Twist Bioscience

Privacy Notice for Job Applicants

Effective Date: [6/[•]/2023]

1. Introduction

This notice (“notice”) describes the categories of personal information that Twist Bioscience Corporation and our subsidiaries and affiliates (collectively “Twist”, “we”, “us”, or “our”) collects from individuals who apply or are recruited for a job with us or one of our affiliates (“applicants”), and how we use and share that information.  

This notice applies to personal information collected about you in your capacity as a job applicant. See our Privacy Policy for information about our practices when you interact with us offline or online in the same manner that a customer or other non-candidate may interact with us.

For purposes of this notice, “personal information” means any information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person, or that constitutes “personal information”, “personally identifiable information”, “personal data”, or information of a similar character governed by applicable data protection laws, such as the the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act, and any binding regulations promulgated thereunder (“CCPA”), the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) (“EU GDPR”), the EU GDPR as it forms part of the law of England and Wales by virtue of section 3 of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 (the “UK GDPR”) and the UK Data Protection Act 2018, and the the Personal Information Protection Law of the People’s Republic of China (Chairman’s Order No. 91) (“PIPL”); in each case, as updated, amended, or replaced from time to time.  For clarity, an identifiable natural person is one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, contact information, an identification number, location data, an online identifier, or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural, or social identity of that natural person.  

Twist is the data controller of your personal information and is responsible for how your personal information is processed.

This notice does not create or form part of any contract for employment or otherwise.  

1. Information We Collect About Applicants

1. Categories of personal information

Below are categories of personal information we may collect and process during the application and recruitment process.  

• Contact information, such as name, home address, telephone number, email address, and social media handles (such as LinkedIn or Facebook URLS should the applicant choose to provide it);
• Information from job application materials or recruiters, such as your job application, resume, or CV, cover letter, writing samples, references, work history (e.g., prior employers, past job titles, tenures), education details, records, and certificates (showing schools attended, degrees earned, enrollment and graduation dates, etc.), whether you are subject to prior employer obligations, personal and professional interests, and information that referrers provide about you;
• Biographical information, such as gender, date of birth, race/ethnicity, veteran status, marital status, signature, and information you make publicly available through job search or career networking sites;
• Professional qualifications, such as professional skills, experience, language proficiencies, licenses, permits, memberships, and certifications;
• Information from the application and recruiting process, such as any phone-screens, interviews, evaluations, and outcomes of recruiting exercises;
• Government-issued identifiers, such as Social Security number, passport number, and driver’s license number.
• Immigration status and other information that would allow us to verify your employment eligibility;
• Job preferences, such as desired position and compensation, location preferences, and willingness to relocate;
• Background check information, such as information necessary to complete background checks when permitted by law, and information received during these checks; 
• Information needed to understand and assess accommodation requests regarding potential disabilities or other health conditions; 
• Medical information if you meet with us in-person, such as your body temperature, health symptoms, vaccination status, and other screening information in connection with Twist’s health and safety plans and protocols, including screening required to access Twist events and other measures designed to prevent the transmission of COVID-19 or other infectious diseases; and,
• Other information you provide to us. 

Providing personal information to us is voluntary.  However, if you do not provide sufficient information, we may be unable to consider your application or, if you are hired, your subsequent promotion, transfer, or relocation.  

In certain cases, we may ask you for additional information for purposes of complying with applicable laws.  We may also inquire about criminal and/or credit records. We will do so only where permitted by applicable law.  

1. Sensitive personal information and protected classification characteristics 

With the possible exception of “contact information” and “job preferences”, all of the categories above include, or contain information from which it may be possible to infer, sensitive personal information and characteristics of protected classifications under California or federal law if applicable. However, we do not use or disclose sensitive personal information in ways subject to the right of California residents to limit use of sensitive personal information under the CCPA. 

1. Sources of personal information

We collect personal information from you when you apply for a job and throughout the job application or recruitment process.  We may also collect your personal information from other sources and combine it with the personal information you provide us.  For example, we may collect your personal information from:

• Job board websites you may use to apply for a job with us;
• Prior employers that provide us with employment references;
• Professional references that you authorize us to contact;
• Pre-employment screening services, such as background check providers (where permitted by law);
• Employment agencies and recruiters; 
• Your educational institutions; 
• Publicly available sources; and,
• Other Twist personnel. 

