Privacy & Cookie policy

Grant Thornton Switzerland/Liechtenstein welcomes you to this website and thanks you for your interest in our services and products. Protecting your privacy is important to us, and we want you to be able to visit our site safely. We ensure that we protect the data about you that is collected, processed and used during your visit to the website. Please read the information given below. It tells you how we handle your data. Since changes to the law or our internal processes may necessitate changes to this privacy policy, we ask you to read it regularly.

This privacy policy tells you how we process your personal data, as well as your rights. These rights may derive from the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), its implementation in Liechtenstein or Swiss data protection legislation.

This privacy policy specifically uses the terminology of the GDPR. The relevant information has also been taken over from the GDPR. Although the wording of the Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (DPA) differs in part from that of GDPR, we comply unreservedly with it.

 

1. Controller / Contact

If you have any questions about the information given below, you can contact us at any time as follows:

• Grant Thornton Switzerland/Liechtenstein
  Data protection contact for Switzerland
  Claridenstrasse 35
  P.O. Box 9317
  CH-8027 Zurich
  T 0041 960 71 71
  E datenschutz@ch.gt.com
  
  
• Grant Thornton Switzerland/Liechtenstein
  Data protection contact for Liechtenstein
  Bahnhofstrasse 15
  P.O. Box 663
  FL-9494 Schaan
  T 00423 237 42 42
  E datenschutz@li.gt.com

2. What is “personal data”?

“Personal data” is information that can be used to determine your personal or practical circumstances, such as your name, address, phone number, date of birth or email address. Information that we are unable to associate with you (or able only with an unreasonable degree of effort), such as anonymised details, is not regarded as personal data. The processing of personal data, such as its collection, consultation, use, storage or transfer, always requires a basis in law or your consent. Processed personal data is erased as soon as the purpose of that processing has been achieved and no further statutory retention periods must be fulfilled. Where we process your personal data to prepare specific offers, we then notify you of the actual procedures involved, the scope and the purpose of processing, the legal basis for it and how long your data will be stored in each case.

3. What personal data do we collect, process and use, and for what purpose?

You can use much of our web presence without entering any personal data. We do store log files that contain the following information:

• Name of the file accessed
• When you accessed it (date and time)
• Volume of data transmitted
• Notification that the file has been accessed successfully
• Your browser, operating system and the domain making the query
• IP address

This data is used exclusively to improve our products, services and websites.

If you would like to use other services that we offer on our website, such as a newsletter, you will need to provide us with further data. This is the information we need to fulfil the service you would like, for example your email address when you subscribe to a newsletter.

We use your personal data exclusively to offer you the full benefit of our website or, if you use our contact form, to provide the service you request.

Unless you have given your express consent in advance, we will not pass the data you transmit to us online to external third parties. All data transmission is currently encrypted to prevent third parties being able to read it. The companies within the Grant Thornton Switzerland/Liechtenstein network are not classified as third parties in this regard.

However, we reserve the right to pass your personal data to external service providers for the purposes of contract data processing. Specifically, we use Google Analytics.

Your personal data is not used in any other way. With the exception of the cases described below, your personal data is not transmitted to third parties or used for marketing purposes without your consent, unless we are obliged by law to disclose that data (information to the criminal prosecution authorities and courts, information to public bodies that receive data on the basis of statutory regulations, such as social security institutions, financial authorities, etc.), or we use that data to enforce our claims against third parties that are bound by professional confidentiality.

Personal data is used as follows, in particular:

a) Newsletter
To subscribe to our email newsletter, in addition to your consent you must provide us with at least the email address to which the newsletter should be sent. Any further details are voluntary. They are used to address you personally and to configure the content of the newsletter to your interests, as well as to clarify enquiries about your email address. It is up to you whether you give us this information or not, but without it we may not be able to send the newsletter to you.

