Privacy Policy

Introduction

• SDG Legal Proprietary Limited and SDG Legal (incorporated as Bekker & Louw Attorneys Inc) (together referred to as “SDG Legal”) are sensitive to the personal nature of the information you may share with us from time to time.
• This policy explains how we protect and use your personal information in support of and in compliance with the Protection of Personal Information Act, 2013. We will review and update this policy from time to time.
• By providing us with your personal information, you agree to the application of this policy (as amended and updated from time to time) and authorise us to process your personal information in the manner set out in this policy. You also authorise SDG Legal, our affiliates, employees, consultants, agents, service providers and other third party collaborators to process your personal information for the purposes stated in this policy.

Scope of this Policy

• We treat all personal information with respect. We will not use any of your personal information for data mining or for any purposes other than those described in this policy.
• We will endeavour to protect all of your personal information we hold from time to time from unauthorised alteration, loss, disclosure or access.
• This policy applies to all external third parties with whom we interact from time to time, including all our individual clients, representatives of client organisations, visitors, and other users of our legal and related services. It also applies to our affiliates, employees, consultants, agents, collaborators, service providers and other third parties who help us to deliver our services to you.
• Where we have used examples in this policy these examples have been used to provide you with an idea of some of the reasons why we may require your personal information or how we may collect and/or process your personal information. These examples should not be read in such a way as to limit the broadness of any clause in this policy, they are illustrative only.

Categories of Personal Information We may Process

• Personal information in this policy refers to all information relating to an identifiable living person and an existing company or other juristic person, and includes information relating to you, to your company, or the company you represent.
• As such we may from time to process the following types of personal information about you:
  • Personal details and identifiers: names, photographs, passport and identity numbers, entity registration/identification numbers, additional Know Your Client information contained in certificates from the South African Revenue Service or documents from the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (or their counter parts in other countries), bank statements, supplier and utilities statements and lease agreements, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses and details from your public social media profiles.
  • Demographic information: sex, gender, date of birth and age, nationality, titles and language preferences, information relating to broad based black economic empowerment status or other affirmative action programmes.
  • Instruction details and consent records: details of individuals in instructions to SDG Legal, consents and related information, evidence and other materials we process in the course of providing legal services.
  • Attendance records: details of meetings, webinars and other events organised by or on behalf of SDG Legal that you have attended.
  • Payment and financial information: billing addresses, bank account numbers, card numbers, invoice records, payment records, SWIFT details, IBAN details, tax numbers.
  • Data relating to your visits to our website and applications: device types, browser types and settings, IP addresses, language settings and other technical communications information.
  • Employment details: capacity within your organisation, names, addresses, phone numbers, websites and applications, and email addresses of the organisation and people within the organisation.
• For this purpose, the processing of personal information in our possession from time to time refers to anything that is done with your personal information, whether or not by automated means, such as collection, recording, organisation, structuring, storage, adaptation or alteration, retrieval, consultation, use, disclosure by transmission, dissemination or otherwise making available, alignment or combination, restriction, erasure or destruction.

Sensitive Personal Information

• Sensitive personal information is personal information that relates to your race or ethnicity, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union memberships, physical and mental health, sex life, any actual or alleged criminal offences or penalties, national identification numbers, and any other information that may be deemed to be sensitive under applicable laws.
• If we need to process sensitive personal information, we will only do so in the ordinary course of our business, for purposes of complying with related legal requirements.
• That said, you acknowledge that we are providing you with legal services and as such, to enable us to advice you, you recognise that we may need to collect and retain sensitive personal information especially in scenarios where, for example, questions are raised relating to equality matters or where advice on broad based black economic empowerment is required. By providing us with this information you consent to us processing it for the purposes of advising you.

