Terms of Service

PLEASE READ THESE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE USING THIS SITE

Introduction

These terms tell you the rules for using our website www.covidence.org (our site).

Covidence is a service dedicated to improving the production of systematic reviews so that health decision-making can draw on the best available evidence.

www.covidence.org is a site operated by Veritas Health Innovation Ltd (We or us).

We are a public company limited by guarantee, registered in Australia (ACN 600 366 274, ABN 41 600 366 274). Our registered office is at Level 10, 446 Collins Street Melbourne VIC 3000 Australia.

We are also a registered charity, regulated by the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission.

To contact us, please email hello@covidence.org.

By using our site you accept these terms

By using our site, you confirm that you accept these terms of use and that you agree to comply with them.

If you do not agree to these terms, you must not use our site.

We recommend that you save or print a copy of these terms for future reference.

There are other terms that may apply to you

These terms of use refer to the following additional terms, which also apply to your use of our site:

• Our Privacy Policy, which sets out the terms on which we process any personal data we collect from you, or that you provide to us. By using our site, you consent to such processing and you warrant that all data provided by you is accurate.

Changes

We may make changes to these terms

We amend these terms from time to time. The current terms are posted on our site.

We may make changes to our site

We may update and change our site from time to time, including to reflect changes to our products, services, our users’ needs, regulatory requirements and our business priorities. We will try to give you reasonable notice of any major changes.

We will not exercise our rights under this clause in a manner that would intentionally cause you to lose access to your Review Data (defined in item 5 below) or fundamentally decrease the utility of our site to users, other than in accordance with these terms.

We may suspend or withdraw our site

We do not guarantee that our site, or any content on it, will always be available or be uninterrupted. We may suspend or withdraw or restrict the availability of all or any part of our site for business and operational reasons. We will try to give you reasonable notice of any suspension or withdrawal.

Using our site

Registering

You may use our site by registering as a User including by providing a valid email address and other information we ask for.

You must keep your account details safe

If you choose, or you are provided with, a user identification code, password or any other piece of information as part of our security procedures, you must treat such information as confidential. You must not disclose it to any third party.

You are responsible and liable for any use of our site through your account, whether authorized or unauthorized, including any conduct which breaches these terms.

We have the right to disable any user identification code or password, whether chosen by you or allocated by us, at any time, if in our reasonable opinion you have failed to comply with any of these terms of use.

If you know or suspect that anyone other than you knows your user identification code or password, you must promptly notify us at support@covidence.org.

Restrictions on use

You must not:

1. use our site for service bureau or time-sharing purposes or in any other way allow third parties to exploit our site;
2. share non-public features or content of our site with any third party; or
3. access our site in order to build a competitive product or service, to build a product using similar ideas, features, functions or graphics of our site, or to copy any ideas, features, functions or graphics of our site.

If we suspect any breach of this clause, we may suspend your access to our site without advanced notice, in addition to any other remedies we may have.

Fees

Pricing

If you are on a free trial there are no fees. If you register as a User as part of a University or other organisation which already has a written agreement with us to pay the fees, then we will charge the fees to that organisation rather than to you directly.

Otherwise, as part of registering as a User, you agree to pay the fees as specified on our site (**fees**). In return for you paying the fees, and subject to these terms of use, we will give you access to our site.

Payment and Taxes

If you are required to pay any fees, you must pay them in advance by credit card or other payment method we accept. No refunds of fees are offered other than as required by law.

The fees are quoted exclusive of all taxes, duties and charges. We will increase the invoiced amount to take account of any such taxes, which may include GST in Australia, VAT in the United Kingdom, sales taxes in the USA and similar taxes elsewhere.

Extending your use

(This section does not apply if your usage is paid for by a University or other organisation.)

The fees you pay give you access to Covidence for a fixed period of time (and with a fixed number of reviews). If you want to keep using Covidence, you will need to extend your access by paying our then-current fees, which are available on our site.

