Privacy Policy
Free the Bears Ltd. – ABN 23 763 253 031 (referred to as “we”, “us” and “our”) will endeavour to handle your personal information in accordance with our Privacy Policy and the Australian Privacy Principles.
Who we are and what we do
· Free the Bears is a registered charity under the Australian Charities & Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC), and under the Charity Commission for England and Wales, working to protect threatened bears in Asia.
· Free the Bears operates in Australia, United Kingdom, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. Free the Bears is headquartered in Perth, Australia.
What is personal information?
“Personal information” means any information or opinion, whether true or not, and whether recorded in a material form or not, about an identified individual or an individual who is reasonably identifiable. In general terms, this includes information or an opinion that personally identifies you either directly (e.g. your name) or indirectly.
What personal information do we collect?
The personal information we collect about you depends on the nature of your dealings with us or what you choose to share with us.
The personal information we collect about you may include:
- Your name, postal address, telephone number and/or email address, along with your preferences as to when and how we should contact you in the future.
- Financial information which you give to us, such as credit card details.
- Information you enter on our website forms.
- Records of your donation history and correspondence and campaign actions taken with us.
- Images, photographs or videos if you take part in an event with us.
- Details of the pages you visit on our website, including technical information such as the IP address and location you use to access the website, your browser type and version.
- Any other details in which you give us including your reasons for supporting us.
We might also obtain personal data about individuals who may be interested in giving gifts to organisations like ours. In these limited cases only, in addition to information you give us directly, we may also collect information about you from publicly available sources.
Free the Bears does not generally collect sensitive information about you (e.g. information or opinion about your racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, political association, religious or philosophical beliefs, membership of a trade union or other professional body, sexual orientation or practices, criminal record, health information, genetic information, biometric information or biometric templates). If we need to record or hold your sensitive information, we will do so only with your consent or as otherwise required or authorised by law, and we will take appropriate measures to protect the security of this information.
You do not have to provide us with your personal information. Where possible, we will give you the option to interact with us anonymously or by using a pseudonym. However, if you choose to deal with us in this way or choose not to provide us with your personal information, we may not be able to provide you with our services or otherwise interact with you.
Free the Bears does not knowingly collect personal information directly from children without appropriate parental or guardian consent.
How do we collect personal information?
We collect your personal information directly from you when you:
- Become or express an interest in becoming, a financial supporter of Free the Bears by making a donation, purchasing a virtual gift or other product from our store, setting up a symbolic adoption or regular gift, making a bequest or pledging to leave us a gift in your Will.
- Become or express an interest in becoming, a non-financial supporter of Free the Bears by registering to attend an event, registering to volunteer with us, enter information on a form hosted by a third party platform, for example on Facebook or Instagram.
- Subscribing to our e-newsletters, requesting information or otherwise contacting us.
- Signing an advocacy petition or becoming involved with one of our campaigns.
- Participating in or responding to any survey we conduct.
- Visiting any of our websites, mobile apps or social media pages contributing or providing personal information, including by making comments on our message boards or discussion forums.
- Applying for a job or consultancy with us.
- Contacting us or interacting with us in any other way than as stated above.
We may also collect personal information through trusted third-party service providers that support our fundraising, donation processing, merchandise sales, event registrations and other activities. Information collected through these platforms is managed in accordance with this Privacy Policy, together with the privacy policies of the relevant service providers.
Collecting personal information from third parties
We may also collect your personal information from third parties or through publicly available sources, for example:
- When you disclose personal information on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok or Pinterest.
- Newspaper articles.
- Sources that provide market research data, geo-demographic information, measures of affluence and similar information.
We collect this information to better understand the interests and motivations of our supporters so that we can deliver more relevant communications and engagement opportunities.
How do we use your personal information?
We use personal information for many purposes in connection with our functions and activities, including the following purposes:
- Providing you with the services, products or information you have purchased or requested.
- Keeping you up to date with the work you are supporting and the latest conservation news and sending you materials, including on fundraising, campaigning and events.
- Keeping a record of your relationship with us.
- Administering your donation(s).
- Asking for financial and non-financial support.
- Managing your communication preferences, including marketing preferences.
- Understanding how we can improve our programs, services, products or information.
- Carrying out our obligations arising from any contracts entered into by you and us.
- Sending you tailored communications and displaying relevant adverts we think will be of interest to you.
- In limited circumstances, analysing the personal information we collect about you and using publicly available information to better understand your interests and identify opportunities to provide more relevant communications and engagement.
We do not sell, rent or trade your personal information to third parties for their own marketing purposes.
We will only share your personal information where necessary to deliver our services, comply with legal obligations, or support our charitable activities in accordance with this Privacy Policy.
Payment processing
When you make a donation or purchase a product through our website, your payment is processed by trusted third-party payment service providers. These providers are responsible for securely processing payment transactions in accordance with applicable security and privacy standards.
Free the Bears does not store your full credit card or debit card details on its own systems. We only receive the information necessary to confirm your payment, process your donation or purchase, issue receipts and communicate with you regarding your transaction.
Depending on the method you choose to donate or purchase, your personal information may be shared with trusted payment and fundraising platform providers acting on our behalf. These providers are only authorised to use your information for the purpose of processing your transaction and supporting the services they provide to Free the Bears.
For more information about how our payment service providers handle your personal information, please refer to their respective privacy policies.
