Application for permission to collect Geological samples from Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) - Privacy Notice

  1. NatureScot  - Application for permission to collect Geological samples from Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI)  - Privacy Notice

This Privacy Notice relates to personal data collected through the NatureScot form ‘Application for permission to collect Geological samples from Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI)’

  1. What Kind of Personal Data We Use and Collect

  • Name of applicant.
  • Institute or affiliation of applicant
  • E-mail address of applicant
  • Contact telephone number of applicant
  • Name(s) of on-site member(s) of the field party responsible for ensuring terms of consent are met.
  • Either email address or contact telephone number of on-site member(s) of field party responsible for ensuring terms of consent are met.

  1. How we obtain your personal data

  • You submit the information on a Word document form. If you are submitting other people’s details on their behalf, please ensure that you have their permission. 

  1. How we use your personal data:

We shall use the personal data gathered in this form:

  • To contact you, the applicant, regarding your application, before, during and after the period of the specified ‘visit dates’.
  • In our assessment of your application, and when granting permission to named individuals to undertake geological sample collecting within specified terms of consent.
  • If necessary, to contact the named individuals during the period of the specified ‘visit dates’ with any further information regarding the application.
  • In any future dispute/inquiry about whether geological samples were collected lawfully.

  1. Our legal basis for using your personal data:

We must process your personal data so that we can assess your application to collect geological samples from an SSSI, and contact you and delegated members of your field part in relation to this application, with the aim of ensuring that the notified features of the SSSI are not damaged. As a result we are processing your data for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest.

This means you have the right to:

  • Ask for copies of information about you and be told why we’re using it;
  • Have incorrect information about you corrected;
  • Object to your information being used by NatureScot because of your specific situation;
  • Restrict our use of information about you where:
    • we are using incorrect information;
    • our use of your information is unlawful and you want us to restrict its use rather than delete it;
    • NatureScot doesn’t need your information any more but you need it for legal action;
    • you have the right to object to information and you are using that right.

  1. Sharing your data with others

We may share your data with:

  • The police or other law enforcement agencies for detecting and preventing crime;
  • Land owners/managers if you ask our assistance with contacting them to request their permission for the activities in your application.

  1. Your Personal Data Rights

  • To be given information by organisations about why and how we use your data;
  • To see, and be given a copy of, data we hold about you;
  • To ask to have incorrect or incomplete data corrected or completed;
  • To ask us to delete data we hold about you;
  • To ask us to stop using your data in certain ways;
  • To object to your data is being used if there we have no grounds to use it;

More information on your rights is available on this page of the NatureScot website.

The UK Information Commissioner also has more information about your rights on their website.

To make a request please write/email the Data Protection Officer, NatureScot, Battleby, Redgorton, Perth, PH1 3EW [email protected]  giving us your name and contact details and a description of the data you want to see. We will respond as soon as we can and by 30 days after your request at the latest. We might ask you to provide some form of identification so we don't give data about you to the wrong person by mistake.

  1. How long we keep your data

Sites of special scientific interest (SSSIs) are protected by being ‘designated’ under relevant laws and stay protected indefinitely unless they are ‘de-designated’. NatureScot is required to keep records about SSSIs for the whole time they are designated. This means we don’t know how long we’ll need to keep SSSI records. However, our corporate policy is to review SSSI records every five years. Permission forms for collecting geological samples will be kept on file with the other records for the relevant SSSI for as long as the site remains designated.

NatureScot’s main Privacy Notice