Data protection

You can exercise the following rights at any time using the contact details provided by our data protection officer:

• Information about your data stored by us and its processing,
• Correction of inaccurate personal data,
• Deletion of your data stored with us,
• Restriction of data processing if we are not yet allowed to delete your data due to legal obligations,
• Objection to the processing of your data by us and
• Data portability, provided that you have consented to the data processing or have concluded a contract with us.

If you have given us your consent, you can revoke this at any time with effect for the future.

You can contact the supervisory authority responsible for you at any time with a complaint. Your competent supervisory authority depends on the federal state of your residence, your work or the alleged violation. Click here to see the list of addresses of the German states’ Data Protection Commissioners.

We shall process your personal data only for the purposes stated in this privacy policy. We shall not transfer your personal data to third parties for purposes other than those stated. We will only disclose your personal data to third parties if:

• you have given your express consent to this,
• the processing is necessary for the performance of a contract with you,
• processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation,

the processing is necessary to protect legitimate interests and there is no reason to assume that you have an overriding legitimate interest in not disclosing your data.

We adhere to the principles of data avoidance and data economy. We shall therefore only store your personal data for as long as is necessary to achieve the purposes stated here or as stipulated by the various storage periods provided for by law. After the respective purpose has ceased to exist or these periods have expired, the corresponding data shall be routinely blocked or deleted in accordance with statutory provisions.

When you access our website, information of a general nature is automatically collected by means of a cookie. This information (server log files) includes the type of web browser, the operating system used, the domain name of your internet service provider, and similar details. This is exclusively information that does not allow any conclusions to be drawn about you as a person.

This information is technically necessary in order to correctly deliver website content requested by you and is mandatory when using the Internet. In particular, it is processed for the following purposes:

• To ensure that the website is connected without any problems,
• To ensure smooth use of our website,
• To evaluate the system security and stability, and
• for other administrative purposes.

The processing of your personal data is based on our legitimate interest for the aforementioned purposes of data collection. We shall not use your data to draw conclusions about you as a person. The only recipients of the data shall be the responsible body and, if applicable, order processors.

Anonymous information of this kind is statistically evaluated by us, if necessary, in order to optimize our Internet presence and the technology behind it.

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To protect the security of your data during transmission, we use state-of-the-art encryption methods (e.g. SSL) via HTTPS.

When users leave comments on our website, in addition to this information, the time of their creation and the user name previously selected by the website visitor are also stored. This provides us with security, as we can be prosecuted for illegal content on our website, even if it was created by users.

On the basis of your expressly given consent, we will regularly send you our newsletter or comparable information by e-mail to your specified e-mail address.

To receive the newsletter, it is sufficient to provide your e-mail address. When registering to receive our newsletter, the data you provide will be used exclusively for this purpose. Subscribers may also be informed by e-mail about circumstances relevant to the service or registration (for example, changes to the newsletter offer or technical circumstances).

A valid e-mail address is required for registration to be effective. In order to verify that a registration has actually been carried out by the owner of an e-mail address, we use the “double-opt-in” procedure. For this purpose, we log the order of the newsletter, the sending of a confirmation e-mail and the receipt of the response requested therein. No further data is collected. The data is used exclusively for sending the newsletter and is not passed on to third parties.

You can revoke your consent to the storage of your personal data and its use for the newsletter dispatch at any time. You will find a corresponding link in each newsletter. In addition, you can unsubscribe at any time directly on this website or inform us of your wish to do so using the contact option provided at the end of this privacy policy.

By registering for one of our webcasts, you consent to your data being made available to GWS mbH or the implementing partner so that they can contact you about this event and send you other information. You can revoke your declaration of consent at any time in accordance with Article 21 of the GDPR. For more information, please see the privacy policy of our partner LogMeIn.

If you contact us by e-mail or contact form regarding questions of any kind, you voluntarily consent to us contacting you. For this purpose, it is necessary to provide us with a valid e-mail address. This shall be used to assign the query and the subsequent answer to it. The provision of further data is optional. The information you provide will be stored for the purpose of processing the query and for possible follow-up questions. After your inquiry has been completed, your personal data will be automatically deleted.

(1) This website uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google Ireland Limited, Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland (“Google”). Google Analytics also uses cookies (for the term see section 3 below), i.e., text files that are stored on your computer and enable an analysis of your use of the website. The information generated by the cookie about your use of this website (including your IP address, which is, however, anonymized with the extension “_anonymizeIp()” so that it can no longer be assigned to a connection or user) is transmitted to a Google server in the USA and stored there.

(2) Google will use the collected information to evaluate your use of the website, to compile reports on website activity and to provide further services to the website operator in connection with website activity and internet usage. Google may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google’s behalf. Google will not associate your IP address with any other data held by Google.

(3) You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser. However, please note that if you do this you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website. By using this website, you consent to the processing of data about you by Google in the manner and for the purposes set out above. You can object to the collection of data by Google Analytics with effect for the future, in particular by installing a deactivation add-on (http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=de) for your browser.

(4) The data processing is based on your consent and thus on the legal basis of Art. 6 para. 1 lit. a) GDPR. You can object to the collection and use of your data by Google at any time or revoke your consent, e.g., by changing your cookie settings on our site accordingly. You can find more information about Google Analytics and data protection at Google at 

https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/6004245?hl=de.

