Muddy Matches App Privacy Policy
Version: 12 May 2023
Introduction
Muddy Matches has been well trusted as the UK and Ireland’s original, online home of country dating and farmer dating for over 17 years now. We fully appreciate just how important your privacy is.
We want you to have the utmost confidence and reassurance in how we protect, and handle, the personal information we gather whilst you date with us.
This Privacy Policy details the types of personal information we may collect across our services. It explains how we take our responsibility to store and manage that data seriously, with your wellbeing as our top priority. It outlines how we use it, your options and choices, and the endeavours we display to respect your privacy.
We have comprehensively reviewed this Privacy Policy so as to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation ("GDPR"), which took effect on 25th May 2018.
Who we are
The Muddy Matches smartphone application for iOS and android, and website (our “services”) are owned and operated by Muddy Matches Limited (also referred to in this policy as “we”, “us” or “our”). We are incorporated in England and Wales under company number 05822840.Links to this Privacy Policy are posted on all appropriate services we own and operate.
Muddy Matches Limited is the "data controller" of personal information collected and processed through our services, as defined by the GDPR. Our registered office address is: Manor Close, Podington, Wellingborough, Northants NN29 7HP.
We are registered with the Information Commissioner's Office ("ICO") under the Data Protection Act 1998 under number Z9484159.
Our purpose for processing your personal data
Our aim always is to introduce you to like-minded people, and to enable like-minded people to find you on our services in a safe, enjoyable manner. The information you provide us during the registration process, and across our services, helps us to help you.
It enables us to:
- Help connect you with other users, and ensure your profile successfully displays to others.
- Assist you in providing quality customer support that responds to any queries you may have once you become a Registered Member.
- Protect our services, and our Users, from harm and non genuine users through constant moderation and vetting of information.
- Communicate with you about features, functions and promotions that are likely to enhance the service you enjoy.
- Constantly improve the performance, and effectiveness, of features and functions within our services.
- Quickly diagnose and resolve technical issues that may temporarily affect our services from time to time.
- Comply with legal requirements, especially with regard transactions made, concerns/complaints raised, and the prevention of online fraud
This is all done for your benefit.
Our lawful basis for collecting and processing your personal data.
Muddy Matches collects and processes personal data when you choose to:
- Install, and access, the Muddy Matches country dating app.
- Purchase a paid subscription through the app
- Visit our website (desktop and mobile) as both a Member and/or as a Non Member.
- Make contact with other members and/or our customer care team.
We process the information, identifiable to a User and profile ID, with the following legitimate reasons in mind:
Contract
Most of the personal information we process is to successfully deliver our side of the service agreement you enter into when you join Muddy Matches seeking meaningful connections. Please see our Terms and Conditions for more information.
Consent
For some of the more ‘special’ or ‘sensitive’ personal information that you provide to us – such as your gender, sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity and precise geo-location (app specific) - we require your explicit consent. This can be withdrawn at any time by cancelling your membership with us. It is not possible to use our services once this consent, or parts thereof, has been withdrawn.
Legitimate interests
Sometimes, we may wish to contact you for other purposes that may enhance your experience as a User for example to inform you of promotions, and service updates that may be of interest to you. We believe we have a legitimate interest in doing this, but you may always choose to opt out from this specific type of communication.
You can manage your contact preferences at any time.
The information we collect about you
While you don't need to sign up to run a basic website search*, you are required to register if you wish to unlock more of the features and functions on our services.
This includes:
- Publishing, and maintaining a Profile.
- Accessing in depth search results and profiles.
- Managing your account, and communication preferences.
- Making contact with other Members.
- Adjusting search filters
- Raise concern reports or report inappropriate conduct.
- Benefit from Promotions and Special Offers
*Sign up is required on our app in order to run a basic website search.
Users Downloading/Installing our mobile application
When downloading and installing our mobile application, Muddy Matches has no responsibility or legitimate control over the collection, processing and use of personal data relating to your app store account credentials. The app store operator will be sole data controller of this information.
Any correspondence with your chosen app store is not relayed, or transferred to Muddy Matches, unless you authorise us to request such information (e.g refund request fulfilment, transaction IDs, concern reports)
Data control ownership transfers to Muddy Matches when the User accesses the app’s member registration, or sign in, processes.
