FreelanceLocals (referred to in this policy as “FreelanceLocals,” “us,” “we,” or “our”) has adopted the following Privacy Policy to explain how we collect, use, and share information from and about you.
Your privacy and security are very important to us at FreelanceLocals. We are committed to transparency when it comes to our privacy practices and how we safeguard your information. This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) outlines what kinds of information we may ask you for and gather from you as you visit or use FreelanceLocals’ website, how that information may be used, and under what circumstances certain information might be shared with others.
This Policy applies to the data you share when you use our “Services,” which includes our website at www.freelancelocals.com and any affiliated web pages or forms we may create or host (“Site”), or when you communicate with us.
This Policy is part of our Terms of Service, which you can find here.
INFORMATION WE COLLECT & YOU TELL US
Some information collected when you use our services is considered “Personal Information.” This is information that can be used to identify you personally and includes things like your full name, your address, your phone number, and your email address. Other than as provided for in this Policy, we won’t share or disclose this kind of information unless we get your permission. Other information that we collect may not identify you personally. This kind of information may be shared or disclosed in an aggregate form, used to personalize your experience, and so on.
Visitors
When you use our Services as a Visitor, we may ask for information about your preferences and interests to personalize your experience and help you find what you need.
All Members
To use many aspects of our Services, you are required to create a Buyer or Seller Account on FreelanceLocals and become a Member. Please note that our system automatically creates you as a Buyer when you opt in to sign up as a Seller. To become a Member, we require that you pick a unique Display Name or username and provide us with your email address so we can contact you. We also ask you to tell us your full name so we know who you are.
Finally, we will ask you to share some information about what kind of user you are (your role), your geographic location, and information about your interests to help us personalize your experience using our Services.
Sellers
Members who register for one of our Seller Memberships (“Sellers”) can choose to use a name other than their given name as a “Display Name.” A Seller’s Display Name, profile image, avatar, or logo, and any additional information they choose to provide about themselves in their FreelanceLocals profile will be publicly viewable.
COMPLIANCE WITH RELEVANT LEGISLATION
We understand that certain factors may determine legislation applicable to data and information under our control. We ensure that all entities which may obtain, receive, and process or store data on our behalf comply with applicable legislation for purposes of compliance with best practices in data information security management, including the ISO/IEC 27000 standards.
FreelanceLocals is compliant with the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA). POPIA was signed into law in 2013, and its provisions aim to safeguard the privacy rights of individuals by regulating the processing of personal information.
OTHER INFORMATION
When you use our Services as a Member or a Visitor, we receive and collect certain information from your browser and your device such as your Internet Protocol address (IP address), device information, operating system, browser type and version, and browser country location. This information helps us defend against fraudulent activity or attacks, maintain the security of our Services, and improve and personalize your experience.
We also log data related to how Members and Visitors use our Services, including cookies that may uniquely identify your visit or account. This log data includes details such as what pages of our Site or App you visit and when, how users navigate through the Site, and visit referral URLs. This information allows us to better understand how our Services are being used, helps us make improvements, and enables us to personalize your experience with our Services. (Please refer to the Cookies section below for more information about how we use cookies.)
HOW WE USE AND SHARE THE DATA YOU GIVE US
IN GENERAL
Your privacy is very important to us. Other than as provided for in this Policy, we do not share your Personally Identifiable Information with third parties without your consent. We use the information we collect about you and the information you tell us about yourself for the following general purposes:
To create your FreelanceLocals account and profile
To identify you in connection with your account activity (In some cases, this information may be shared or displayed publicly or only to certain other Members in a full or modified form as described in sections B, C, and D below.)
To provide customer support
To personalize your experience with our Services
To track usage of our Service and run tests to improve our Services
To identify and understand trends in user activity so that we can make improvements to our Services
To ensure the proper operation and security of our Services
Other purposes to deliver and improve our Services for you
WHEN YOU OPEN A FREELANCELOCALS STORE
If you choose to become a Seller on FreelanceLocals, you will have a store page and profile, where you can choose to provide additional details about yourself to your customers. The information you add to your store profile is information that your visitors can see.
The following information is visible to others:
Your Display Name. This will be any name you choose as “Display Name.” Once entered, you cannot update your Display Name from the profile section of your account.
Your location. Some location information may be optional to display and can be adjusted in your store profile.