Collecting Personal Information

• We may collect or receive personal information about you in the course of our relationship with you:
  • In the course of providing legal services to you or your organisation in person, through virtual platforms such as MS Teams and Zoom, and when you visit our offices or we visit you.
  • Directly from you or otherwise, for example from an opponent in a litigious matter as part of the discovery process or from a counterpart with whom we are engaging on your behalf when negotiating a contract.
  • When you visit or interact with our website @sdglegal.africa or our various social media platforms.
  • When you make your personal information public.
  • When you register to use any of our legal and related services including inter-active webinars, newsletters, seminars, and legal updates.
  • When you interact with any third party content on our website or linked from our website.
• We also create content from time to time that may include your personal information, such as:
  • Recordings of meetings, hearings and discussions held virtually on Zoom, MS Teams, WhatsApp and other digital platforms;
    Webinars, vlogs and other videos shared from time to time on YouTube and other video sharing sites;
  • Records of your communications and interactions with us, including email and WhatsApp correspondence;
  • Deal league tables and track records of significant transactions where we have acted for you,
  • unless this content are subject to legal professional privilege or clearly confidential in nature, we may disseminate the content (which may include your personal information) for reporting, marketing, ranking and award purposes. We will never circulate information which is subject to legal professional privilege or otherwise confidential without your express consent unless such dissemination ordinarily falls within the scope of our legal services to you (for example, should we be responsible for preparing a transcript of an arbitration this will necessarily have to be shared with the counterparty to the arbitration) in which case, by briefing us to provide legal services you are consenting to the use and dissemination of your personal information as necessary to enable us to provide these services. More information on how we use personal information for marketing purposes can be found the SDG Legal Standard Terms and Conditions to which you agree when you first engage us to act on your behalf.
• We may also receive personal information about you from third parties, such as regulators, law enforcement agencies, opponents, counterparts and your other advisors on transactions.

Purposes for which we Process Personal Information

• We will process your personal information only in the ordinary course of our business of providing legal and related services. We will primarily use your personal information only for the purposes for which it was originally obtained from you. We will only use your personal information for a secondary purposes if these are a legitimate interest, closely related to the primary purpose for which it was collected. By briefing us to provide legal services you are consenting to the use and dissemination of your personal information as necessary to enable us to provide these services.
• We may subject your personal information to processing during the course of various business-related activities, including:
  • Operating our business.
  • Analysis, evaluation, review and collation of information in order to determine legal issues and potential disputes, provide legal advice, and prepare or comment on legal opinions, agreements, reports, memoranda, correspondence, publications, documents relating to legal proceedings and other documents and records.
  • Compliance with legal requirements and fraud and money laundering prevention.
  • Legal investigations, due diligence and reporting.
  • Transfer of information to our consultants and other third parties.
  • Recruitment.
  • Safety and security purposes.
• We may process your personal information for relationship management and marketing purposes in relation to our services, for purposes of improving the legal services we deliver to you, for accounts management, and for marketing activities in order to establish, maintain and improve our relationship with you and our service providers. We may also analyse your personal information for statistical purposes.
• We may process your personal information for internal management and management reporting purposes, such as conducting internal audits, conducting internal investigations, implementing internal business controls, providing central processing facilities, for insurance purposes, and for management reporting analysis.
• You also recognise and give your consent that any information shared with us by yourselves, your shareholders, directors, employees, officers or agents can be used for research purposes, including but not limited to further study by any of our employees or for research publications, once it has been suitably anonymised although any data gathered may still be identified by general location and industry.

