Securing your data

There are two types of cookies used by our web sites, “Session Cookies” and “Persistent Cookies”.

Cookies do not endanger your computer or operating system. A cookie is just a simple text file, which does not have anything to do with computer viruses!

In order to uniquely identify you within our secure services, we use a temporary cookie that maintains your access information during the working session. The cookie stores only the user data, which you use to identify yourself.

The cookie is deleted after you log off or when you close your internet browser. The data stored within the cookie is therefore only held in your computer's memory for a short period of time, during your working session. This cookie is not used to monitor your online usage of the system.

Persistent cookies are those that are stored on your computer even after you close your browser. We use persistent cookies so that we can collect anonymous data on what pages are being viewed on our web sites so that we can deliver content that better meets our customer needs.

This data is stored in a secure database and is only used internally to provide reporting on traffic patterns within our web sites. This data is only accessible by those people requiring it to produce reports and will not be provided to any third parties. All data logged is anonymous and no attempt will be made to identify individual users. See more information on our website tracking.

There are 2 ways to easily understand if you are in a secure area of our site.

The first is to look for a small padlock symbol either green or grey depending on your browser. This indicates that you are using a web page that utilises Secure Socket Layers (SSL) protection. Another sign of this level of security is to look at the address in your browser window. It will start with "https" rather than "http", which unsecured pages use.

The second element to look for are references to "GeoTrust Inc". This indicates where we have employed additional measures to improve the security of our online transactions and other confidential communications. By clicking on the padlock in the toolbar, you can see the details of our security certificate.

If you use Internet Explorer:

• Select Tools -> Internet Options from the menu
• Select the "Security" tab
• Click the "Custom Level..." button
• In the "Cookies" section make sure that "Allow per-session cookies (not stored)" is set to "Enable"
• Confirm the changes by clicking OK
• Answer "Yes" to the following dialog box
• Close and save your changes by clicking "OK" on the "Internet Options" dialog box