When you subscribe to the newsletter, your email address will be used for our own marketing purposes until you unsubscribe. You can unsubscribe by clicking the link at the end of the newsletter.

b) Contact form
If you use the option of our contact form to send us your enquiries, whether general or regarding specific offers, we will ask you for your first name and surname, your company, your email address and/or your phone number. You can then use the free text field to write your individual message to us.

It is up to you whether you give us this information or not. All data transmission is currently encrypted to prevent third parties being able to read it.

c) Marketing and market research
If you have given your permission for your data to be used for marketing and market research purposes, we will use your information beyond the provision of the services you requested. We do this to offer you a web presence that is customised to your interests, and to send you occasional post or emails (in the form of our newsletter) to let you know the latest news and information about our company or our range of goods and services, based on your data and tailored to your interests. In addition, we will use your data for the analysis required to provide these services, and for market research purposes.

To do this, it is technically necessary to collate the data given by and generated about you into usage profiles, and to analyse these for the purposes described above. This is done only internally, and only for the purposes described.

You can revoke your consent for us to do this at any time by getting in touch with the contact given above. If you have not given your consent, or revoked it, your data will not be used as described in the section above. You may, of course, still use our services.

4. User profiles/use of cookies

Other than in the cases described above, we do not create any personal user profiles. When you call up the information you want from our website, our servers store data only in anonymised form to enable us to provide our various services, or for analysis purposes. They log general information such as when what content was accessed from our online offering, or which pages are visited most frequently.

We use cookies. These are small text files that our web server sends to your browser when you visit our websites. Your browser stores them on your computer for the next time you access the site. 

The cookies we use mainly record frequency of use and the number of users of our website, and continue identifying your computer during your visit if you switch from one of our websites to another. They also record when you leave the site. This tells us which areas of our websites and which other websites our users have visited.

This usage data gives no clue as to individual users, however. None of this anonymised usage data is combined with your personal data. It is erased immediately once our statistical analysis is complete. 

When you visit our websites, cookies are stored long-term on your computer. This helps to optimise userfriendliness and fast, easy website access. Most browsers accept cookies automatically by default. However, you can deactivate this function or set your
browser to notify you before any cookies are stored.

You can also go to your browser software settings to prevent cookies being installed at all. Please note, however, that if you do so you may not be able to make full use of all of the functions of our website.

5. Social Media

On our website you will find links to our profiles on social media, specifically Facebook, LinkedIn, XING and Instagram. Please note that these links lead to external websites that are operated by third parties. Clicking on them takes you to the platforms in question.

Please note that, when you visit these external websites, the particular data protection provisions and practices of those platforms apply. We have no influence on the collection, processing or use of your personal data by these social media platforms. Please read these individual platforms’ own privacy policies to find out how they process your data.

For more information on data processing at Facebook, please consult the Facebook privacy policy at: Facebook privacy policy.

For more information on data processing at Instagram, please consult the Instagram data policy at: Instagram data policy.

For more information on data processing at XING, please consult the XING privacy policy at: Privacy at XING.

For more information on data processing at LinkedIn, please consult the LinkedIn privacy policy at: LinkedIn privacy policy.

Please note that we are not responsible for the content or data protection practices of these external websites. We recommend adjusting your social media privacy settings in line with your own preferences.

6. Google Analytics

This website uses Google Analytics, a web analysis service provided by Google Inc. headquartered at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA (referred to below as “Google”). Google Analytics uses cookies, which are text files that are stored on your computer. They permit your use of the website to be analysed. The information that the cookie generates about your use of this website is generally transmitted to a Google server in the USA and stored there. Google may also pass this information on to third parties if required by law or if such third parties process this data on behalf of Google.

However, if IP anonymisation is activated on this website, Google will shorten your IP address in advance within the member states of the European Union and in other states party to the Agreement on the European Economic Area. Only in exceptional cases will the full IP address be transmitted to a Google server in the USA and shortened there. On this website, Google Analytics has been extended by the code “gat._anonymizeIp();” to ensure that IP addresses are recorded in anonymised form in a process known as IP masking.

