PRIVACY POLICY

1. Who we are

BIOTRANSFORM, a Horizon Research & Innovation project, is funded by the European Union funded by the European Union, under Grant Agreement No. 101081833, with a budget of approximately €2 million. The project started on October 1st 2022 and will last for 30 months.

BIOTRANSFORM provides European policymakers with an adequate assessment and policy development framework, knowledge base and an expert support ecosystem to accelerate the transition from linear fossil-based systems to circular bio-based systems. It is therefore operating at the interface between the circular economy and the bioeconomy transitions. BIOTRANSFORM’s “assessment package” will be tested by and provided for European policymakers. To achieve this, the project develops and tests its framework to establish and roll out circular bio-based systems by applying a multi-actor approach around 6 regional cases: Andalusia (Spain), Northern Burgenland (Austria), Western Macedonia (Greece), across Finland, Charles Spa Region (Czech Republic) and North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany). These regional case-studies represent several important industries and transition scenarios for Europe such as: forestry, agri-food, lake ecosystems, lignite and minerals, and chemicals. Action roadmaps will consider specific regional available resources and infrastructures, conversion pathways, logistics, current policies, strategies, and access to finance.

The project partners of the BIOTRANSFORM consortium, listed below, process certain types of personal data for the purposes of the project. Each partner is responsible for the personal data they collect and process during their activities under the framework of the project:

For further information, we can be contacted at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

 

2. How we collect your personal data

We collect personal data both directly and indirectly:

  • We obtain personal data directly from individuals in a variety of ways, including the following cases:
    • an individual subscribes to our newsletter/s;
    • an individual registers to attend meetings, workshops and other events we host and during attendance at such events;
    • we establish cooperative relationships with an individual;
    • we provide professional services pursuant to our contract with the European Commission
  • We obtain personal data indirectly about individuals from a variety of sources, including:
    • our research partners;
    • our networks and contacts;
    • public and open data sources such as public registers, news articles and internet searches; 
    • social and professional networking sites (e.g. LinkedIn). 

 

3. What types of data we collect

We only collect the data necessary for our project’s smooth implementation. These data fall into the following categories:

  • contact details (name/ surname, e-mail address, phone number);
  • professional information (job title, organisation, field of expertise);
  • demographics (e.g. age, gender, nationality);
  • information about what a person knows or believes;
  • videos and photos (from people that attend our events, webinars, workshops etc.).

 

4. Bases of lawful processing

We process personal data on the following legal bases:

  • Legal obligations – for processing activities required for compliance both with applicable national and European legislation as well as with the specific legal and regulatory framework of the Horizon Europe Framework Programme for Research and Innovation of the European Union.
  • Consent – for processing activities such as organisation of meetings, workshops, other events, and dissemination of project’s results.
  • Contractual obligations – for processing activities such as reporting to the European Commission and complying with project’s publicity obligations.

 

5. What we do with your personal data

We process your personal data with the purpose of:

  • Disseminating our project’s results to different types of stakeholders;
  • Sending invitations and providing access to guests attending our meetings, events, webinars and workshops;
  • Administering, maintaining, and ensuring the security of our information systems, applications, and websites;
  • Processing online requests or queries, including responding to communications from individuals;
  • Complying with contractual, legal, and regulatory obligations.

 

6. How we secure your personal data when we process it

We continuously apply a personal data risk assessment process to identify, analyse, and evaluate the security risks that may threaten your personal data. Based on the results of this risk assessment, we define and apply a set of both technical and organizational measures to mitigate the above security risks, including but not limited to:

  • Data Protection Policies to guide personnel involved in the BIOTRANSFORM Project when processing your data;
  • Written contracts with organisations that process personal data on our behalf;
  • Non-Disclosure Agreements with personnel of the BIOTRANSFORM consortium partners;
  • Back up process, antimalware protection, access control mechanisms, etc.
  • Some of BIOTRANSFORM partners have appointed a Data Protection Officer.

