Data protection information

A. General information

The following information applies to all data processing on this website.

1. Responsible body and contact details

Controller in the sense of the GDPR for these websites is

Further company details can be found in the Imprint.

Contact details of our data protection officer:

2. Data categories, purposes and legal basis of data processing

We process your personal data in accordance with the provisions of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Federal Data Protection Act (BDSG) as well as all other applicable legal provisions. As a matter of principle, the nature and the scope of the data processing are determined by the service or information you have chosen and the contractual relationship in existence with you. Purposes and legal bases can be seen from part B.

3. Data recipients

We transfer your personal data to the following data recipients:

• The transfer takes place in compliance with a legal requirement under which we are obliged to report or pass on the data (e.g. to authorities).
• The transfer of data takes place to external companies that act as order processors on our behalf or that act on our behalf (this concerns, for example, courier and logistics companies, call centres, external computer centres, EDP and IT applications, website management, auditing services, credit institutions, data disposal, etc.).
• The transmission of data to third parties takes place with your consent.
• Data is transferred for the purpose of processing a contractual relationship with you pursuant to Art. 6 para. 1 s. 1 lit. b GDPR (e.g. to an affiliated company within the group (cf. item 2) or a subcontractor or to a logistics company).
• Data is transferred to subsidiaries or also affiliated enterprises in order to fulfil statutory obligations or on the basis of your legitimate interests. In this context, it can be a question of economic, administrative or also other internal business purposes; this only applies to the extent that your interests or fundamental rights and liberties requiring the protection of personal data do not override.
• Transfer is to credit agencies to access creditworthiness information.
• Transmission is done to examine and to make claims (e.g. debt collection companies, legal consultants).
• Transmission is done in order to handle the planning, preparation and/or implementation of a (partial) sale of the enterprise or a merger (or similar processes such as a take-over within the framework of liquidation, bankruptcy, dissolution etc.) with another enterprise.

4. Deletion of data and duration of storage

In principle, we process and store your data only for the duration of our business relationship, including the initiation and execution of the contract as well as the statutory retention periods (e.g. from commercial or fiscal law).

If the data is no longer required for the fulfilment of contractual or legal obligations and rights, it is regularly deleted, unless its – temporary – further processing is necessary for the fulfilment of the purposes listed above for an overriding legitimate interest.

Insofar as individual processing of personal data requires other deletion periods, these are mentioned in the description of the individual processing operations under part B.

5. Processing of your data in a third country

Data is only transferred to bodies in third countries (states outside the European Union (EU) or the European Economic Area (EEA)) if it is necessary for the execution of an order/contract from or with you, if it is required by law (e.g. reporting obligations under tax law), if appropriate data protection levels exist or if you have given us your consent.

The processing of your data in a third country may also be carried out in connection with the involvement of service providers, e.g. as part of commissioned processing. If there is no EU Commission decision on an adequate level of data protection for the country in question, we will ensure through appropriate suitable measures (e.g. EU standard contractual clauses) that your rights and freedoms are adequately protected and guaranteed.

Information on the appropriate or adequate safeguards and on the possibility of obtaining a copy from you can be obtained from the Data Protection Officer upon request.

6. Automated decisions in the individual case / profiling

Procedures for automated decision-making / profiling which have a legal effect towards you or considerably impair you in a similar way are not used by us.

7. Duty to provide data

You only need to provide the data which is necessary for the use of the website and its functions or for the commencement and implementation of a business relationship or for a pre-contractual relationship with us or which we are obligated to collect by law. However, without these data, we are not in a position to provide our website to you properly and securely, to reply properly to your inquiries to us and also to conclude or to perform a contract with you. This may also relate to data which become necessary later.

