This Privacy policy describes what information the Federation of European Materials Societies (FEMS) collects on its website, www.fems.org, and how we use this information. If you have any questions about this statement or your personal information, please contact us at privacy@fems.org.

This website is operated by the Federation of European Materials Societies (FEMS). FEMS is a non-profit European federation (AISBL) created in accordance with the Belgian law of 25 October 1919, with its legal headquarters at Malendriesstraat 70, 3370 Boutersem, Belgium.

FEMS complies with EU data protection legislation. This regulates the processing of personal data relating to you and grants you various rights in respect of your personal data.

Collection and retention of your personal information

You do not have to give us any personal information in order to use this website. However, if you wish to take advantage of some of the more special, personalised services that we offer, you will need to provide us with certain information about yourself. For example, if you wish to subscribe to our newsletter we will collect some or all of the following personal data from you: name, address, email.

When you visit our website, we use Google Analytics to collect standard internet log information and details of behaviour patterns. The website records your IP address and is used only for statistical purposes and to monitor trends in website use.

We also collect information when you voluntarily complete surveys, provide feedback or use our contact form. Website usage information is collected using cookies.

How we use your information and with whom we share your information

We will use your personal information to send you the FEMS and allow you to benefit from the services on our website.

We may employ the services of a third party to help us to deliver our services, such as website hosting. In some cases the third party may receive your information. However, at all times, we will control and be responsible for the use of your information.

We may use aggregated information for the purposes of tracking usage of the website and in order to help up improve our website and for research and analysis purposes. We may pass this information to third parties. The aggregate information and statistics will not, however, include details that can be used to identify you.

Except as set out in this statement, we do not share, sell or transfer your information to anyone else.

FEMS Events

Events organised on behalf of FEMS are done via a Member Society and as such will be subject to the data Privacy policy of that individual society. Anyone signing up for a FEMS event organised by a FEMS Member Society should take note of the individual society’s Privacy policy and ensure they provide the necessary permission, as appropriate, to be contacted about future FEMS events.

Communication

We would like to keep you up to date by email, with details of our services, or those of carefully selected third parties, using the information that you have supplied, but only with your permission.

You have a right at any time to stop us from contacting you for marketing. Please send an email to secretary@fems.org (Subject: Remove) if you don’t want to receive emails from FEMS or its partners.

Use of Cookies

A cookie is a text-only string of information that a website transfers to the cookie file of your computer's hard drive. A cookie will typically contain the name of the domain from which the cookie has come, the ‘lifetime’ of the cookie, and a value, usually a randomly generated unique number.

When you visit our website we send you a cookie. Cookies may be used in the following ways:

• To help us recognise you as a unique visitor (just a number) when you return to our website and to allow us to tailor content or advertisements to match your preferred interests or to avoid showing you the same adverts repeatedly.
• To compile anonymous, aggregated statistics that allow us to understand how users use our site and to help us improve the structure of our website. We cannot identify you personally in this way.

Two types of cookies may be used on this website, session cookies, which are temporary cookies that remain in the cookie file of your browser until you leave the site, and persistent cookies, which remain in the cookie file of your browser for much longer (though how long will depend on the lifetime of the specific cookie). 

Cookies used on this site:

__unam and cookies prefixed "sharethis": Some pages on this website may use a widget from ShareThis (link is external) which makes it quick and easy to share our pages on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. These cookies are set as part of the ShareThis service to monitor "click-stream" activity, e.g. web pages viewed and navigated, and time spent on pages. We are advised that the ShareThis service only personally identifies you if you have separately signed up with ShareThis for an account with them and given them your consent. Full details on the ShareThis Privacy policy, with opt-out option (link is external)

has_js: This Drupal cookie checks if you have Javascript enabled. If you don't have this enabled you may not be able to experience all the website's functionality. This cookie expires at the end of your browsing session.

cookie-agreed: This cookie is set when you agree to accept cookies using the EU Cookie Policy popup widget.

