Site Policies

Changes and Amendments

We reserve the right to modify the Disclaimer and Policies or its terms relating to the Website or Services at any time, effective upon posting of an updated version of the Disclaimer and Policies on the Website. Continued use of the Website after any such changes shall constitute your consent to such changes.

Acceptance of the Disclaimer and Policies

You acknowledge that you have read the Disclaimer and Policies and agree to all its terms and conditions. By using the Website or its Services you agree to be bound by the Disclaimer and Policies. If you do not agree to abide by the terms of the Disclaimer and Policies, you must not use or access the Website and its Services.

Representation

Views or opinions represented in this Website are, naturally except external contributions, personal and belong solely to us and do not represent those of people, institutions or organizations that we may or may not be associated with in professional or personal capacity unless explicitly stated. Such views or opinions are not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, or individual.

Links to and from other Websites

Our Website contains links to other websites that are not owned or controlled by us. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the content of such other websites or third-parties. Furthermore, information contained on any pages linked to and from the Website are subject to change at any time and without warning.

Indemnification and Warranties

While we have made every attempt to ensure that the information contained on the Website is correct, Website Operator is not responsible for any errors or omissions, or for the results obtained from the use of this information. All information on the Website is provided “as is”, with no guarantee of completeness, accuracy, timeliness or of the results obtained from the use of this information, and without warranty of any kind, express or implied. In no event will Website Operator be liable to you or anyone else for any decision made or action taken in reliance on the information on the Website or for any consequential, special or similar damages, even if advised of the possibility of such damages. Information on the Website is for general information purposes only and is not intended to provide legal, financial, medical, or any other type of professional advice. Please seek professional assistance should you require it. Furthermore, information contained on the Website are subject to change at any time and without warning.

What Are Cookies?

In their most basic form, cookies are text-strings that websites save to your hard disk. They serve as a memory tool and are able to recognize your online behavior and remember your actions. While this may sound negative, cookies are actually what makes the World Wide Web work the way it does. Whether you are online shopping, logging in to an account, or browsing the internet, cookies are responsible for your overall online experience.

You’ve been told that a website uses cookies. → Learn more on Cookies & You about cookies and how to control and disable cookies.

Cookies Types

Cookies were created in 1997 by Netscape who also created Javascript and SSL. In general, there are three different ways to classify cookies: Their provenance, how long they endure and what purpose they serve. There are cookies that will not fit neatly into these defined categories or may qualify for multiple categories.

Provenance

Depending on the source of the cookies the cookies can be classified as first-party cookies and third-party cookies. → We recommend to disable third-party cookies in your Cookies Settings.

• First-party cookies – As the name implies, first-party cookies are put on your device directly by the website you are visiting.
• Third-party cookies – These are the cookies that are placed on your device, not by the website you are visiting, but by a third party like an advertiser or an analytic system.

Duration

Depending on the duration the cookies are stored, they can be classified as session or persistent.

• Session cookies – These cookies are temporary and expire once you close your browser (or once your session ends).
• Persistent cookies – This category encompasses all cookies that remain on your hard drive until you erase them or your browser does, depending on the cookies’ expiration date. All persistent cookies have an expiration date written into their code, but their duration can vary.

Purpose

Depending on the purpose of the cookies, they can be classified as necessary and non-necessary.

• Necessary cookies – These cookies are essential for you to browse the website and use its features, such as accessing secure areas of the site. Cookies that allow web shops to hold your items in your cart while you are shopping online are an example of strictly necessary cookies. These cookies will generally be first-party session cookies.
• Preferences cookies – Also known as “functionality cookies,” these cookies allow a website to remember choices you have made in the past, like what language you prefer, what region you would like weather reports for, or what your user name and password are so you can automatically log in.
• Statistics cookies – Also known as “performance cookies,” these cookies collect information about how you use a website, like which pages you visited and which links you clicked on. None of this information can be used to identify you. It is all aggregated and, therefore, anonymized. Their sole purpose is to improve website functions.
• Marketing cookies – These cookies track your online activity to help advertisers deliver more relevant advertising or to limit how many times you see an ad. These cookies can share that information with other organizations or advertisers. These are persistent cookies and almost always of third-party provenance.