Registered Member
When you register as a Member (free membership) on our app, we require you to provide a certain amount of information identifiable to an individual person, including, but not limited to:
- First Name
- Surname
- Email address
- Mobile telephone number
- Gender identity
- Sexual orientation
- Date of birth
- Login credential preferences (e.g Password)
Once registered, you are able to review and manage selected elements of this information, on the app.
You will be asked to confirm that you have read and agree to the Muddy Matches Terms and Conditions and this Privacy Policy to confirm your consent. As a security measure, we may access your personal information to send notifications, via in-app, email or sms to verify, your registration with us, and authenticate the personal informative submitted.
Member with a Published Profile
Once registered, you will be invited to publish a Profile, where you will be asked to provide additional personal information and data, including:
Location
Your postcode is required to enable search by location. It is not published to your public profile. Your location, and ‘distance from’ (app only) will be displayed on your profile.
Background and Lifestyle
On some of our services, we may ask for additional information about your background and lifestyle. This includes questions about your religion (if any) ethnicity, occupation, habits, marital situation, interests and hobbies.
Whilst valued by other Registered Members, this is not compulsory within the profile vetting process and it at your discretion.
Physical Characteristics
We may ask for other basic information about your appearance, such as height, health, hair/eye colour, body type. This is not compulsory within the profile vetting process but does feature in advanced search (website only), and will be displayed publicly when disclosed (website only).
Photography
You will be invited to upload photos. Uploading a main photo that adheres to our photography standards is a mandatory requirement of registration. We reserve the right to reject, edit, or crop photos in line with our photography standards. From time to time, we may use our discretion, without prior notification, to upgrade any additional photos you upload and select one which may be more fitting as a main profile image.
Free text (bio description)
We ask you to tell us about yourself in your own words. We reserve the right to edit this before publication, but, should you choose to voluntarily disclose further sensitive information about yourself, this at your own risk. For your safety, we will remove any references made to full address, social media credentials, contact details, workplace and reference to illegal or deemed anti-social activity.
Clicking "Finish" signifies that you agree that we may publish your Profile once we have reviewed and vetted it, including all the information you have given us.
Paid Subscriber (and auto renewals)
If you wish to exchange messages with other Members you are required to become a Subscriber.
All in app payments are processed, on a user agreement with your app store operator. This is independent of Muddy Matches. Muddy Matches will have partial visibility, and 'on request only' access to the transaction/billing information for verification purposes, but will not collect, process or store payment details or personal app store credentials.
Muddy Matches automatically collect and store device specific information.
Other information we may collect
Each time you use our services, we will automatically log your IP address (a unique address for your computer or other access device) and device type. We also collect usage data such as login date and time, referral URLs, and any error messages triggered.
When installing, or accessing the Muddy Matches app, we will collect device specific data, including, but not limited to:
- Operating system
- Browser type
- Service provider
- Device ID (UDID, IDFV)
We use this data to help diagnose any technical problems, and to administer the site. It will identify you and the choices you have made. It may also be used to gather broad demographic information, and usage data.
How we use, and share, your personal data
Not all the information you give us will be published in your Profile.
Of the data collected at point of registration, only your chosen name, age, gender, location and sexual orientation will later appear in your public Profile, alongside photos and free text uploaded. Other information is used for account management purposes and to provide you with the best possible level of service.
Optional information provided as part of the advanced profile build will be displayed on the website only. Your password details will be encrypted in our database.
Some bits, such as your surname, postcode, mobile phone number and email address, are needed so that we can make contact with you when necessary regarding our service (including approving your Profile and photograph(s), communicating with you regarding your membership, advising you that you have received a message from another Member and responding to queries or complaints); for administration and accounting; and to help ensure that the content and services that we offer are tailored to your needs and interests.
Your personal information is also used to operate a Search Member directory through which other Members can contact you. If you do not wish to be included in this directory, you may at any time choose to either "hide" your Profile or terminate your membership within the app and have your details permanently deleted.
You can permanently delete your account within the app.
Tap here to permanently delete your account.
By completing our registration process, you are agreeing for us to process your personal information to the extent necessary to enable us to provide you with the level of service you have chosen, and to operate our services for the purposes for which they are reasonably intended.