8. Your rights as a data subject

Under the statutory preconditions, the following rights as a data subject, which you can claim against us, accrue to you as a data subject:

• Right to information: You are at any time entitled to demand a confirmation from us within the framework of Art. 15, GDPR, whether we process personal data concerning you; if this is the case, you are further entitled within the framework of Art. 15, GDPR, to receive information about these personal data and certain further information amongst others, purposes of processing, categories of personal data, categories of recipients, planned storage time, the origin of the data, the use of automated decision-making and, in the case of a transfer to a third country, the suitable guarantees) and a copy of your data.
• Right to rectification: You are entitled to demand from us pursuant to Art. 16, GDPR, that we rectify personal data stored concerning you if they are incorrect or defective.
• Right to erasure: Under the preconditions of Art. 17, GDPR, you are entitled to demand that we erase personal data concerning you without delay. Amongst other things, the right to erasure does not exist if the processing of the personal data is necessary for (i) exercising the right to freedom of expression and information, (ii) to fulfil a legal obligation to which we are subject (legal statutory archiving duties) or (iii) to establish, to exercise or to defend legal claims.
• Right to restriction of processing: Under the preconditions of Art. 18 GDPR, you are entitled to demand that we restrict the processing of your personal data.
• Right to data portability: Under the preconditions of Art. 20, GDPR, you are entitled to demand that we provide the personal data concerning your which you have provided to us in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format.
• Right to object: Under the preconditions of Art. 21, GDPR, you have the right to object to the processing of your personal data, with the result that we must end the processing of your personal data. The right to object only exists in the limits provided for in Art. 21, GDPR. In addition, our interests may override ending of the processing, with the result that we are entitled to process your personal data despite your objection.
• Right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority: Under the preconditions of Art. 77, GDPR, you are entitled to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, in particular in the Member State of your habitual residence, your workplace or the place of the alleged infringement, if you are of the opinion that the processing of the personal data concerning you infringes the GDPR. The right to lodge a complaint exists notwithstanding any other administrative law or judicial remedy.

A list of the data protection supervisory authorities and their contact data can be seen from the following link: https://www.bfdi.bund.de/DE/Infothek/Anschriften_Links/anschriften_links-node.html.

The supervisory authority competent for us is:

Landesbeauftragte für Datenschutz und Informationsfreiheit Nordrhein-Westfalen
Kavalleriestr. 2-4
40213 Düsseldorf
Telefon: 0211/38424-0
Fax: 0211/38424-999
E-Mail: poststelle@ldi.nrw.

However, we recommend that you always lodge a complaint with our data protection officer first.

Your applications for the exercising of your rights should be addressed in writing or electronically to the address stated above under 1 or directly to our data protection officer.

9. Information on the right to object (Art. 21, GDPR)

Insofar as the processing of your personal data is carried out on the basis of Art. 6 para. 1 s. 1 lit. f GDPR (data processing based on a balance of interests) or on the basis of Art. 6 para. 1 sentence 1 lit. e GDPR (data processing in the public interest), you have the right to object to the processing at any time, without costs other than those of transmission according to the basic tariffs being charged for this.

We will then in any case no longer process the personal data for the purposes of direct marketing or related profiling and furthermore not for other purposes, unless we can demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds for the processing which override your interests, rights and freedoms, or the processing serves the assertion, exercise or defence of legal claims. In this case, you must provide reasons for the objection that arise from your particular situation.

If possible, you should send your objection to the following contact address:

datenschutz@remondis.de

10. Changes

This data protection information can be adapted by us at any time (e.g. if the data processing or the legal framework conditions change). Any changes will be made known by publication of the changed data protection information on the website. To the extent that nothing to the contrary is stipulated, such changes take effect immediately. Therefore, please check this data protection information regularly in order to find the current version at the time.

B. Individual processing, purposes and legal bases

1. Logging

When using the website, certain connection data and data provided by your Internet browser are temporarily stored. The following data is logged and stored in log files for the operation of the website:

• (Anonymised) IP address of the retrieving computer
• Operating system of the retrieving computer
• Browser version of the retrieving computer
• Name of the retrieved file
• Date and time of retrieval
• Referring URL
• Nature of terminal device (e.g. desktop/Smartphone)
• Connection logging

The logging of the data and their processing in log files is technically absolutely necessary for the proper and secure operation of the website. The legal basis for the (initial) storage and/or reading of data from your terminal device is therefore § 25, subsection 2, no. 1, TTDSG. To the extent that automatically transmitted data (e.g. the public IP address of your terminal device) is processed, the processing is done on the basis of Art. 6, subsection 1, lit b, GDPR, insofar as you are visiting our website for purposes of performance of a contract with you or for pre-contractual measures (e.g. information about our products, inquiries) and also within the framework of our legitimate interest according to Art. 6, subsection 1, lit. f, GDPR. Our legitimate interest is the proper and secure provision of the website or our online offer.

