Introduction:

This privacy Policy (the "Policy") is intended to provide you with information about what personal data M3 India collects about you and how it is used. This Policy describes how we may obtain personal data, the types of personal data we may obtain, how we use, share and protect the personal data, the rights of data subjects with respect to their personal data, and how to contact us about our privacy practices. We may revise this Privacy Policy at any time, without notice to you. You are responsible for reviewing it regularly. Your access of the Sites following the posting of changes means you agree to abide by those changes.

This Privacy Policy was last revised on September 19, 2024.

About M3 India:

M3 India (“Company”) provides latest news and articles from 1000+ medical journals and provides a one-stop platform for Indian Doctors. We provide curated content, access to paid for market research opportunities and collaborations with Pharma and Healthcare businesses.

M3 India is owned and operated by M-Panels Research Services Pvt and is part of M3MR Group which includes activities provided by M3 USA Corporation and its affiliates, including M3 (EU) Ltd., M3 Global Research, Qualitative and Quantitative Fieldwork Services AB (QQFS), Ekas Marketing Research Services (Ekas), M-Panels Research Services Private Limited (m360 Research), pharma-insight GmbH and Med Planet.

This Privacy Policy relates to the products and services offered by M3 India.

About the M3 Group:

The M3 Group, named to represent Medicine, Media, and Metamorphosis, was founded with the goal of changing the world of medicine through full use of the power of the Internet. The M3 Group operates in the US, Asia, and Europe with over 2 million physician members globally via its physician websites such as: m3.com, mdlinx.com, m3globalresearch.com, m-panels.com, doctors.net.uk, ekas.com.au, networksinhealth.com, medigate.net, medlive.cn, pharma-insight.com, https://www.medplanet.biz.

M3 Inc. is a publicly traded company on the Tokyo Stock Exchange (jp:2413) with subsidiaries in major markets including USA, UK, Sweden, Japan, S. Korea, India, Australia and China. M3 Group provides services to healthcare and the life science industry. In addition to market research, these services include medical education, ethical drug promotion, clinical development, job recruitment, and clinic appointment services. M3 has offices in Tokyo, Fort Washington, PA, Oxford, London, Gothenburg, Chatswood, Bangalore and Seoul.

• The Types of Personal Data We May Obtain and Process:

  M3 India collects personal data when individuals engage with the www.m3india.in ("Site") or any Activities or Services provided by M3 India or Affiliates. We use this personal data to provide you with services as described below. We do not sell personal data to anyone and only share it with third parties who are facilitating the delivery of our services or when you give us explicit additional permission or in event of a merger, consolidation, acquisition, combination, amalgamation, demerger, hive-off or any reorganization of the Company, or any one or more of its undertaking, assets or any division.

• Personal data you give us about yourself when you register:

  Personal data M3 India may collect includes but is not limited to your name, telephone number, e-mail address, practice specialty and academic qualifications, workplace details, and contact address. In order to verify your identity, we use our Partner, Yoti (https://www.yoti.com/) to collect an ID document and biometric selfie which forms part of the registration process. We may also use details you provide on your place of work to contact them as part of the healthcare professional verification process.

• Personal data you give us within your membership profile:

  M3 India may collect from you additional personal data either before Activities or within the Site. This is used to allow us to invite you to participate in Activities or promote content that you are more likely to be interested in. For example, this may include information about your medical experience and the types of patient you treat.

• Personal data you give us within and immediately before or after online activities:

  Activities should not contain requests for you to provide personal data. However, M3 India maintains systems that control access to and measure outcomes (for example; if you completed the Activity or failed to qualify) so we may need to collect personal data before and/or after the Activity. This data is not linked directly to the Activity data and is only passed to third parties with your explicit consent and/or as laid out in this policy.

  Online market research activities offered to M3 India members may be on a website provided by M3 India or one provided by a third party. In the latter case, any personal data collected will be subject to the host’s privacy policy. If you take part in other forms of market research with M3 India or affiliates, for example, discussion groups or telephone interviews, then you will be asked to provide specific consent for any necessary processing of your personal data.

• Personal data related to your previous participation in market research activities:

  We collect and store records of the Activities you have been invited to participate in, whether you responded to them, qualified for them, completed or partially completed them. We keep this data so that we make it available via the Sites and can respond to enquiries. On occasions we may also send you invitations to new Activities based upon your participation in previous Activities.

  We use this data in aggregate to understand how many individuals of any type may participate in any future Activity and to understand trends in and patterns of participation.

  We also maintain records of any data quality issues that may have been identified in the data you provided within an Activity so we can manage the quality of the data we provide to clients – this may affect your invitation to future Activities.

• Personal data we may collect from Site engagement:

  We may collect certain other non-personal information such as the posts that you create & discussions on any forums, comments to the various posts on the Site, details regarding your participation in services offered on the Site and response to surveys or other similar requests for information from M3 India.

