Cookie Statement

INFORMATION WE COLLECT AND THE METHODS WE USE

When using our Site, you may voluntarily provide information about yourself, including your name, postal address, e-mail address, phone number, and any other information you choose to provide. We collect this information when you register with us, or interact with us for any other purpose.

We also collect and store information that is generated automatically as you navigate online through the Site. For example, we may collect information about your computer’s connection to the Internet, which allows us, among other things, to improve the delivery of our web pages to you and to measure traffic on the Site. We do this via two main methods:

1. Server-side tracking, which means requests made to our server,

and

2. Cookies, a standard feature found in browser software to enhance your experience with the Site.

Cookies are small files that your web browser places on your hard drive for record-keeping purposes. By showing how and when visitors use the Site, cookies and server-side tracking help us deliver advertisements, identify how many unique users visit us, and track user trends and patterns. They also prevent you from having to re-enter your preferences on certain areas of the Site where you may have entered preference information before. The Site also may use web beacons (single-pixel graphic files also known as “transparent GIFs”) to access cookies and to count users who visit the Site or open HTML-formatted email messages.

DIGITAL ADVERTISING AND ANALYTICS

We may partner with ad networks and other ad serving providers (“Advertising Providers”) that serve ads on behalf of us and others on non-affiliated platforms. Some of those ads may be personalized, meaning that they are intended to be relevant to you based on information Advertising Providers collect about your use of the Site and other sites or apps over time, including information about relationships among different browsers and devices. This type of advertising is known as interest-based advertising.

Facebook Custom Audiences

(1) This website uses Facebook Custom Audiences with the pixel function ("Facebook Pixel") and the server-side conversion API ("API") of Facebook Ireland Ltd. ("Facebook"). This allows users of the website to see interest-based advertisements ("Facebook Ads") when they visit the social network Facebook or other Facebook-related apps and websites. This allows us to show you advertisements that are of interest to you in order to make our website more interesting for you.

(2) Your browser automatically establishes a direct connection to the Facebook server through the Facebook Pixel included. Using the API, web events from your browser are transmitted directly to Facebook via a server connection. These events are used for the extended comparison of the integrated Facebook Pixel. The data transmitted through the Facebook Pixel and the API are used for results measurement, reporting and the optimization of ads. If you are registered with a Facebook service, Facebook can allocate the website visit to your account.

We have no influence on the scope and further use of the data collected by Facebook and therefore inform you according to our level of knowledge.

Even if you are not registered with Facebook or have not logged in, there is a possibility that the provider will discover and save your IP address and other identification features.

(3) The legal basis for the processing of personal data using marketing cookies is Article 6(1)(1)(a) GDPR.

(4) Using the Facebook pixel and the API, Facebook is able to identify the visitors of our online offer as a target group (called "Custom Audiences") for the presentation of advertisements (called "Facebook Ads"). Accordingly, we use the Facebook Pixel and the API to display only the Facebook ads placed by us to Facebook users who have also shown an interest in our online offer or who have certain characteristics (such as interests in certain topics or products determined on the basis of the websites visited), which we transmit to Facebook (the "Custom Audiences"). Using the Facebook Pixel and the API, we would also like to ensure that our Facebook Ads correspond to the potential interest of the users and are not annoying. Using the Facebook Pixel and the API, we can also understand the effectiveness of Facebook advertisements for statistical and market research purposes by seeing whether users have been redirected to our website after clicking on a Facebook advertisement and have interacted with our products (called "Conversion"). These purposes also fall within our justified interest in the sense of Art. 6(1)(1)(f) GDPR.

(5) In the event that Facebook passes on data to the USA, Facebook is certified under the Privacy Shield Agreement and thus guarantees a level of data protection comparable to European law (Art. 44 et seq. GDPR). (https://www.privacyshield.gov/...).

(6) Third party information: Facebook Ireland Limited, 4 Grand Canal Square, Dublin 2, Ireland; Board of directors: Gareth Lambe, Shane Crehan; Registered with the Companies Registration Office of the Republic of Ireland; Company number 462932.

Further information on data processing by Facebook can be found at https://www.facebook.com/about.... You can find more information about Facebook Ads here: https://www.facebook.com/about...

(7) You can object to the collection using the Facebook Pixel and the API and the use of your data to display Facebook Ads by using the opt-out mentioned below. To set which types of advertisements are shown to you within Facebook, you can call up the page set up by Facebook and follow the instructions there on the settings for usage-based advertising: https://www.facebook.com/adpre.... The settings are platform-independent, that is, they are adopted for all devices such as desktop computers or mobile devices.

Google Analytics and Conversion Tracking

This website uses Google Analytics, an advertising analysis service of Google Inc. ("Google"). Use takes place based on Art. 6 paragraph 1 sentence 1 lit. f. GDPR Google Analytics uses so-called "cookies", text files that are stored on your computer and enable an analysis of the use of the website by you.

The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website like:

Browser type / version,

Operating system used,

Referrer-URL (the site visited previously),

Hostname of the calling computer (IP address),

Time of the server query

is as a rule transmitted to a Google server in the USA and stored there. The IP address transmitted as part of Google Analytics from your browser is not amalgamated with other Google data. We have also added the code "anonymizeIP" to Google Analytics on this website. This ensures that your IP address is masked so that all data is collected anonymously. Only in exceptional cases is the full IP address transferred to a Google server in the USA and shortened there.

For the exceptional cases in which personal data is transferred to the USA, Google has submitted to the EU-US Privacy Shield https://www.privacyshield.gov/....

On behalf of the operator of this website, Google uses this information to evaluate your use of the website, to collate reports on website activities and to render further services to the website operator connected with the website use and internet use. This represents a legitimate interest in the sense of Article 6, paragraph 1 sentence 1 lit. f GDPR.

You can prevent the storage of the cookies by means of an appropriate setting in your browser software; however, we would like to point out that in this case you may not be able to use all the functions of this website to their full extent.

You can also prevent the recording of the data related to your use of the website (incl. your IP address) by Google as well as the processing of this data by Google by downloading and installing a browser plug-in available on the following link: http://tools.google.com/dlpage.... An opt-out cookie is set that prevents the future collection of your data when you visit this website. The opt-out cookie only applies for this browser and only for our website and is saved on your device. If you delete the cookies in this browser, you must set the opt-out cookie afresh.

This website additionally uses Google Analytics for a cross-device analysis of visitor flows carried out via a User-ID. You can deactivate in your customer account under "My Data", "Personal Data" the cross-device analysis of you use.

User terms: http://www.google.com/analytic..., data protection overview: http://www.google.com/intl/de/..., as well as the data protection declaration: https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/.

Analytics and Application Integration

U-Connect reserves the right to use a variety of analytics for statistical purposes and other uses, including but not limited to:

Twitter tracking and remarketing

Facebook tracking and remarketing

Google tracking and remarketing

Google Analytics tracking and remarketing

Bing tracking and remarketing

Member Software Hosted on our servers for maintaining memberships

Payment Gateway for transferring encrypted processed data

Server side tracking