Data Protection Statement
The controller under data protection laws, in particular the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is:
The President of the Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute
Prof. Dr. Birgit Kleinschmit
Bundesallee 50
38116 Braunschweig
Telephone +49 531 5961003
info@thuenen.de
Your rights as a data subject
You can exercise the following rights at any time via the contact details for our data protection officer which are provided below:
- information concerning your data saved by us and its processing,
- rectification of incorrect personal data,
- erasure of your data which is saved by us,
- restriction of data processing should we not yet be permitted to erase your data due to legal obligations,
- objection to the processing of your data by us and
- data portability, should 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 your responsible supervisory authority at any time with any complaints. Your responsible supervisory authority depends on the German Federal State in which you reside, work or where the alleged breach has taken place. A list of the supervisory authorities (for the non-public sector) with addresses can be found here.
Purposes of the data processing by the controller and third parties
We only process your personal data for the purposes stated in this data protection statement. Your personal data will not be transmitted to third parties for purposes other than those stated below. We will disclose your personal data to third parties only if:
- you have given explicit consent to this,
- the processing is necessary in order to fulfil a contract with you,
- the processing is necessary in order to fulfil a legal obligation,
- the processing is necessary to safeguard legitimate interests and there is no reason to assume that you have a superordinate protectable interest in the non-disclosure of your data.
Erasure and blocking of data
We comply with the principles of data avoidance and data economy. Therefore, we only save your personal data for as long as is necessary in order to achieve the purposes named here or for the retention periods which have been prescribed by the legislator. Once the respective purpose no longer applies or following the expiry of the retention periods referred to above, the relevant data will be routinely blocked or erased in accordance with the legal regulations.
SSL encryption
In order to protect the security of your data during transfer, we use encryption procedures (for example SSL) via HTTPS which correspond to the current state of technology.
Getting in touch with us
Should you get in touch with us by email or via the contact form in case of any questions, you thereby voluntarily consent for us to contact you. For this purpose, a valid email address must be provided. The purpose of this is to allocate and respond to the query. The provision of additional data is voluntary. The information provided by you will be saved in order to process the query and for any follow-up questions. Once your query has been dealt with, the personal data will automatically be deleted.
Recording of general information when visiting our website
When you access our website, information of a general nature is automatically recorded with the assistance of a cookie. This information (server logfiles) contains the type of web browser, the operating system used, the domain name of your internet service provider and similar data. This is solely information which does not allow you personally to be traced.
This information is technically necessary in order to correctly deliver the information from websites which you have requested and is required when using the internet. It is processed for the following purposes in particular:
- to ensure a smooth connection to the website,
- to ensure smooth use of our website,
- to evaluate the security and stability of the system and
- for other administrative purposes.
The processing of personal data is based on our legitimate interest from the above-mentioned purposes of the data gathering. We do not use your data in order to trace you personally. The recipients of the data are only the controller and any order processors.
Anonymous data of this type may be statistically evaluated by us in order to optimise our online presence and the underlying technology.
Cookies
As with many websites, we use so-called “cookies”. Cookies are small text files which are transferred to your hard drive by a website server. By means of the cookies, we automatically receive certain data, such as the IP address, browser used, operating system in relation to your computer and connection to the internet.
Cookies cannot be used to launch programs or transfer viruses onto a computer. On the basis of the information contained in cookies, we can make navigation easier and enable the correct display of our websites.
Under no circumstances will the data gathered by us be passed on to third parties and no linkage with personal data will take place without your consent.
Naturally you can generally view our website without cookies. Most internet browsers are generally set to automatically accept cookies. You can deactivate the use of cookies at any time via your browser settings. Please use the help function of your browser to find out how to alter these settings. Please bear in mind that individual functions of our website may not work if you deactivate the cookies.
Server logfiles
Log file information is stored for security reasons (e.g. to investigate instances of misuse or fraud) for a short period of time and then deleted. Data that has to be retained for evidentiary purposes is excluded from erasure until the relevant incident has been fully resolved.
Newsletter
On this website you will have the possibility to subscribe to news free of charge and to receive news about the Thünen-Institute. When registering, your e-mail address will be transmitted to us via the input mask. The registration for our newsletter takes place in a so-called double opt-in procedure. This means that after registering you will receive an e-mail asking you to confirm your registration. This confirmation is necessary so that no-one can register with other people’s e-mail addresses. When registering for the newsletter, the user’s IP address and the date and time of registration are stored. This serves to prevent misuse of the services or the data subject’s e-mail address. The subscription to the newsletter can be cancelled by the data subject at any time. Consent to the storage of personal data can also be revoked at any time. When processing data for sending the newsletter, the data is not passed on to third parties. The data is used exclusively for sending the newsletter and is collected for this purpose.
Changes to our data protection provisions
We reserve the right to amend this data protection statement so that it always fulfils the current legal requirements or in order to implement changes to our services in the data protection statement, for example the introduction of new services. The next time you visit, the new data protection statement will then apply.