Cookies @Work

This Website sets cookies (hereinafter referred to as “cookies”) in order to optimize the use of the Website and to obtain information that can help to improve the Services made available via the Website.

On Cookiedatabase.org you can consult information about cookies, Local Storage, pixels and other tracking technologies. You can also read the Data Passports they created about the services and organizations that create or use these technologies.

Web Analysis

We use web analysis services to analyse the use of the Website in general and to gain insights into how to improve our contents. The web analysis services use cookies to collect data. The information generated in this process (e.g. IP address, referrers and browser type) can be transmitted, after being rendered anonymous, to a server of the web analysis service to be saved and processed.

For cookies inserted by third parties (including Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity), we would like to refer you to the explanations given by these parties on their respective websites. We do not have any influence over the content of these explanations or the content of the cookies inserted by these third parties.

Our Privacy Policy has more details.

Social Media

For you to like or share our content through social media, we have included sharing buttons on our Website. When you click on one of these buttons, a cookie may be set by the service. These sites are likely to be collecting information and may use that information. You should check the respective policies of each to see exactly how they use your information.

Cookies Settings

You can decide for yourself whether the Website’s web server is allowed to save cookies on your computer or not. You can opt to change your browser settings so that they do not allow cookies to be accepted or saved at any time.

Alternatively, you can opt to be shown a warning message every time before you accept cookies or you can set your browser up in such a way that it only accepts cookies from certain websites. You can also delete cookies that have already been saved at any time.

• Cookies settings Google Chrome
• Cookies settings MS IE, Edge
• Cookies settings Mozilla Firefox
• Cookies settings Apple Safari Desktop, Mobile
• Cookies settings Telenor Opera

We would like to emphasise that if you decline cookies on the Website, some functions on the Website may be limited or unavailable. As a result, to make it easier to use the Website, we recommend that your browser settings accept cookies on the Website.

WhatIsMyBrowser tells you more about your browser settings, e.g. cookies / third-party cookies enabled / disabled as well as more info about your system.

More Information

Complaints about the privacy risks presented by cookies are generally about third-party, persistent, marketing cookies. These cookies can contain significant amounts of information about your online activity, preferences and location.

The chain of responsibility (who can access a cookies’ data) for a third-party cookie can get complicated as well, only heightening their potential for abuse. Perhaps because of this, the use of third-party cookies has been in decline since the passage of the GDPR (so far the most comprehensive data protection legislation).

• For further useful information about cookies, you may go to one of these (non-exhaustive list):
  • internetcookies.org
  • ec.europa.eu/
• The digital marketers association has drawn up a guide to online behavioural advertising and online privacy:
  • youronlinechoices.eu

Other storage technologies such as Web Storage include sessionStorage and localStorage. The difference between these two and cookies is, besides size, that localStorage stores data with no expiration date and gets cleared through JavaScript or clearing the Browser cache / locally stored data whereas sessionStorage being similar to localStorage expires when the browser is closed (not the tab).

Whilst cookies are primarily for server-side reading (can also be read on client-side), localStorage and sessionStorage can only be read on client-side. → This Website uses localStorage to remember your choice of reading mode (toggle dark / light mode).

Automatic collection of Information

When you visit the Website our servers automatically record information that your browser sends. This data may include your device’s IP address, browser type and version, operating system type and version, language preferences or the webpage you were visiting before you came to our Website, pages of our Website that you visit, the time spent on those pages, information you search for on our Website, access times and dates, and other statistics.

Collection of Personal Information

You can visit the Website without telling us who you are or revealing any information by which someone could identify you as a specific, identifiable individual. If, however, you wish to use some of the Website’s features, you will be asked to provide certain Personal Information (for example, your name and e-mail address).

