Our website may be used without entering personal information. Different rules may apply to certain services on our site, however, and are explained separately below. We collect personal information from you (e.g. name, address, email address, telephone number, etc.) in accordance with the provisions of German data protection statutes. Information is considered personal if it can be associated exclusively to a specific natural person. The legal framework for data protection may be found in the German Federal Data Protection Act (BDSG) and the Telemedia Act (TMG). The provisions below serve to provide information as to the manner, extent and purpose for collecting, using and processing personal information by the provider

Germany

Please be aware that data transfer via the internet is subject to security risks and, therefore, complete protection against third-party access to transferred data cannot be ensured.

Our website may be used without entering personal information. Different rules may apply to certain services on our site, however, and are explained separately below. We collect personal information from you (e.g. name, address, email address, telephone number, etc.) in accordance with the provisions of German data protection statutes. Information is considered personal if it can be associated exclusively to a specific natural person. The legal framework for data protection may be found in the German Federal Data Protection Act (BDSG) and the Telemedia Act (TMG). The provisions below serve to provide information as to the manner, extent and purpose for collecting, using and processing personal information by the provider

Germany

Please be aware that data transfer via the internet is subject to security risks and, therefore, complete protection against third-party access to transferred data cannot be ensured.

For technical reasons, data such as the following, which your internet browser transmits to us or to our web space provider (so called server log files), is collected: 

– type and version of the browser you use 
– operating system 
– websites that linked you to our site (referrer URL) 
– websites that you visit 
– date and time of your visit 
– your Internet Protocol (IP) address. 

This anonymous data is stored separately from any personal information you may have provided, thereby making it impossible to connect it to any particular person. The data is used for statistical purposes in order to improve our website and services.

We offer you the opportunity to sign up for our website. The information entered when signing up, as shown in the registration form

Name, job title, contact information including email address, demographic information, preferences, interests and other information relevant to customer surveys or offers

is collected and stored solely for use by our website. When signing up for our website, we also store your IP address and the date and time you registered. This serves to protect us in the event a third party improperly and without your knowledge makes use of your data to sign up for our site. None of this information is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

Our website offers you the opportunity to subscribe to our newsletter. The newsletter provides you periodically with information about our services. To receive our newsletter, we require a valid email address. We will review the email address you provide for the purpose of determining whether you are in fact the owner of the email address provided or whether the actual owner of said address is authorized to receive the newsletter. When subscribing to our newsletter, we will store your IP address as well as the date and time you subscribed. This serves to protect us in the event a third party improperly and without your knowledge makes use of your email address to subscribe to our newsletter. We will not collect any other data. The data thereby collected is used solely for the purpose of receiving our newsletter. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that other components of our website may collect. You may cancel your subscription to the newsletter at any time. You will find additional details in the email confirming your subscription as well as in each newsletter.

On our website we offer you the opportunity to contact us, either by email and/or by using a contact form. In such event, information provided by the user is stored for the purpose of facilitating communications with the user. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

On our website we offer you the opportunity to post comments about individual articles. For this purpose, the IP address of the user/internet connection subscriber is stored. This information is stored for our security in the event the author through his/her comments infringes against third party rights and/or unlawful content is entered. Consequently, we have a direct interest in the author’s stored data, particularly since we may be potentially liable for such violations. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

On our website we offer you the opportunity to subscribe to subsequent comments about an article which you intend to comment on. When you choose this option, you will receive a confirmation email which is used to determine if you are actually the owner of the email address entered. You may at any time revoke your decision to subscribe to such follow-on comments. You will find additional details in the confirmation email. No data hereby obtained is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

Our website uses Google Analytics, a web analysis service from Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA, hereinafter referred to as “Google“. Google Analytics employs so-called “cookies“, text files that are stored to your computer in order to facilitate an analysis of your use of the site.

The information generated by these cookies, such as time, place and frequency of your visits to our site, including your IP address, is transmitted to Google’s location in the US and stored there.

