Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy

Introduction

We are committed to protecting our visitors' and/or user’s privacy and we will not collect any personal information about you as a visitor unless you provide it voluntarily.

Pursuant to the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (GDPR) and the Data Protection Act (Chapter 586 of the Laws of Malta), we have a legal duty to respect and protect any personal information we collect from you and we will abide by such duty. We take all safeguards necessary to prevent unauthorised access and we do not pass on your details collected from you as a visitor and/or user, to any third party unless you give us your consent to do so.

This Privacy Policy can be easily accessible via a link at the bottom of each web page.

As a user, we collect personal information in the process of submission of forms through our website (energy.gov.mt), addressed to a Government of Malta ministry, department or other entity as the case may be.

If you follow a link to a service provided by another government department, ministry, agency or local authority, that organisation will:

•           Be the data controller

           Be responsible for processing any data you share with them

           Publish and manage their own privacy policy with details of how to contact them


The Controller of personal data

The data controller responsible for your personal data is the Ministry for the Environment, Energy and Enterprise located at Barriera Wharf, Valletta Malta. In this Privacy Policy, “we”, “us” and “our” refer to the Ministry for the Environment, Energy and Enterprise and shall be construed accordingly.


What personal data we collect

When you visit our website, the following information will automatically be processed and this solely for the use of this Office:

·        Questions, queries or feedback including your name, surname, personal identification details such as an Identity Card and Passport, residential address and email address if you contact us or give us feedback

·        The requested web page or download;

·        Whether the request was successful or not;

·        The date and time when you accessed the site;

·        The Internet address of the web site or the domain name of the computer from which you accessed the website;

·        The operating system of the machine running your web browser and the type and version of your web  browser.

All information provided in the Contact Us/Feedback form will dealt-with with strict confidence according to law.


How we collect your personal data

Your personal data may be collected in a number of ways including:

1.      E-Forms

We may collect personal information in the process of submission of forms through the website, addressed to a Government of Malta Ministry, Department or other Entity as the case may be.  In such cases, the website is used as a User Interface and the information contained through forms is submitted for processing to the relevant Government of Malta Ministry, Department or other Entity. In this case, the retention period of the service in question would apply.

2.      Contact Us/Feedback

When using this website’s online facilities, data subjects may be required to provide their contact details for contact purposes.  All information provided in the Contact Us/Feedback form will be processed following your provision of consent.

3.      IP Address and location

The web server keeps limited logs about IP addresses or the location of your computer on the Internet, for systems administration and troubleshooting purposes.  We do not use IP address logs to track your session or your behaviour on our site.


Legal basis for processing your personal data

The legal basis for processing personal data in relation to the website is our legitimate interests, and the legitimate interests of our users, in ensuring the security and integrity of energy.gov.mt.

The legal basis for processing all other personal data is that it is necessary to:

·        Perform a task in the public interest

·        In the exercise of our functions as a government ministry


What we do with your personal data

There may be instances where we have to share your personal data with various categories of persons. We may disclose your personal data with our employees, officers and professional advisors. Your personal data may be shared with other government departments, agencies and public bodies. It may also be shared with our technology suppliers, for example our hosting provider. However, we will not:

           Sell or rent your data to third parties

           Share your data with third parties for marketing purposes

When we share your personal information with third parties, we make sure that such parties make use of this data in a manner which ensures safety and security to your personal data. We will also share your data if we are required to do so by law.


Your rights

The rights afforded to yourself in connection to your personal data are the following:

                 Right of Access – the right to obtain from us confirmation as whether or not personal data concerning you is being processed, and where that is the case, access to the personal data and the additional information as outlined in the regulations. Limitations to this right will only be applicable if provided in terms of law.

                 Right to Rectification – the right to request for your personal data to be amended or updated where it is inaccurate or incomplete;

            Right to Erasure (“Right to be Forgotten”) – the right to request that we delete your personal data, subject to legal, compliance and regulatory obligations which we may be subject to including anti-money laundering regulations.

                  Right to Restrict – the right to request that we stop processing all or some of your personal data;

           Right to Object – the right to object at any time to us processing your personal data on grounds relating to your particular situation and the right to object to your personal data being processed for direct marketing purposes;

                Right to Data Portability – the right to request a copy of your personal data in electronic format and the right to transmit that personal data for use in another entity’s service; and

             Right not to be subject to Automated Decision-making – the right to not be subject to a decision based solely on automated decision making, including profiling, where the decision would have a legal effect on you or produce a similarly significant effect.

Should you wish to exercise any of your rights, please contact us through the Contact Us page within the website.


How long we keep your data

We will only retain your personal data for as long as:

•           It is needed for the purposes set out herein

•           The law requires us to


Cookies

Cookies are small pieces of data that the site transfers to the user’s computer hard drive when the user visits the website. This website makes limited use of cookies and consequently, for any further information, you are being guided to visit our Cookies Policy.


Security

We are committed to doing all that we can to keep your data secure. We have set up systems and processes to prevent unauthorised access or disclosure of your data - for example, we protect your data using varying levels of encryption. We also make sure that any third parties that we deal with keep all personal data they process on our behalf secure. This site uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to ensure secure transmission of your personal data.  You should be able to see the padlock symbol in the address bar of your browser.  The URL address will also start with https:// depicting a secure webpage.  SSL applies encryption between two points such as your PC and the connecting server.  Any data transmitted during the session will be encrypted or scrambled and then decrypted or unscrambled at the receiving end.  This will ascertain that data cannot be read during transmission.


Links to other websites

Energy.gov.mt contains links to other websites. This Privacy Policy only applies to energy.gov.mt, and does not cover other websites, government services and transactions that we link to. These have their own privacy policies to which we accept no responsibility or liability for.


Complaints and concerns

If you have any concerns with regards to our privacy methods and processes, please contact our Data Protection Officer by email on dpo.meee@gov.mt

In case you are not satisfied with our response, you may contact the Information and Data Protection Commissioner of Level 2, Airways House, High Street, Sliema SLM 1549 or by visiting their website at https://idpc.org.mt.

Last Updated: 6th January 2021