• We retain information provided by the User through the contact form for a limited period of time only to improve the ability to react and neither use that information for marketing purposes nor forward that information to third parties.
• When Visitors leave comments on the Website, we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the Visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection. The comment and its metadata are retained indefinitely. This is so we can recognize and approve any follow-up comments automatically instead of holding them in a moderation queue.
• An anonymized string created from your email address (also called a hash), you submitted in the comments form, may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment. Please consult Automattic’s privacy policy for details.
• For Users that register on the Website (e.g. subscribe for e-mail alerts whenever a new entry is posted), we store the personal information such as the e-mail address they provide.
• When Users toggle dark / light mode while browsing the Website, this information is collected and stored with local storage which can only be read by the User’s side and no cookie is set.

We receive and store any information you knowingly provide to us when you fill any online forms on the Website. You can choose not to provide us with your Personal Information, but then you may not be able to take advantage of some of the Website’s features. Users who are uncertain about what info is mandatory are welcome to contact us.

We improve our website by using Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity to see how you use our website. By using our site, you agree that we, Google and Microsoft can collect and use this data. Through our partners, we capture how you use and interact with our website through behavioral metrics, heatmaps, and session replay to improve our website. Website usage data is captured using first and third-party cookies and other tracking technologies to determine the popularity of online activity. Additionally, we use this information for site optimization and fraud / security purposes. Please consult the following non-exhaustive list of providers’ privacy policies for further details.

• Google’s privacy policy
• Microsoft’s privacy policy

Use and Processing of collected Information

Any of the information we collect from you may be used to personalize your experience; improve our Website; improve User service and respond to queries and emails of our Visitors; run and operate our Website and Services. Information collected automatically is used only to identify potential cases of abuse and establish statistical information regarding Website usage. This statistical information is not otherwise aggregated in such a way that would identify any particular Visitor. We may process Personal Information related to you if one of the following applies:

(i) You have given your consent for one or more specific purposes. Note that under some legislations we may be allowed to process information until you object to such processing (by opting out), without having to rely on consent or any other of the following legal bases below. This, however, does not apply, whenever the processing of Personal Information is subject to European data protection law; (ii) Provision of information is necessary for the performance of an agreement with you and/or for any pre-contractual obligations thereof; (iii) Processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which you are subject; (iv) Processing is related to a task that is carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in us; (v) Processing is necessary for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by us or by a third party.

We are prepared to clarify the specific legal basis that applies in particular whether the provision of Personal Information is a statutory or contractual requirement, or a requirement necessary to enter into a contract.

Information Transfer & Storage

Depending on your location, data transfers may involve transferring and storing your information in a country other than your own. You are entitled to learn about the legal basis of information transfers to a country outside the European Union or to any international organization governed by public international law or set up by two or more countries, such as the UN, and about the security measures taken by us to safeguard your information. If any such transfer takes place, you can find out more by checking the relevant sections of this document or inquire with us using the information provided in the contact section.

The Rights of Users

You may exercise certain rights regarding your information processed by us. In particular, you have the right to do the following under certain circumstances:

(i) you have the right to withdraw consent where you have previously given your consent to the processing of your information; (ii) you have the right to object to the processing of your information if the processing is carried out on a legal basis other than consent; (iii) you have the right to learn if information is being processed by us, obtain disclosure regarding certain aspects of the processing and obtain a copy of the information undergoing processing; (iv) you have the right to verify the accuracy of your information and ask for it to be updated or corrected; (v) you have the right, under certain circumstances, to restrict the processing of your information, in which case, we will not process your information for any purpose other than storing it; (vi) you have the right, under certain circumstances, to obtain the erasure of your Personal Information from us; (vii) you have the right to receive your information in a structured, commonly used and machine readable format and, if technically feasible, to have it transmitted to another controller without any hindrance.

This provision is applicable provided that your information is processed by automated means and that the processing is based on your consent, on a contract which you are part of or on pre-contractual obligations thereof.