The log file information is stored anonymously after the session has ended.

2. Newsletter subscription

You are given the opportunity to sign up to our newsletters when you visit our websites. We only send newsletters and electronic communications containing advertising material if the recipient has given us their consent or on the basis of legal permission. Our newsletters contain information about our services, our company and the latest happenings in our industry.

Signing up for our newsletters involves the so-called double opt-in procedure, i.e. an email is sent to you after you sign up asking you to confirm your subscription. All you need to do to sign up to a newsletter is to enter your email address. (add to this if further information is required). A record is kept of your subscription to our newsletter so that we are able to document and prove that the sign-up process fulfilled all legal requirements. This includes recording and storing what time you signed up, what time you confirmed your subscription and your IP address. A record is also kept of the changes made to your data that is stored at the service provider responsible for sending out our newsletters. In addition, the following data is recorded and stored throughout the time you are signed up to receive our newsletters:

• Which newsletters were sent by email and which newsletters were unable to be successfully delivered (so-called “email bounces”)

Our newsletters are sent via the US service provider Amazon Web Services Inc., 410 Terry Avenue North, Seattle, WA 98109-5210, USA. You can view the company‘s Privacy Policy here: https://aws.amazon.com/de/compliance/germany-data-protection/.

This service provider has been appointed based on our legitimate interest to have our newsletter sent via secure means as per Art. 6, Para. 1(f) GDPR and on a data processing agreement in acc. with Art. 28, Para. 3 sentence 1 GDPR.

Our newsletters are sent based on the consent given by the recipients in acc. with Art. 6, subsection 1, lit. a GDPR or, to the extent that you have given us your e-mail address in connection with the acquisition of goods or services or we send you personalised advertising, in order to safeguard our legitimate interests according to Art. 6, subsection , lit. f, GDPR, in conjunction with § 7, subsection 3, Act against Unfair Competition (German Unfair Competition Act); our legitimate interest is based on our economic interests in performing advertising measures and advertising orientated to the target groups. The sign-up process is recorded and stored based on statutory requirements pursuant to Art 6, subsection 1, lit. c, GDPR, in conjunction with proof and documentation duties and also on the basis of our legitimate interest as set out in Art. 6, Para. 1(f) GDPR. Our legitimate interest here is to have a user-friendly and secure newsletter system that serves our business interests and meets the expectations of the users and also enables us to provide proof that consent has been given.

You can unsubscribe from our newsletter and withdraw your consent whenever you wish. An unsubscribe link can be found at the bottom of all our newsletters. Based on our legitimate interests, we can store the email addresses of unsubscribed recipients for up to three years before deleting them in order to be able to prove that they had previously given their consent. The only time this data is processed is in defence of any possible legal claims.

Right to lodge a complaint in the event of use within the framework of conclusion of a contract

If we receive your e-mail address in connection with conclusion of the contract and provision of our products and you have not contradicted, we reserve the right to send offers on similar products from our range to you regularly by e-mail. You can contradict this use of your e-mail address at any time by a message to the possibility of contact described below or via a link in the newsletter e-mail provided for this purpose, without costs other than those of transmission according to the basic tariffs being charged for this.

3. Matomo

On our websites we use a version of Matomo which is implemented on our own servers. This is an open source analysis software for the purpose of statistical evaluation of visitor access. Based on this evaluation, we particularly wish to track which of our sites are accessed and are therefore of interest and how often and how long, by whom they are accessed.

The purpose of the processing is the statistical analysis of user behaviour to optimise the functionality of our websites. Our legitimate interest lies in the improvement of our websites and our online offer.

The legal basis for the use of Matomo is Art. 6 para. 1 s. 1 lit. a GDPR.

