BC Pet Registry Privacy Policy

Last Updated: December 19, 2025 

The British Columbia Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (“BC SPCA”, “we”, “us”) knows that your privacy is important. This BC Pet Registry Privacy Policy (“Privacy Policy”) explains what personal information we collect when you use the BC Pet Registry, when we collect it, and how we use, store, and share it. 

This Privacy Policy summarized our privacy practices in connection with the BC Pet Registry and its related services (the “Services”). These Services include any content and services on http://www.bcpetregistry.ca and http://www.bcpetregistry.com (the “Website”). For information about how the BC SPCA handles personal information in connection with its other activities (including volunteer management, donor outreach and adoption services) please see the BC SPCA Privacy Policy. 

This Privacy Policy works together with the applicable BC Pet Registry Terms and Conditions. Find your applicable Terms and Conditions here: 

• BC Pet Registry Terms and Conditions – For Pet Owners 

• BC Pet Registry Terms and Conditions – For Shelters 

• BC Pet Registry Terms and Conditions – For Vets

1. What is Personal Information? 

This policy applies to personal information that the BC SPCA handles for its Pet Registry Services. “Personal information” means any information that can identify you as a person. This includes things like your name, address, age, financial information, and phone number. 

Personal information does not include aggregated information that cannot be linked to a specific person. It also does not include business contact information. 

2. What Information Does the BC SPCA Collect, and How is it Used? 

We collect personal information to assist us in providing the BC Pet Registry Services and adapting and updating them to ensure we meet your needs.  

We collect and use these types of personal information directly from you: 

• When you sign up for an account: we need information such as your name, email address, , address, and phone number. We use this information to set up your account and profile, confirm who you are, communicate with you, and provide you with the Services. This includes contacting you to keep your information updated. We also ask you to create a password to keep your account safe. 

• When you register a pet: If you are a pet owner, you may also give us information like your pet’s name and other details (for example, pictures, descriptions, microchip, tattoo, or license information).  

• We may also ask for information about co-owners or other contacts for your pet. You must get permission from any other people before giving us their personal information. 

• Pet information and contact information will be available to registered veterinary clinics, animal control agencies, or shelters. They can use this information to connect you with your lost animal and make sure your pet gets home safely. All microchips registered with BC Pet Registry can also be found internationally through the American Animal Hospital Association’s (AAHA) universal pet microchip lookup at petmicrochiplookup.org. 

• If you fail to complete your registration, we may contact you with our promotional messages to encourage you to complete your registration. 

• When you subscribe to newsletters and promotional materials: If you consent to receive newsletters or promotional materials from the BC SPCA, we will use your contact information to send them to you based on your preferences. Our promotional emails may be equipped to track whether you open emails, click links, or if emails bounce back. You can unsubscribe at any time. However, you cannot unsubscribe from important account-related messages, such as messages regarding your lost pet. 

• If you make a payment through our Services: a third-party service provider will collect and store your financial information (like payment card details and billing information) to process payments. The BC SPCA will collect limited information about your payment, including the date and time, amount paid, transaction reference numbers, and other details. 

• When you communicate with us: When you contact us by email or through the Website, we will collect your contact information and messages to answer your questions and provide customer service. If you call us, we (or our third-party call centre provider) may record the call for quality assurance and training purposes. If you give us feedback on our Services, we may use this information to improve the Services. 

• Other information: you may choose to give us other information when filling out forms, doing searches, or using other features of the Services. We will only use this information to provide you with Services or as explained in this Privacy Policy or in other notices provided to you at the point of collection. 
  
  

We also automatically collect the following information when you use the Website: 

• Cookies: our Website uses “cookies” which help us remember you, understand and save your preferences, and operate certain features on the Website. You can turn off cookies by changing the settings on your internet browser, but this may also block cookies for any website you visit. 

• Device and Usage Data: we or our third-party providers also use cookies and other tracking technology on our Website to collect certain data. This data includes how you use the Website (pages you visit, links you click, referring webpages, searches, etc.), access times, how long you stay on the site, and device information (e.g., IP address, browser type, operating system, etc.). Our third-party analytics providers may also provide us with aggregated, anonymized information about Website visitors, such as age, language, and general location (based on IP address). We use this information to provide, maintain, understand and improve the Website and Services, measure how effective ads are at bringing visitors to the Website, and for troubleshooting purposes. 

We may also receive personal information from third party sources: 

• Ad Networks. We may receive additional information about you from third parties. For example, we may receive aggregated, anonymized data about individuals who interact with our advertisements from ad networks, such as Meta and Google Ads (this includes information such as demographics, locations, and device types).  

• Payment Processors. If you make a payment, our payment processors may also provide us with a risk score to help us detect, mitigate and prevent fraudulent transactions. For more information about our payment processors, please visit their privacy policies: https://stripe.com/en-ca/privacy and https://www.shopify.com/ca/legal/privacy/consumers.

3. Additional Uses of Personal Information 

In addition to the main purposes listed above, we may use personal information for these additional purposes: 

• To understand, improve, and develop our Website and Services; 

• To detect and prevent fraud, abuse, security breaches, and any other activity that could harm the Website, Services, or users; 

• To investigate breaches of our policies, terms and conditions, and applicable laws; 

• To resolve disputes and enforce agreements and policies;  

• To meet legal and regulatory requirements; 

• With your consent, or where required or allowed by law.

4. How Does the BC SPCA Share Personal Information? 

We may share user personal information when necessary to fulfill purposes identified when we collected it or for related purposes. We may also share user personal information when you direct us to or with your consent. 

