Privacy policy
This policy covers the personal information we collect when you register for a soil test, send us samples, or use the CoreLog app. We handle personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles.
On this page
What we collect
To run a soil test we collect:
- About you. Your name, business name, email address and phone number.
- About your property. The property address or location, the paddocks you nominate, your local government area and the soil type recorded for those paddocks.
- About each sample. The location the sample was taken from, recorded in the CoreLog app, along with the date, the paddock it belongs to and any notes you add.
- A photograph of each paddock, taken in the CoreLog app before you sample it, so whoever writes your report can see what the paddock looks like. The app makes the photo smaller on your phone and removes the location the camera stores inside it before sending it, so the only location we hold for a sample is the one the app records on purpose.
- Your work as you go. While you sample, the CoreLog app sends what you have recorded so far to us, so it is not lost if your phone is lost, broken or cleared. That copy is deleted when you send the kit, and a copy that is never sent is deleted after 90 days.
- The sample itself, and the DNA sequence data and laboratory results generated from it.
We do not collect payment card details. Where a test is paid for, payment is handled by our payment provider and we receive only a confirmation that payment succeeded.
Why we collect it
- To check whether your paddocks are eligible for a funded place.
- To post you a sampling kit, or to arrange for a MADE field officer to collect samples on your property.
- To match each sample to the right paddock, run the analysis and write your report.
- To send you the report and answer questions about it.
- To meet the reporting, record-keeping and audit obligations that come with government funding.
We do not use your information for anything else without asking you first.
Who we share it with
We share your information only where we need to, and only with:
- MADE (Mollongghip & District Enterprises Pty Ltd), who lead the project, for program administration, sample collection and grant reporting.
- The accredited laboratory that runs the mineral panel, where one is run on your samples.
- Australia Post, to send your kit and return your samples.
- The Commonwealth of Australia, which under the funding agreements receives the project results and holds a permanent royalty-free licence to use and publish them, including under a Creative Commons Attribution licence. See program terms, section 6.
Your farm is not named in what goes to the Commonwealth
Before results go to the Commonwealth or into the national soil database, we remove the identifying details: your name, your business name, your contact details, your farm and paddock names, and the precise location the sample was taken from. What goes on is the soil result with its soil type and general region.
Using your data in the CoreLog app is opt-in
Beyond your own report and the program obligations above, we ask before using your results for anything else, such as improving what the CoreLog app shows you and other farmers. You can decline and still receive your report and keep your funded place, and you can change your mind later in the app.
We do not sell your information, and we do not give it to anyone for marketing.
Overseas disclosure
Your samples are sequenced in Australia and your results are held in Australia. The laboratory work, the analysis and the reports do not leave the country.
Some of the services we use to run the business operate internationally. The providers, and where they may handle information, are:
- Cloudflare, a United States company, hosts and delivers this website and the CoreLog app across a global network. Cloudflare handles the technical records involved in serving a page, including IP addresses, and may process them at locations outside Australia. The CoreLog records are also stored with Cloudflare: your registration details, the property address, the paddock outlines and sample locations, your answers in the app, the work the app saves while you sample, and the paddock photographs. We have placed that storage in Cloudflare’s Oceania region, but Cloudflare does not guarantee that data in that region stays in Australia. Only named SoilBiome staff can open the photographs, and they are never included in the de-identified data used for research.
- Microsoft, a United States company, provides our email through Microsoft 365 Exchange Online. Our mailboxes sit in Microsoft’s Australian region, served from its Sydney and Melbourne data centres, so the email you send us is stored in Australia.
- GoDaddy, a United States company, sells and administers our Microsoft 365 subscription and our domain.
- Resend, a United States company, sends the automatic emails from this website and the CoreLog app, such as the confirmation you receive after you register and the message that reaches us when you ask for a kit. What is in that email passes through Resend: your name and email address, the town and state you gave us, and the paddock names you chose. Our sending is set to Resend’s Tokyo region, so those emails leave from Japan. Resend is not given your soil results.
- Mailchimp (Intuit), a United States company, runs our email newsletter. Only people who tick the newsletter box are added, and only a name and an email address go across. You can unsubscribe from any newsletter we send. Declining costs you nothing: your place and your report are unaffected.
Support, administration and backup work by those providers may involve access from the United States and from other countries in which they operate.
Where we disclose personal information to an overseas recipient we comply with Australian Privacy Principle 8, which requires us to take reasonable steps to ensure the recipient handles it consistently with the Australian Privacy Principles.
How we keep it secure
We take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your information from misuse, interference, loss and unauthorised access, modification or disclosure. Access is limited to the people who need it to do the work.
If a data breach affects your information we will act promptly, tell MADE, and notify you and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner where the law requires it.
How long we keep it
We keep records relating to the project for at least seven years after the services under the funding agreement are completed, because the grant agreement requires it, and longer where the Commonwealth requires it.
Sequence data and soil results are kept beyond that so you can compare a later test against your own earlier baseline. If you would rather we did not, ask us and we will tell you what we can delete and what we are required to keep.
Getting at your information, and correcting it
You can ask us for a copy of the personal information we hold about you, and ask us to correct it if it is wrong or out of date. Email orderkit@soilbiome.ai.
We will respond within a reasonable period. If we cannot give you access, or will not make a correction, we will tell you why in writing.
If you are unhappy with how we handled your information
Tell us first. Email orderkit@soilbiome.ai with the details and we will look into it and write back to you.
If you are not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner at oaic.gov.au.
Changes to this policy
If we change how we handle your information we will update this page and change the date at the top. Where a change materially affects you we will tell you directly.
Related
What a funded place covers, how places are allocated and what happens to your soil results is set out in the program terms.