(1) On our website we use the service Google Maps (API) of Google Ireland Limited, Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland (“Google”). Google Maps is a web service for the display of interactive (land) maps to visually display geographical information. When calling up the sub-page on which the map of Google Maps is integrated, information about your use of our website will be already transmitted to Google servers in the USA and stored there. This applies in particular to your IP address. This occurs regardless of whether you have a Google user account and are logged in to it, or whether no user account exists. If you are logged in to Google, your data may be assigned directly to your account.

(2) Detailed information on data protection in connection with the use of Google Maps can be found on the Google website: https://www.google.de/intl/de/policies/privacy/

The data processing is based on our legitimate interests, namely our interest in optimizing the user-friendliness of our website within the meaning of Art. 6 (1) f) GDPR. In order to display our content correctly and graphically appeal across browsers, we use script libraries and font libraries such as Google Webfonts (https://www.google.com/webfonts/) on this website. Google Web Fonts are transferred to your browser’s cache to avoid multiple loading. If the browser does not support Google Web Fonts or prevents access, content is displayed in a standard font.

Calling up script libraries or font libraries automatically triggers a connection to the operator of the library. It is theoretically possible that – but currently also unclear whether and for what purposes – operators of such libraries collect data.

The privacy policy of the Google library operator can be found here: https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/

We embed YouTube videos on some of our websites. The operator of the corresponding plugins is YouTube, LLC, 901 Cherry Ave, San Bruno, CA 94066, USA. When you visit a page with the YouTube plugin, a connection to YouTube servers is established. This tells YouTube which pages you are visiting. If you are logged into your YouTube account, YouTube can assign your surfing behavior to you personally. You can prevent this by logging out of your YouTube account beforehand.

If a YouTube video has started to play, the provider can use cookies that collect information about user behavior.

Those who have deactivated the storage of cookies for the Google ad program will not have to expect any such cookies when watching YouTube videos. However, YouTube also stores non-personal usage information in other cookies. If you wish to prevent this, you must block the storage of cookies in the browser.

Further information on data protection at “YouTube” can be found in the provider’s privacy policy at: https://www.google.de/intl/de/policies/privacy/

(1) Provided you give your consent, we shall also use retargeting/remarketing services from third-party providers on our website to optimize our range. Data shall be collected and evaluated on the basis of a cookie/tracking technology to optimize our advertising and the entire online range (so-called retargeting/remarketing). This data shall not be used by us to identify you personally, but solely used to evaluate the use of our website and to target users who have already shown interest in our content, in offers with interest-based advertising on our website, on other websites, and in social media offers by our partners.

(2) We are convinced that the display of interest-based advertising is usually more interesting for the user than advertising that has no such personal reference. The insertion of advertising into our website or on the websites of our partners shall be based on an analysis of previous usage behavior. According to the providers of the retargeting/remarketing services we use, usage profiles are generally created anonymously or pseudonymously. This data is also not merged by us at any time with other personal data stored by us.

(3) You can find out which third-party providers we work with, how your data is processed in this context and how you can deactivate retargeting/remarketing technologies in the following section of this privacy policy.

Google Tag Manager

For reasons of transparency, we would like to make everyone aware that we use the Google Tag Manager on our website. Through this service, website tags can be managed and integrated via an interface. Tags are small code elements that are used, among other things, to measure traffic and visitor behavior, to record the effects of online advertising and social channels, to set up remarketing and targeting, and to test and optimize websites. Google Tag Manager only implements tags. This means that no cookies are used and no personal data is collected.

LinkedIn Insight Tag für Analytics & LinkedIn Ads

(1) We shall use the conversion tracking technology and the retargeting function of the LinkedIn Corporation, 2029 Stierlin Court, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA on our website with your consent. With the help of this technology, visitors to our website can be shown personalized advertisements on LinkedIn. Furthermore, it is possible to create anonymous reports on the performance of the advertisements as well as information on website interaction. For this purpose, the LinkedIn Insight tag is embedded into this website, which establishes a connection to the LinkedIn server if you visit this website and happen to be logged into your LinkedIn account at the same time. We point out that we as the provider of the pages have no knowledge of the content of the transmitted data and its use by LinkedIn. The information collected by the LinkedIn Insight tag about your use of our website is encrypted. The cookie is stored in the LinkedIn member’s browser until the member deletes the cookie or the cookie expires (the expiration date is a rolling six months after the member’s browser last loaded the Insight tag).

(2) The data processing is based on your consent and thus on the legal basis of Art. 6 (1) a) GDPR. You can object to the collection and use of your data for the display of LinkedIn Ads at any time or revoke your consent, e.g., by changing your cookie settings on our site accordingly. LinkedIn members have the option to opt out of LinkedIn conversion tracking and block and delete cookies or disable demographic features at https://www.linkedin.com/psettings/advertising/. There is no separate opt-out option in LinkedIn’s settings for third-party impressions or click tracking for campaigns running on LinkedIn, as all underlying campaigns respect LinkedIn members’ settings. You can also deactivate the LinkedIn Insight Conversion Tool as well as interest-based advertising as a non-member by opting out via the following link: https://www.linkedin.com/psettings/guest-controls/retargeting-opt-out.

(3) See LinkedIn’s privacy policy at https://www.linkedin.com/legal/privacy-policy for more information on data collection and use, as well as your privacy options and rights.

Live Chat is provided by Crisp IM (https://crisp.chat). Use of Live Chat is subject to the terms and conditions (available at https://crisp.chat/en/terms/) and privacy policy (available at https://crisp.chat/en/privacy/) of the live chat provider.

We reserve the right to adapt this privacy policy so that it always complies with the current legal requirements or in order to implement changes to our services in the privacy policy, e.g., when introducing new services. The new privacy policy will then apply to your next visit.