The ACCC is subject to the Privacy Act 1988 and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) contained in that Act. The APPs set out the manner in which agencies and organisations may collect, store, use and disclose personal information and how a person can access and/or correct records containing their personal information.
How personal information is collected
When you visit this site
Our objective in maintaining an active and expanding site is to improve communication with the community at large, specifically to:
- make it possible to quickly provide information about our activities
- encourage feedback from you.
We operate our website using both Australian Government and commercial web hosting facilities. When visiting this site, a record of your visit is logged. The following clickstream data is recorded and is used by us for statistical purposes:
- your IP address
- your top level domain name (e.g. .com, .gov, .au, .uk)
- the type of browser you are using
- your operating system (e.g. Windows, Mac)
- the date and time of the visit to the site
- the pages accessed and the documents downloaded
- the internet address of the site from which you linked directly to our site.
No attempt will be made to identify users or their browsing activities except in the unlikely event of an investigation when a law enforcement agency or other government agency may exercise its legal authority to inspect our internet web server logs.
When you subscribe to email alerts
When you subscribe to email alerts you must provide an email address to which the system can send your alerts. We will not use your email address to send you unsolicited information, unless you otherwise indicate that you would like to receive this information from us.
When you complete an online form or make a submission
We may only solicit and collect personal information:
- for a lawful purpose that is reasonably necessary for, or directly related to, one or more of our functions or activities
- by lawful and fair means.
We provide a number of online forms for enquiries, complaints, reports, submissions and web feedback. Not all of our online forms provide facilities for the secure transmission of information across the internet. You should be aware that there are inherent risks transmitting information across the internet using non-secure forms. Our secure forms can be identified by the padlock symbol and an address starting with https://.
With the exception of clickstream data recorded when you visit our website, the personal information you provide the ACCC is voluntary.
Use of cookies
Our site uses cookies to better serve you when you return to the website. A cookie is a piece of data that a site can send to your browser, which may then be stored on your computer as an anonymous tag that identifies your computer but not you.
You can set your browser to notify you before you receive a cookie, giving you the chance to decide whether to accept it. You can also set your browser to turn off cookies. If you do so, some pages in the site may not work properly.
Cookies are either persistent or session based. Persistent cookies are stored on your computer, contain an expiry date, and may be used to track your browsing behaviour upon return to the issuing site. Session cookies are short-lived, are used only during a browsing session, and expire when you quit your browser.
Our site uses both kinds of cookies to provide a rich and session based experience. The cookies are used to enable us to track users’ browsing patterns in order to provide statistical information to improve the usability of the site.
Website analytics
Our website uses Google Analytics which transmits website traffic data to servers offshore. Google Analytics does not identify individual users or associate your IP address with any other data held by Google. We use this data to help us make the website better by understanding how our website is used.
Providing your personal information
If you do provide us with your personal information and you wish to limit the use and disclosure of personal information, we recommend you expressly state those limitations when contacting us.
If you provide personal information in the course of a public review process, for example you make a submission which may be placed on an ACCC website and you do not wish for your personal information to be disclosed, you should expressly state this and we can take steps to redact your personal information before placing your submission on the website.
To assist other regulators of the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) we share some de-identified data with them. Any information you provide confidentially is excluded.
If you do not wish to provide the ACCC with your personal information, you may contact us anonymously, or by using a pseudonym. By remaining anonymous, or by using a pseudonym, we may be limited in our ability to respond to or make further enquiries regarding your complaint, submission or enquiry with us.
Accessing your personal information
To request access to your personal information, please email privacy@accc.gov.au. When making your request, please provide sufficient information to enable us to identify records held by us that contain your personal information and to verify that the information contained in the records is your personal information.
We will provide you access to your personal information except where we are not required to do so.
Where access is refused, the ACCC will act in accordance with the Privacy Act and the APPs.
Correcting your personal information
You can request to correct your personal information by:
- contacting the staff member or area of the ACCC and AER that you had contact with, or
- emailing privacy@accc.gov.au providing sufficient information to enable us to identify records held by us that contain your personal information and the correction you wish to make.
If we are unable to correct your personal information in the manner you request, we will act in accordance with the procedures outlined in the Privacy Act and the APPs.
Make a complaint
If you believe the ACCC or AER has breached the APPs you can lodge a complaint with the ACCC by email to privacy@accc.gov.au. We will respond to your complaint as soon as possible.
You may also wish to read our Service Charter.
Users enquiring about their rights and remedies for breaches of privacy can access detailed information at the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.
ACCC / AER Privacy Policy
For further information please refer to the ACCC / AER Privacy Policy.