Privacy Policy

Last Updated: 21 October 2025

This Privacy Policy explains what information of yours will be collected by The Australia Institute when you visit and interact with our websites, including thepoint.com.au, how the information will be used, and how you can control the collection, correction and/or deletion of information.

The way we manage your personal information is governed by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles.

We will not use or share your information with anyone except as described in this Privacy Policy.

This Privacy Policy does not apply to information we collect by other means (including offline) or from other sources, such as publicly available information.

Throughout this policy, “The Australia Institute” also refers to our affiliated entities and initiatives, such as The Point, the Centre for Future Work, the Nordic Policy Centre, No New Coal Mines and Go Home On Time Day.

Some of our activities involving personal information are undertaken by us as a media organisation for journalistic purposes within the meaning of the Privacy Act 1988 and are exempt acts or practices under the Act.  In relation to our activities as a media organisation, we are committed to respecting the rights and obligations of journalists employed or engaged by us to observe the Journalist Code of Ethics or other journalistic standards. If and to the extent that our acts or practices are exempt under the Privacy Act 1988, this Privacy Policy does not apply to them or restrict our ability to collect or disseminate information to the public.

Information We Collect

We collect information that you provide to us about yourself, such as your name and e-mail address. If you correspond with us by email, we may retain the content of your email messages, your email address, and our responses. We may also retain any messages you send through our websites. You may provide us information in user content you post to our website.

Third Party Services

The Australia Institute uses the NationBuilder platform to organise our community of supporters. You can read more about that company and its features and policies at NationBuilder.com. When you visit our websites, NationBuilder may send one or more cookies – a small text file containing a string of alphanumeric characters – to your computer that uniquely identifies your browser and lets NationBuilder help you log in faster and enhance your navigation through our websites. A cookie does not collect personal information about you. You can reset your web browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, some features of our websites may not function properly if the ability to accept cookies is disabled. NationBuilder is located in the United States and maintains processing operations in various jurisdictions. Information you provide to us may be disclosed to NationBuilder for processing in the United States or elsewhere to enable us to communicate with you. You can read more about how the NationBuilder service interacts with and protects your information at nationbuilder.com/privacy and nationbuilder.com/confidentiality.

The Australia Institute uses Google Analytics and tracking pixels to help understand use of our websites. These services collect the information sent by your browser as part of a web page request, including cookies and your IP address, and their use of it is governed by their Privacy Policy.

The Australia Institute may also share anonymised information with other trusted third parties (such as Meta) to improve your online experience. Such third parties may be located in the United States or other jurisdictions.

How We Use Your Information

We use the personal information you submit for the purpose for which it was collected and to operate, maintain, and provide to you the features and functionality of our websites, as well as to keep you informed of The Australia Institute’s activities and, for fundraising purposes.

By providing The Australia Institute with your email address, you consent to our using the email address to send you The Australia Institute related notices, including any notices required by law, in lieu of communication by postal mail. You also agree that we may send you notifications of activity on our websites to the email address you give us, in accordance with any applicable privacy settings. We may use your email address to send you other messages, such as newsletters, changes to features of our websites, or other information. If you do not want to receive such email messages, you may opt out at nb.australiainstitute.org.au/unsubscribe.

The Australia Institute reserves the right, but has no obligation, to monitor the user content you post on our websites. We reserve the right to remove any such information or material for any reason or no reason.

How We Share Your Information

The Australia Institute will not rent or sell your personally identifiable information to others. The Australia Institute may share your personally identifiable information with third parties for the purpose of providing The Australia Institute services to you or so they can communicate with you about The Australia Institute on our behalf. If we do this, such third parties’ use of your information will be bound by this Privacy Policy.

We may store personal information in locations outside the direct control of The Australia Institute (for instance, on servers or databases co-located with hosting providers).

Any personal information or content that you voluntarily disclose for posting to our websites, such as user content, becomes available to the public, as controlled by any applicable privacy or website customisation settings. If you remove information that you posted to our websites, copies may remain viewable in cached and archived pages, or if other users have copied or saved that information.

Except as otherwise described in this Privacy Policy, The Australia Institute will not disclose personal information to any third party unless you give us explicit permission to do so, or unless we are required to do so by law or subpoena, or unless we believe that such action is necessary to:

1. conform to the law, comply with legal process served on us or our affiliates, or investigate, prevent, or take action regarding suspected or actual illegal activities;
2. enforce this policy, take precautions against liability, to investigate and defend ourselves against any third-party claims or allegations, to assist government enforcement agencies, or to protect the security or integrity of our site; and
3. exercise or protect the rights, property, or personal safety of our websites, our users or others.

How We Protect Your Information

The Australia Institute cares about the integrity and security of your personal information. We cannot, however, ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to The Australia Institute or guarantee that your information on the service may not be accessed, disclosed, altered, or destroyed by breach of any of our physical, technical, or managerial safeguards. Your privacy settings may also be affected by changes to the functionality of third-party providers, such as social networks. The Australia Institute is not responsible for the functionality or security measures of any third party.

To protect your privacy and security, we take reasonable steps (such as requesting a unique password) to verify your identity before granting you access to your account.

You are responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your unique password and account information, and for controlling access to your email communications from The Australia Institute at all times.

Compromise of Personal Information

In the event that personal information is compromised as a result of a breach of security, The Australia Institute will promptly notify those persons whose personal information has been compromised, in accordance with the notification procedures set forth in this Privacy Policy, or as otherwise required by applicable law.

Your Choices About Your Information

You may, of course, decline to submit personally identifiable information through our websites, in which case The Australia Institute may not be able to provide certain services to you.

You can review and correct the information about you that The Australia Institute keeps on file by contacting us directly at mail@australiainstitute.org.au

If you request for your personal information to be corrected or deleted, The Australia Institute’s policy is to comply as much as possible. However, some or all of the information may need to be retained for archival, legal or accounting purposes. Furthermore, The Australia Institute may retain and continue to use indefinitely all information (including user content) contained in your communications.

Children’s Privacy

Protecting the privacy of young children is especially important. For that reason, The Australia Institute does not knowingly collect or solicit personal information from anyone under the age of 13 or knowingly allow such persons to register for our websites.

If you are under 13, please do not send any information about yourself to us, including your name, address, telephone number, or email address.

In the event that we learn that we have collected personal information from a child under age 13 without verification of parental consent, we will delete that information as quickly as possible.

If you believe that we might have any information from or about a child under 13, please contact us at mail@australiainstitute.org.au

Links to Other Web Sites

We are not responsible for the practices employed by websites linked to or from our websites, nor the information or content contained therein.

Notification Procedures

It is our policy to provide notifications, whether such notifications are required by law or are for marketing or other business-related purposes, to you via email notice, written or hard copy notice, or through posting of such notice on our websites, as determined by The Australia Institute in its sole discretion.

We reserve the right to determine the form and means of providing notifications to you, provided that you may opt out of certain means of notification as described in this Privacy Policy.

Changes to Our Privacy Policy

If we change our privacy policies and procedures, we will post those changes on our websites to keep you aware of what information we collect, how we use it and under what circumstances we may disclose it. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, the practices of this site, your dealings with this website, or complaints relating to the Australian Privacy Principles, please contact us at mail@australiainstitute.org.au or by mail to:

The Australia Institute
Level 1, 113 Canberra Avenue, Griffith, ACT, AUSTRALIA 2603

If the Australia Institute receives a complaint from you about how it has handled your personal information, the Australia Institute will determine what (if any) action should be taken to resolve the complaint. If the Australia Institute decides that a complaint should be investigated further, the complaint will usually be handled by the Chief Operating Officer.