BioVaria Privacy Policy

When you register for BioVaria 2024 on the website www.biovaria.org, or log in to the virtual platform, or attend BioVaria 2024, or when you contact us for inquiries, we may collect some of your personal data. We use your personal data (received directly from you or automatically collected) to manage your attendance at BioVaria 2024 as well as to help us understand and improve your experience. We use your data only if we have a legal basis in compliance with applicable privacy legislation. Please check our privacy policy and our cookie policy in order to receive full information on how we process your personal data.

Ascenion GmbH understands concerns about privacy and works hard to comply with relevant data protection laws. This Privacy Policy is provided to explain:
 

  • the types of personal data we collect about you
  • how we may use and share your personal data
  • the choices available to you regarding our use of your personal data
  • the measures we take to safeguard your personal information
  • how long we retain your personal information, and
  • how to contact us about our privacy practices and exercise your data privacy rights.


Note that the virtual platform service is offered by Ascenion through Converve. Visit the Converve website (www.converve.com) to see their privacy policy.
 

 

1. Who is responsible for data processing?

Ascenion GmbH (hereinafter: Ascenion, we, us, our)
Herzogstraße 64
D-80803 Munich
Germany

Email: info@biovaria.org
Telephone: +49 (0)89 – 318814-0
Fax: +49 (0)89 – 318814-20

 

2. What data do we collect?

We collect various types of personal information depending on how you interact with us. Some information may be collected automatically. In all cases, we limit the amount of information we collect and store to that which is necessary to provide you with the relevant services.


2.1. Data provided and/or acquired when you interact with us

When you interact with us, we may collect information about you and your job. This information is described in detail below. Please note that the sharing of some personal information is optional. Essential data we require in order to respond to your request is indicated with an asterisk or equivalent, or specified as such verbally at the time of collection. If you do not fill in the required fields or do not provide this essential information, we will not be able to respond to your request.
 

a) Personal identification, business information and contact information

This includes information such as your name, your company, your business position, your contact details (including email address), your photograph, your biographical business summary, your website business link; your communication preferences, your password. We may collect this information when: (i) you register for BioVaria 2024 on the website www.biovaria.org; (ii) you log in to the virtual platform (iii), you attend BioVaria 2024; (iv) you contact us for inquiries.

Provision of this information is optional, except for essential data marked with an asterisk (e.g., name, contact data, password etc.), without which we cannot provide you with the services requested.


b) Newsletter subscription

We use your email address to send you our newsletter on a regular basis if you have explicitly agreed to this under GDPR Article 6 para. 1 (a). The submission of your email address is sufficient in order to receive the newsletter.

You may unsubscribe at any time, for example via a link at the bottom of every newsletter. Alternatively, you may also unsubscribe at any time by sending an email to info@biovaria.org
 

c) Social network information

This refers to any information that is part of your profile on a third-party social network you give us or information you allow the third-party social network to share with us or that you post publicly. Examples may include your basic account information (e.g., name and profile picture, etc.) and any other additional information or activities that you permit the third-party social network to share with application developers or that you post publicly on a social networking page provided by the Data Controller. Sharing this information is optional. To learn more about how your social network information may be obtained by the Data Controller, please visit the website of the relevant third-party social network.


d) User-generated content, incl. chat

This refers to any content (e.g. messages, photos or videos) that you create and then share with other BioVaria 2024 participants using the virtual platform. Please note that this kind of information is shared only on your own initiative and the Data Controller will not access the shared content. To learn more about the privacy regulations applied to your information while using the virtual platform, please visit the website of the third-party service provider.


e) Photos and videos

This refers to your profile picture that you may submit on the virtual platform. Submitting a profile picture is optional. Furthermore, a professional photographer may take pictures of you during BioVaria 2024. We may use them with your consent to promote BioVaria on our websites, social network and further promotional material. If a third-party provider is involved, please also visit their website to learn more about their privacy policy as it applies to your personal data.