In using Google Analytics our website employs the extension, “_gat._anonymizeIp”. In doing so, Google abbreviates and thereby anonymizes your IP address before transferring it from member states of the European Union or signatory states to the Agreement on the European Economic Area.

Google uses this information to analyze your use of our site, to compile reports for us on internet activity and to provide other services relating to website and internet use. Google may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law or where such third parties process this data on Google’s behalf. 

Google states that it will in never associate your IP address with other data held by Google. You can prevent cookies from being installed by adjusting the settings on your browser software accordingly. You should be aware, however, that by doing so you may not be able to make full use of all the functions of our website.

Furthermore, Google offers a deactivation add-on for most current browsers that provides you with more control over what data Google can collect on websites you access. The add-on tells the JavaScript (ga.js) used by Google Analytics not to transmit any information about website visits to Google Analytics. However, the browser deactivation add-on offered by Google Analytics does not prevent information from being transmitted to us or to other web analysis services we may engage. You can find additional information on how to install the browser add-on at the following link:

https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=de

Our website employs the “+1“-buttom from Google+ belonging to Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA, hereinafter referred to as “Google“.

Each time our website receives an access request equipped with a “+1“ component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this component from Google. Through this process, Google is informed precisely which page of our website is being visited. 

As specified by Google, your visit undergoes additional analysis in the event you are not logged into your Google account.

If you access our site while logged into Google and press the “+1″ button, Google can collect information about your Google account, websites you recommend as well as your IP address, along with other browser-related information. 

This allows your “+1“ recommendation to be stored and publicized. Your Google “+1“ recommendation can then appear as a reference in other Google services, such as search results, your Google account or other places, such as on websites and ads in the internet, , together with your account name and, if applicable, a picture you provided to Google. Furthermore, Google can link your visit to our site with data stored by Google. Google also records this information for the purpose of further improving Google services.

If you wish to minimize the collection of information by Google as previously described, you must log out of your Google account before visiting our website.

You can access Google‘s data protection policies relating to the “+1“ button together with all relevant information on the collection, transfer and use of data by Google, your rights in this regard as well as your profile settings options at the following link:

 https://developers.google.com/+/web/buttons-policy

Our website employs components provided by facebook.com. Facebook is a service of Facebook Inc., 1601 S. California Ave, Palo Alto, CA 94304, USA.

Each time our website receives an access request equipped with a Facebook component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this Facebook component. Through this process, Facebook is informed precisely which page of our website is being visited. 

When you access our site while logged into Facebook, Facebook uses information gathered by this component to identify the precise page you are viewing and associates this information to your personal account on Facebook. Whenever you click on the “Like“ button, for example, or enter a comment, this information is transmitted to your personal account on Facebook and stored there. In addition, Facebook is informed of your visit to our website. This occurs regardless of whether you click on a component or not.

If you wish to prevent the transfer to and storage of data by Facebook about you and your interaction with our website, you must first log out of Facebook before visiting our website. The data protection policies of Facebook provide additional information, in particular about the collection and use of data by Facebook, your rights in this regard as well as the options available to you for protecting your privacy: https://de-de.facebook.com/about/privacy/

In addition, tools are freely available on the market that can be used to block Facebook social plug-ins with add-ons from being added to all commonly used browsers: http://webgraph.com/resources/facebookblocker/

You can find an overview of Facebook plugins at https://developers.facebook.com/docs/plugins/

Our website employs components provided by Twitter. Twitter is a service of Twitter Inc., 795 Folsom St., Suite 600, San Francisco, CA 94107, USA.

Each time our website receives an access request equipped with a Twitter component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this component from Twitter. Through this process, Twitter is informed precisely which page of our website is being visited.

We have no control over the data that Twitter collects in the process, or over the extent of the data that Twitter collects. To the best of our knowledge, Twitter collects the URL of each website accessed as well as the IP address of the user, but does so solely for the purpose of displaying Twitter components. Additional information may be obtained from the Twitter data privacy policy, at: http://twitter.com/privacy.