Your Profile Image. You have the option to upload a photograph, logo, or other image to your Profile.
Other Information. You can choose to provide additional information about your service, your business, your relevant skill sets, and your experience. Any portfolio information you provide is visible to those who visit your profile and can be edited, updated, or removed by you at any time.
Other than as described in this Privacy Policy, we won’t publicly display or disclose Personal Information about you, such as the email address associated with your account, your street address or phone number, without your consent.
Information About Sellers:
The following information about a seller can be viewed by the general public. These include seller display name, description of services they are offering, their packages prices, skill, and short note about the seller. These are all written by the seller.
Private data: These private data can only be viewed by the seller. These include their first & last name, email, phone no, house address, etc. This information was provided by the seller during registration.
Data generated as a result of the seller’s activities on the platform, which includes rating and reviews provided by clients they have worked for, statistics of the number of jobs they have done, etc. All these are made public.
SERVICE PROVIDERS AND PARTNERS
FreelanceLocals engages the services of third-party companies (“Service Providers”) to support and help provide certain features of our Services, such as customer support, data storage and analysis, visitor tracking and user testing, email messaging, advertising, surveys, Site security, and other services. FreelanceLocals shares data with these Service Providers so that they can perform their services, which help deliver our Services more securely, efficiently, and effectively. Service Providers may have access to certain Personal Information in the course of providing their service. Service Providers’ access to your Personal Information is limited to the purpose of providing the services contracted for. Service Providers are not permitted to disclose information to other parties or use your Personal Information for any other purpose.
FreelanceLocals may from time to time share aggregate user data with business partners, Service Providers, or other third parties to identify or share trends, usage statistics, and so on. Sharing data in an aggregate form means that no Personal Information, which would allow the recipient of the data to identify you personally, will be shared.
MERGER OR ACQUISITION
In the event of a merger or an acquisition of FreelanceLocals, we may transfer the data we have collected, including Personal Information, to the purchasing company. In such an event, we will notify you of that change. In addition, any purchasing company would have to adhere to the terms of this Policy, including notifying you before making material changes and giving you the opportunity to opt out.
LEGAL OBLIGATION
Finally, we respect and comply with legal obligations and may release information (including Personal Information and information about your account activities) in cooperation with a law enforcement investigation, in response to a valid legal request such as a court order or legal subpoena, as part of the process outlined by law, or to defend, protect, or exercise our legal rights.
YOUR RIGHTS AND OPTIONS
At FreelanceLocals, it is important to us that you have the ability to make choices about your personal information, so we provide you with options for managing your account and the information you give us.
ACCOUNT INFORMATION
You can view, update, and correct the information you’ve provided about yourself by visiting your profile pages. You can also remove any of the optional information you’ve provided. Information that is required will be indicated as such and can be updated but cannot be removed.
If you do not want to have an account with us anymore, you can close your account at any time. You can find instructions on how to close your account or you can contact us for assistance.
EMAIL PREFERENCES
FreelanceLocals uses your contact information to communicate with you about our services and to provide notifications related to your account or activity. Certain communications related to your account or your activity are required, and you cannot opt out of receiving them. These include, but are not limited to, notifications related to changes that have been made to your login credentials or account details, and legal notifications. Other communications may not be required, such as announcements about our services, newsletters, and messages with information you might be interested in, and other marketing and promotional messages (“Optional Communications”).
OTHER
If you choose to create a public profile or post Communications, any information you post will be visible to other Users and the public. You can edit and update Communications you have posted and information provided in your public profile. You can delete your public profile at any time.
ACCOUNT SECURITY
Access to your FreelanceLocals account is secured by the password you choose. For your security, we store only a hashed version of your password. This means that we do not know your password, and your password is not visible to us when members of our team view your account.
To prevent unauthorized access to your account, choose a password that cannot be easily guessed, and do not share your password with anyone else. Whenever you use a shared computer or other shared device to access your FreelanceLocals account, be sure to log out of your account completely before you leave your workstation, uncheck the “remember me” option at login, and select “no” if the web browser prompts you to save your login credentials. You are responsible for keeping your password confidential and for all activity that occurs under your account, whether or not authorized by you.
You can change or update your password anytime by visiting your profile page. If you forget your password, you can request a reset password link.