On behalf of the operator of this website, Google will use this information to evaluate your use of the website, to compile reports on website activity and to provide further services to the website operator relating to website and internet use. The IP address transmitted by your browser to Google Analytics is not combined with other Google data.

You can prevent cookies being saved by adjusting your browser settings accordingly. Please note, however, that if you do so you may not be able to make full use of all of the functions on this website. You can also prevent Google collecting the data about your use of the website that the cookie generates by downloading and installing the browser add-on available via this link: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en-GB.

You will find further information at https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en-GB and at https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/, which offers an overview of Google Analytics and privacy.

7. Google Maps

Google Maps, the map service offered by Google Inc. (“Google”) is also integrated into this website. Google Maps uses cookies, which are text files that are stored on your computer if you use the map function on our website.

Clicking on the link establishes a direct connection between your browser and the Google server. This tells Google that you have visited our website from your IP address. If you click on the Google Maps link while you are logged in to a Google account, Google is able to associate your visit to our sites with your user account. As the provider of our websites, we have no knowledge of the content of the data that is transmitted, or how Google uses it. Details of data collection (purpose, scope, further processing, use) and on your rights and  ways  of  changing  your  settings,  can  be  found  in  Google’s  privacy  information  at https://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en&gl=ch.

8. Use of YouTube videos

We use embedded YouTube videos. YouTube is a service provided by Google Inc., Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA.

When you call up the website, and to embed videos, the IP address is transmitted to YouTube. This IP address cannot be allocated to a specific user, unless you have logged in to YouTube or to another Google service before accessing the site, or you are permanently logged in to those services.

As soon as you play an embedded video by clicking on it, YouTube stores cookies on your computer, but only those that do not contain any personally identifiable data. These cookies can be blocked with the corresponding browser settings and add-ons (source: YouTube, “Turn on privacy-enhanced mode”).

Further information on embedding YouTube videos can be found on the YouTube Help page at https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/171780?hl=en-GB&sjid=17497904744046639678-EU.

9. Security measures protecting the data stored with us

We undertake to protect your privacy and to treat your personal data as confidential. To prevent the loss or misuse of data stored with us, we take a comprehensive range of technical and organisational security precautions that are reviewed regularly and adjusted in line with the latest technologies. However, the structure of the internet means that other individuals or institutions for which we are not responsible may not observe data protection rules or the security measures described above.

10. Links to external websites 

Our website includes hyperlinks to the websites of other providers. When you click on these links you are taken directly from our website to the other providers website. One of the things you will notice is the change in URL. We accept no responsibility for the confidential handling of your data on these third-party websites, because we have no influence over whether or not these companies comply with the legal data protection provisions. Please consult these websites directly to find out how these companies treat your personal data.

11. Revocation/objection

By using our website and any further services (such the newsletter) based on it, you (expressly) agree to the associated processing of your personal data. In principle, you can revoke your consent at any time with effect for the future, and also object at any time to the processing and use of your data. Please get in touch with the contact given above. Any such revocation does not affect the legality of data processing that has taken place on the basis of your consent up to the point you revoked it.

12. Storage duration and your rights to your personal data that we hold 

We store your personal details only for as long as permitted by law or legitimate interests. Stored personal data is erased when the user revokes their consent for us to store it, or if the data is no longer required for the purposes for which it has been stored, in particular where the user account is deleted or where the data can no longer be stored for other legal reasons.

Upon request we will be pleased to tell you what data we hold about you. If the data we hold is inaccurate, despite our efforts to keep it correct and up to date, then we will rectify it immediately. In addition, you are able to receive the personal data about you that you have agreed can be processed in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, and to pass it on to another controller either yourself or via us.

You can check, amend or erase the personal data you have provided to us at any time by getting in touch with the contact given above.

If you would like to have the stored data erased, we will do so immediately upon your request. If the data in question cannot be erased for legal reasons, it will be restricted (locked) instead. Please note, however, that if we delete your data we will no longer be able to offer you the services described here.

If you believe that the processing of data about you is in breach of statutory regulations, you may exercise your right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority.