Privacy Statement

Thank you for your interest in WITTENSTEIN SE (“WITTENSTEIN”), its subsidiaries and our products and services. We want you to feel comfortable visiting our site regarding your privacy. Data protection is a very important concern. The observance of the relevant data protection legislation such as the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the German Data Protection Act (BDSG) and the German Telemedia Act (TMG) is a matter of course.

We want you to know about the information we collect online, why we collect it and how we process it. We have implemented technical and organizational measures to ensure that data protection regulations are observed both by us and where data is passed on to external service providers.

Personal data

Personal data means any information relating to the personal or material circumstances of an identified or identifiable natural person ("data subject"). This includes details such as your name, address, telephone number and e-mail address. You are not required to disclose personal data in order to use our website. However, in certain cases, we need your name, address and other details so that we can provide you with the requested services.

The same also applies, for example, if we are sending you information, delivering goods that you have ordered or answering individual questions. In such cases, we will specifically draw your attention to the processing of the data. In addition, we will only store and process data that has been supplied to us voluntarily or automatically.

Where you make use of our services, we will normally collect only the data we need to provide the service concerned. If we request further data from you, the information is voluntarily. We will process personal data solely in order to provide the requested service and to safeguard our own legitimate business interests.

Controller

WITTENSTEIN is the operator of this website in accordance with the existing data protection regulations; under the relevant provisions of the GDPR, we are the controller responsible for processing your personal data. You can find the website operator’s contact details in our legal notice at https://www.wittenstein-us.com/legal-notice/ 

Information on data collection, use, storage and erasure

WITTENSTEIN collects data on the basis of the information you provide to us. WITTENSTEIN regularly needs data about you for the performance of its business operations, namely the manufacture, marketing and sale of mechatronic drive technology and related services. Any personal data collected, for example, in connection with visits to trade fairs or business contacts, including emails, or through email addresses entered on the website, in the contact form or in relation to newsletters (e.g. your name and your postal or email address) is provided on a voluntary basis. These data are processed pursuant to Art. 6(1) b GDPR to facilitate the performance of a contract, to enable us to take steps prior to entering into a contract or, to the extent permissible and desirable (assuming that consent has been given pursuant to Art. 6(1) a GDPR), for our own marketing purposes; we will not disclose them to anyone else other than for the aforementioned purposes without your express consent. Authorized third parties with whom data are shared might be affiliated companies, for example, or service providers. The provision of personal data by you is not required by law. Its provision is only contractually required if you yourself become a contracting party; however, such data are regularly needed for the performance of business operations and for contract execution purposes, to enable us to communicate with you in the framework of contract initiation or contract performance and to ensure smooth processing.

We will only store your data for the period and the duration of the pre-contractual steps and / or the business relationship or, irrespective of this, for as long as you require information on our products and / or services. The data which are stored about you (usually your name, address and email address) will be erased as soon as the purpose for which they have been stored no longer applies and provided its erasure does not conflict with any statutory tax, archiving or other obligations. If such legal obligations exist, the data will be erased after the retention periods have expired.

WITTENSTEIN would like to point out that no data transmission over the Internet (e.g. when communicating by e-mail), and especially unencrypted transmissions, can be guaranteed to be absolutely secure and vulnerabilities can never be ruled out entirely. While we make every effort to protect your data, complete protection against access by third parties is not possible.

Information, rectification, erasure, restriction of processing, data portability and withdrawal of consent

You have the right to request information regarding personal data stored by us about you at any time and at no cost, in particular about the origin and recipients of your data as well as the purpose for which it has been processed. In addition, you also have the right to demand the rectification, erasure, restriction of processing and portability of such data to the extent permitted by law. If you have given us your consent to collect and store data about you, you have the right to withdraw your consent to the storage of such data at any time. The withdrawal of consent does not affect the lawfulness of collection and storage based on consent before its withdrawal. If you have any questions in this respect, please write to the contact address in the website’s legal notice at https://www.wittenstein-us.com/legal-notice/ or contact our data protection officer directly.

Contact person for data protection

Transparency is of the greatest importance to us. If you have any questions about how we use your data or regarding the WITTENSTEIN Privacy Statement, feel free to contact Mr. Malte Schober, the data protection officer appointed by us, at the address given in the website’s legal notice (https://www.wittenstein-us.com/legal-notice/); alternatively, you can write an email to datenschutzbeauftragter@wittenstein.de. Our data protection officer is also your contact for all requests about information, objections, comments, criticisms, suggestions or complaints regarding personal data.

Right to lodge a complaint

Under Art. 77 GDPR, every data subject has the right to lodge a complaint with the supervisory authority if he or she considers that the processing of personal data relating to him or her is unlawful. The responsible supervisory authority with regard to data protection issues is the state data protection officer for the federal state in which WITTENSTEIN is located. For a list of data protection officers and their contact details, follow this link: https://www.bfdi.bund.de/DE/Infothek/Anschriften_Links/anschriften_links-node.html

Additonal privacy statement for the website

Data collection and use

Certain data are automatically collected by our IT systems when you visit the website. These data are primarily technical data (such as your browser, operating system or page views). They are automatically recorded whenever you access our website. We collect the data partly to ensure the proper functionality of the website. Other data may be used to analyze how you use the website.