 

7. Do we share personal data with third parties?

Your personal data may be shared with trusted third parties to help us deliver efficient and quality services. When we do so, we ensure that recipients are contractually bound to safeguard the data we entrust to them before we share the data. We may engage with several or all of the following categories of recipients:

  • Parties that support us as we provide our services (e.g., cloud-based software services such as Dropbox, Microsoft SharePoint, Google);
  • Our professional advisers, including lawyers, auditors, and insurers;
  • Dissemination service providers (e.g., MailChimp);
  • Law enforcement or other government and regulatory agencies or other third parties as required by, and in accordance with applicable law or regulation;
  • The European Commission according to our relevant contractual obligations.

 

8. Do we transfer your personal data outside the European Economic Area?

We do not own file servers located outside the European Economic Area (EEA). However, some partners may use cloud and/or marketing services from reputable providers such as SharePoint, DropBox, MailChimp, Google, etc., situated both inside and outside the EEA. We always check that such providers comply with the relevant GDPR requirements before starting to use their services.

 

9.Do we use cookies?

Our website, https://www.biotransform-project.eu, uses cookies. We use cookies to improve site navigation and to analyse our traffic. In the next paragraphs, you will learn what cookies are, what cookies we use and how you can disable their use.

Cookies are small alphanumeric characters files that are transferred from websites that you visit to your PC, smartphone, tablet or any other electronic device that you use for browsing. Cookies assign your computer with a unique ID, which in turn becomes your own identity each time you return to a website. Cookies do not damage your electronic equipment, nor can they read information from other files on your computer’s hard drive.

Websites use cookies to “remember” for a period your actions and preferences such as language, font size and other display features. In this way, you are not required to enter these preferences each time you visit a website and navigate its pages. Furthermore, cookies help website owners to analyse how you are using their website and whether or not you are facing problems as you navigate them.

Personal Data Protection legislation states that we can store cookies on your device if they are strictly necessary for the operation of our website. For all other types of cookies, we need your consent. You can change or withdraw your consent at any time from the Cookies Settings on our website.

On our website, https://www.biotransform-project.eu, we use necessary, statistics and functional cookies. Some cookies are placed by third-party services (e.g., Google Analytics).

Without the necessary cookies, the website cannot perform its basic functions. These cookies are generally placed automatically either when a webpage is loaded or as a result of a user’s request (that cannot be fulfilled without using a relevant cookie). Usually, necessary cookies expire when you close your browser.

Statistics cookies help us to measure our website’s traffic and where it comes from so that we can improve its performance. Moreover, they collect information about which pages are more popular and how visitors use our website. None of this information can be used to identify you. It is all aggregated and, therefore, anonymized. This category includes cookies from third-party analytics services such as Google Analytics. Our website uses the following statistics cookies:

Name

Provider

Purpose

Expiry

_ga

Google Analytics

This cookie is used to distinguish unique users by assigning a randomly generated number as a client identifier. It is included in each page request on a site and used to calculate visitor, session and campaign data for the site’s analytics reports.

2 years

_gid

Google Analytics

This cookie stores and updates a unique value for each page visited. It is used to generate statistical data on how the visitor uses the website. It collects anonymized data including the number and origin of visitors and the websites they visited.

1 day

_gat

Google Analytics

This cookie is used to throttle the request rate, that is limiting the collection of data on high-traffic sites.

1 minute

 

Functionality cookies allow websites to remember the user’s site preferences and choices they make on the site including username, region, and language. This allows the website to provide personalized features if you share your location. They are anonymous and do not track browsing activity across other websites.

You can delete cookies and stop them from being installed in your browser. There is no standardized way to remove cookies since different browsers clear cookies using different procedures. Please follow the instructions provided by each browser manufacturer on how to remove cookies.

If you wish to stop sending your information to Google Analytics, you may install in your browser the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on.

You may select and change the cookie settings (with the exception of the technically necessary cookies) by clicking on Cookie settings. By making a cookie active, you consent to its use according to the provisions of this Cookies Policy.

