Privacy policy
At railwaymates.com the privacy of our visitors is of extreme importance to us. This page outlines how information is used and the options you have to control your data.
Cookie settings
A quick overview of our cookies and your options to enable/disable them. Full details further below.
Essential cookies
- Preferences:
- Security:
- Performance analytics:
Advertising cookies
- Contextual via scalemates:
- Personal via 3rd parties:
- We stopped personalised 3rd party advertising in May 2018 to increase your privacy
Social media cookies
- Social plugins:
- We removed Facebook/Twitter/Instagram plugins in May 2018 to increase your privacy
- Youtube embedded video:
- We use www.youtube-nocookie.com since May 2018 to increase your privacy
Chrome Internet Explorer Firefox Safari Opera
Please be aware that if cookies are disabled, some features on railwaymates.com may not operate as intended.
Applicable to guests and members
This section is applicable to all users, both guests and members.
Communications
All traffic between the browser and our infrastructure is encrypted (HTTPS) for privacy reasons.
- The settings are regularly checked and updated to secure the communication channel.
- Traffic over plain HTTP is by default redirected to HTTPS (we also include HSTS header).
- We strive to have a green rating on ssllabs.com (ssllabs.com - scalemates.com rating).
- We strive to have a green rating on securityheaders.com (securityheaders.com - scalemates.com rating).
Log files and security
The log files of our infrastructure (server/CDN) track industry standard information (IP, Browser, ISP, time stamps, requests...) to protect our network as well as information security (your data).
Data collection in our logs is set up in a privacy friendly mode:
- Limited to data required for security related analysis (real time and post incident)
- This data stored safely and access is very limited.
- This data is purged regularly.
- This data is not part of long term backups
- This data is not processed for any other purposes.
We use a minimum amount of short lived cookies to help us protect against malicious users.
Security/Bot protection: Cookie name: ak_bmsc (2 hours)
Security/Bot protection: Cookie name: bm_sv (2 hours)
User experience
In order to increase the user experience and remember your preferences we use cookies.
Performance optimisations: Cookie name: AKA_A2 (2 hours)
Mobile/Desktop version: Cookie name: design (3 months)
Sort-by filters: Cookie name: sortby (3 months)
Cookie consent: Cookie name: CONSENT (2 years)
Performance analytics
Nobody likes slow loading webpages. We therefore use Akamai mPulse, a performance monitoring solution that assists us in monitoring and optimizing our website for speed and quality (eg. pageload, time to first byte,...).
Data collection towards mPulse is set up in a privacy friendly mode:
- We configured mPulse to remove your IP address.
- We remove query strings as they are not relevant for our performance measurements.
- We did not configure tracking of personal identifiers.
- We did not configure tracking of 3rd party analytics ID's.
- We signed a Data Processing Amendment with Akamai.
mPulse makes use of one cookie storing short term session data (30mins) and technical data (7 days).
Distinguish users: Cookie name: RT (30mins)
Technical data: Cookie name: RT (7 days)
Contextual Advertising
To keep this website available as a free service we display contextual banner advertising. We use an own hosted advertising solution, so there is no data leakage towards 3rd parties and pages load super fast.
Data collection towards mPulse is set up in a privacy friendly mode:
- No 3rd party tracking cookies.
- All banners hosted on this domain, so there is no hidden data leakage
- There are no statistics on who viewed/clicked an ad
- Ads are based on the page you look at (in combo with country level targeting)
- No 3rd party ad networks are displayed
In order for this service to work correctly we use a number of session and persistent cookies starting with OA*. (eg. to limit the same banner being shown to the same user, to track clicks and performance improvements and for Geo targeting).
Session identifier: Cookie name: SCM-ID (90 days)
Geo Location (Country level): Cookie name: SCM-GEO (session)
Banner capping: Cookie name: OASCCAP, OASCAP (session)
Banner blocking: Cookie name: OACBLOCK, OABLOCK (30 days)
Last click: Cookie name: OXBLC (90 days)
Applicable to members only
This section is only applicable to members.
Required profile info
When creating an account you need to enter some basic personal information which is stored in our database. This required info is limited to the bare minimum: nickname, email and password
Data collection and usage is set up in a privacy friendly mode:
- Nickname is public.
- Your e-mail is not public
- Your e-mail is used validate legitimate users, sending notifications (configurable in profile) and account recovery.
- We do not share/sell your email with others.
- We do not use your email for direct/indirect marketing activities.
- Your passwords safely hashed(encrypted) before storing in our database.
While logged in we use a persistent cookie to remember your session ID.
Guests vs Members: Cookie name: U (30 days)
Session identifier: Cookie name: PHPSESSID (30 days)
Language: Cookie name: lang2 (30 days)
Optional profile info
Other personal information (Name, Birthdate, Gender, Activities, Clubs, Favorites,...) you add to your profile is optional data. And fully under your control
- Please do not add any personal information in your profile which you do not want to be public
- Your preference page allows controlling several account level privacy settings for the information you entered.
- Sending a message to other users allows you to mark them private or public.
Stash management info
Stash management and related activities are by default public.
- Full list views can be hidden for guests via preferences.
- Extra stash info like pricing/storage/location is not public and only visible to you.
- We use aggregated data of stash management information for public reports (Eg. Most wanted kits, most built kits,...)
Projects/Albums/Collection info
All Projects/Albums/Collection information is public by nature. You own full control of what is saved and visible
Contributor info
As a member you have to option to make changes to the shared database (kits, tools, events, sites, books, colors, magazines, ...)
- All data entered in the shared database is visible to everyone.
- Every change you make to the shared database is audited and associated with your profile ID.
- These audit trails are not purgeable and are kept for versioning, historical, copyright and quality reasons.
Right to be forgotten
You have the right to have your personal data erased/modified/corrected/anonymised and we will if applicable adhere to these requests in a timely fashion.
railwaymates.com - ad hoc requests
Scope: All users (guests and members)
Does content on railwaymates.com contain your personal information which should be removed? Please provide us with the necessary details and we will act on it swiftly.
Scope: Members
We offer very granular control on your own content in a self service mode.
- Deleting your comments/wall posts
- Editing your comments/wall posts
- Modifying privacy settings comments/wall posts
- Modifying profile information
- Modifying album/project/collection info
- Modifying public stash/wishlist visibility
railwaymates.com - Account removal
Please note: Account removal is final and not revertible!
Scope: Members
In case, you want to stop your membership and have your full personal profile erased you can do this in a self service mode.
- Will by default remove all your social interactions and remove your account completely (including references to the required information email, nickname and password).
Scope: Members (Contributors)
- When you are a contributor; stopping your membership will remove all your personal profile data (except your nickname and email) but only deactivate your account. (this is in order to maintain audit trails)
Links to Independent Websites
Articles, forum topics and comments hosted on railwaymates.com may link to independently run web sites outside of the https://www.railwaymates.com domain. railwaymates.com is not responsible for the privacy practices or content of such web sites.
More info
If you require any more information or have any questions about our privacy policy, please contact us.
If you feel that this site is not following its stated privacy policy, please contact us immediately.