f) Payments and financial data

This includes any information you use to register for BioVaria 2024, such as information relating to the transaction and your payment method information (e.g. credit or debit card number, bank account information or payment card image), billing name and address associated with your form of payment, voucher etc.. Please note that Ascenion has contracted the payment service provider Stripe, Inc. to manage credit card payments and organize the necessary flow of funds between the banks involved and/or the respective credit card company (hereinafter referred to as ‘Institutions’). To learn more about how your information is processed by Stripe, Inc. and the institutions (incl. personal data sharing and international transfers, as well as security and data retention periods), please check the privacy policies currently available on their websites. Please, consider that Stripe and/or the Institutions may use your information to market and advertise their products or services subject to the terms of their privacy policy. Please review their privacy policies to learn more, including your rights to stop their use of your information for marketing purposes.


g) Email correspondence

We may collect information from you if you correspond with us via email and/or telephone. For example, if you send an email to info@biovaria.org, we may obtain certain information about you (such as your contact email address) and use it to follow up. The sharing of personal information is optional, except for essential information (e.g., your name or contact details). If you do not provide us with all or some of the requested information, we may not be able to provide you with certain services or information.


h) Feedback and survey

This includes information that you voluntarily share with us about your experiences when using our services. Examples may include comments and suggestions, testimonials, or other feedback you send us about our services. We typically collect this information in the form of customer surveys, feedback forms and email correspondence. Sharing this information with us is optional.

 

2.2 Automatically collected data

We may automatically collect some data using various technologies, including cookies. In particular, we may collect:
 

  • information about your visit to our website, including the full Uniform Resource Locator (URL) clickstream to, through and from our website (including date and timepage response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs), and methods used to browse away from the page;
  • technical information that your browser sends whenever you visit a website, or your mobile App sends when you are using it. This log data may include your Internet Protocol (IP) address, the address of the web page you visited before using the service, your browser type and settings, the date and time of your use of the service, information about your browser configuration and plug-ins, device information (including device identifiers and estimated geographical location), language preferences and cookie data.

     

3. What is the legal basis and how do we use the information we collect?


a) Consent

We need your consent to process your personal data, such as your personal identification data, business information and contact information in order:

  • to promote, market and advertise our events and services and to make a tailored event available to you.

We need your consent to process your pictures and screenshots, in order:

Please consider that you can revoke your consent in writing at any time. The revocation will be effective only for the future.


b) Contractual obligations

In the following cases we process your data, such as personal information, contact details and payment/financial information etc. for the performance of contractual obligations, like:
 

  • to furnish our services to you;
  • to manage your registered virtual platform account;
  • to send you notifications of private messages received through the virtual platform;
  • to enable us to manage customer service interactions with you.


c) Legitimate interest

In the following cases, we process your personal data because of a legitimate interest pursued by the Data Controller or by a third party:
 

  • to identify the participants at BioVaria 2024 and to verify their identity;
  • to enable us to manage customer service interactions with you and to handle participant contacts, queries, complaints or disputes;
  • to allow the other participants to recognize you as the author of private messages, group discussion posts, and activity feed posts you create, as well as to let them find you on the virtual platform;
  • to conduct studies and make statistics, which are not published.


d) Legal Obligation

In the following cases, we process your personal data, because the processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which the Data Controller is subject:
 

  • for crime and fraud prevention, detection and related purposes;
  • where we have a legal right or duty to use or disclose your information (for example in relation to an investigation by a public authority or in a legal dispute).

 

4. Communication and publication of data

Your personal data may be communicated to suppliers, collaborators and/or third-party consultants of the Data Controller, which are entrusted with carrying out certain processing operations, within the scope of the purposes set out in point 3, in order to make certain services available to you. When legally required according to Art. 28 GDPR, we impose contractual obligations on service providers to ensure that they (i) process personal data only under our instructions; (ii) assist us in fulfilling our obligations under applicable data protection legislation; and (iii) safeguard personal data in compliance with applicable data protection legislation. For the complete list of data processors for the purposes referred to in this point 4, you may send a request to the following email address info@biovaria.org.