This section generally describes our practices currently and during the preceding 12 months. You should assume that each category of personal information we collect may have been collected from each category of sources listed above in this section.
 

1. How We Use Personal Information About Applicants

1. Purposes for which we use personal information

We may use the categories of personal information above for the following purposes:

• Recruitment management. Managing recruitment generally, such as:

• operating the careers website we maintain at https://www.twistbioscience.com/company/careers or any other site to which this notice is posted (“Careers Site”); 
• recruiting, interviewing, and evaluating job applicants;
• conducting background checks and other pre-employment screening (where permitted by law);
• analyzing and improving our application and recruitment processes;
• accommodating disabilities or health conditions; 
• communicating with you regarding your candidacy, opportunities with the Twist or about the Careers Site and any changes to applicable terms or policies; and,
• other business operations. 

• Compliance, safety and protection, such as:

• complying with or monitoring compliance with legal and other requirements, such as tax, audit, recordkeeping, reporting, verifying identity and eligibility to work, and equal opportunities monitoring requirements, where applicable; 
• complying with internal policies and procedures;
• complying with lawful requests and legal process, such as to respond to subpoenas or requests from government authorities; 
• protecting our, your, or others’ rights, safety and property, including by complying with applicable public health guidelines and requirements, including, without limitation, guidance from public health authorities relating to the prevention and control of COVID-19 or other infectious diseases; 
• investigating and deterring against fraudulent, harmful, unauthorized, unethical, or illegal activity, or conduct in violation of our policies or procedures; 
• controlling access to and monitoring our physical premises (e.g., by requiring health screenings to access offices/facilities; 
• pursuing legal rights and remedies, including investigating, making, and defending complaints or legal claims; administering and enforcing internal policies and procedures; and,
• sharing information with government authorities, law enforcement, courts, or private parties where we have a good-faith belief it is necessary for the foregoing purposes.

• Analytics.  Creating anonymous, aggregated, or de-identified data that we use and share to analyze our application and recruitment activities, business and for other lawful business purposes.

Employment decisions are not based solely on automated decision-making.

1. Sharing personal information

We may share your personal information with the following parties for the purposes described above. 

• Affiliates. Our subsidiaries and other affiliates under the control of our corporate parent, for purposes consistent with this notice or to operate shared infrastructure, systems, and technology.
• Service providers. Companies that provide us with services that help us manage the recruiting process and operate our business, such as job boards, recruiting, interviewing and testing, pre-employment screening, interview travel booking and expense reimbursement (where applicable), relocation (where applicable), and recruitment analytics.
• Government authorities, law enforcement and others. Government authorities, law enforcement, courts, and others as described in the compliance, safety and protection section above.
• Business transfers. Parties to transactions and potential transactions whereby we sell, transfer, or otherwise share some or all of our business or assets, including your personal information, such as a corporate divestiture, merger, consolidation, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets, or in the event of bankruptcy or dissolution. 
• Professional advisors. Lawyers, immigration advisors, and other outside professional advisors who require your information in the course of providing their services. 
• Customers and business partners. Customers, other companies, and individuals with whom Twist does business or is exploring a business relationship. 
• Other parties not listed above but that are identified at or before the point at which we collect your personal information along with the purposes for which the information will be shared.  

This section generally describes our practices currently and during the preceding 12 months. You should assume that each category of personal information we collect may be disclosed, and may have been disclosed during the preceding 12 months, to each category of other parties listed above in this section.

1. Retention

The criteria for deciding how long to retain personal information is generally based on whether such retention periods are sufficient to fulfill the purposes for which we collected it as described in this notice, including complying with our legal obligations.  When personal information is no longer needed, we either irreversibly anonymize the data (and we may further retain and use the anonymized information) or securely destroy the data.

1. Data Security and Accuracy

Twist will take appropriate measures to ensure that personal information processed is reliable for its intended use, accurate and complete, and protected by safeguards consistent with those required by applicable data protection laws and regulations.

Access to personal information within our company will be limited to those who have a need to know the information for the purposes described above, and may include personnel in Human Resources, IT, Compliance, Legal, Finance, and Accounting.   

Twist has put in place procedures to deal with any suspected information security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach of your personal information where we are legally required to do so.
 

1. Transfers of Personal Information

Twist operates globally. In order to perform general business management and operations, fulfill legal obligations, and for other lawful purposes, Twist may transfer personal information collected from you to Twist’s affiliated entities and third parties outside of your country or region, for example, the United States where we are headquartered. When your personal information is transferred outside of your country or region, we will ensure that the transfer complies with applicable data protection laws and will implement appropriate and necessary measures to provide an equivalent level of data protection in accordance with those laws.
 

1. Your Privacy Rights

Depending on where you reside and how data protection laws apply, you may be afforded the following rights over your personal information. However, these rights are not absolute, and in certain cases we may decline your request as permitted by law. 

• Right to Information/Know.  You can request the following information about how we have collected and used your personal information during the past 12 months:
  • The categories of personal information that we have collected.
  • The categories of sources from which we collected personal information.
  • The business or commercial purpose for collecting or selling personal information.
  • The categories of third parties with which we share personal information.
  • The categories of personal information that we sold or disclosed for a business purpose.
  • The categories of third parties to whom the personal information was sold or disclosed for a business purpose.
• Right to Access and Portability.  You can request a machine-readable copy of the personal information that we have collected about you, which can be sent to you or a third party of your choice.
• Right to Deletion/Erasure.  You can ask us to delete the personal information that we have collected from you.
• Right to Correction/Rectification.  You can ask us to correct inaccurate personal data that we have collected about you.
• Right to Restriction of Processing.  You can request that we restrict the processing of your personal information in certain cases, such as if the personal information’s accuracy is disputed, or if Twist no longer requires the personal information but you need the personal information to establish, exercise, or defend legal claims. 
• Right to Object to Processing.  You can object to direct marketing, or object to our reliance on legitimate interests as the basis of processing your personal information where you believe it impacts your rights.
• Right to Opt-out of Sales or Sharing of Personal Information.  California residents can opt-out of any “sale” or “sharing” of personal information as such terms are defined under the CCPA.  We do not sell or share personal information of applicants and have not done so in the preceding 12 months. However, we encourage you to review our Privacy Policy for information about the sale or sharing of personal information that may occur when you interact with us offline or online in the same manner that a customer or other non-candidate may interact with us. 
• Right to Nondiscrimination.  You are entitled to exercise the rights described above free from discrimination, including exercising such rights without retaliation.  

You may submit requests to exercise your privacy rights by emailing [   ]@twistbioscience.com or by calling [add a phone number for individuals to call]. We cannot process your request if you do not provide us with sufficient detail to allow us to understand and respond to it. We may need to verify your identity to process your requests, and we reserve the right to confirm your current residency.  

Under certain data protection laws, you may use an authorized agent to make a request on your behalf upon our verification of the agent’s identity and our receipt of a copy of a valid power of attorney (or equivalent legal instrument) given to your authorized agent. If you have not provided your agent with such a power of attorney, you must provide your agent with written and signed permission to exercise your rights on your behalf, provide the information we request to verify your identity, and provide us with confirmation that you have given the authorized agent permission to submit the request. 

1. Third Parties

This notice does not address, and we are not responsible for, the practices of any third parties, which have their own rules for how they collect and use your personal information. Our links to third party websites or services are not endorsements. 

1. Changes to this Notice

We reserve the right to change this notice at any time. The “Effective Date” heading at the top of this notice indicates when it was last revised. Any changes will become effective when we post the revised notice on our Careers Site.

1. Children

The Careers Site is not intended for children under the age of 18.

1. Your Obligations

Among other obligations, including without limitation the obligation to provide complete and accurate information in recruiting documents and processes, it is your responsibility to ensure that information you submit does not violate any third party’s rights.

You should keep your personal information on file with the Twist up to date and inform us of any significant changes to it.

1. Questions or Complaints

If you have questions or complaints about this notice, please contact:

[email where applicant inquiries about data handling/privacy issues should go]

[phone number]

If you are a resident of the European Economic Area, you can also submit a complaint to the data protection regulator in your jurisdiction. You can find your data protection regulator here. If you are a resident of the United Kingdom, you can submit a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office.