Privacy Policy

Forum for Equity in Malta (“F.E.M.”, “we”) runs this website. This notice describes every kind of personal data the site handles. It is short because the site collects very little: most of it can be read without giving us anything at all.

1. Browsing this site

You can read every public page, the library, events, blog and this notice, without signing in, without being tracked, and without giving us any personal data.

There are no analytics, no advertising, and no third-party trackers or embeds. Fonts and scripts are served from this site rather than from an external network, so simply reading a page does not report your visit to anyone else. We set no cookies at all for ordinary visitors, so there is no cookie banner to click.

Our web server keeps ordinary technical logs (including IP addresses) for a short period so the site can be kept running and secure. These rotate automatically.

2. Suggesting a resource

If you use the suggestion form, we receive the link and any note you write. These are kept as part of our library research.

An email address is optional and only used to follow up on your suggestion. Because it stops being needed once that has run its course, your address is erased automatically 90 days after you send it. The suggestion itself stays; only the personal part is removed.

3. Contacting us

If you use the contact form, we receive your message, the topic you chose, and your name and email address if you give them (both are optional). Only the site's administrators can read these messages. We use your address only to reply to you. Each message is deleted automatically one year after you send it, or sooner if you ask.

If you email us, we hold that correspondence for as long as needed to deal with what you raised. Either way, please do not send us sensitive personal information you would not want held in an ordinary mailbox.

4. Images we publish

Photographs uploaded for the site are re-encoded before publication and their embedded metadata is discarded, including any GPS coordinates the camera recorded. Location data in a photograph is never stored or published.

5. Staff accounts and security records

People who edit this site have accounts holding their name, email address and a password that is stored only in irreversible hashed form. Signing in sets a single cookie, fem_session, which is strictly necessary to keep them signed in and expires after 12 hours.

We keep a security log of sign-ins, failed sign-in attempts, lockouts and account changes, including the email address and IP address involved. This exists so that unauthorised access to the site can be detected and investigated, our legitimate interest in keeping the site and its contributors safe. These records are deleted automatically after 180 days.

6. How long we keep things

• Email address on a suggestion — 90 days, then erased automatically.
• Contact-form messages — one year, then deleted automatically.
• Security log entries — 180 days, then deleted automatically.
• Sign-in cookie — 12 hours.
• Suggested links and notes, published content — kept while they remain useful to the library.

The first three are enforced by a job that runs every day, not by someone remembering to do it.

7. Your rights

Under the GDPR you can ask us for a copy of the personal data we hold about you, ask us to correct it, ask us to erase it, or object to our holding it. Email hello@femalta.com and we will respond within one month.

If you gave us an email address with a suggestion, or sent us a message through the contact form, and would like it removed before its retention period is up, say so and we will erase it. You can also complain to the Office of the Information and Data Protection Commissioner (IDPC) in Malta.

8. Sharing and changes

We do not sell personal data and do not share it with anyone for marketing. Data is shared only with the providers who host this site, and only so far as hosting requires.

If this notice changes materially we will update the date at the top of this page.

9. Contact

Questions about this notice? Email hello@femalta.com.