As part of this, you will also be consenting to us processing data of a more sensitive personal nature, for example, your sexual preferences, and, if applicable, your ethnicity and religious beliefs. Information of this nature is given greater protection in the GDPR.
How we will contact you
Our usual methods of communication will be by email, sms or in-app notifications. Any such correspondence will be stored on file with access limited to our authorised staff members.
Any contact you have with our customer care team is also stored and recorded against your Profile ID. This includes all information relating to the resolution of your query, complaints, concern reports, feedback, cancellation notes or positive engagement.
Users can manage their communication preferences on the website.
In-app push notifications
To make best use of the Muddy Matches smartphone app, you may receive ‘push notifications’ from Muddy Matches, even when you are not currently using the app. These messages are designed to enhance your app experience, including maintenance information, profile advice or usage updates.
Messages may contain promotional information deemed to be of legitimate interest to you.
You can stop receiving push notifications by adjusting the configuration settings on your mobile device.
Disclosure of your personal information to third parties
We may share your personal information with our agents, representatives, contractors and service providers in order to operate our services and provide you with a service (including, for example, remote data backup of your personal information). Our relationships with our suppliers are governed by contracts which restrict what they can do with Member information.
We may from time to time receive requests for information about Members on our services, from the police and other authorities (such as, Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, social services and other local and central government bodies).
We will always consider such requests carefully, recognising that we have an obligation not to pass on your information without a lawful justification. Where appropriate, we may ask the authority in question to seek a court order.
How we keep your personal information safe
We do our utmost to ensure the security of our systems and protect your personal information.
Security procedures include the use of firewall protection, two-stage authentication, verification codes, backup measures, permanent monitoring of error reports, limiting access to data to relevant personnel only and password protecting all machinery holding personal data.
Furthermore, Members' passwords are stored one-way encrypted in our database, we secure access to all transactional areas of our services using ‘https' technology and all sensitive data is secured by SSL encryption.
We regularly monitor our system for possible vulnerabilities and attacks, and we carry out penetration testing to identify ways to further strengthen security. Internet security, however, is a complex topic and no system can be said to be 100% secure. In the unlikely event of a security breach, we would endeavour to react as quickly as possible to remedy the problem, and will notify you if there is a breach of your personal data that might expose you to serious risk.
Updating your personal information
You can freely update your personal information on the app, using the home screen (top left) and editing your account.
If your personal information becomes inaccurate, please do update it. It is not possible to manage your preferences or, delete your account and/or profile directly on the app. However all registered app users are granted website access for this purpose.
Automated collection of information
We use Google Analytics to gain a better understanding of our users' behaviour and preferences. For further information about how this works, please see "How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services" at https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites?hl=en-GB&gl=uk
In particular, we have enabled Google Analytics Advertising Features, specifically Google Analytics Demographic and Interest Reporting. Demographics reports will provide us with age, gender and household income data for users of our services, and Interest reports will provide us with hobbies and interests data.
For further information about how this works, please see "About Advertising Features" at https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/3450482?hl=en
Both tools involve the use of "cookies". For further information on this, please refer to our Cookie Policy.
You may opt out of the automated collection of information by Google Analytics by visiting https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/.
We are unable to perform the opt-outs on your behalf.
Is your personal information transferred outside the UK or EEA
We're based in the UK but sometimes your personal information may be transferred to a "third country" outside the European Economic Area. Our site is "hosted" by a mainstream web hosting service provider and it is common practice for information, including image storage, to be hosted in multiple locations.
We acknowledge other territories may have different laws about data processing. Our dealings with them are governed by approved contractual agreements, and we are satisfied that suitable safeguards are in place.
The European Commission has published a list of countries which have adequate data protection rules, which can be found here: https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/law-topic/data-protection/data-transfers-outside-eu/adequacy-protection-personal-data-non-eu-countries_en
How long do we hold your personal information for
We will store your personal information for as long as you are a Member for legitimate business purposes. On cancellation of your membership you will cease to be a Member and we will keep all your personal information on our records for up to a period of three years to enable us to respond to any subsequent queries or concern reports that may arise.
At the end of that retention period, your data will either be deleted completely or anonymised, for example by aggregation with other data so that it can be used in a non-identifiable way for statistical analysis and business planning.
If you uninstall the Muddy Matches country dating app from your device without first cancelling your membership, this will not automatically delete the personal information provided, or the usage data we process and handle.
