Orcasound Product Research Opt-In: Privacy and Consent Policy

What we collect

Email address, first name, and last name (required). We also ask how you'd describe yourself, your connection to marine conservation, your connection to the Salish Sea, and your generation, so we can recruit a representative mix of research participants. Two fields are optional free text: accessibility needs, and anything else you'd like us to know.

Why and how we use it

We use it to contact opt-in participants about Orcasound Product UX Research studies, and for research purposes, to inform changes to Orcasound Product deployments. This includes building personas and related UX deliverables, always in aggregate or de-identified form, never presented as a real, identifiable individual. Not sold, not shared outside the Orcasound Product team, never used for advertising. We do not use automated decision making or profiling based on your data. Every decision about your data is made by a person on the Orcasound Product team.

Consent

Explicit opt-in by typing your first name, last name, and the date in separate, unbundled consent fields on the form. Nothing is pre-filled. Declining does not affect your ability to use the Orcasound site or any Orcasound service. This is the legal basis we rely on to process your data: your freely given, specific, informed consent, which you may withdraw at any time as described below.

Voluntary participation

Taking part in any Orcasound Product study is entirely voluntary. You can decline to answer any question, skip any activity, or stop a session partway through, for any reason or no reason, without penalty and without affecting your standing as a participant in future studies.

Where it is stored

Your general opt-in contact information is stored in Resend, our participant contact platform, which is the sole system of record for the mailing list. When you're recruited for a specific study, your contact information may also be copied into a recruitment tracking spreadsheet, in Google Sheets or Excel, stored on Orcasound Product's Google Drive, so the team can track outreach and scheduling for that study. Access to both is limited to the Orcasound Product team. If a study session is recorded, the recording is processed by a transcription service before it is stored; we require any such vendor to protect your data under confidentiality and security obligations at least as strict as this policy. Orcasound Product is based in the United States, and your data may be processed and stored there regardless of where you are located. Where required, we rely on legal safeguards such as standard contractual clauses to protect data transferred internationally.

Retention

Your opt-in contact information is retained for the life of Orcasound Product, or until you withdraw, whichever comes first. Your information in Resend will not be deleted unless Orcasound Product dissolves or you withdraw from the mailing list. Withdraw at any time by contacting product@orcasound.tech.

Recruitment tracking spreadsheets are retained on the same terms as the study they support: for 5 years after that study's recording has been transcribed, or indefinitely if the study wasn't recorded, until you withdraw.

You sign a separate consent form for each study you participate in. If that study session is recorded, the recording and its corresponding signed consent form are both retained for 5 years after the recording has been transcribed, so the consent record never expires before the data it authorizes.

Your rights

Wherever you live, you can email product@orcasound.tech to:

• Access the personal data we hold about you.
• Correct it if it's inaccurate or incomplete.
• Delete it.
• Receive a copy in a portable, commonly used format.
• Object to, or ask us to restrict, how we use it.
• Withdraw your consent, at any time, for any reason.

We aim to respond within 5 business days. If you are in the European Union, the United Kingdom, or another country with its own data protection authority, you also have the right to lodge a complaint with that authority, though we would appreciate the chance to resolve any concern directly first.

Use of your feedback and contributions

Ideas, suggestions, and feedback you share during a study may inform changes to Orcasound Product, including personas and related UX deliverables, always in aggregate or de-identified form. If we ever want to quote you or reference something you shared outside of internal research use, for example in a public case study, a conference talk, or materials for funders, we will only do so anonymously, without your name or other identifying details, unless we ask for and receive your separate, specific permission to use your name.

No usage tracking

Orcasound does not track individual website or app usage through analytics. We do track aggregate, unattributed website usage. Research about how individual people use our tools is gathered only through direct study engagement and self report, never passive tracking.

Minors

This form is not directed to children. Participants must be 18 or older to opt in, regardless of where you live. We set the threshold at 18 worldwide, above the age of consent or age of digital consent in every country we know we have participants from, rather than tracking a different minimum per country. If a minor is present during your session but is not observed, recorded, or asked to participate, that's fine, they are a bystander and not a research subject. We cannot include a minor as a participant in an adult study session.

If Orcasound Product's structure changes

Orcasound Product currently operates under a fiscal sponsorship arrangement while it completes nonprofit formation. If Orcasound Product's fiscal sponsor, corporate structure, or ownership changes, your data will continue to be protected under the terms of this policy, or a policy at least as protective, and we will notify participants of any material change before it takes effect.

Changes to this policy

This policy lives at this page and is dated at the top. Material changes update the effective date above.

Governing law

This policy, and any dispute about your participation in Orcasound Product research, is governed by the laws of the United States. Nothing in this policy limits any rights you have that cannot be waived under the law of your own country.

Contact

Orcasound Product, product@orcasound.tech. We are a small team and currently handle all privacy inquiries directly rather than through a dedicated Data Protection Officer or in-country representative; if our participant base grows to a point where a formal EU, UK, or other regional representative is required, we will appoint one and update this policy.