COOKIES
Cookies are small pieces of data that are stored on your computer browser. When you visit websites like ours, some information about your visit is stored in cookies, which are used to tailor your experience, surface relevant information, products, and advertisements, and to allow you to pick up where you left off the next time you visit.
By using our Services as a Visitor or Member, you agree to our use of cookies in the following ways, as well as other similar purposes:
Analytics
Marketing
Preserving your preferences
Personalizing your experience
Understanding where our website traffic is coming from
To ensure the security and availability of our Site and our Services
You have the right to decide whether a website can store cookies on your computer. Depending on the internet browser you use, you can view, manage, delete, and disable cookies through your browser preferences. Some features may not work properly if you choose not to allow us to use cookies.
HOSTED CONTENT
The Content uploaded or posted to our Services is made available at the direction of our Members. We are not responsible for the Content, including any disclosures of Personal Information by our Members. If you believe that any Content posted on our Services violates your personal privacy rights, please notify us at frank@freelancelocals.com.
DATA RETENTION
FreelanceLocals will use your information for the reasons detailed in this Policy to deliver our Services to you while your account is active. If you no longer wish to be a Member of our Services, you can close your account with us at any time. If you close your account, your account is placed in an inactive state. We retain a record of your account information and only use your account information to provide sales data to Sellers you have transacted with, to continue to make Resources available to Members who have purchased from you, to comply with a valid legal request or resolve a dispute, or to meet any legal requirements or obligations. We may also continue to include your data as part of ongoing aggregate data and usage analysis. We will no longer send you marketing or other communications about your account or our Services. You can restore your account at any time by logging in with your email or username and your password.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
Both the buyer and the seller agree that all intellectual property rights and database rights, whether registered or unregistered, in the Site, information content on the Site, and all the website design, including, but not limited to, text, graphics, software, photos, video, music, sound, and their selection and arrangement, and all software compilations, underlying source code, and software shall remain at all times vested in us.
Use of such material will only be permitted as expressly authorized by us. Any unauthorized use of the material and content of this website is strictly prohibited, and you agree not to, or facilitate any third party to, copy, reproduce, transmit, publish, display, distribute, commercially exploit, or create derivative works of such material and content without prior consent from us.
Freelancers are responsible for information they explicitly provided about themselves, which we made public. These include their display name, logo, avatar, bio, description of services they offer, achievements, packages, etc.
Freelancers are to ensure they provide contents that reflect their own achievements and do not infringe someone else’s intellectual property. Freelancers bear the sole responsibility for any form of infringement on another’s intellectual property right without such individual's consent.
Where there is any form of infringement claim with evidence, we expect the freelancer to make necessary amendments as soon as possible; else, FreelanceLocals will take necessary action to ensure fairness to all.
CHANGES TO THIS POLICY
From time to time, we have the right to update this Policy without prior notice to you in accordance with the process and rules in our Terms and Conditions.
HOW TO CONTACT US
For any questions you have about this policy or if you need assistance with your account, you can reach us anytime using the following methods:
Submit a question using our Contact Us form
Email us at frank@freelancelocals.com for legal-related matters, general inquiries, and IT/technical support
LIABILITY AND INDEMNITY
You shall protect, defend, indemnify, and hold FreelanceLocals harmless from and against all losses, lost, liabilities, claims, damages, and expenses of every kind and character, as incurred, resulting from or relating to or arising out of:
The inaccuracy, non-fulfillment, or breach of any representation, warranty, covenant, or agreement made by freelancer and client.
Any legal action, including any counterclaim, that has either been settled by the litigants or has proceeded to judgment by a court of competent jurisdiction, in either case to the extent it is based upon alleged facts that, if true, would constitute a breach of any representation, warranty, covenant, or agreement made by freelancer and client.
LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
You agree that FreelanceLocals shall not be liable for any loss or damage whatsoever, which is suffered (including but not limited to indirect or consequential loss) or for any monetary losses of any kind, loss of use, loss of goodwill, loss of expectation, loss of data, or infringement, that may arise in connection, suffered or sustained (even caused by negligence) in connection with the use of this service.
All services are supplied by the freelancer to the client. We make no promises and do not accept any liability, either express or implied, as to the services provided by the freelancer and client, including but not limited to its accuracy, relevance, or quality.
By accepting this Privacy Policy, you agree that:
FreelanceLocals can process your personal data in accordance with all relevant policies as they relate to data privacy laws.