You can permanently delete your account within the app. Tap here to permanently delete your account.
Your rights under the GDPR
If you would like to exercise any of the following rights, please write to us at info@muddymatches.co.uk.
The right to access personal data
You may ask us to confirm whether we are processing any personal data concerning you, and, if so, to give you access to that data and certain basic information.
The right to rectification
If you believe that any information we hold about you is inaccurate or incomplete, please tell us, and we will rectify it as soon as we can.
The right to erasure ("the right to be forgotten")
You may request the deletion or removal of personal data where there is no longer a good reason for them to be processed.
The right to restriction of processing
You have the right to block the processing of personal data in certain circumstances. If so, we will be allowed to store the data but not further process it.
The right to data portability
This allows you to obtain and reuse your personal data for your own purposes across different services. You can ask to receive the personal data which you have provided to us, in a commonly-used and machine-readable format. You also have the right to ask us to transmit the data to another controller directly.
The right to withdraw consent
You have the right to withdraw consent at any time by cancelling your membership.
The right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority
The Information Commissioner's Office is the data protection authority for the United Kingdom, and you have the right to complain to them at any point.
You can contact them by calling 0303 123 1113 or visit www.ico.org.uk/concerns (opens in a new window; please note we can't be responsible for the content of external websites).
If you are based outside the UK, you have the right to lodge your complaint with the relevant data protection regulator in your country of residence.
Cookies
Like most websites and apps, we store information about you in a 'cookie', which is a small file that is sent from our web server to your device. We use cookies to keep track of things such as your chosen set up of the website or app, your login or registration identification, you login time and any of your preferences as a User. For more information about the ways we use cookies, consult our cookies policy.
Whilst using our services, tracking technologies (such as Apple IDFA, DoubleClick or Google Advertising ID) may be stored on your device. This is independent of Muddy Matches, and is not part of our data processing. You reserve the right to reject this, and in such instance it will not affect your rights whilst using our services, nor performance of Muddy Matches services.
Third party sites
Our services may contain links to third party websites, but we are not responsible for the privacy policies of these sites, or for the way in which information about their users is treated. This Privacy Policy only applies to information collected by services owned and managed by Muddy Matches, and your use of third party websites is subject to privacy policies posted on those websites.
Your responsibility
Unless advised otherwise, our services make your Profile available to its Users. Please consider that any information that is disclosed in these areas becomes public information and you should exercise caution when deciding to disclose your personal information.
It is your responsibility to maintain the personal information we store about you, and update us of any changes.
Children’s Privacy (age appropriateness)
We require that all Users are aged 18 or older in order to access our services.
Nowhere on our services do we knowingly collect personal information from persons under 18 years of age. Nor do we knowingly market or promote our services to persons aged under 18 years of age.
Any profiles identified as representing Users aged under 18 will be rejected without exception. We reserve the right to request age verification, where deemed required.
If you suspect that a User is under 18 years of age, please use the REPORT THIS PROFILE option on app and website to alert customer care.
Personnel correspondence
If you choose to engage in message exchange with other members through the messaging service on our services, we will store this information.
We strictly respect your privacy and any message sent is private correspondence between you and the sender/recipient.
We do, however, reserve the right to monitor your correspondence for any reason including:
- to conform or comply with applicable laws;
- to protect and defend our rights or property;
- to protect the personal safety of other Users or the public.
Messages with other members, and communication with our customer care team is not end-to-end encrypted. The sending of contact details, social media credentials or other personal information not collected by Muddy Matches is at the Users risk, and does not form part of this Privacy Policy.
Changes to our Privacy Policy
As our services and data processes evolve, it is likely that we will need to update this Privacy Policy from time to time to ensure it remains up-to-date.
We will notify you of any significant changes, by email, in-app, and by posting a notice on the website, and you are welcome to check back whenever you wish.
Each time that you use our services, or provide us with information, by doing so you are accepting the practices described in this Privacy Policy at that time.
Further Questions?
We hope this Privacy Policy has been helpful in explaining the way we handle your personal data and your rights to control it.
If you have any further questions, you can contact us in any of the following ways:
By email: info@muddymatches.co.uk
By post: Muddy Matches Limited, Paddock View, Grange Farm, Farndish, Wellingborough, Northants NN29 7HJ.
