Data Privacy Statement

General information about the collection of personal data

• It’s important to us that your privacy be protected while you’re using our website. Accordingly, we will always use your personal data according to statutory provisions on data protection. Personal data means all data that can be attributed to you personally, such as your name, address, email address and user behaviour. In the following, we will inform you about how we will handle your personal data.
• The controller under Art. 4 (7) EU-General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the person named as the controller in the Impressum (legal notice). You can reach this person under the contact data indicated there.
• If you are under 16, please get permission from your parent or legal guardian before you provide personal data or become active on our website.

Your rights

Under the provisions of the GDPR, you may assert the following rights toward us:

• Right of access
• Right to rectification
• Right to restriction of processing
• Right to erasure (“right to be forgotten”)
• Right to data portability
• Right to object

To assert one of your rights listed above, you may contact us at any time.

If the processing of your personal data is based on your consent, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time, with effect for the future. Withdrawing consent will not affect the legality of any processing performed on the basis of that consent before that consent was withdrawn.

Moreover, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the data protection supervisory authority about the processing of your personal data by us. The competent supervisory authority for your federal province is accessible under www.bfdi.bund.de/DE/Infothek/Anschriften_Links/anschriften_links-node.

Collection of personal data when you visit our website

• You can visit our website without telling us who you are. As is typical of almost all websites, the server on which our website is located (“Webserver”) collects information from you automatically whenever you visit us on the internet. These data are technically necessary for us and guarantee the website’s stability and security.
  
  The Webserver automatically recognises certain personal data, such as your IP address, the date and time at which you visit our site, the pages you visit on our website, the website you were on previously, the browser you used (such as Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Safari), the operating system you used (such as Windows, Linux, or MAC OS) and the domain name and address of your internet provider (such as 1&1, Telekom, or Unitymedia). If our website uses cookies (as explained below), the Webserver will also store this information (for which the legal basis is Art. 6 (1) p. 1f GDPR).
  
  If the system is misused, we will use this information in cooperation with your internet provider, local authorities, or both, to determine the perpetrator of that misuse.
• In addition to the aforementioned data, cookies will be stored on your computer when you use our website. Cookies are small text files which are stored on your hard drive by the browser you use and which send certain information to the party who sent the cookies (us in this case). Cookies cannot execute programmes or transmit viruses to your computer. They serve only to make the internet services more user-friendly and effective as a whole.
  
  This website uses session cookies, sometimes called transient cookies. Transient cookies are deleted automatically when you close your browser. These store what is known as a “session ID”, with which various requests of your browser can be allocated to the joint session.
  
  You can configure your browser settings accordingly, and reject the acceptance of third-party cookies or all cookies, for example. Please note that if you do you might not be able to use all this website’s functions.
• Cookies from third parties on our website
  This website uses the web analysis software Matomo to analyse the use of our website and improve it periodically. We can use the statistics we gain to improve our services and make them more interesting for you as a user. The legal grounds for using Matomo is Art. 6 (1) sentence 1 (f) GDPR.
  We use the software Matomo on our own server so that no data can leave Germany or our computer centre.
  
  For this utilisation, session cookies are also stored on our computer.
  
  This website uses Matomo with the extension “AnonymizeIP”. This means that IP addresses will be further processed in truncated form, thus ruling out any direct connection to a specific person. The IP address transmitted from your browser using Matomo will not be pooled with other data we have collected.
  The programme Matomo is an open-source project. You can obtain information from the third-party provider about data protection under matomo.org/privacy-policy.
  
  If you prefer that we not collect your data in Matomo, you can deactivate that collection here, using the opt-out:
  
  
• Inclusion of Google Maps
  On this website, we use the services of Google Maps. This means we can show you interactive maps directly on the website and enable you to use the map function comfortably. When you visit the website, Google is informed that you have accessed the respective subpage of our website. In addition, the data named in this declaration will be transmitted. This will occur regardless of whether Google provides a user account into which you are logged, or whether a user account exists. If you are logged in with Google, your data will be assigned directly to your account. If you don’t want this assignment to your Google profile to take place, you must log out of Google before activating the button. Google will store your data as a usage profile and use it for advertising, market research, or to design its website based on user needs. Such use will especially occur (even for users who are not logged in) to render needs-based advertisement and to inform other users of the social network about your activities on our website. You may object to this user profile being formed. To exercise that right, you must contact Google.
  For additional information about the purpose and scope of the data collection and how the plug-in’s provider will process the data, please read that provider’s data privacy statements. There you can also obtain additional information about your rights, and options for adjusting your settings in this regard to protect your privacy:
  https://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en-GB Google also processes your personal data in the USA and participates in the EU-US Privacy Shield, www.privacyshield.gov/EU-US-Framework
• Making contact
  If you contact us through email or a contact form, we will store the data you communicate (your email address and possibly your name and telephone number) to answer your questions. We will delete the data accumulated in this context as soon as its storage is no longer necessary, or will restrict its processing if statutory retention periods exist.
• The provision of your personal data is not a statutory or contractual obligation. This means you are not obligated to provide us with your personal data. If you decide not to provide us with your personal data, we will be unable to answer all parts of your question, if any.
  
  No decisions are made automatically—in other words, based exclusively on automated processing, including profiling—which will legally affect or otherwise similarly impair you.

Storage period

Webserver logs: 14 days

Location of the data processing

We process your data exclusively in Germany or the EU.

Forwarding your personal data

As a basic principle, personal data will not be forwarded to third parties.

Security measures

If we must forward data to our service providers as part of the services described here, or if service providers must process data (as part of website support, for example), those service providers will be bound by contractual specifications with us regarding data protection, in addition to compulsory statutory provisions.

We use data security measures, which we continually optimise according to technical and statutory developments, to protect your data as best we can against accidental or intentional manipulation, loss, destruction or access by unauthorised third parties, such as dedicated firewall systems, managed antivirus systems from well-known manufacturers and premium SSL encryption, as well as well-known and trustworthy certification agencies.

Links to other websites

Our online services contain links to other websites. This data privacy statement does not extend to other providers. We have no influence on whether the operators of those providers will take over and comply with the data protection provisions, and are therefore not responsible for whether the information provided there is correct, up to date or complete.

Our website can contain hyperlinks to websites which are owned and operated by third parties. Those foreign websites have their own data protection guidelines, and they probably also use cookies, so we suggest that you review those guidelines. The guidelines of those websites regulate the use of personal data, which you transmit when you visit the websites in question and which can also be collected through cookies. We assume no liability for such foreign websites, so if you use them you do so at your own risk.

Questions and comments

If you have questions or comments about these guidelines regarding data protection and cookies, please contact us (for contact data, see the imprint).

The rapid development of the internet makes it necessary to adjust our data protection provisions from time to time. You will be informed here about any updates.

Last revision: 03 January 2022