Privacy Policy

🏛️ Introduction

Contemporary Innovations Journal (CIJ) is committed to protecting the privacy of its users, authors, reviewers, and visitors. This Privacy Policy outlines how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you visit our website, submit manuscripts, participate in peer review, or interact with our services.

Please read this policy carefully. By using CIJ's website and services, you acknowledge that you have read and understood this Privacy Policy.

📋 Information We Collect

2.1 Personal Data

We may collect personal identification information from users in a variety of ways, including when you visit our site, register an account, submit a manuscript, subscribe to our newsletter, or fill out a form. This may include:

• Full name and professional title
• Email address and mailing address
• Phone number and institutional affiliation
• ORCID iD and research interests
• Payment details (processed securely by our payment providers)

2.2 Non-Personal Data

We may also collect non-personal information about your interaction with our site, including browser type, device type, operating system, Internet service provider, referring URLs, and pages viewed. This data is used in aggregate form only and cannot identify you personally.

🎯 How We Use Collected Information

CIJ uses your information for the following purposes:

• Editorial processing: To manage manuscript submissions, peer review assignments, and publication workflows.
• Customer service: To respond to your enquiries, requests, and support needs efficiently.
• Account management: To create and maintain your author or reviewer account on our platform.
• Payment processing: To process APC (Article Processing Charge) payments and issue invoices.
• Communications: To send submission status updates, editorial decisions, and relevant journal announcements.
• Site improvement: To analyse aggregate usage patterns and improve our services.

🔒 How We Protect Your Information

We implement appropriate technical and organisational security measures to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, alteration, disclosure, or destruction. These measures include:

• Encrypted password storage using industry-standard bcrypt hashing
• HTTPS encryption for all data transmitted between your browser and our servers
• Strict access controls limiting data access to authorised personnel only
• Regular security assessments of our platform and infrastructure
• PCI DSS-compliant payment processing via certified third-party providers

While we strive to protect your personal information, no method of internet transmission or electronic storage is 100% secure. We cannot guarantee absolute security but are committed to minimising risk.

🤝 Sharing Your Personal Information

We do not sell, trade, or rent your personal identification information to third parties. We may share your information only in the following limited circumstances:

• Peer reviewers: Manuscript details (typically anonymised) shared for review purposes.
• Metadata repositories: Author names, affiliations, and publication metadata submitted to CrossRef, DOAB, OpenAIRE, and Google Scholar upon publication.
• Payment processors: Billing data shared with our payment providers (Paystack, Flutterwave) solely to process transactions.
• Legal requirements: Where required by law, court order, or governmental authority.

We may share generic, aggregated, non-personally identifiable information about our user base with business partners and advertisers for analytical purposes.

🔗 Third-Party Websites

Our website may contain links to external sites and services — including partner publishers, research databases, and funding bodies. CIJ has no control over the content or privacy practices of these linked sites and is not responsible for them.

We encourage you to review the privacy policy of every site you visit. The inclusion of a link does not imply CIJ's endorsement of that site.

📝 Changes to This Privacy Policy

CIJ reserves the right to update this Privacy Policy at any time. When changes are made, we will revise the "Last Updated" date at the top of this page and — for material changes — notify registered users by email.

We encourage you to review this policy periodically. Your continued use of our website and services after any changes are posted constitutes your acceptance of the updated policy.

✍️ Your Acceptance of These Terms

By using this website, you signify your acceptance of this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with any part of this policy, please do not use our website or services.

Your continued use of the site following the posting of any changes to this policy will be deemed your acceptance of those changes.

📬 Contacting Us

If you have any questions, concerns, or requests regarding this Privacy Policy or how we handle your personal data, please contact us:

This document was last updated on September 12, 2026.