Your information is also called ‘personal data’ – this is any individual piece of information that is about you or might tell us who you are.

This can include things like:

• Your name and birthday
• Any nickname or username you use online or with Childline
• Contact information like a phone number, email address or address (where you tell us these)
• Information we collect from your computer that might tell us the town or areas of town you are in, as well other technical data about your computer, phone or tablet
• Any content that you send us, or which are made as part of your contact with Childline or the NSPCC.

You might also give us information about how you are feeling, or things that have happened in your life.  This also counts as ‘personal data’.  It is up to you what you tell us about – we will keep the information safe, although we may not be able to keep it private if we need to protect you or another child from harm.

In some cases, we might ask for your permission to use your information – this is called consent. We will only do this where we can promise to delete your information if you want us to. An example would be if you complete a survey for Childline.

For a lot of the information you give us, we will not be able to delete it, even if you ask us to. This is because the law tells us we have to keep it, or because it’s important that we do as part of our services which help to protect you and other children.

Because of this, we can’t ask your permission to use your information –we have to use it, in a similar way to how your school or doctor must use information.

We use information about you to:

• To help you, including making sure we know what you have already talked to us about (the law calls this ‘legitimate interest’ - we use your information to work out how best to support you)
• To make sure you and other people are safe (this is called a ‘public task’, to protect children and young people from harm – we are given this task by UK law)
• To make sure that Childline services work safely, including protecting your online safety while you are using Childline (this is also a ‘legitimate interest’)
• Because the law tells us we have to (a ‘legal obligation’).
• To understand the types of things affecting young people and to try to make things better for all children (another ‘legitimate interest’ - we will make sure that no one can find out who you are when we use your information in this way).

Sometimes Childline asks you to take part in surveys. It is up to you if you take part, and we will only use the information you give us there to help answer the questions we’re asking.

You might talk to us about your health, your religion or culture, or the community you are part of (which might include your ‘ethnicity’). You may also want to talk about topics like sex and relationships, including feelings you might be having towards other people.

These types of information are called ‘special category data’.

Where you talk to us about any of these topics, we keep and use that information as part of our work as a charity, and to make sure that you and other children are safe (‘substantial public interest’ and ‘recognised legitimate interest’. We use it for things like making sure children are treated fairly, that children are given the right support and improving what Childline and NSPCC does.

We also keep it to make sure we’re doing what the law tells us to, including for health and social work reasons (‘Legal obligation’).

Most of the time Childline will not share your information with anyone else – it will be kept private. This is our Confidentiality Promise.

Sometimes we do have to pass information on to other organisations, including the police or children’s services (like social workers).  We do this to keep children safe or because the law tells us we have to.

We might share information because:

• You ask us to
• We believe your life, or someone else’s life, is in danger
• You or someone else are being hurt by someone in a position of trust who has access to other children (like a teacher or police officer)
• You tell us that you’re seriously hurting someone else
• A court tells us we have to

We will always share your information as safely as possible.

We keep all information that comes to Childline for 25 years, or for 75 years if you told us that you have been in care. This helps keep you and other children safe. If anyone needs to check what happened to you, or make sure that you were helped properly, the information is still there.

Your voice recordings from Childline calls will be kept for one year.

All of your information will be stored and processed in the UK or the European Union (EU). If this changes at any point, we will tell you by updating this notice.

We will always make sure that we keep your information as safe as possible. We store your data in protected computer systems that are checked regularly. This makes sure that no one can access your information who is not allowed to. We also use protections like passwords and special access codes so only the right safe adults can see your information, and only when they need to and have permission to.

When you start a 1-2-1 chat, if a counsellor isn’t free right away, you can choose to chat with our helper bot, Cubie. Cubie does not use AI. Cubie follows rules and a script to find helpful information from the Childline website based on what you say.

When a counsellor joins, they can see what you said to Cubie, so they can help you better. You don’t have to use Cubie while you wait, and you can say no at any time. This is also called “opting out”.

We never use AI to make decisions about you. Where we use AI, the work it does for us is always checked by a human to make sure that it’s right.

You will always speak to a real person at Childline when you call or send us a PIB. For 1-2-1 online chats, you can get information from our non-AI chatbot Cubie first, then a real person.

Childline uses AI to help with some tasks so that we have more time to help more children. These tasks are:

• helping us make notes. These notes are always checked by the person you have spoken to or messaged with
• helping us spot mistakes, like words written wrong in call transcripts
• helping us look for patterns in what children are worried about when they contact us – this is done in a way that does not identify individual children

Our AI does not share your information with anyone outside of Childline or NSPCC. This includes not sharing your information with other AI. The things our AI helps us with can only be seen by trusted people who need it to help you or other children.

If we are going to use AI to help us with other tasks in the future, we’ll tell you about any changes.

Like others website and apps you use, Childline uses small pieces of computer code called ‘cookies’ that:

• Help the website remember who you are, including your log in details if you’ve asked it to
• Help us to measure how many people visit the site, where they are and how they are accessing it (so, whether they are using a phone, tablet or laptop)
• Help us to keep the site safe and secure

Some of this technical information is shared with other organisations we work with.

Information that you talk to us about is not shared in this way.

If you use a link on the Childline site to visit another website, Childline has no control over how your information is handled by that site.

Your data is your data, and you can ask us to do things with it – the law gives you that right. We won’t always be able to do exactly what you want, but where we can, we will. You can ask us;

1. For a copy of your data – you will need to give us your name, username and phone number, depending on how you have contacted us.
2. To fix or update information if you think we have got it wrong.
3. To delete or stop us using data in some ways.

We will review every request, but some types of request will not be able to be done – for example we cannot delete information that we need for legal reasons or to protect a child.

We need some information from you to find your records. It helps us if you can remember:

• how you contacted us
• when you contacted us
• if you have given us your full name, your first name or a nickname

You can email to ask us to do any of these at [email protected]

You can also:

• Call us: 0203 772 9512 (Mon–Fri, 9am–5pm)
• Write to us: Data Protection Officer, NSPCC, 42 Curtain Road, London, EC2A 3NH

We try to answer all requests within a month. If you have been in contact with us a lot, or in different ways, it might be complicated to find and check all of your information, so it might take up to three months. We will let you know if it will take longer than a month.

If you think we’ve done something really wrong with your data, you can also use these details to make a complaint to us, and we have to get back to you within one month.  If you’re still not happy, you can contact the Information Commission here.