Questions for the data protection officer
Should you have any questions relating to data protection, please send us an email or contact the person at our organisation who is responsible for data protection directly:
Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute
Data Protection Officer
Bundesallee 50
38116 Braunschweig
Telephone +49 531 596-1218
Processing of personal data in the context of the use of social networks
As part of its press and public relations work, the Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute has its own accounts on the social networks YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, Bluesky and Mastodon.
The data processing associated with the social media platforms enables a direct and rapid exchange with users. By commenting on and sharing posts, users can participate directly in the public, democratic discourse. The Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute restricts the use of its accounts – also for the protection of personal data – to content within the scope of the press and public relations work of the Johann Heinrich von Thünen -Institute. Administrative services or communication beyond the aforementioned purpose of use are not offered, processed or answered via these services.
Please do not actively share any personal data via our social media channels, e.g. in posts, comments or retweets, and always use our direct communication channels to contact us. All interactions with the social media accounts (sharing, liking, commenting on or quoting posts) are displayed publicly. This applies both to actions by third parties in relation to posts by Thünen-Institute accounts and to actions by Thünen Institute accounts in relation to posts by third parties.
Further information on social networks and how you can protect your data can be found on the website of the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI).
1 Technical information: Forwarding via hyperlinks
From our website, you can access the aforementioned networks via icons behind which there are so-called hyperlinks. A hyperlink activated by clicking on it opens the external destination in a new window of your browser. No data is transferred to third parties before this activation.
2 General note: Responsible use of social networks
We expressly draw your attention to the fact that these services store the data of their users (e.g. personal information, IP address, etc.) in accordance with their own data usage guidelines and – with the exception of Mastodon – also use them for business purposes. The Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute has no influence on data collection and its further use by the social networks. For example, there is no reliable information about the extent to which, where and for how long the data is stored, the extent to which the respective networks fulfil existing deletion obligations, which analyses and links are made with the data and to whom the data is passed on.
We would like to point out that the vast majority of the platforms mentioned carry out their data processing worldwide and in particular in the USA. This so-called third country transfer outside the EU harbours risks with regard to the possible assertion of your data protection rights. Please do not contact us via social networks if you wish to avoid this. You use these services and their functions on your own responsibility. This applies in particular to the public use of interactive functions (e.g. commenting, sharing, rating) of the US platforms.
3 Our activities in social networks
In order to fulfil editorial tasks in social networks, in particular the live management of comments and enquiries, the Johann Heinrich von Thünen Institute necessarily processes data of the persons who interact with the Institute there. Publicly accessible data such as profile and account name, profile picture, content of the enquiry, number of followers and profiles followed by the profile, as well as the latest posts can be viewed by employees of the Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute.
We would like to point out that the data is processed on the basis of Article 6(1)(e) GDPR in conjunction with Section 3 BDSG. Processing of the personal data transmitted by you is necessary for the purpose of processing your communication.
In the following, we would like to inform you about the social networks we use.
3.1 LinkedIn
On the LinkedIn platform of the provider LinkedIn Ireland Unlimited Company, Wilton Place, Dublin 2, Ireland (“LinkedIn”), the Johann Heinrich von Thünen Institute, in joint responsibility with LinkedIn, operates a company page on which we provide information about the Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute.
As a provider of an online presence on the LinkedIn social media platform, we process personal data when you write to us directly via the platform (in a personal message or via the public comment function). Which data is collected depends on the information you provide and the contact details you provide or share. If possible, please refrain from sending personal data when using LinkedIn.
LinkedIn also collects information via cookies and similar technologies (e.g. web beacons, pixels, ad tags and device identifiers) that enable LinkedIn to recognise users and comprehensively analyse user behavior. LinkedIn provides us with corresponding information for analysing user behavior on our online presence in anonymised form. This enables us to statistically evaluate the use of our LinkedIn page and thus to manage our activities in a targeted manner.
The operator of the social media platform can also use the data collected in this way to create user profiles. This enables them to display interest-based advertising to the user within and outside the respective social media presence. If you are logged into your social media account when you visit our LinkedIn page, LinkedIn can also assign this visit to your account. The processing of personal data collected by us via the platform is based on Art. 6 para. 1 lit. e GDPR. If you are asked by LinkedIn for consent to the data processing described above, the legal basis for this processing is Art. 6 para. 1 lit. a; Art. 7 GDPR.
We have concluded an agreement with LinkedIn in accordance with Art. 26 GDPR, in which the data protection obligations arising from the operation of our company page are divided between us and LinkedIn. LinkedIn has assumed a large part of the data protection obligations, such as the fulfillment of the rights of data subjects pursuant to Art. 12 et seq. GDPR, the obligation to provide suitable technical and organisational measures to protect the security of personal data and the reporting and notification obligations in the event of a data breach. If you contact us regarding your rights as a data subject, we will forward your request to LinkedIn immediately.
Further information on the agreement between us and LinkedIn can be found here.
The data protection statement was created using the activeMind AG data protection statement generator and was adapted by us.