The Privacy Tool Suite was introduced by The Joomla! Project in response to snowballing privacy and data protection legislation.
Example: GDPR or General Data Protection Regulations in the UK and EU.
New privacy and data protection laws have changed the way you are allowed to:
- collect and store personal data,
- where and how you store personal data,
- who can access the personal data and
- who you can share that personal data with.
The Privacy Tool Suite is provided to help website owners and administrators avoid breaking the law related to data protection and privacy.
In 2021 the Joomla! Community Magazine published a useful article introducing the Privacy Suite.
Read more: The Joomla! Privacy Tool Suite
How does the Privacy Tool Suite help you?
It will help protect you from unwittingly not complying with Data Protection legislation.
The two most common instances when the Privacy Tool Suite will help protect you are when visitors:
- register with your website, and
- contact you via the contact form displayed on your website's contact page.
The Privacy Tool Suite is enabled by default in a WYNCHCO Website Design.
What is included?
The Privacy Tool Suite comprises of six Privacy Plugins plus two additional Consent Plugins, for each of which you can change the settings to suit your needs.
Open the Plugins screen of your website's Dashboard to review the settings of each.
The Suite of six Privacy Plugins
Ensure all these Plugins are enabled if you want to use the Privacy Tool Suite with your website.
Consent Plugins
Open each of the Consent Plugins shown in the image to change its settings to suit your needs.
And make sure both are enabled for the Privacy Tool Suite to work with your website.
Content - Confirm Consent Plugin
"This plugin adds a required consent checkbox to a form eg the core contact component." Source: Joomla! CMS Plugin screen.
Core contact component = contract form on your website's contact page.
System - Privacy Consent Plugin
"Basic plugin to request user's consent to the site's privacy policy. Existing users who have not consented yet will be redirected on login to update their profile." Source: Joomla! CMS Plugin screen.
Expiration Tab
There is a tab labelled Expiration on the Privacy Consent Plugin screen.
It enables you to determine how long a user's consent will be valid for.
By default Expiration is not enabled.
Privacy Type
Both of the above Consent Plugins enable you to choose how to connect to your website's Privacy.
The images above show the default option: Article.
The image below shows the alternative: Menu Item.
Whichever you choose, you can browse to find the Article or Menu Item.
Privacy Policy Article and Menu Link
We include an empty Privacy Policy article in every WYNCHCO Website Design together with an (unpublished) Menu Link to it in the Bottom Menu.
The Menu Link is by default unpublished because a website's Privacy Policy should be specific to the website.
If you choose to write a Privacy Policy then:
- use the Privacy Policy Statement article,
- publish the Privacy Policy menu link, and
- select Article or Menu Item in each Consent Plugin.
Your website's Privacy Policy will then be displayed in a pop-up window for users to read before giving their consent.
What is not included?
The Privacy Tool Suite does not include a Cookie Bar Module.
UK Data Protection law requires that websites warn visitors about Cookies and enable visitors to give their consent to a website's use of Cookies in their browser.
The law also requires that your website publish a Cookie Policy.
Maybe at some future time the Privacy Tool Suite will include a Cookie Bar Module.
Until then there is a wide range of 3rd Party Extensions for you to choose from.
Impact of Privacy Tool Suite in the Front End
Content - Confirm Consent Plugin
This plugin adds a required consent checkbox to your website's contact form.
The message displayed can be changed via the Confirm Consent Plugin screen.
Privacy Note * is a hyperlink to the website's Privacy Policy.
When the link is clicked then a pop-up window displays the Privacy Policy.
Example Pop-up Window when the link is clicked.
System - Privacy Consent Plugin
This plugin adds a required consent checkbox to your website's user registration page.
The message displayed can be changed via the Privacy Consent Plugin screen.
Privacy Policy * is a hyperlink to the website's Privacy Policy.
When the link is clicked then a pop-up window displays the Privacy Policy.
Impact of Privacy Tool Suite in the Dashboard
When the Privacy Tool Suite is enabled then you will see a Privacy Notifications button displayed in the Notifications panel of the Home Dashboard.
And Privacy Consent and Privacy Requests links under the Users Component in the sidebar menu.
Requests
A record of any user having requested details of what personal data about them your website has collected and stored.
Consents
A record of any user having consented to your website collecting and storing personal data when they have interacted with your website.
The Privacy Dashboard
Window Button
Next to the Privacy Heading under the Users Component section of the sidebar menu you will see a window button.
Click the window button to view the Privacy Dashboard.
The Privacy Dashboard
The Privacy Dashboard provides an overview of the status of the various elements which the Privacy Tool Suite is comprised of.
Notice in the image shown below a yellow triangle stating Not Available.
The message next to the triangle states:
- "Database connection encryption is not enabled".
Unless such encryption is enabled then it would be unwise to store personal data in your website other than the:
- name,
- username,
- password,
- email address, and
- assigned user group(s)
of any one registered user.
A registered user's account will not function without these items of personal data.
Any additional data you collect and store is not essential unless you are administering an eCommerce website, in which case database connection encryption is also essential.
WYNCHCO Joomla! CMS Support
We coach, help and support managers with responsibility for Joomla! websites in organisations across Cheshire, Manchester, Merseyside, North West England & the UK.