You may change your data privacy settings in your account settings, at http://twitter.com/account/settings.

Our website employs components provided by the network LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a service of LinkedIn Corporation, 2029 Stierlin Court, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA. Each time our website receives an access request equipped with a LinkedIn component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this component from LinkedIn.

Through this process, LinkedIn is informed exactly which page of our website is being accessed. By clicking the LinkedIn “recommend button“ while logged into your LinkedIn account, you can link content from our website to your LinkedIn profile. This allows LinkedIn to associate your visit to our site with your LinkedIn account.

We have no control over the data that LinkedIn collects thereby, nor over the extent of the data that LinkedIn collects. Nor do we have any knowledge of the content of data transferred to LinkedIn. Details on data collection by LinkedIn as well as your rights in this regard and your browser setting options may be obtained from the LinkedIn data privacy policy, which may be accessed at: http://www.linkedin.com/legal/privacy-policy

On our website we use components (videos) of YouTube, LLC 901 Cherry Ave., 94066 San Bruno, CA, USA, a company belonging to Google Inc., Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA.

To this end, we use the “ – enhanced data protection mode – ” option provided by YouTube.

When you display a page that has an embedded video, a connection will be made to the YouTube server and the content will appear on the website via a communication to your browser.

According to the information provided by YouTube, in “ – enhanced data protection mode -”, data is only transferred to the YouTube server, in particular which of our websites you have visited, if you watch the video. If you are logged onto YouTube at the same time, this information will be matched to your YouTube member account. You can prevent this from happening by logging out of your member account before visiting our website.

Further information about data protection by YouTube is provided by Google under the following link:

https://www.google.de/intl/de/policies/privacy/

Our website employs components provided by Slideshare.com, a service of SlideShare Inc., 1 Montgomery St., Suite 1300, San Francisco, CA 94104, USA and is integrated into our site using a so-called 2-click approach. No personal data is transmitted to Slideshare.com by merely accessing our website. Personal information is transferred to Slidewhare, Google Analytics and ComScore and stored in the US only when you manually activate Slideshare components. In addition, a cookie is placed on your browser. We have no control over data collected by Slideshare.com or their processing operations. Nor are we familiar with the full extent of the data collected, the purposes for which is collected or any storage periods which may be specified by Slideshare.com. Additional information is available at http://www.slideshare.net/privacy.

ComScore (Corporate Headquarters Reston, 11950 Democracy Drive, Suite 600, Reston, VA 20190, USA) stores the data thereby obtained by means of a “user profile”. Analysis of this “user profile“ by ComScore is used to provide advertisements tailored to meet market demands and/or for purposes of market research. You are entitled to the right to deny consent to the compiling and storage of this user profile by ComScore. To exercise this right, contact comScore, Inc., at 11950 Democracy Drive, Suite 600, Reston, VA 20190, USA. Additional information on the purpose and extent of data collection and its processing by comScore can be found at http://www.comscore.com/ger/Ueber_Uns/Datenschutz

Our website employs the bookmark service addthis.com. AddThis is a service of Clearspring Technologies Inc., 8000 Westpark Drive, Suite 625, McLean, VA 2210, USA. Each time our website receives an access request equipped with an AddThis component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this component from AddThis. Through this process, AddThis is informed exactly which page of our website is being accessed.  In addition, addthis.com also records your IP address, browser type, browser language, the website previously accessed as well as the date and time you visited the site and uses this data to compile an anonymized user profile. This data allows AddThis and its partner companies to direct targeted personalized ads at website users based on their particular interests. The display of advertising material occurs based on a browser cookie put in place by addthis.com, which analyzes user interaction with the website. You can permanently prevent addthis.com from placing a cookie on your browser by downloading and installing the opt-out cookie available at the following link: http://www.addthis.com/privacy/opt-out.