If you are a pet owner registered on the Services, your pet details and contact information will be available to registered veterinary clinics, animal control agencies, or shelters who are authorized to use this information to connect you with your lost animal and make sure your pet gets home safely. 

All microchips registered with BC Pet Registry can be found internationally through the American Animal Hospital Association’s (AAHA) universal pet microchip lookup at petmicrochiplookup.org. This service gives people a list of registries they can contact to get pet owner information (it does not give your information directly). 

We may share user personal information with third-party service providers that we use to provide the Services. These third parties generally have limited access to your information only for doing tasks for us. The specific providers may change from time to time. We use the following categories of service providers: 

• Payment service providers: We use payment processors to handle payments you make on the Website or in connection with the Services. These will handle payment card details and related information (e.g., billing info). Our payment processor handles payment information according to its own policies and procedures. We encourage you to review the privacy policy of these providers: https://stripe.com/en-ca/privacy and https://www.shopify.com/ca/legal/privacy/consumers.  

• Email marketing platform providers: These may store and process contact information (names, titles, phone numbers, mailing addresses), communication preferences, and email engagement data (including email opens, click throughs, bounce backs, etc.) to let us send our promotional emails and measure how effective they are. 

• Call centres: These may process your pet registry information and phone communications to provide customer service. These call centres may record phone calls for quality assurance and training purposes. 

• Data analytic providers (e.g., Hotjar, Google Analytics): These may process Website log data in order to help us understand patterns, how users interact with our Website, Services, and advertising campaigns, to help with troubleshooting and improvements to our Website. 
  
  

We may share information with courts, law enforcement, or government authorities, or authorized third parties if we are allowed or required to do so by law.  

If the BC SPCA is involved in a merger, acquisition, reorganization, sale of assets, bankruptcy, or other insolvency event, then we may sell, transfer, or share some or all of our assets, which may include transferring your information. 

The Website may contain links to other websites that are not controlled by the BC SPCA. We encourage you to read the privacy policies of the websites you visit. These other parties will have their own rules and policies for handling personal information. 

5. Cross-Border Transfers of Personal Information 

Your personal information may be transferred to our service providers and partners, some of which may be located outside of Canada (including in the United States). Therefore, your personal information may be processed in countries outside of Canada. This means this information may be accessible to legal orders from courts, law enforcement, and national security authorities of those countries. 

6. Consent 

We get consent to collect, use, or share personal information, except where we are allowed by law to do so without consent. Consent may be express or implied. 

Subject to certain exceptions, you may withhold or withdraw your consent for the BC SPCA to use your personal information in certain ways. If you withhold or withdraw consent, it may limit our ability to provide certain Services. 

7. How Long do you Store My Personal Information? 

We will keep user personal information only as long as reasonably necessary to fulfill identified purposes or a legal or business purpose. 

If we use your personal information to make a decision that affects you, we will try to keep the personal information for at least one year so that you have a reasonable opportunity to request access to it. 

8. Ensuring Accuracy of Personal Information 

It is your responsibility to update your personal information and keep it accurate. 

You may request to update, correct, or delete your personal information at any time by logging into your account. You may also request correction of your personal information by submitting a request in writing to info@bcpetregistry.ca or by phone at: 1-855-622-7722. 

When updating your records, if you need to transfer your pet to a new owner, please follow the process outlined in our FAQ page. 

9. How is My Personal Information Protected? 

We are committed to keeping user personal information secure to protect it from unauthorized access, collection, use, disclosure, copying, modification, disposal, or other similar risks. We have security measures in place to protect user personal information. We will use appropriate security measures when we destroy user personal information. 

We regularly review and update our security policies and controls to ensure ongoing personal information security. The internet is not 100% secure, so we cannot guarantee complete security and protection of the transmission and storage of your information, and we expressly disclaim any and all liability in this regard. 

The BC SPCA takes steps to verify identity of requesters to protect the privacy of individuals on its database and only give out contact information in response to legitimate requests. The database is made accessible to industry organizations such as veterinarians, humane societies and animal services. The BC SPCA takes steps to inform these organizations of their responsibilities under BC PIPA. However, the BC SPCA ultimately does not control, and is not responsible for how these entities collect, use and disclose personal information. 

10. How Can I Access my Personal Information? 

You may request access to your own personal information, subject to limited exceptions in the law. A request to access personal information must be made in writing and provide enough detail to identify the personal information you want. You can also request to know how we use your personal information and to whom it has been shared. 

We will respond to requests within 30 days or provide notice of an extension if more time is needed. A fee may be charged for providing access to personal information. If applicable, the fee will be disclosed at the beginning and you will be given the choice of whether or not to proceed with the request. 

If a request is refused, we will notify the user in writing, provide reasons for the refusal, and explain what recourse is available to the user. 

11. Questions and Complaints 

Users may direct complaints, concerns, or questions about the BC SPCA’s compliance with PIPA and/or this policy to privacy@spca.bc.ca. If you cannot resolve the concern after speaking with a representative of the BC SPCA, you may also write to the Information and Privacy Commissioner of British Columbia. 

12. Changes to the Privacy Policy 

Our Privacy Policy may change from time to time to remain compliant with local laws and regulations and to best protect users’ personal information. If changes are made, we will post the revised policy on the Website so you are always aware of how we treat personal information. Your continued access to or use of our Services after any revisions become effective will mean that you accept and agree to be bound by the new policy. In certain circumstances, we may notify you and get consent before using personal information in a new way. 

13. Contact Us 

To exercise your data protection rights or if you have any questions, concerns, or complaints about our Privacy Policy or the processing of your Personal Information, you may email our Privacy Officer at privacy@spca.bc.ca.