Analytics and third-party tools

When you visit our website, statistical analyses may be made of your surfing behavior. This happens primarily using cookies and analytics. The analysis of your surfing behavior is usually anonymous, in other words we will not be able to identify you from these data except by using certain analytics tools. You can object to these analyses or prevent them by not using the tools concerned. For more information, please see our Privacy Statement on the individual analytics and plugins. We will inform you in this Privacy Statement about how to exercise your right of objection in this regard.

SSL or TLS encryption

This website uses SSL or TLS encryption for security reasons and to protect the transmission of confidential content, such as any inquiries which you send to us using the contact form. You can recognize an encrypted connection in your browser when the address changes from “http://” to “https://” and a locked padlock is displayed in the address line. If SSL or TLS encryption is enabled, the data you transfer to us cannot be read by third parties.

Contact form

If you send us questions or inquiries using the contact form, we will collect the data entered in the form, including any contact details provided by you, to answer your question or inquiry as well as any follow-up questions.

Any data you enter in the contact form will only be processed subject to your consent (Art. 6(1) a EU GDPR). You may withdraw your consent at any time. An informal email to this effect is sufficient. The withdrawal of consent does not affect the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal.

We will retain the data you provide in the contact form until you request its erasure or withdraw your consent to storage, or until the purpose for which they have been stored no longer applies (for example, after we have finished processing your inquiry). Any statutory provisions, for example regarding retention periods, shall remain unaffected.

Cookies

We use cookies on our website. Cookies do not harm your computer and they do not contain any viruses. Cookies help make our website more user-friendly, efficient and secure. Cookies are small text files which are placed on your computer and stored in your browser.

Most of the cookies that we use are so-called “session cookies”, which are automatically deleted from your hard drive at the end of the browser session. Other cookies remain stored on your computer until you delete them explicitly; they enable us to recognize your browser the next time you visit the WITTENSTEIN website.

You can change your browser settings, so that you are informed about the use of cookies and can decide on a case-by-case basis whether to accept or reject a cookie. Alternatively, your browser can be configured to automatically accept cookies if certain conditions apply or to always reject them, or to automatically delete cookies when you close the application. Note: If you disable cookies, you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website.

Cookies which are necessary to allow electronic communications are stored pursuant to Art. 6(1) f EU GDPR. The website operator has a legitimate interest in the storage of cookies to ensure that the best possible service is provided free of technical errors.

Server log files / data collection on our website

Our website provider automatically collects and stores information that your browser automatically transmits to us in so-called server log files. This information could be, for example, the browser type and version, your operating system, the referrer URL, the host name of the accessing computer and the time of the server request.

These data cannot be associated with a specific person and will not be combined with other data sources. WITTENSTEIN reserves the right to check these data at a later time if there are specific grounds for assuming that they have been used illegally. The legal basis for processing is Art. 6(1) b EU GDPR, which permits the processing of data for the purpose of performing a contract or in order to take steps prior to entering into a contract.

Google Analytics

This website uses functionalities of “Google Analytics”, a web analytics service provided by Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA.

Google Analytics uses “cookies”, which are text files placed on your computer, to help the website analyze how users use the site. The information generated by the cookies about your use of the website (including your IP address) will generally be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States.

For more information on how Google Analytics processes user data, you can review the Google privacy policy by following this link: https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/6004245?hl=en

Google Analytics cookies are stored pursuant to Art. 6(1) f GDPR. The website operator has a legitimate interest in analyzing how you use the website, to enable the website to be further improved and optimize advertising.
 

IP anonymization in Google Analytics

We have activated the “anonymizeIP” option on this website. This means that Google will remove the end of your IP address prior to transmission to the United States, so it only locates you as within the member states of the European Union or other members of the European Economic Area. Only in exceptional cases will the full IP address be transmitted to a Google server in the United States and shortened there. Google will use this information to evaluate how you use the website, compile reports on website activity on behalf of the operator of this website and offer other services relating to website activity and Internet usage to the operator of this website. The IP address as transmitted by Google Analytics from your browser will not be consolidated with any other data held by Google.

Google Analytics browser plugin

You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser; however, please note that if you do this you may not be able to use the full functionality of this website. Furthermore, you can prohibit Google from collecting and analyzing the data generated by cookies about your use of the website (including your IP address) by downloading and installing the browser plugin available here: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en

Objection to data collection by Google Analytics

You can prohibit Google Analytics from collecting data about you by going to https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/eula.html?hl=en and disabling the add-on by clicking “Accept and Install”. You can also prevent Google Analytics from collecting data by clicking the following link: