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Privacy Notice

Please note: this is a translation for the convenience of English speakers who might have difficulty understanding all the details of the German Datenschutzerklärung,  but it is not meant for direct compliance with the legal requirements of European and German data protection law. Only the German version is intended for that purpose and only the German version is legally binding.

Name and address of the responsible organisation

„Der Chinesische Garten e.V.“ (aka The Chinese Garden Society)
c/o Botanischer Garten der Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Universitätsstrasse 150
44780 Bochum
Germany
Phone: +49(0)234/32-23098 (reachable from 8 am to 12 noon)
Fax: +49(0)234/32-14423
E-Mail: cgev@rub.de
Website: www.rub.de/cgev

Data Protection Officer (DPO)

The Society is not required to designate a DPO and has not done so.

Purposes and Lawful Basis for Processing Personal Data

The Chinese Garden Society „Der Chinesische Garten e.V.“ provides information about the Chinese Garden Qian Yuan at the Ruhr University of Bochum and about the society's activities in support of the garden, under the URL www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/cgev (or www.rub.de/cgev) with its subordinate pages.

On these internet pages we collect no data about the visitors of these pages. We also set no cookies, nor do we log visits in any way, and we do not otherwise try to determine who is accessing these pages or by what means they are being accessed. This implies that we also do not store any data about our visitors and so we cannot pass this information on to other persons or organisations. 

However, our pages reside on the servers of the Ruhr University of Bochum and the Ruhr University does set cookies and collects data about visits to its domains in order to manage its own internet presence.  The activities of our "host“, the Ruhr University, are covered by its own privacy notice, which you can access here (only in German). There you can read which personal data about the users will be stored in order to enable access to these pages and you can learn for which purposes and under which lawful basis this data is being collected and how long it will be stored, which cookies will be placed on the visitors' devices and how the user can prevent the setting of cookies or the storage of data not absolutely necessary for providing access to the internet pages hosted by the Ruhr University of Bochum.

The menu entry "Links“ in the left-hand column of our pages makes links available to the web offerings of other providers, for example to the Botanic Garden of the Ruhr University. Also, various fields in the margins of our internet pages provide direct access to the Ruhr University's other internet offerings. As soon as the user clicks on one of these fields or on one of the links under "Links", they will leave the pages we ourselves have prepared and will switch to the offerings of a different provider, who may also collect and process the personal data of users who access that site. When you leave our pages, please refer to the privacy notices of the new providers.

Data provided by members of the Society

Although our Society does not collect any data from visitors to our internet pages, we do of course store the data provided by our members which we need for the management and running of their membership.

Membership cannot be applied for electronically or online, but only by submitting an application form on paper, a sample of which can be downloaded as a PDF file from our home page. To request membership, this German-language Beitrittserklärung must be printed out and signed by hand, and it is only on this form that we collect the personal data which we store from our members (and which we must store in order to manage their membership). This data is used only for purposes which are necessary for maintaining the membership, in particular for sending out notices and invitations to membership meetings, as well as for the collection of the membership fee via direct debit if one has been set up.

Only if the member has explicitly allowed it (for example by checking the corresponding box in the membership application) can the member's name and address be passed on to institutions or employees of the Ruhr University of Bochum who wish to extend invitations, notices or special offers directly to our members and who certify that they will delete the data immediately if the member should withdraw their consent.

Important: we ask future applicants for membership in the Society to use only the current version of the membership application. Older application forms lacking the privacy notice will no longer be accepted. This also applies to the application form in our flyer dating from 2014, which is still available from our home page for informational purposes and which we sometimes distribute on guided tours.

Categories of recipients of personal data

Access to the personal data we collect is given only to the Society's governing board and to persons who regularly prepare for transmission and send out the written communications to the members (as a rule these are just the president's Christmas letter reporting on the events of the year just ending and the legally required written invitation to the annual general membership meeting).

With the member's special consent, their name and address can also be passed on to institutions and employees of the Ruhr University of Bochum wishing to grant our members preferential status.

Direct debits are processed by our bank.

The retention period of the data

The members' personal data will be retained until the membership ends in accordance with the society's statutes. After that, the data will be stored as long as is required by law.

Remarks on your rights as a concerned party

You may at any time withdraw your consent to the continued use of your personal data, effective for your future dealings with the Society, by sending written notice to our postal address or via e-mail sent to cgev@rub.de.

Every concerned person has the right to

  • information about the processing of personal data in accordance with Art. 15 GDPR,
  • withdraw consent in accordance with Art. 7 GDPR,
  • rectification in accordance with Art. 16 GDPR,
  • erasure in accordance with Art. 17 GDPR,
  • restriction of processing in accordance with Art. 18 GDPR,
  • object to processing on compelling legitimate grounds in accordance with Art. 21 GDPR.

For the rights to information and to erasure the restrictions of §§ 34 and 35 BDSG (the German Federal Data Protection Law) apply. In addition you have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority (Art. 77 GDPR in combination with § 19 BDSG).

If a member demands the erasure of their personal data (and does not merely withdraw consent to its extended use), then the membership cannot be continued, so that erasure also implies a cancellation of the membership. The data will be erased as soon as the membership ends in accordance with the statutes and no legal requirement compels the further storage of the data.

Necessity for membership

Refusal to provide essential information makes it impossible to document a membership properly. Some of the information on the membership application is necessary to be able to contact the members.

The bank data is needed if the member wants to pay membership dues via direct debit.