Privacy Policy

Lawyers for the Arts South Africa NPC (“LASA”, “we”, “us”) is a non-profit company that advances the rights of South Africa’s creative community through legal education, advocacy, partnerships and access to legal support. For the purposes of the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (“POPIA”), LASA is the responsible party for personal information processed through this website.

Questions, requests and complaints about privacy can be sent to our Information Officer at privacy@lawyersforthearts.org.za.

This policy explains how we collect, use, share, protect and keep personal information when you visit https://lawyersforthearts.org.za, submit an enquiry or contact form, apply for legal support, register for or attend our events, or use our staff platform. It applies to personal information of natural persons and, where POPIA applies, juristic persons.

We only collect information that is adequate, relevant and not excessive for the purpose for which it is collected. This may include:

• Contact details: your name, email address, phone number, province or city, and organisation.
• Creative and enquiry details: your discipline or creative field, and the description of your legal question, matter or request, including any information you choose to share in it.
• Partnership and general correspondence: messages you send us by email or through our contact form, and our replies.
• Staff account information: name, email address, login and two-factor authentication details for invited staff.
• Technical information: device, browser, IP address, pages visited and similar usage data collected automatically when you use the website, as well as essential cookies or local storage needed to keep the site secure and working.

Please share only what is necessary for us to understand your request. An enquiry may sometimes reveal special personal information (for example, health, religious beliefs, race or ethnic origin, or alleged criminal behaviour) or information about other people. We process special personal information only where POPIA permits it, such as with your consent or where it is necessary to establish, exercise or defend a right or obligation in law. If you include information about someone else, you confirm that you are entitled to share it with us.

• To respond to enquiries and contact requests, and to send acknowledgements and follow-ups.
• To assess legal support requests and, with your consent, refer you to suitable volunteer legal practitioners, partners or other resources.
• To run our programmes, workshops and events, and to report on our impact in aggregated, de-identified form.
• To manage partnerships, funding relationships and general correspondence.
• To operate, secure and improve the website and staff platform, including preventing spam and abuse.
• To comply with our legal, regulatory, tax and governance obligations as a non-profit and public benefit organisation.

We process personal information on one or more of the grounds set out in section 11 of POPIA: your consent; the conclusion or performance of an arrangement with you; compliance with an obligation imposed by law; protection of your legitimate interests; or our legitimate interests or those of a third party to whom the information is supplied. Where we rely on consent, you may withdraw it at any time, although this will not affect processing that took place before the withdrawal.

We do not sell personal information. We share it only where needed for the purposes above, with:

• Volunteer legal practitioners, partner organisations and referral partners, but only with your consent and only to the extent needed to assist you.
• Operators (service providers) who host the website, store data, deliver email and provide security on our behalf. They process information only on our instructions and must keep it confidential and secure, as required by sections 20 and 21 of POPIA.
• Regulators, courts, law enforcement or other authorities where we are required or permitted by law to do so.

Some of our service providers store or process information on servers outside South Africa. We transfer personal information outside the Republic only as permitted by section 72 of POPIA, for example where the recipient is subject to laws, binding rules or an agreement that provide an adequate level of protection, or where you consent to the transfer.

We take appropriate, reasonable technical and organisational measures to prevent loss of, damage to, unauthorised destruction of, and unlawful access to or processing of personal information, as required by section 19 of POPIA. These include encrypted connections, access controls limited to invited staff, two-factor authentication on staff accounts and spam protection on our forms. No system is completely secure. If we have reasonable grounds to believe that your personal information has been accessed or acquired by an unauthorised person, we will notify you and the Information Regulator as required by section 22 of POPIA.

We keep personal information only for as long as necessary to achieve the purpose for which it was collected, unless a longer period is required or authorised by law, needed for our lawful functions or activities, agreed with you, or kept for historical, statistical or research purposes with appropriate safeguards. When information is no longer needed, we delete, destroy or de-identify it.

Subject to POPIA and the Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2000 (“PAIA”), you have the right to:

• Be told that your personal information is being collected, or that it has been accessed by an unauthorised person.
• Ask whether we hold personal information about you and request access to it.
• Request the correction, destruction or deletion of personal information that is inaccurate, irrelevant, excessive, out of date, incomplete, misleading or unlawfully obtained.
• Object, on reasonable grounds, to the processing of your personal information, and object at any time to processing for direct marketing.
• Withdraw your consent where processing is based on consent.
• Lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator.

To exercise any of these rights, email privacy@lawyersforthearts.org.za. We may need to verify your identity before acting on a request, and will respond within a reasonable time. Requests for access to records may be handled under PAIA.

We will only send you newsletters or other direct marketing by electronic communication if you have consented to it, or if you have engaged with us before and the communication relates to similar programmes or services, as permitted by section 69 of POPIA. Every such message includes a way to unsubscribe, and you can opt out at any time free of charge.

This website is not directed at children under 18. We do not knowingly process the personal information of children without the consent of a competent person (such as a parent or guardian), or another ground permitted by POPIA. If you believe a child has provided us with personal information, please contact us so that we can address it.

The website uses cookies and local storage that are strictly necessary for it to function, to keep sessions secure and to protect forms against abuse. Where we use cookies or technologies that are not strictly necessary, such as analytics, we will tell you and, where required, ask for your consent. You can control cookies through your browser settings, but disabling essential cookies may affect how the site works.

If you are not satisfied with how we handled your personal information, we encourage you to contact us first so that we can try to resolve it. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator (South Africa) through its website at https://inforegulator.org.za.

We may update this policy from time to time. The latest version will always be published on this page with its effective date. Where changes are significant, we will take reasonable steps to bring them to your attention.

Information Officer, Lawyers for the Arts South Africa NPC: privacy@lawyersforthearts.org.za