Personal Information
All personal information provided to the Office of the Ombudsperson by any means including this website is confidential and is protected in accordance with the Ombudsperson Act, the Public Interest Disclosure Act, and the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
To exercise functions and duties under the Ombudsperson Act and the Public Interest Disclosure Act, BC Ombudsperson employees have access to the personal information you send. If necessary to exercise functions and duties under the Ombudsperson Act and the Public Interest Disclosure Act, or if otherwise required by law, we may share select personal information with other authorised persons.
If you send us personal information, we will use only the information required to respond to your message.
Automatically transmitted data
When you access the BC Ombudsperson website, the following information is exchanged automatically between your computer and the site server:
- Domain name and IP address
- Type of browser and operating system used
- Pages visited
- Address of referencing site if you linked to the BC Ombudsperson website from another website
These data automatically transmitted between computers do not make it possible to identify you personally. This exchange of information allows the website to display the content in a way that is the most compatible with your computer equipment. It is also used for statistical purposes.
Data gathered for statistical purposes
The BC Ombudsperson uses Google Analytics to analyze activity on its website through statistical reports. We may collect, hold, and use statistical information about visits to help improve the site. The data collected are aggregated and visitors are not personally identifiable.
Google Analytics reports the following information:
- The number of visitors to the website
- Browser and operating system (Windows, Mac OS, Linux)
- Date, time and length of visits
- Pages visited
- Websites that referred visitors to the BC Ombudsperson website
Use of IP addresses and cookies by Google Analytics
To collect the information for its statistical reports, Google Analytics uses:
Cookies, which are small text files that a web server installs on visitors’ computers, in the background. Cookies cannot be used to run programs or deliver viruses to your computer. They can be referenced during the visit and in subsequent visits to allow faster website navigation. There are two types of cookies, session cookies and persistent cookies. Our website may use session cookies which are stored in temporary memory and are not retained after you sign out or close the browser session.
IP address, which is the digital address of individual computers on the internet. IP addresses are masked so that they cannot be used to identify individuals. The anonymous part of the IP address and the information generated by the cookies about website use are sent to and stored by Google. No personal information that would identify visitors is recorded on or provided to Google.
You can choose to opt out of analysis by Google Analytics by:
- Deactivating acceptance of cookies by choosing that browser option; or
- Installing the Google analytics opt-out browser add-on.
You will continue to be able to access information on our website. Unless you have deactivated cookies on your browser, the default setting (cookie acceptance) is used.
Links to other websites
The BC Ombudsperson website includes links to other sites. When you follow a link, you leave our website and your use of any other website is no longer subject to our privacy policy, but rather those of the other websites you visit.