Disclosure of Personal Information to Third Parties

• Our associates include SDG Legal’s affiliated companies (holding companies, subsidiaries and other related entities), and all of our shareholders, directors, employees, counsel, experts, investigators, correspondent attorneys, and consultants. We also have a number of third party service providers, including providers of information technology services and products, communication services, networks and products, data providers and storage, file storage, printing, scanning and copying service providers, auditors, tax consultants, financial advisors, translators, insurers, brokers and other professional advisors.
• We may disclose your personal information to our associates and service providers, for legitimate business purposes, in accordance with applicable law, and subject to all applicable professional and regulatory requirements relating to confidentiality. In addition, we may disclose your personal information:
  • If required to do by law.
  • If required to do so by regulatory authorities, upon request, or for purposes of reporting any actual or suspected breaches of applicable laws and regulations.
  • Where necessary for purposes of, or in connection with, actual or threatened legal proceedings or the establishment, exercise or defence of legal and commercial rights and interests.
  • If necessary for purposes of preventing, investigating, detecting or prosecuting criminal offences and penalties, including safeguarding against and preventing threats to children or public security.
  • If we sell or otherwise transfer all or any portion of our business or assets, including as part of a reorganisation, dissolution or liquidation.
  • If our website uses third party advertising, plugins or content.
  • If required by our service providers, such as providers of data hosting services and document review technology and services internationally.

International Transfer of Personal Information

• We may share your personal information to recipients outside the borders of South Africa provided that:
  • We recognise that foreign operators must be subject to laws, binding corporate rules, enforceable policies, or binding agreements which provide a similar or higher level of data protection to that applicable in South Africa.
  • They undertake to protect your personal information in line with all applicable data protection legislation and regulation.
  • Such sharing is necessary in order to provide the legal and related services that are required by SDG Legal’s clients, or the services are by their nature internationally based, such as data and cloud hosting services.
• As such we will review our relationships with such operators and, to the extent required by applicable law, will require them to be bound to only process your personal information with our prior written instructions, and to use appropriate measures to protect the confidentiality and security of such personal information.

Data Security

• We implement appropriate technical and organisational security measures to protect your personal information in our possession against accidental or unlawful destruction, loss, alteration, unauthorised disclosure and unauthorised access, in accordance with applicable law.
• Where there are reasonable grounds to believe that your personal information in our possession has been accessed or acquired by any unauthorised person, we will notify you and the relevant regulator, unless a public body responsible for the detection, prevention or investigation of offences, or the relevant regulator, informs us that notifying you would impede a criminal investigation.
• Because the internet is an open system, the transmission of information via the internet is never completely secure. Although we will implement all reasonable measures to protect your personal information in our possession, we cannot guarantee the security of information transmitted electronically and we cannot be held liable for any loss of privacy that occurs during the course of such transmission.

Data Accuracy and Minimisation

• The personal information provided to SDG Legal should be accurate, complete and up-to-date. Should personal information change, the onus is on the provider of such data to notify SDG Legal of the change and provide SDG Legal with accurate data.
• SDG Legal will restrict its processing of personal information to data which is sufficient for the fulfilment of the primary purpose and legitimate secondary purposes for which it was collected.
• SDG Legal will only retain and store personal information for the period for which the data is required to serve its primary purposes and legitimate secondary purposes, and for the periods required to comply with any applicable legal requirements.

Your Legal Rights

• You may have rights under South African law to access your personal information and to ask us to rectify, erase and restrict use of your personal information.
• You may also have rights to object to your personal information being used, to ask for the transfer of personal information you have made available to us, and to withdraw consent to the use of your personal information.

Cookies and Similar Technologies

• We may process your personal information by our use of cookies and similar technologies, for purposes of recording information about the devices and browsers you use and, in some cases, your preferences and browsing habits.
• When you visit our website, we may place cookies on your device, or read cookies already on your device, subject always to obtaining your consent where required and in accordance with applicable laws.

Marketing

• We may process your personal information for the purposes of providing you with information regarding services that may be of interest to you and you may unsubscribe for free at any time.
• If you currently receive marketing information from us which you would prefer not to receive in future, please email us at info@sdglegal.africa.

Contact Details

• You may contact us with any queries relating to this privacy policy or the processing of your personal information. Please address your queries to:
• The Data Protection Officer
• SDG Legal
• Attention: Tammy-Lynne Bekker
• Phone: +27 81 450 2497
• Email: tl.bekker@sdglegal.africa.