Data protection statement

We are delighted that you are visiting our website. We attach great importance to data protection and data security on our website. That is why we would like to take this opportunity to tell you what personal data we collect when you visit our website and how this data is used.

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As legal changes or changes to our in-house processes may make an amendment to this data protection statement necessary, please reread it regularly.

1. Personal data

Personal data is data that can be used to find out personal or factual information about you, such as your name, address, phone number or email address.

Information that we cannot associate with you personally is, by definition, not personal data.

2. Purpose of data processing

In connection with your use of this website, we process your personal data for, inter alia, the following purposes:

To provide services via contact forms and newsletters
To undertake personal and anonymised evaluations
For statistical analyses
To prevent abuse.

3. Collection, process and use of personal data

We use your personal data solely in order to provide you, via our website, with comprehensive and personalised services or to respond to your contact requests.

You can use our website without revealing your identity to us. If, however, you register for one of our personalised services, such as by subscribing to a newsletter or requesting information, we will ask for contact details such as your name and email address or request further personal information. It is entirely for you to decide whether or not to enter this data. Without it, we may, however, be unable to provide you with the service you request or answer your enquiry. At the point of data entry, you will find separate details of the exact procedure and, as required, appropriate declarations of consent that you can accept or reject as you see fit.

4. Statistical evaluation

We do not use your data for direct, personal evaluation, but we reserve the right to evaluate pseudonymised or anonymised data records in order to improve the website or for statistical purposes. We keep records of general information such as when a page was visited or which page is visited most frequently.

5. Newsletter

When you subscribe to one of our newsletters, we will send a confirmation link to the email address you have given us. You will only receive our newsletter once you have activated this confirmation link (double opt-in).

Should you no longer wish to receive the newsletter, you can unsubscribe at any time. To do so, click on the unsubscribe link found in all of our newsletters.

6. Cookies

We use cookies on our website to help make your visit more enjoyable and to enable you to use certain functions. Cookies are small text files generated by a Web server and stored on your computer by your Web browser during your website visit. Most of the cookies we use are so-called session cookies. These are deleted automatically once you end your brower session. Cookies cannot download data from your hard disk or pass on to us your email address or other personal data of yours.

We also use persistent cookies, mainly to provide you as a user of our website with recurring settings. In addition, cookies enable us to analyse visitors’ user behaviour, but only during the validity period of the cookie.

All data is saved without any direct reference to your person and is generally pseudonymised. Your data is not used in this regard to create a profile. It merely enables us to adjust our website to your individual preferences.

You can refuse to accept data collection and storage at any time with future effect. You can also prevent the storage of cookies on your computer by, for example, changing your browser settings so that cookies are not accepted or so that you are notified before a cookie is placed. This might, however, limit the functionality of our website or our services

The details of cookies placed by other providers or by third parties include a link via which you can refuse permission for their use.

The provider will then place an opt-out cookie on your computer that prevents the collection of further data. Do not delete the opt-out cookie as long as you want to continue to object. If you delete it subsequently, you must repeat the deactivation process. You can object to data collection and storage by many other services at any time with effect for the future by visiting www.youronlinechoices.com/de/praferenzmanagement or www.networkadvertising.org/choices/ (only available in English).

You can use our website without cookies, but most browsers’ default settings accept cookies automatically. If you would prefer our cookies not to be stored on your computer, please refuse permission as described above.

Cookies are used in various places on the Mazars website. Here is a list of them with details of their purpose and validity period.

The key cookie which ensures that this website works is:

Name	Purpose	Validity period
eZSESSID	This cookie is generated by our content management system as soon as you access our website. It is required for using the website.	Until the end of the session

Storing your acknowledgement of our information on cookies:

When you first visit our website, you may receive in the top right-hand corner of your screen a pop-up message with information about the use of cookies. If you click on the “Accept” button, we will save a cookie so that we know you have acknowledged receipt of our message, which we then no longer need to show again on your next visit.

Name	Purpose	Validity period
mazarsAcceptCookies	Saves a cookie so that we know you have read our message about cookies and have accepted them.	12 months

Usage analysis of our website:

This website uses Google Analytics, a Web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (“Google”). Google Analytics uses cookies that are placed on your computer to help the website analyse how you use the site. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States. This website only uses Google Analytics with the “_anonymizeIp()” extension, which ensures that your IP address is truncated by Google within the area of European Union member states or in that of other parties to the European Economic Area so as to prevent direct identification of individuals. Only in exceptional instances will the full IP address be transferred to a server in the United States and truncated there. Google will use this information on our behalf to evaluate your use of the website, to compile reports on website activities for us and to provide us with other services relating to website and Internet usage The IP address that your browser transmits in connection with the use of Google Analytics is not linked with any other Google data. You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser. Please note that if you do this, however, you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website. You can also prevent collection and processing by Google of the data generated by the cookie and of data relating to your use of the website, including your IP address, by downloading and installing the browser plug-in from the following link:

