Data Privacy

Personal Privacy of Program Participants

Your privacy matters to BIP! From this page, you can explore how we handle your data. Important to that, is your personal privacy. When reading about how we handle your data, please remember we conduct many data collection programs. Our policies are generalized to apply to all programs. No matter if you take our online survey, participate in Tech Team sampling, or use our hivescale portal, your personal privacy matters.

The Bee Informed Partnership, Inc.SM goes to great extent to not unilaterally release any information that could identify individual’s personal information who participate in our programs. Among information we consider personal identifiers, in addition to name, address, email or phone number, includes the location of apiaries. We may offer participants the ability to share their own data by for example displaying their hive scale data on a map, but the public map display is not required. You are also free to obfuscate the location of your hivescale by setting it at a nearby landmark.

BIP does create aggregate views of our data to broaden understanding of trends in bee health. During the development of these aggregate views, much attention is given to protect your privacy. For example, in our colony loss survey, we do not release state level loss numbers in states with fewer than 5 responses. It is not our objective to share your loss numbers, but instead we want to estimate how many colonies are lost each year.

Tech Team sampling for commercial beekeepers is conducted by our trained consultants in regionally specific areas. Aggregate views as of this data have yet to be publicly distributed to protect privacy of participants, however aggregate views are generated and distributed to participants in the program. These again do not identify individuals but use strategies such as reporting results averaged by month or state instead of the actual sample date or county. For programs available to smaller, and therefore more numerous beekeepers as in the Sentinel Apiary Program, we may provide averages for an apiary by month, but generalize the location to the county level and use an apiary ID generated to be unrecognizable as an individual.

For more technical details on how we protect your data, please see our Data Management Plan and our End User License Agreement (EULA) in place for Research.beeinformed.org user accounts.

The Bee Informed Partnership, Inc.SM Governance and Policies

We are a non-profit 501 (c) (3) organization governed by a nine member board. Our board members represent a mix of commercial beekeepers, top beekeeping scientists and epidemiologists as well as leaders in other honey bee organizations.

If you’d like to help us help the honey bee please consider sending a donation through our Donation Page.

Personal Privacy of Program Participants

Your privacy matters to BIP! From this page, you can explore how BIP handles your data and personal privacy. Please remember that BIP conducts many data collection programs. BIP’s policies are generalized to apply to all programs. No matter which programs in which you participate, your personal privacy matters.

The Bee Informed Partnership, Inc. goes to great lengths to not unilaterally release any information that could identify individual’s personal information who participate in BIP’s programs. Information BIP considers personal identifiers includes name, address, email, phone number, and the location of apiaries. In certain cases, a combination of variables can also be used to identify participants (e.g., number of colonies managed and state), in which case, the combination of variables is also restricted from being released at individual levels. BIP may offer participants the ability to share their own data by for example optionally displaying their apiary location on a map. You are also free to obfuscate the location of your apiary by setting it at a nearby landmark.

BIP does create publicly available aggregate views of the data to broaden understanding of trends in bee health. During the development of these aggregate views, much attention is given to protect your privacy. For example, in our colony loss survey, which aims to estimate how many colonies are lost each year, BIP does not release state level loss numbers in states with fewer than ten (10) responses. 

Tech Team sampling for commercial beekeepers is conducted by our trained consultants in regionally specific areas. The identity of our participants (and their contact information) is kept private, unless the participant authorizes us specifically to share his information for a particular purpose (e.g., scientific collaboration with a separate research team). Aggregate views are generated and distributed to participants in the program. These again do not identify individuals but use strategies such as reporting results averaged by month or state instead of the actual sample date or county. For programs available to smaller, and therefore more numerous beekeepers as in the Sentinel Apiary Program, BIP may provide averages for an apiary, but generalize the location to the county level and use an apiary ID generated to be unrecognizable as an individual.

For more technical details on how BIP protects your data, please see the Data Management Plan and the End User License Agreement (EULA).

GOVERNANCE AND POLICIES

We are a non-profit 501 (c) (3) organization governed by a Board of Directors that represents a mix of commercial beekeepers, top beekeeping scientists and epidemiologists, and business professionals.

If you’d like to help us improve help honey bee health please consider sending a donation through our Donation Page.

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