including sending us your comments and feedback online you agree that we may disclose the contents of your comments or other correspondence on our websites and in our programs and promotions, together with your name and suburb and other "personal information" that you send to us, such as your photograph.  Please be aware that we may wish to present your name, your likeness, suburb or other personal comment or details supplied in a humorous way for creative purposes, and you agree that we may do so unless you let us know that you do not want your "personal information" disclosed or treated in this way.

We may disclose your "personal information" which we collect in accordance with the Act and this policy to third parties for related purposes connected with the business of the Producer and/or the reason which you provided the “personal information” to us (including to consider you as a participant on a program).  Such disclosure may be to our related or associated companies, broadcasters, television networks, distributors, and other licensees, production companies and contractors with whom we do business third party service providers or suppliers, and our external business, accounting and legal advisors, and as required by law.  This may include transfer of your personal information overseas particularly where it is embodied in a program (for example, where a host introduces you and information about you) or it is relevant to or included in associated material regarding the program, eg background and pitch or promotional information about the program and its participants. The countries may for example include (but not limited to) New Zealand, the United Kingdom and members of the European Union, the United States, and Canada.

We may use Facebook Custom Audiences to ask Facebook to show you ads that are customised based on your interaction with our websites or our Facebook applications and to measure how you interact with those ads.  This service may use cookies and similar technologies such as web beacons, tags and embedded scripts, to record information about your interaction with our websites.  Facebook’s Data Policy (www.facebook.com/policy.php) describes how Facebook protects information collected through Facebook Custom Audiences.  You may opt-out of Facebook Custom Audiences by following the information provided by Facebook in its Help Centre (www.facebook.com/help/1415256572060999).

There may be other limited circumstances where we are required to disclose your personal information.  For example, to lessen or prevent a serious and imminent threat to an individual's life, health or safety or a serious threat to the health and safety of the public, or as required by law.

If for any reason you do not want us to retain or disclose your personal details, or allow us to disclose or use the contents of your correspondence for any of the purposes set out or referred to in this Policy, you should let us know at the time you send your correspondence to us. You may also elect not to provide some personal information to us or to use a pseudonym when dealing with us.  However, this may mean that we are unable to consider or progress your application for participation in a program or may choose not to use your comments or contributions or otherwise use the information for the purpose that you provided it to us.

Quality and Security of your personal information

We take reasonable steps to ensure the information we collect and use is accurate, complete and stored securely.

Reasonable security measures are in place to help protect your personal information from misuse, interference, loss and from unauthorized access, modification or disclosure.  Security systems are in place at our premises to protect the physical security of your personal information as well as systems in place to ensure computer systems are secure.  Our staff is made aware of the privacy principles contained in the Act and its obligations in dealing with personal information.

Any personal information that is no longer required by us will be destroyed or de-identified on our data storage systems.  All contestant applications and police and background checks will be kept up until the application process is determined and for any such reasonable time thereafter for reasonable purposes connected with the program (e.g. to keep a record of your details during the production of the program and its broadcast period) and when no longer required will then be securely destroyed or de-identified.

Accessing or updating your personal information

You have the right to access most personal information that we hold about you. There may be limited circumstances in which access will not be possible.  If that is the case, you will be told the reason why that information is not disclosed.  We reserve the right to charge a reasonable fee to process and collate personal information that you have requested access to where such fee is appropriate and permitted under the Act.  In most circumstances a fee would not be charged.

If, at any time you would like to access, update or request that we delete your personal information from our records, please send us a written request addressed to:

The Directors

Half Hour News Hour Pty Ltd (Privacy)

PO Box 108

FITZROY VIC 3065

We will respond within a reasonable time on receipt of your written request.

However, please note that any deletion or removal of your personal information may mean that we are unable to consider or progress your application for participation in a program, or we may choose not to use your comments or contributions or otherwise use the information for the relevant purpose.

Please let us know if your details change so that we can keep our records up-to-date. Any queries or complaints regarding our Privacy Policy or your personal information should be directed to us at the above address.

Complaints

If you believe there may be some information disclosed inappropriately or misused or any other breach relating to your personal information, we want to know about it.  Complaints should be posted to us marked “Privacy” at the address listed above.  All complaints will be investigated.

Changes to this Policy

We may at any stage amend and post online an updated version of our Privacy Policy, which will apply to you without further notice.