Your personal data are not made public. As an exception, your personal data such as name, company and pictures are made available through the virtual platform to the other participants for networking reasons within the purposes and the legal basis set out under Section 3.c. We may also publish your image contained in screenshots, photos and videos, made during BioVaria 2024, within the purposes and the legal basis set out under Section 3.a of this Privacy Policy.

In order to learn more about your data subject to communication and publication, you may send a request to the following email address: info@biovaria.org.

 

5. International transfers

We store your data in the European Union. However, it is possible that the data we collect when you use our website or our services may be transferred outside the European Union and EEA to countries whose data protection legislation differs from that applicable within the European Union or your country of residence. This applies in particular to data shared with our service providers or subcontractors located outside the European Union. When the recipient is located in a country whose legislation has not been the subject of an adequacy decision by the European Commission, we ensure that the transfer is governed by the European Commission's standard contractual clauses guaranteeing a sufficient level of protection of the privacy and fundamental rights of individuals, or equivalent guarantees.

You may send a request to the email address info@biovaria.org to receive more information about possible international transfers involving your personal data. In order to learn more about international transfers made by our payment service provider, please review the privacy policy of Stripe Inc..

 

 6. Data retention

We will retain your personal information for the period necessary to fulfil the purposes described in this Privacy Policy. The criteria used to determine such retention periods include: (i) the duration of the contractual relationship with you; (ii) whether there is a legal obligation to which we are subject; or (iii) whether a longer retention period is required or permitted by law. Please consider that a different retention period could be applied to screenshots and photos uploaded on social networks; please check the privacy policy made available from the relevant third party.

 

 7. Security measures

We are committed to data security. We protect personal data through integrated physical, technological and administrative safeguards in order to prevent accidental or unlawful destruction, loss, alteration, unauthorised disclosure of, or access to, personal data transmitted, stored or otherwise processed which may in particular lead to physical, material or non-material damage. Personal data are protected by security safeguards appropriate to the level of sensitivity of the data through (i) physical measures, such as secure areas; (ii) technical measures, such as encryption and secure servers; and (iii) organizational measures such as access policies based on the need-to-know and employee security through vetting and supervision.

 

 8. Rights of the data subject

As an interested party in the processing of personal data, you may exercise the rights under Articles 15 et seq. of EU Regulation 679/2016 (GDPR), by making an informal request to the Data Controller by writing to the email address info@biovaria.org. This request will be duly answered without delay. In particular, you have the following rights:
 

  • to access your personal data, to obtain all the information concerning the processing and to obtain a copy of this data;
  • to obtain rectification and integration of, respectively, inaccurate or incomplete data;
  • to obtain erasure of your personal data;
  • to obtain restriction of the processing;
  • to receive from the Data Controller your personal data in a structured format, in common use and readable by an automatic device and to transmit them to another data controller (so-called portability);
  • to object to the processing of your personal data at any time, e.g. when the processing is carried out by automated means including profiling, when we process your data for direct marketing purposes and in every other case of processing on the legal basis of Art. 6 para. 1 p. 1 lit. e and f GDPR.;
  • to withdraw your consent to the processing at any time with effect for the future;
  • to lodge a complaint to the supervisory authority about the processing of your personal data.

 

9. Use of cookies

We use cookies on our website to distinguish you from other users. This helps us to provide you with a good experience in the framework of BioVaria 2024 and also allows us to improve our services. With regard to the use of cookies and your choices, please refer to the information provided in our cookie policy.

 

10. Changes to this notice

We reserve the right, in our sole discretion, to update or modify this Privacy Policy at any time (“Modifications”). Modifications to this Privacy Policy will be posted with a change to the “Updated” date at the top of this Privacy Policy. In certain circumstances we provide you with additional notice of such modifications, including by email.

Please review this Privacy Policy periodically, and especially before you provide any personal data. This Privacy Policy was updated on the date indicated above.