You should be aware, however, that by doing so you may not be able to make full use of all the functions of our website. You can find the data privacy policies for AddThis at the following internet address, along with information about the collection and use of data by AddThis: http://www.addthis.com/privacy/privacy-policy

On our website we offer you the opportunity to contact us, either by email and/or by using a contact form. In such event, information provided by the user is stored for the purpose of facilitating communications with the user. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

Our website employs components provided by Tumblr. These components are a service of Tumblr, Inc., 35 East 21st St, 10th Floor, New York, NY 10010, USA. Each time our website receives an access request equipped with a Tumblr component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this component from Tumblr. Through this process, AddThis is informed exactly which page of our website is being accessed by which IP address. We have no control over the extent of data collected or over the data that Tumblr collects using this component. To the best of our knowledge, the component is not used for any other purpose than to display the button. You can find more information in the Tumblr data privacy policy, at https://www.tumblr.com/policy/en/privacy. To prevent Tumblr from associating your visit to our website to your Tumblr account, you must first log out of your Tumblr account before visiting our site.

On our website we offer you the opportunity to contact us, either by email and/or by using a contact form. In such event, information provided by the user is stored for the purpose of facilitating communications with the user. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

We use MailChimp to send our newsletter to our subscribers. MailChimp is a service provided by The Rocket Science Group, LLC, 512 Means Street, Suite 404, Atlanta, GA 30318, USA. 

The data stored when you registered for the newsletter (email address, name, IP address, and time and date of registration) will be sent to a server operated by The Rocket Science Group in the United States and stored there in accordance with its Safe Harbour Agreement. 

Further information about the data protection offered by MailChimp can be found at: 

http://mailchimp.com/legal/privacy/

You may cancel your newsletter subscription and revoke your consent to the storage of this data at any time with future effect. For instructions to take this step, please refer to the confirmation email and each newsletter.

On our website we offer you the opportunity to contact us, either by email and/or by using a contact form. In such event, information provided by the user is stored for the purpose of facilitating communications with the user. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

On our website, we promote the service Google Remarketing belonging to the company Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA, hereinafter “Google”. Advertisements may appear for users who have already visited our website in the past with Google Remarketing. Within the Google network, advertisements adapted to your interests can hereby be displayed on our site. Google Remarketing uses cookies for this evaluation. Cookies are small text files stored on your computer which allow the use of the website to be analyzed. This makes it possible to recognize our visitors if these sites are accessed within the advertising network of Google. In this way, advertisements can be presented within the advertising network of Google based on content which has previously been accessed on websites within the Google advertising network by visitors who are also using the Google Remarketing feature. Google does not itself collect any personal data. You can disable this feature by making the appropriate settings under http://www.google.com/settings/ads. 

We promote the service Instagram on our website. Instagram is a service of Instagram Inc. By means of the integrated “Insta” button on our page, Instagram receives the information that you have accessed the corresponding page of our website. If you are logged into Instagram, Instagram may assign the visit to our site to your Instagram account and link the data by this means. The data transmitted by clicking the “Insta” button is stored by Instagram. You can find more information regarding the purpose and scope of data collection, its processing and use, as well as your related rights and settings options for protecting your privacy in the Instagram data protection notice under https://help.instagram.com/155833707900388.

To prevent your visit to our site from being accessed by your Instagram account, you must log out of your Instagram account before visiting our site. 

On our website we offer you the opportunity to contact us, either by email and/or by using a contact form. In such event, information provided by the user is stored for the purpose of facilitating communications with the user. No data is transferred to third parties. Nor is any of this information matched to any information that may be collected by other components of our website.