The right to object to Processing

Where Personal Information is processed for the public interest, in the exercise of an official authority vested in us or for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by us, you may object to such processing by providing a ground related to your particular situation to justify the objection. You must know that, however, should your Personal Information be processed for direct marketing purposes, you can object to that processing at any time without providing any justification. To learn, whether we are processing Personal Information for direct marketing purposes, you may refer to the relevant sections of this document.

Privacy of Children

We do not knowingly collect any Personal Information from children under the age of 13. If you are under the age of 13, please do not submit any Personal Information through our Website or Service. We encourage parents and legal guardians to monitor their children’s Internet usage and to help enforce this Policy by instructing their children never to provide Personal Information through our Website or Service without their permission.

If you have reason to believe that a child under the age of 13 has provided Personal Information to us through our Website or Service, please contact us. You must also be at least 16 years of age to consent to the processing of your Personal Information in your country (in some countries we may allow your parent or guardian to do so on your behalf).

Do Not Track Signals

Some browsers incorporate a Do Not Track feature that signals to websites you visit that you do not want to have your online activity tracked. Tracking is not the same as using or collecting information in connection with a website. For these purposes, tracking refers to collecting personally identifiable information from consumers who use or visit a website or online service as they move across different websites over time. Our Website does not track its visitors over time and across third party websites. However, some third party sites may keep track of your browsing activities when they serve you content, which enables them to tailor what they present to you.

Links to other Websites

Our Website contains links to other websites that are not owned or controlled by us. Please be aware that we are not responsible for the privacy practices of such other websites or third-parties. We encourage you to be aware when you leave our Website and to read the privacy statements of each and every website that are not owned or controlled by us and may collect Personal Information.

Embedded content from other websites

Articles on the Website may include embedded content (e.g. videos, music tracks, images, articles, maps, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website. These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

If you use interactive content such as videos, music tracks or maps (embedded in the Website) that is hosted elsewhere, these services will set cookies on your computer. Providers such as Google incl. YouTube, Microsoft and Vimeo use these cookies and perhaps other tracking technologies to help them and their partners to analyze the traffic to their websites. Please consult the following non-exhaustive list of providers’ privacy policies for further details.

• YouTube’s privacy policy
• Vimeo’s privacy policy

It is our legitimate interest to use YouTube and other Google products, Microsoft products, Vimeo, as well as possibly other sources’ content because we need their services to enrich our content and would not be able to provide you with their content features otherwise.

Information Security

We secure information you provide on computer servers in a controlled, secure environment, protected from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. We maintain reasonable administrative, technical, and physical safeguards in an effort to protect against unauthorized access, use, modification, and disclosure of Personal Information in its control and custody.

However, no data transmission over the Internet or wireless network can be guaranteed. Therefore, while we strive to protect your Personal Information, you acknowledge that (i) there are security and privacy limitations of the Internet which are beyond our control; (ii) the security, integrity, and privacy of any and all information and data exchanged between you and our Website cannot be guaranteed; and (iii) any such information and data may be viewed or tampered with in transit by a third-party, despite best efforts.

Data Breach

In the event we become aware that the security of the Website has been compromised or Users Personal Information has been disclosed to unrelated third parties as a result of external activity, including, but not limited to, security attacks or fraud, we reserve the right to take reasonably appropriate measures, including, but not limited to, investigation and reporting, as well as notification to and cooperation with law enforcement authorities.

In the event of a data breach, we will make reasonable efforts to notify affected individuals if we believe that there is a reasonable risk of harm to the User as a result of the breach or if notice is otherwise required by law.

Legal Disclosure

We will disclose any information we collect, use or receive if required or permitted by law, such as to comply with a subpoena, or similar legal process, and when we believe in good faith that disclosure is necessary to protect our rights, protect your safety or the safety of others, investigate fraud, or respond to a government request.

Changes To This Privacy Policy

We may update our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of any changes by posting the new Privacy Policy on this page. You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.

