Heritage on the Air (HOTA), operated under the auspices of the Bo-Karoo Amateur Radio Club, is committed to protecting your privacy and handling your personal information responsibly. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, store, and share your personal information, and sets out your rights in relation to that information.
This policy is issued in compliance with the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA), which is the primary data protection legislation of the Republic of South Africa.
POPIA Compliance Notice
The Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) gives effect to the constitutional right to privacy. It regulates the processing of personal information and establishes minimum requirements for the lawful processing of that information. HOTA acts as the Responsible Party in terms of POPIA when processing your personal information.
Our processing of personal information is guided by the following POPIA principles:
- Accountability — We take responsibility for ensuring that your personal information is processed lawfully and in a manner that respects your privacy.
- Processing Limitation — We only collect personal information that is adequate, relevant, and not excessive for the purpose it is collected.
- Purpose Specification — Personal information is collected only for a specific, explicitly defined, and lawful purpose.
- Further Processing Limitation — Information is not processed in a way that is incompatible with the original purpose of collection.
- Information Quality — We take reasonable steps to ensure that personal information is complete, accurate, and not misleading.
- Openness — We maintain documentation of all processing activities and notify data subjects of the details of collection.
- Security Safeguards — We implement appropriate, reasonable technical and organisational measures to secure your personal information.
- Data Subject Participation — You have the right to request access to, correction of, or deletion of your personal information.
1. Responsible Party
The Responsible Party for the purposes of POPIA is:
- Organisation: Heritage on the Air (HOTA) / Bo-Karoo Amateur Radio Club
- Website: heritageontheair.co.za
- Contact: Contact us via our contact page
2. Information We Collect
We may collect the following categories of personal information:
- Registration information: Name, surname, callsign, email address, and any other details provided when creating an account.
- Participation data: Activation and chase log submissions, including dates, site codes, and radio contacts.
- Contact form submissions: Name, email address, and the content of messages sent to us.
- Technical data: IP address, browser type, operating system, pages visited, and other usage statistics collected automatically via cookies or server logs.
- Communications: Correspondence you send to us, including email or contact form messages.
We do not knowingly collect sensitive personal information (as defined in POPIA, such as health information, religious beliefs, or political opinions) unless you voluntarily provide it.
3. How We Use Your Information
We use personal information for the following lawful purposes:
- To create and manage your HOTA user account.
- To process and display activation and chase log submissions on the leaderboard and site records.
- To communicate with you regarding your account, activations, or enquiries.
- To maintain and improve the functionality, security, and performance of the website.
- To comply with applicable legal obligations.
- To compile anonymised statistics about HOTA participation (no personally identifiable information is included in published statistics).
We will not process your personal information for any purpose other than those specified here without your prior consent, unless we are required to do so by law.
4. Lawful Basis for Processing
Under POPIA, we process your personal information on the following lawful grounds:
- Consent: Where you have given us explicit consent (e.g., when registering an account or submitting logs).
- Contractual necessity: Where processing is necessary to fulfil obligations related to your participation in HOTA.
- Legitimate interest: Where processing is in our legitimate interest and does not override your rights (e.g., website security and fraud prevention).
- Legal obligation: Where we are required by law to process your information.
5. Sharing of Personal Information
We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal information. We may share personal information only in the following circumstances:
- Service providers: Third-party providers who assist in operating the website (e.g., hosting providers), subject to confidentiality agreements and POPIA-compliant data processing terms.
- Legal requirements: Where disclosure is required by applicable law, regulation, or court order.
- Public leaderboard data: Your callsign, activation count, and chase count may be displayed publicly on the HOTA leaderboard as part of normal programme participation. You consent to this public display when registering.
6. Retention of Personal Information
We retain personal information only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, or as required by law. Account information is retained for the duration of your participation in HOTA. If you request deletion of your account, we will remove your personal information within a reasonable timeframe, except where retention is required by law or for the integrity of historical activation records.
7. Security of Personal Information
We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, loss, destruction, or alteration. These measures include password hashing, HTTPS encryption, and access controls. However, no method of transmission over the internet is 100% secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.
In the event of a data breach that is likely to affect your rights and interests, we will notify you and the Information Regulator as required by POPIA.
8. Your Rights Under POPIA
As a data subject under POPIA, you have the following rights:
- Right of access: You may request confirmation of whether we hold your personal information and obtain a copy of that information.
- Right to correction: You may request that we correct or update inaccurate or incomplete personal information.
- Right to deletion: You may request the deletion of your personal information where it is no longer necessary for the purpose it was collected, subject to legal retention requirements.
- Right to object: You may object to the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances.
- Right to withdraw consent: Where processing is based on your consent, you may withdraw consent at any time. This will not affect processing carried out before withdrawal.
- Right to lodge a complaint: You have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator of South Africa if you believe your personal information has been processed in violation of POPIA.
To exercise any of these rights, please contact us. We will respond within a reasonable timeframe as required by POPIA.
9. The Information Regulator
The Information Regulator is the supervisory authority for POPIA in South Africa. If you are unsatisfied with how we handle your personal information, you may contact the Information Regulator:
- The Information Regulator (South Africa)
- JD House, 27 Stiemens Street, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2001
- P.O Box 31533, Braamfontein, Johannesburg, 2017
- Complaints email: complaints.IR@justice.gov.za
- General enquiries: inforeg@justice.gov.za
10. Cookies
This website may use cookies and similar tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience and collect usage analytics. Cookies are small text files stored on your device. You can control or disable cookies through your browser settings; however, some features of the site may not function correctly without cookies.
We do not use cookies to collect personally identifiable information without your knowledge.
11. Changes to This Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices or applicable legislation. Any updates will be published on this page with a revised date. We encourage you to review this page periodically.
12. Contact Us
For any questions, requests, or complaints relating to this Privacy Policy or the processing of your personal information, please contact us via our contact page.