Effective Date: 1st January 2025
Welcome to climbing-history.org (the "Website"). Our mission is to create and maintain a comprehensive, freely accessible historical archive of mountaineering and climbing achievements from around the world. We are committed to operating transparently and protecting personal data in accordance with applicable laws.
This Privacy Policy explains what personal data we process, why we process it, your rights regarding your data, and how we keep it secure.
For the purposes of data protection law, the data controller for the personal data processed through this Website is:
climbing-history.orgThe data controller is the organization responsible for deciding how and why personal data is used.
Our primary activity is to collect information about climbers and their ascents from publicly available sources to build a historical record.
The categories of personal data we process for our archive include:
The purpose of processing this data is solely for creating and maintaining a permanent, public archive for historical, research, and journalistic purposes, in the public interest.
Under the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), we must have a valid legal reason, known as a 'lawful basis', to process personal data.
Our lawful basis for processing the personal data in our archive is Legitimate Interests.
This means we are processing the data to pursue our legitimate interest in operating a historical archive, which we believe is a valuable resource for the public, researchers, and the climbing community. We have carefully balanced this interest against the rights and freedoms of the individuals whose data we process and have concluded that our activities are reasonable, expected, and do not cause unwarranted harm. We have documented this assessment in a formal Legitimate Interests Assessment.
Data protection law in the United Kingdom provides special recognition for the processing of personal data for journalistic, academic, and historical research purposes to balance the right to data protection with the right to freedom of expression and information.
Our work in creating and publishing a historical archive falls under these "special purposes". This legal status acknowledges the significant public interest in our mission and allows us to process data for the archive in a way that might differ from a standard commercial business.
When you visit our Website, we automatically collect a limited amount of technical information to ensure the site functions correctly and securely, and to understand how visitors use our site so we can improve it. This may include:
We apply different retention periods for different types of data, in line with the 'storage limitation' principle of data protection law.
We take the security of personal data seriously. We have implemented appropriate technical and organizational measures to protect the data we hold against accidental loss, unauthorized access, or unlawful processing. These measures include:
climbing-history.org is based in the United Kingdom. The personal data we process is stored on secure servers which may be located outside of the UK.
Under data protection law, you have certain rights over your personal data. The table below explains these rights and how you can exercise them. Please note that some of these rights are not absolute and may be limited, particularly where they conflict with our legal obligations or our mission to maintain a public historical archive for journalistic and research purposes.
| Your Right | What This Means | How to Exercise It |
|---|---|---|
| The Right of Access | You have the right to ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you. | Please email us at dpo@climbing-history.org with the subject line "Data Subject Access Request". |
| The Right to Rectification | You have the right to ask us to correct any information you believe is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask us to complete information you believe is incomplete. | We are committed to accuracy. Please email us at dpo@climbing-history.org with details of the required correction. |
| The Right to Erasure | You have the right to ask us to erase your personal data in certain circumstances. This right is not absolute. We may be legally entitled to refuse a request if deleting the data is incompatible with our purpose of maintaining a permanent public historical archive. | Please email us at dpo@climbing-history.org with your request. We will consider each request on a case-by-case basis. |
| The Right to Restrict Processing | You have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your data in certain circumstances, for example, while we are verifying its accuracy. | Please email us at dpo@climbing-history.org with your request. |
| The Right to Object to Processing | You have the right to object to our processing of your data where it is based on our legitimate interests. This right is not absolute. We may continue to process the data if we can demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds that override your interests, such as the public interest in our historical archive. | Please email us at dpo@climbing-history.org with your objection. We will consider each request on a case-by-case basis. |
| The Right to Data Portability | This right allows you to receive your personal data in a structured, machine-readable format. It only applies to information you have provided to us. | This right is unlikely to apply to the data in our archive, as it is collected from public sources, not provided by you. |
To exercise any of these rights, we may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity.
The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), provides specific rights to residents of California.
climbing-history.org is not currently subject to the CCPA/CPRA as we do not meet the legal thresholds for applicability (e.g., related to annual revenue or the volume of data processed).
However, we are committed to transparency. We do not "sell" or "share" your personal information as those terms are defined under the CCPA/CPRA. You can find more information about our data practices in this Privacy Policy.
Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information: climbing-history.org does not sell or share personal information with third parties for monetary or other valuable consideration or for cross-context behavioral advertising.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or wish to exercise any of your rights, please contact us at:
dpo@climbing-history.orgYou also have the right to lodge a complaint with the data protection regulator. As we are based in the UK, our supervisory authority is the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).
Information Commissioner's OfficeWe may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will post any changes on this page and indicate the new effective date at the top of the policy. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.