Prohibited Activities and Uses

You may not use the Services to publish content or engage in activity that is illegal under applicable law, that is harmful to others, or that would subject us to liability, including, without limitation, in connection with any of the following, each of which is prohibited under this Policy:

• Distributing malware or other malicious code.
• Disclosing sensitive personal information about others.
• Collecting, or attempting to collect, personal information about third parties without their knowledge or consent.
• Hosting, distributing or linking to child pornography or content that is harmful to minors.
• Promoting or facilitating gambling, violence, terrorist activities or selling weapons or ammunition.
• Engaging in the unlawful distribution of controlled substances, drug contraband or prescription medications.
• Managing payment aggregators or facilitators such as processing payments on behalf of other businesses or charities.
• Facilitating pyramid schemes or other models intended to seek payments from public actors.
• Threatening harm to persons or property or otherwise harassing behavior.
• Infringing the intellectual property or other proprietary rights of others.
• Facilitating, aiding, or encouraging any of the above activities through our Services.

System Abuse

Any User in violation of our Services security is subject to criminal and civil liability, as well as immediate account termination. Examples include, but are not limited to the following:

• Use or distribution of tools designed for compromising security of the Services.
• Intentionally or negligently transmitting files containing a computer virus or corrupted data.
• Accessing another network without permission, including to probe or scan for vulnerabilities or breach security or authentication measures.
• Unauthorized scanning or monitoring of data on any network or system without proper authorization of the owner of the network or system.

Service Resources

You may not consume excessive amounts of the Services or use the Services in any way which results in performance issues or which interrupts the services for other Users. Prohibited activities that contribute to excessive use, include without limitation:

• Engaging in any activities that degrade the usability and performance of our Services.

Protection of your Privacy

You may not post your date of birth and / or street address on the Website. This is to protect yourself from yourself because this information may become accessible to anyone. For more information on how we collect, protect and use the personally identifiable information you may provide and the choices available to you regarding our use of your personal information please refer to our Privacy Policy.

No Spam Policy

You may not use our Services to send spam or bulk unsolicited messages. We maintain a zero tolerance policy for use of our Services in any manner associated with the transmission, distribution or delivery of any bulk e-mail, including unsolicited bulk or unsolicited commercial e-mail, or the sending, assisting, or commissioning transmission of commercial e-mail.

Your products or services advertised via SPAM (i.e. Spamvertised) may not be used in conjunction with our Services. This provision includes, but is not limited to, SPAM sent via fax, phone, postal mail, email, instant messaging, or newsgroups. Sending emails through our Services to purchased email lists (“safe lists”) will be treated as SPAM.

Defamation and Objectionable Content

We value the freedom of expression and encourages Users to be respectful with the content they post. We are not a publisher of User content and are not in a position to investigate the veracity of individual defamation claims or to determine whether certain material, which we may find objectionable, should be censored.

Copyrighted Content

Copyrighted material must not be published via our Services without the explicit permission of the copyright owner or a person explicitly authorized to give such permission by the copyright owner. Upon receipt of a claim for copyright infringement, or a notice of such violation, we will immediately run full investigation and, upon confirmation, will promptly remove the infringing material from the Services. We may terminate the Service of Users with repeated copyright infringements. Further procedures may be carried out if necessary. We will assume no liability to any User of the Services for the removal of any such material. If you believe your copyright is being infringed by a person or persons using our Services, please send a report of the copyright infringement to the contact details listed at the end of this Policy.

Enforcement

We reserve our right to be the sole arbiter in determining the seriousness of each infringement and to immediately take corrective actions, including but not limited to:

• Disabling or removing any content which is prohibited by this Policy, including to prevent harm to others or to us or our Services, as determined by us in our sole discretion.
• Reporting violations to law enforcement as determined by us in our sole discretion.
• A failure to respond to an email from our abuse team within 2 days, or as otherwise specified in the communication to you, may result in the suspension or termination of your Services.

Nothing contained in this Policy shall be construed to limit our actions or remedies in any way with respect to any of the prohibited activities. In addition, we reserve at all times all rights and remedies available to us with respect to such activities at law or in equity.

Reporting Violations

If you have discovered and would like to report a violation of this Policy, please contact us immediately. We will investigate the situation and provide you with full assistance.