Uploading content to our site

Review Data

Review Data means data used in a systematic review created in our site which you upload or input into our site, but does not include derivative data, such as analytics.

You are responsible for Review Data

Whenever you make use of a feature that allows you to upload content to our site, including Review Data, you are responsible for the accuracy, quality and legality of any such content. You warrant that any such contribution or Review Data does not infringe the rights of any third party, and complies with these terms, and you will be liable to us and indemnify us for any breach of that warranty. This means you will be responsible for any loss or damage we suffer as a result of your breach of warranty.

We accept no liability for the content of Review Data. We may prevent the publication of Review Data where we believe publication might breach the rights of any third party or otherwise be unlawful. We may disclose your identity to any third party who is claiming that any content posted or uploaded by you to our site constitutes a violation of their rights or is unlawful.

Input and Output

The input and output formats to transfer data in and out of our site are limited to those available from time-to-time. It is your responsibility to ensure that those formats are appropriate for your needs. You are solely responsible for the regular export of your Review Data as a backup mechanism.

Our rights to use your Review Data

As part of our mission to improve the efficiency of evidence production we may develop services that enable the sharing of this data with other Covidence users and others in the scientific community. You retain all of your ownership rights in your Review Data, but you grant to us a perpetual, royalty-free and worldwide license to use, copy, modify and distribute Review Data (including where it has been removed from our Database by us and not including your personal information) for non-commercial purposes, including:

1. to provide Covidence to you and other users, and to support, enhance and develop Covidence;
2. making Review Data available to other users of our site, and non-users, for non-commercial purposes; and
3. aggregating and incorporating Review Data as part of new data sets, and making those data sets available for non-commercial purposes, including the development of machine learning models.

This section does not apply to your personal information, which is covered by our Privacy Policy.

Retention of Review Data

Removal of Review Data by us

Where you are on a free trial, we will retain Review Data linked to the trial account for the duration of the trial (Trial Period). The trial period will be communicated at the time of trial activation. Seven days after the conclusion of the trial, any Review Data linked to the trial account will be deleted and permanently removed from our Database. If you make a request in writing (including by email) within seven days of the conclusion of your trial, we will retain your Review Data for an additional period of 30 days before it is deleted so that you can download it. You are able to download any of your Review Data using the export functionality in your account prior to the end of your Trial Period through your account.

If you are registered as a User as part of a University or other organisation, or have your own paid account (including where you have converted a trial account into a paid account) we will retain your Review Data indefinitely.

You agree that even where we have removed your Review Data from our publicly accessible Database, we are still able to use your Review Data in accordance with the section above (Our rights to use your Review Data).
This section does not apply to any personal information contained in your account, which will be managed in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

Removal by User

You can delete your Review Data through your account at any time. If you have deleted your Review Data it will be permanently removed from our Database. This applies to all users and accounts, whether it is a paid account or a free trial.

Privacy & Data Security

We shall collect, use and disclose personal information in accordance with our Privacy Policy in force from time to time, available at https://www.covidence.org/privacy.

You acknowledge and agree that:

1. Our site may use cookies (a small tracking code in computer browsers) to improve your experience while browsing, while also sending browsing information back to us. You may manage how you handle cookies in your own browser settings.
2. You must not do anything to prejudice the security or privacy of our systems or the information on them.
3. Hosting data online involves risks of unauthorized disclosure or exposure and that, in accessing and using our site, you assume such risks. We offer no representation, warranty, or guarantee that your data will not be exposed or disclosed through errors or the actions of third parties.
4. We do not warrant that we are able to backup or recover specific Review Data from any period of time.

How you may use material on our site

We own the material on our site

We are the owner or the licensee of all intellectual property rights in our site, and in the material published on it (except for Review Data), and in our trademarks. Those works are protected by copyright, trademarks, patents, proprietary rights and other laws and treaties around the world. All such rights are reserved.