4. Fulfilment of statutory requirements

We also process your data to fulfil statutory requirements. We are subject to a number of legal obligations. These are primarily statutory requirements (for example from commercial and fiscal acts), but also, if applicable, other official requirements. This in particular includes fulfilment of fiscal law control and reporting duties as well as archiving and documentation duties.

The legal basis for the processing is Art. 17, subsection 3, lit. b, GDR, and Art. 6, subsection 1, sentence 1, lit. c), GDPR.

5. Assertion and defence of rights

Under certain circumstances, we also process your personal data in order to be able to claim our rights and to assert our legal claims and/or to defend ourselves against legal claims and/or to the extent that this is necessary to avert or to prosecute criminal offences.

The legal basis for the processing is Art. 17, subsection 3, lit. e, GDPR, as well as Art. 5, subsection 1, sentence 1, lit. f), GDPR. Our legitimate interest is assertion of and defence of rights.

6. Sale of enterprise, mergers etc.

Under certain circumstances, we also process your personal data processed via the websites in order to handle a sale of enterprise or a merger (or similar processes such as a take-over within the framework of liquidation, bankruptcy, dissolution etc.) with another enterprise. In the event of another enterprise acquiring or intending to acquire the assets/capital, which can also include your personal data, from us or if we carry out or aim for a merger with another enterprise, we must possibly grant this enterprise access to your personal data stored with us or transfer them for the purpose of examination and performance of the sale of enterprise/merger (e.g. to determine the company value, business risks or similar).

We process your personal data for this purpose to safeguard our legitimate interests according to Art. 6, subsection 1, lit. f, GDPR, in order to be able to plan and carry out a planned sale of enterprise or merger.

C. Overview Cookies

Cookies are small text files that are stored on your hard drive by your browser. We also use so-called session cookies. These serve to establish a clear connection between you and our Internet presence. Only a random number is stored for this purpose. The session cookie is automatically removed when the browser is closed.

If you do not wish to accept cookies on your computer (or another device), you can deactivate them in your Internet browser. However, this may impair the user-friendliness and functionality of the website. The cookies used by us are technically absolutely necessary in order to be able to provide the website and its function or the functions required by you (e.g. language settings). The legal basis for the (initial) storage and/or reading of data from your terminal device is § 25, subsection 2, nol. 1, TTDSG.

Our website uses the following cookies:

Necessary Cookies:

1. wp-settings

The cookie is used to customize the view of the admin interface. This cookie is only relevant for the web administrators.
Storage period: 1 year.

2. wp-settings-time

Session cookie for WordPress user management
This cookie is only relevant for the web administrators. No personal data is processed.

3. wordpress_logged_in

Session cookie for WordPress user management
This cookie is only relevant for web administrators and is used to identify the logged-in user.

4. wp-saving-post

Cookie for the WordPress editor
Used to automatically save a post created in the editor.
Storage period: 1 day.

5. wordpress_sec

Security cookie to prevent tampering.
Storage period: 2 weeks.

6. wordpress_test_cookie

Session cookie to determine whether cookies can be set.

7. PHPSESSID

Session cookie for running a PHP website.
It serves to recognize your browser for various purposes (e.g. to remember your language setting). Storage period: as long as the browser window is open.

8. simplefavorites

The cookie remembers selected saved articles. No personal data is stored.
Storage period: 1 year.

9. wordpress_pixemate

The cookie saves the selected settings of the cookie banner.
Storage period: 14 days

Statistics Cookies:

1. _pk_id.83.6ba4

The cookie is part of the Matomo web analytics tool and is used to track user activity on the website. The cookie contains a unique ID that allows Matomo to track the activity of a specific user across multiple page views.
Storage period: 13 months.

2. _pk_ref.83.6ba4

This cookie is also part of the web analytics tool Matomo and stores information about which website a visitor came to our website from. The cookie contains a URL indicating from which website the visitor came and a timestamp.
Storage period: 6 months.

3. _pk_ses.83.6ba4

The cookie is also part of the Matomo web analytics tool and is used to track a user’s session data. The cookie contains a unique session ID that allows Matomo to track the activities of a particular user during their current session on the website. Since this cookie is a session cookie, it is automatically deleted as soon as the user closes his browser or ends his session on the website.