Disclosure of personal information to third parties
We may disclose your personal information to third parties in circumstances where you would reasonably expect us to disclose your information.
For example, we may disclose your personal information to:
- our third party service providers (for example, our IT providers and payment processing providers);
- our marketing providers;
- our professional services advisors.
In these cases, we ensure that we have a contract with the provider and as part of that agreement the provider agrees to respect the security of your personal information and to treat it in accordance with the law. We only permit providers to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.
We may also be required to disclose your personal information to government bodies or in connection with legal proceedings. In these circumstances, we will only disclose your personal information to the extent it is required by law.
We may disclose your personal information to third parties for the purposes of advertising, including online behavioural advertising, website personalisation, and to provide targeted or retargeted advertising content to you (including through third party websites).
Transfer of personal information overseas
Free the Bears operates sanctuaries across Southeast Asia and is a registered charity in both Australia and the United Kingdom. In some circumstances, we may need to disclose personal information to another Free the Bears office or authorised service provider located overseas, and will ensure we comply with any relevant international laws.
Where we disclose your personal information overseas, we will take reasonable steps to ensure that data security and appropriate privacy practices are maintained.
How do we protect your personal information?
Free the Bears recognises the importance of protecting personal information and seeks to handle it responsibly throughout its collection, use, storage and disclosure.
Free the Bears seeks to take appropriate steps to ensure that the personal information that we hold about you is kept confidential and secure, including by:
- implementing appropriate measures to reduce the risk of misuse, interference, loss, unauthorised access, modification or disclosure;
- restricting access to personal information to authorised personnel and reputable third-party service providers who require it to carry out their responsibilities;
- using reputable third-party providers, including payment processing, fundraising and customer relationship management platforms, that maintain appropriate security measures for the services they provide;
- maintaining administrative and operational practices designed to support the secure handling of personal information;
- using encrypted online forms and secure payment platforms when collecting personal or financial information through our website; and
- periodically reviewing our privacy practices and procedures.
Online Activity
Cookies
Our website uses cookies and similar technologies to enhance your browsing experience and help us understand how visitors use our website. Cookies are small text files stored on your device that enable certain website features and improve functionality.
We do not use cookies to identify you, just to improve your experience on our website(s). If you do not wish to use the cookies, you can amend the settings on your internet browser so it will not automatically download cookies. However, if you remove or block cookies on your computer, please be aware that your browsing experience and our website’s functionality may be affected.
Where applicable, we may also use trusted third-party analytics services to help us understand website usage and improve our communications and fundraising activities. These providers may collect information about your interactions with our website in accordance with their own privacy policies.
Direct marketing
We may send you direct marketing communications and information about our work, opportunities, or events that we consider may be of interest to you if you have requested or consented to receive such communications. These communications may be sent in various forms, including mail, SMS and email, in accordance with applicable marketing laws, such as the Australian Spam Act 2003 (Cth). If you indicate a preference for a method of communication, we will endeavour to use that method whenever practical to do so.
You may opt-out of receiving marketing communications from us at any time by following the instructions to “unsubscribe'' set out in the relevant communication and/or contacting us using the details set out in the “How to contact us” section below.
Retention of Personal Information
Free the Bears seeks to retain personal information only for as long as it is reasonably required to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, to comply with legal or regulatory obligations, or for other legitimate operational purposes.
When personal information is no longer required, Free the Bears will seek to securely delete, destroy or de-identify that information where appropriate and practicable, subject to any legal or operational requirements.
How to access and correct your personal information
We will endeavour to keep your personal information accurate, complete and up to date.
If you wish to make a request to access and / or correct the personal information we hold about you, you can make a request by contacting us using the details set out in the “How to contact us” section below. You can also request for us to delete your personal information and we will endeavour to do so unless we are required to retain your personal information to comply with applicable laws, for example record-keeping obligations.
Links to third party sites
Free the Bears website(s) may contain links to websites operated by third parties. If you access a third party website through our website(s), personal information may be collected by that third party website.
We make no representations or warranties in relation to the privacy practices of any third party provider or website and we are not responsible for the privacy policies or the content of any third party provider or website. Third party providers / websites are responsible for informing you about their own privacy practices and we encourage you to read their privacy policies.
Complaints
We are committed to working with you to obtain a fair resolution of any complaint or any concern you might have about privacy and your personal data processed by us.
You can exercise your rights and raise your complaint with us directly and we will respond to resolve your complaint without undue delay.
In this case, please contact us at the E-mail: contact@freethebears.org
It will not always be possible to resolve a complaint to everyone’s satisfaction. If you are not satisfied with Free the Bears response to a complaint, you have the right to contact the Office of Australian Information Commissioner to lodge a complaint.
Changes to this Privacy Policy
This policy was last updated 14 July 2026.
We reserve the right to amend or update this Privacy Policy from time to time.
Any changes to this Privacy Policy will become effective when the revised Privacy Policy is published on this webpage. You may wish to check this policy from time to time to see our latest version.
How to contact us
Any time you’d like us to change the way we contact you, please email us at contact@freethebears.org, or follow the opt-out links on any marketing message sent to you.
If you have any questions, complaints or requests about this Privacy Policy, please contact us using the contact details below:
Email: contact@freethebears.org
Post: PO Box 1393, Osborne Park DC, Western Australia 6916, Australia
Call: +61 (08) 9244 1096