For purposes of promotion, our website also employs the Google ad tool “Google-Adwords”. As part of this, our website employs the analysis service “Conversion-Tracking” from Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA, hereinafter referred to as “Google“. If you access our site by way of a Google ad, a cookie is placed on your computer. Cookies are small text files that your internet browser downloads and stores to your computer. These so-called “conversion cookies” cease to be active after 30 days and are not used to identify you personally. If you visit certain pages of our website while the cookie is still active, we and Google know that you, as user, have clicked on ads placed on Google and were redirected to our site.

Google uses the information obtained through “conversion cookies” to compile statistics for our website. These statistics tell us the total number of users who have clicked on our ad as well as which pages of our site were then accessed by each user. However, neither we nor other advertisers who use “Google-Adwords” receive any kind of information that can be used to personally identify users.

You can prevent the installation of “conversion cookies” by making the appropriate change to your browser settings, for example by setting your browser so that the automatic placement of cookies is deactivated or by blocking cookies from the domain “googleadservices.com“.

You can obtain the relevant data privacy policy from Google at the following link:

https://services.google.com/sitestats/de.html

Our website employs Google AdSense. Google AdSense is a service of Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA, for incorporating advertisements. Google-AdSense uses so-called “cookies“, text files, that are stored to your computer and which provide analysis of the use of our website. Furthermore, Google AdSense uses so-called “web beacons“. Web beacons allow Google to analyze information, such as visitor traffic to our website. This information, along with your IP address and the ad format displayed, is transmitted to Google in the US where it is stored and may be transferred by Google to contracting partners. However, Google does not merge your IP-address with other stored data on you. You can prevent cookies from being installed by adjusting the settings on your browser software accordingly. You should be aware, however, that by doing so you may not be able to make full use of all the functions of our website. By using our website you declare that you agree to the processing of data collected about you by Google in the manner previously described and for the purposes there specified.

Our website employs affilinet tracking cookies in order to correctly record sales and/or leads. Cookies are small text files that are saved to your computer when you visit a website. These affilinet tracking cookies do not store personal data of any kind. Instead, it only collects the identification number of the intermediary partner as well as the reference number of the advertising material that was clicked on by the visitor to the website. This information is required in order to process the payment transaction between the website operator and the advertiser. The partner identification number serves to designate the intermediary partner to which a commission is to be paid once a transaction has been concluded.

You can prevent cookies from being installed by adjusting the settings on your browser software accordingly. You should be aware, however, that by doing so you may not be able to make full use of all the functions of our website. 

Our website employs components from the micropayment service Flattr. These components are a service of Firma Flattr Network Ltd., 2nd Floor, White bear yard 144A Clerkenwell Road, London, Middlesex, Great Britain, EC1R 5DF.

Each time our website receives an access request equipped with a Flattr component, the component prompts your browser to download an image of this component from Flattr. In the event you are not logged into your Flattr account, it is possible that user data may nevertheless be collected and stored. If you are logged into your Flattr account, Flattr will receive information as to exactly which page of our website you are viewing. If you continue to interact with the Flattr button integrated into our site, this information will be transmitted to Flattr and utilized and stored for billing purposes in accordance with Flattr guidelines.

You can find additional information about the purpose and extent of data collected and how it is processed by Flattr at

https://flattr.com/privacy

We electronically collect and process your application data for the purpose of completing the application process. If your application results in the conclusion of an employment contract, the data collected from you may be stored in your personnel file for purposes of normal organizational and administrative processes in compliance with appropriate legal requirements.

Upon rejection of your application, data you have provided is automatically deleted two months after notification of rejection. This does not apply in such instances where, due to legal requirements (such as the burden of proof obligation stipulated in the Equal Treatment Act) a longer storage period is necessitated or when you expressly agreed to have your data stored for a longer period in our database of prospective applicants.

On the basis of the Federal Data Protection Act, you may contact us at no cost if you have questions relating to the collection, processing or use of your personal information, if you wish to request the correction, blocking or deletion of the same, or if you wish to cancel explicitly granted consent. Please note that you have the right to have incorrect data corrected or to have personal data deleted, where such claim is not barred by any legal obligation to retain this data.