You must not copy our site or materials from it or the services that it provides for any purpose other than using our site, or directly or indirectly copy, recreate, decompile, reverse engineer or otherwise obtain, modify or use any source or object code, architecture, algorithms contained in our site or any documentation associated with it.

All content (with the exception of Review Data) remains our intellectual property, including any source code, analytics, insights, aggregations, ideas, enhancements, feature requests, suggestions or other information provided by you or any other party with respect to our site.

We do not guarantee the content of our site

Although we make reasonable efforts to update the information on our site, we make no representations, warranties or guarantees, whether express or implied, that the content on our site is accurate, complete or up to date.

We are not responsible for websites we link to

Where our site contains links to other sites and resources provided by third parties, these links are provided for your information only. Such links should not be interpreted as approval by us of those linked websites or information you may obtain from them.

We have no control over the contents of those sites or resources.

We are not responsible for viruses and you must not introduce them

We do not guarantee that our site will be secure or free from bugs or viruses.

You are responsible for configuring your information technology, computer programmes and platform to access our site. You should use your own virus protection software.

You must not misuse our site by knowingly introducing viruses, trojans, worms, logic bombs or other material that is malicious or technologically harmful. You must not attempt to gain unauthorised access to our site, the server on which our site is stored or any server, computer or database connected to our site. You must not attack our site via a denial-of-service attack or a distributed denial-of service attack.

Rules about linking to our site

You may link to our home page, provided you do so in a way that is fair and legal and does not damage our reputation or take advantage of it.

You must not establish a link in such a way as to suggest any form of association, approval or endorsement on our part where none exists.

You must not establish a link to our site in any website that is not owned by you.

Our site must not be framed on any other site, nor may you create a link to any part of our site other than the home page.

We reserve the right to withdraw linking permission without notice.

If you wish to link to or make any use of content on our site other than that set out above, please contact hello@covidence.org.

Our responsibility for loss or damage suffered by you

Exclusions and limitations

You acknowledge and agree that:

1. You use our site at your own risk.
2. We are not responsible for the activities of any user of our site.
3. Access to and use of our site is dependent on third-party services, including: Banks, credit card providers and/or Bpay; Telecommunications services; Hosting infrastructure services; Email services; and Analytics services; and we shall not be responsible or liable in any way for interruptions to the availability of our site due to third-party services; or information contained on any linked third party website.
4. Any conditions, warranties or other terms which are not stated in these terms or which might be implied or incorporated into these terms or any collateral contract, whether by statute, common law or otherwise, are hereby excluded to the fullest extent allowed by law, including any implied conditions, warranties or other terms as to satisfactory quality, fitness for purpose or the use of reasonable skill and care.
5. In no circumstances will we be liable for any direct, incidental, consequential or indirect damages, personal injury, death, damage to property, loss of property, loss or corruption of data, loss of profits, goodwill, bargain or opportunity, loss of anticipated savings or any other similar or analogous loss resulting from your access to, or use of our site (or inability to use our site) whether based on warranty, contract, tort, negligence, in equity or any other legal theory, and whether or not we knew or should have known of the possibility of such damage or loss.

Consumer Protection Laws

Certain rights and remedies may be available under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) and may not be permitted to be excluded, restricted or modified. Apart from those that cannot be excluded, we exclude all conditions and warranties that may be implied by law. To the extent permitted by law, our liability for breach of any implied warranty or condition that cannot be excluded is restricted, at our option to:

1. the re-supply of services or payment of the cost of re-supply of services; or
2. the replacement or repair of goods or payment of the cost of replacement or repair.

Which country’s laws apply to any disputes?

These terms of use, their subject matter and their formation (and any non-contractual disputes or claims) are governed by the law of Victoria, Australia. We both agree that the courts of Victoria, Australia will have exclusive jurisdiction.

Which country’s laws apply to any disputes?

These terms of use, their subject matter and their formation (and any non-contractual disputes or claims) are governed by the law of Victoria, Australia. We both agree that the courts of Victoria, Australia will have exclusive jurisdiction.