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

You can refuse permission for data collection by Google Analytics by clicking on the following link. This places an opt-out cookie which prevents future collection of your data when you visit this website:

<a href=“javascript:gaOptout()“>Google Analytics deaktivieren</a>

Name	Purpose	Validity period
_utma	This randomly generated number is used to determine the number of one-off visitors to our website.	2 years
_utmb	This randomly generated number is used (with _utmc) to calculate the average duration of visits to our website.	30 minutes
_utmc	This randomly generated number is used (with _utmb) to note when you shut your browser down.	Until the end of the session
_utmz	This is a randomly generated number with information about how visitors have reached the website (via a link or via an organic or paid search).	6 months
_jsuid	This cookie contains a random number that is generated when the website is visited for the first time. Its purpose is to recognise new visitors.	10 years
_eventqueue	This cookie saves a series of mouse events that may not be completed before you leave the page. These events can be executed while you load the next page.	1 hour
heat- maps_g2g_10062 6449	This session cookie is always placed when you first visit the website. Its purpose is to ensure that only parts of the code are shown when you visit the home page in order to make the website faster.	1 hour
_first_pageview	This session cookie is always placed when you first visit the website. Its purpose is to ensure that only parts of the code are shown when you visit the home page in order to make the website faster.	10 minutes
_referrer_og	This cookie saves information about how a visitor has arrived at the website.	90 days

7. Google Maps

Our website uses Google Maps on a number of pages to show interactive maps and indicate directions. Google Maps is a map service provided by Google. Using Google Maps may lead to information about the use of this website, including your IP address and the (starting point) address you entered to use the route planning function, being sent to Google in the United States.

When you access a page that contains Google Maps, your browser will establish a direct connection to Google’s servers. The contents of the map are transmitted by Google to your browser, which incorporates them in the Web page. We therefore have no influence on the extent of the data collected by Google in this way.

If you do not wish for Google to collect, process or use data about you via our website, you can deactivate JavaScript in your browser settings. You will then, however, be unable to use the map function.

For further information about the purpose and scope of data collection and the further processing and use of data by Google, your rights in this regard and how you can use settings to protect your privacy, please refer to Google’s data protection information at http://www.google.de/intl/de/policies/privacy/.

8. Incorporating third-party content

Our website includes hyperlinks to other providers’ websites. When you activate these links, you are taken straight to the other provider’s website. You can tell that this is the case because, for example, the URL changes.

We cannot accept responsibility for how these providers handle your data on their websites because we have no influence on what they do with it. Please consult their websites for more information.

9. Contact form

On our website, we offer you an opportunity to contact us by email and/or via a contact form. If you do so, your details (name and email address) will be stored so that we can contact you. We will only use this data to contact you and not for any other services, such as newsletters.

10. Passing on personal data to third parties

We do not pass on your personal data to third parties. In certain cases, we may, however, be legally required to disclose your personal data to law enforcement authorities, for instance. This is the case if, for instance, there is a suspicion of a criminal offence or of abuse of our website.

11. Social media plug-ins

For reasons of data protection, we have deliberately decided not to incorporate social media plug-ins (such as the Facebook “Like” button, the Twitter button or the Google +1 button) directly in our website. So when you access our website, no data will be passed on to social media services such as Facebook, Twitter or Google+.

12. Security measures to protect the data we store

The personal data that we collect is stored by us or the data processors we contract on specially protected servers. Access to these servers is limited to only a few people who look after technical, commercial or editorial matters. To prevent data loss or abuse, we take extensive technical and organisational security precautions that are regularly reviewed and updated to state of the art. We must, however, point out that in view of the Internet’s structure it is possible for other persons or institutions over whom we have no control to disregard the rules of data protection and the security measures listed above. In particular, unencrypted data can be read by third parties, and we have no technical influence in this regard. It is therefore the responsibility of the user to encrypt any data they send via the Internet or to take other precautions to prevent unauthorised access on the part of third parties.

13. Rights of data subjects

On request, we are happy to inform you at any time whether we hold any data about you and, if so, what. If, despite our best endeavours to keep data accurate and up to date, we hold inaccurate data, we will correct it in accordance with your instructions.

We also delete data in line with statutory requirements. If we are unable to do so for legal reasons, we may block it. For further details, please contact:

datenschutz@mazars.de