__utma, __utmb, __utmc, __utmz, _ga, _gat - Third-Party: Google Analytics. From Google's own Privacy Centre Page (link is external): ‘Google Analytics is a web analytics tool that helps website owners understand how visitors engage with their website. Google Analytics customers can view a variety of reports about how visitors interact with their website so they can improve it. Google Analytics collects information anonymously. It reports website trends without identifying individual visitors.’

As a visitor to this site you are opted in to anonymised Google Analytics tracking by default. If you wish to opt out, you can do this either with Google's own browser add-on (link is external), by adjusting your browser's privacy settings or, if you are a registered user of this site, by editing this in your account settings, or by contacting us to request this, stating your website username.

Twitter: Where Twitter feeds are embedded on this site, Twitter's own privacy settings apply and are not controlled by us. From Twitter's own privacy page (link is external): ‘When you view Twitter content or Twitter products integrated into other websites using Twitter for Websites, Twitter may receive information including the web page you visited, your IP address, browser type, operating system, and cookie information. This information helps us to improve our products and services, including personalized suggestions and personalized ads.’

Third Party Advertising 

We may use a third party to serve advertisements on our site. Cookies may be associated with these advertisements to enable the advertiser to track the number of anonymous users responding to the campaign. We do not have access to or control of cookies placed by third parties.

Disabling/Enabling Cookies

You have the ability to accept or decline cookies by modifying the settings in your browser. However, you may not be able to use all the interactive features of our site if cookies are disabled.

Links

Our site contains links to other websites over which we have no control. We are not responsible for Privacy policies or practices of other websites to which you choose to link from this site. We encourage you to review the Privacy policies of those other web sites so you can understand how they collect, use and share your information.

Security

We have implemented technical and organisational measures designed to secure your personal information from accidental loss and from unauthorised access, use, alteration or disclosure. However, the internet is an open system and we cannot guarantee that unauthorised third parties will never be able to defeat those measures or use your personal information for improper purposes.

Processing of data

Data may be processed in EU or non-EU countries where the European Commission considers that it does not guarantee an adequate level of protection of personal data. In this case FEMS, as controller, will take appropriate protective measures by means of standard contractual data protection clauses adopted by the Commission in accordance with Article 46(2) of the GDPR. These can be consulted at the controller's headquarters.

Storage period

Personal data are retained for the duration of your membership with FEMS, or as long as you stay subscribed to our newsletter and thereafter for one year and/or until the expiry of the legal retention obligations, in particular tax and accounting obligations and until the end of contractual liability.

Your right to access information

You are entitled to see the information held about you. If you wish to do this, please contact us at privacy@fems.org. Please note that in certain circumstances we may withhold access to your information where we have the right to do so under current data protection legislation.

Your rights as a data subject

Upon written request and with proof of your identity, you can obtain from FEMS, free of charge if reasonable volume, the written communication of data, as well as, where appropriate, the withdrawal of your consent to the processing of your data, rectification, limitation of processing, deletion of data that are inaccurate, incomplete or irrelevant. If the processing is based on the performance of a contract or consent, you may exercise your right to the portability of the data.

Full explanations of your rights are available on the ICO website at https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/individual-rights/

If, at any time, you wish to exercise your rights with FEMS, you can send an email to privacy@fems.org with proof of your identity. FEMS will make every effort to detect and correct the problem.

In accordance with Article 77 of the GDPR, you may also address or lodge a complaint with the Commission for the Protection of Privacy (the Data Protection Authority as from 25 May 2018) at the following address: 1000 Brussels, Rue de la Presse, 35 (Tel. 32 2 274 48 00 - Fax + 32 2 274 48 35 - commission@privacycommission.be) or with the supervisory authority of the country of your habitual residence, for the exercise of your rights.

Updating your information

You may review, correct, update or change your personal information at any time either by making the changes to your user account (where permitted) or by contacting us at privacy@fems.org.

Changes to this privacy policy

If our privacy policy changes in any way, we will place an updated version on this page. Regularly reviewing this page ensures that you are always aware of what information we collect, how we use it and under what circumstances, if any, we will share it with other parties.

Contacting us

If you have any questions about this statement or your personal information, please contact us at privacy@fems.org .