 

10. Your rights

You have the following rights regarding our processing of your personal data:

  • Right to withdraw consent – You can withdraw consent that you have previously given to one or more specified purposes to process your personal data. This will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent.
  • Right of access – You can ask us to verify whether we are processing personal data about you and if so, to have access to a copy of such data.
  • Right to rectification and erasure – You can ask us to correct our records if you believe they contain incorrect or incomplete information about you or ask us to erase your personal data after you withdraw your consent to processing or when we no longer need it for the purpose it was originally collected.
  • Right to restriction of processing – You can ask us to temporarily restrict our processing of your personal data if you contest the accuracy of your personal data, prefer to restrict its use rather than having us erase it, or need us to preserve it for you to establish, exercise or defend a legal claim. A temporary restriction may apply while verifying whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to process it. You can ask us to inform you before we lift that temporary processing restriction.
  • Right to data portability – In some circumstances, where you have provided personal data to us, you can ask us to transmit that personal data (in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format) directly to another entity.
  • Right to object – You can object to our use of your personal data for direct marketing purposes, including profiling or where processing has taken the form of automated decision-making. However, we may need to keep some minimal information (e.g., e-mail address) to comply with your request to cease marketing to you.
  • Right to make a complaint to your local Data Protection Authority (DPA) (see https://ec.europa.eu/justice/article-29/structure/data-protection-authorities/index_en.htm) regarding any concerns you may have about our data handling practices.

 

To ask us to do anything of the above, you can contact us by email: https://www.biotransform-project.eu. We will promptly examine your request against the relevant requirements of the laws and regulations governing privacy and personal data protection and we will answer the latest within 30 days after receiving your request. We will ask you for some kind of identification (e.g. photocopy of your identity card or passport) to avoid the non-authorized reveal of your personal data. If for reasons of the complexity of the request or a multitude of requests, we are unable to respond promptly, we will notify you within 30 days of any delay, which in no case may exceed two months from the expiration of the 30-day deadline.

 

11. How long do we retain personal data?

We retain personal data to provide our services, stay in contact with you and comply with applicable laws, regulations, and contractual obligations to which we are subject. Please note that we have an obligation to retain data concerning projects funded by the Horizon Europe Framework Programme for Research and Innovation of the European Union for up to five years after the end of the project (unless auditors request further retention). After the expiry of the retention period, and unless further legitimate grounds for retention arise, we will dispose of personal data in a secure manner.

 

12. Disclaimer of liability for third-party websites

Although our site may contain links to third-party sites, including the sites of the BIOTRANSFORM consortium partners, we are not responsible for the privacy practices or content of these sites, and we expressly disclaim any liability for any loss or damage that may be caused by the use of these links. We do not monitor the privacy practices or the content of these sites. If you have any questions about the privacy practices of another site, you should contact the site’s responsible personnel. We suggest you read the privacy policy of each website you interact with, before allowing the collection and use of your personal data.

We may also provide social media features that allow you to share information on your social networks and interact with the BIOTRANSFORM project on various social media sites. The use of these social media features may result in the collection or sharing of information about you. We recommend that you check the privacy policies and regulations of the social networking sites you interact with to ensure that you understand what information may be collected, used and disclosed by these sites.

 

13. Children

We do not knowingly collect, use, or disclose information from children under the age of 16. If we learn that we have collected the personal information of a child under 16 we will take steps to delete the information as soon as possible. Please immediately contact us if you become aware that a child under 16 has provided us with personal information.

 

14. Revisions of this Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy is valid from 01/12/2022 and replaces any other previous notifications that we had issued in the past regarding our personal data management practices. We reserve the right to revise this Policy at any time. The current version will be always uploaded to our website indicating the date of entry into force, so you know when the most recent revision took place. If there are critical changes in this policy or our personal data practices change significantly in the future, we will notify you by posting the changes on our website.

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Funded by the European Union under GA no.101081833. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the authors only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union. The granting authority cannot be held responsible for them
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