• Personal data created about you by your use of our systems:

  We use a variety of technical means to collect and/or store personal data about you. These include cookies, web beacons and device fingerprinting/watermarking. We use Google ReCAPTCHA to collect personal information to determine whether the user is human and not a bot. This involves placing a Google cookie on the computer being used. We use Imperium (https://www.imperium.com/) anti-fraud solution to prevent duplicates and fraudulent Activity responses.

  For more information on our use of these technologies please refer to our Cookie Notice and Policy. Additionally, we keep records of your use of our systems. These are used to improve the security of our systems and to improve the experience we offer you.

• Payment details you give us for compensation payments:

  Where an Activity attracts a compensation payment (market research activities) we collect and use specific personal data so that we can process payment of your compensation. The personal data we need to use varies depending on the form of payment but can include bank account details, name, mailing address and email address. This is used only to process these payments but may be shared with payment processing partners to process the payment. (e.g., we must share bank account details with our bank to process a bank transfer to your account.) This personal data is also retained for financial reporting, audit and tax purposes.

• Personal data we get from third parties:

  Clients sometimes send us lists of healthcare professionals who they would like us to include or exclude in specific Activities. We also subscribe to various lists of healthcare professionals that we use to validate registrations and to append a variety of unique identification numbers to assist with deduplicating registrations and matching client lists. Lists of healthcare professionals are also used for direct marketing purposes outside the EU.

  Our partner, Yoti provides details to us which they collect as part of the verification process at registration. This may include date of birth, gender, nationality, address and ID document details.

• Personal data we retain for an extended period:

  In order to manage its business, M3 India needs to retain limited personal data about previous members for longer periods of time. We have carefully limited the personal data retained and the circumstances in which it is needed to the following:

  • Requests by individuals to not email them
  • Requests by individuals not to be contacted by M3 India
  • Individuals who have objected to M3 India processing their personal data (where there is not an overwhelming interest in us continuing to do so)
  • Individuals who have breached the Sites Terms of Service, including those suspected of fraudulent behaviour

  This personal data is not shared with anyone and is only used to honour your requests or to prevent subsequent Activity participation.

• Personal data we may collate about you:

  We use a variety of public sources to collate information about healthcare professionals we believe may be suitable to complete specific Activities or may wish to become members of M3 India. The information would include your name, contact information (address, phone number(s) and email address) and your healthcare specialty.

• Personal data created by your use of third-party platforms:

  Your use of third-party websites and services associated with M3 India may expose your personal data. These sites are beyond our control and you should see their respective privacy policies: LinkedIn, Twitter,Facebook.

• Purpose and legal basis for processing your personal data:

  This data is used to manage our contact with you, so that, for example, multiple attempts to contact you regarding the same services are eliminated or you are not re-contacted after informing us you are not interested in our services.

  The legal bases we rely upon to offer these services to you are:

  • Where we have a legitimate interest (i.e., we have a valid business reason) and we have carefully balanced your individual rights against this need:
  • To fulfil a contractual obligation that we have with you; and/or
  • Your consent for direct marketing.

  We will only process your personal data for the purpose it was first collected. If we process the personal data for a new purpose we will ensure it is either compatible with your original purpose, or gain your consent.

• How We Use the Personal Data We Obtain:

  We may use the personal data we obtain to:

  • Manage our existing and prospective relationships;
  • Communicate with you for marketing, newsletters and company updates and to respond to your inquiries and fulfil your requests, such as to send you documents or, promotional emails about new products or services;
  • for our business purposes, such as data analysis, audits, developing new products, enhancing our Site, improving our products and services, identifying Site usage trends, personalizing your experience on the Site by presenting products and offers tailored to you, and determining the effectiveness of our promotional campaigns.
  • Processing compensation payments;
  • Safeguard and defend M3 India interests; and
  • Comply with applicable legal requirements, industry standards and our policies.

  We may also use all data including your personal data received as part of a merger, consolidation, acquisition, combination, amalgamation, demerger, hive-off or any reorganization of the Company, or any one or more of its undertaking, assets or any division. In any such event, the reference Company under this policy will mean and include any such new or resulting entity that has received the Data. The transferring entity in each case will continue to retain the Data and use the same in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

• How We May Share Personal Data:

  M3 India does not sell, rent, or trade members personal data. We may share your personal data only with:

  • Other companies within our corporate group or Affiliates of M3 India for purposes consistent with this Privacy Policy, facilitating seamless service provision and the enhancement of our products and services
  • Service providers that M3 India has retained to perform services on its behalf, such as, but not limited to, IT service providers. Service providers are not permitted to use the personal data for their own purposes and are prohibited from onward transfer of the personal data without our written consent in each instance
  • Law enforcement and other government authorities if required by law or reasonably necessary to protect the rights, property, and safety of others or ourselves. This includes lawful requests by public authorities, including to meet national security or law enforcement requirements. In the event of a merger, consolidation, acquisition, combination, amalgamation, demerger, hive-off or any reorganization of the Company, or any one or more of its undertaking, assets or any division, your personal information may be transferred as part of the transaction, with efforts made to comply with applicable laws and implement appropriate safeguards to protect your privacy.
  • Programme Sponsors: If you choose to participate in certain sponsored programmes or services run on the Site (for instance by accessing the materials published in connection with it), your participation, along with your personal identifier, may be passed on to the sponsor of that programme or its associated companies and data processors. Sponsors undertake to use such data solely for assessing your access (and the frequency of that access) to material provided by them via the Site for their internal auditing purposes.

• Links to other websites:

  Our Site may contain links to other websites. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting other websites and these other websites are not governed by this privacy policy. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.

• International Data Transfers:

  Within M3 India: M3 India endeavours to apply suitable safeguards to protect the privacy and security of your personal data and to use it only in ways that are consistent with your relationship with M3 India and the practices described in this Privacy Policy. Because of the global nature of our business, there may be times when we need to transfer your Personal Data to a country outside of the country you reside. M3 India uses cloud and physical servers in the UK, EU, USA, India, and Australia.  UK and EU Personal Data will only be stored and processed in UK, EU or USA.

  To clients and partners: As laid out in this Privacy Policy, we may from time to time share limited information with our clients or carefully selected partners. This may involve transferring your personal data to countries outside the country you reside. M3 India will remain in contractual control of the data.

• How We Protect Personal Data:

  We maintain appropriate technical and organizational security safeguards designed to protect personal data against accidental, unlawful or unauthorized destruction, loss, alteration, access, disclosure, or use. We update and test our security technology on an ongoing basis. We limit access to your personal data to those employees who need access to provide benefits or services to you. In addition, we train our employees about the importance of confidentiality and maintaining the privacy and security of your personal data.

• How Long We Retain Personal Data:

  We store personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which we collect the data (see "How we use the Personal Data we obtain"), except if required otherwise by law. Your personal data may be kept for 10 years after the working relationship has ceased.

• Changes and updates to the Privacy Policy:

  As our organization, membership and benefits change from time to time, this Privacy Policy and our Terms of Service is expected to change as well. We reserve the right to amend the Privacy Policy and Terms of Service at any time, for any reason, without notice to you, other than the posting of the amended Privacy Policy and Terms of Service at this Site. We may e-mail periodic reminders of our policy and terms and will e-mail members of material changes to it, but you should check our Site frequently to see the current Privacy Policy and Terms of Use that are in effect and any changes that may have been made to them.

• Your Rights:

  If you wish to confirm that M3 India is processing your personal data, or to have access to the personal data M3 India may have about you, please contact our Data Protection Officer.

  You may request information about:

  • the purpose of the processing;
  • the legal basis for that processing;
  • the categories of personal data and the data subject concerned;
  • information on the type or identity of third parties to which your data may be disclosed to and the protection provided;
  • the source of the personal information (if you didn’t provide it directly to us); and
  • how long it will be stored.

  You have a right to:

  • access your personal data
  • have inaccurate personal data rectified
  • request erasure of personal data
  • restrict the processing of your personal data
  • object to the processing your personal data
  • data portability
  • opt out of data being transferred to a third party, unless there is a legal reason to do so (see "How we may share Personal Data")
  • opt out of direct marketing
  • opt out of automated decision making

  To exercise your rights, you can write the Data Protection Officer at privacy@m3globalresearch.com.
  
  Reasonable access to your personal data will be provided at no cost to you upon your request. M3 India will provide the information to you within the legal time frame. If for some reason access is denied, M3 India will provide an explanation as to why access has been denied.

• Contact Information:
  • If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, please email M3 India’s Data Protection Officer at privacy@m3globalresearch.com.
  • For all other questions regarding your account, preference changes, compensation for surveys or our services, please e-mail support@m3globalresearch.com.
• Use of Cookies:

  Cookies consist of pieces of text, often including unique identifiers, that are sent by web servers to web browsers, and which may then be sent back to the server each time the browser requests a page from the server.

  Cookies can be used by web servers to identity and track users as they navigate different pages on a website and to identify users returning to a website.

  Cookies do not contain any information that personally identifies you, but personal information that m3india.in store about you may be linked, by m3india.in, to the information stored in and obtained from cookies. m3india.in may use the information m3india.in obtains from your use of these cookies for the following purposes:

  • to recognize your computer when you visit our Site
  • to track you as you navigate our Site
  • to improve the Site's usability
  • to analyse the use of our Site and/or
  • in the administration of this Site.