Privacy Policy

SILMIX^® Website Data Protection and Privacy Policy

Wacker Chemie AG offers custom silicone rubber compounds under the brand SILMIX^®. Wacker Chemie takes seriously its obligation to safeguard personal data. This website privacy policy (“Privacy Policy”) informs visitors to www.silmix.com  (the “Website”) about how Wacker Chemie AG, in its capacity as controller as defined by Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of April 27, 2016, on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation – “GDPR”), collects, processes and uses the personal data and other information of visitors to the Website.

Please note that other sites, services or offerings may be subject to different privacy policies. This Privacy Policy does not apply to Wacker Chemie AG affiliates, subsidiaries, or related entities other than Silmix or to offerings of third parties to which the Website links.

Categories of Personal Data, Processing Purposes, Legal Basis

What personal data about you do we process and for what purposes? What is the legal basis? When you visit the Website, we collect the following information: web browser and operating system used, referring page, webpages accessed, downloaded files, plays of videos/audio, clicks on individual links, search words and phrases, length of visit, IP address, date and time of request. Usage data are used to enable your access to the Website, to maintain and restore the security of the Website, and to detect malfunctions and errors in electronic communications. All this is necessary, for technical reasons, for us to provide the Website to you. Legal basis: to the extent that personal data are affected, the relevant legal basis is point (f) of Article 6(1) GDPR. We reserve the right to check these data retrospectively if we become aware of specific indications of unlawful use. Moreover, these data are generated when accessing any other Internet webpage. Accordingly, this is not a specific function of WACKER’s webpages.

Processing of Personal Data

We process personal data only if you provide such data to us of your own accord (e.g. by registering, making a contact request, requesting a quote, filling in forms or sending emails). This information will be utilized by SILMIX for the purposes for which the information is provided, i.e., developing a product, providing a quote for services.  We will forward your personal data to third parties only when necessary for the provision of the service requested by you, or if you have given us your consent for such forwarding. The legal basis for processing data is our legitimate interest pursuant to point (f) of Article 6(1) GDPR in responding to your needs. If your contacting us is aimed at entering into a contract, the additional legal basis for the processing is point (b) of Article 6(1) GDPR.

Determination of Location

In order to automatically present the product portfolio valid for your country when you load our webpages, it is necessary to process your IP address. Here we rely on points (f) and (c) of Article 6(1) GDPR as the legal basis for processing.  You can change the automatically suggested country at any time. 

Web Analytics

For the purposes of advertising, market research and customized design of the Website (and the newsletter, if applicable), we use web analytics software and/or JavaScript to collect and process usage data on your visit to the Website and on your use of links in the newsletter, if available. The collection of your usage data and the creation of a usage profile from these data take place pseudonymously, using a cookie ID, and audience segments to be used for targeted marketing or information campaigns are created based on data from that cookie ID. Data collected by means of web analytics will not be used to personally identify the visitor to the Website without the separately-granted consent of the person who is the data subject, and will not be combined with personal data about the holder of the pseudonym. Your IP address is either not collected or, if it is, it is anonymized as soon as it is collected. Legal basis: here we rely on statutory permission (point (f) of Article 6(1) of Regulation (EU) 2016/679) as the legal basis for processing. By using the Website, you agree to the processing of the data collected about you in the manner described above, and for the purposes mentioned. You can prevent the storage of cookies by selecting the corresponding setting in your browser software. Please note, however, that if you do this you may not be able to use the full functionality of the Website.

6 Google AdWords

The Website uses the Google AdWords online advertising tool and its conversion tracking feature. When a user clicks an ad placed by Google, a conversion tracking cookie is set. These cookies expire after 30 days, and involve only non-identifiable information. If a user visits certain webpages of the Website and the cookie is still valid, WACKER and Google can detect that the user clicked the ad and was redirected to the ad webpage. Each Google AdWords customer is assigned a unique cookie. Cookies therefore cannot be tracked by means of AdWords customers’ websites. The information collected through the use of conversion tracking cookies provides conversion statistics for AdWords customers who have chosen to use conversion tracking. These customers obtain statistics showing the total number of users who clicked their ad and were redirected from the ad to a webpage that has a conversion tracking tag. All the information collected is non-identifiable, meaning that no personal data about users are collected. Users who prefer to disable the conversion tracking feature can do so easily in their browser settings. These users are then excluded from the conversion tracking statistics. Learn more about Google’s privacy policy

https://policies.google.com/privacy

The information collected by means of the conversion tracking cookie helps us generate statistics about our conversion rate. That means we learn how many users are coming from a Google ad and buying a product through the Website within 30 days.

Forwarding to Third Parties

We forward your data within the WACKER Group and to third parties, especially our distribution partners, solely for the performance of contracts or for pre-contractual steps, or when it is in your interests for us to do so. We do not otherwise sell your data to third parties. Your data will also be partly processed in countries outside the European Economic Area (“EEA”), where the levels of data protection might generally be lower than in Europe. Where that is the case, WACKER will take measures to ensure an appropriate level of data protection by other means.

Third-Party Services

We include external services and content on the Website. If you use such a service, or if third-party content is displayed to you, communication data are exchanged, for technical reasons, between you and the respective provider.

8.3 Google Maps

On certain individual webpages, we use the Google Maps API provided by Google LLC, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA (“Google”). This service lets us show you where our sites are located and makes it easier for you to get there. When Google Maps is embedded in a webpage, your IP address is transmitted directly to Google as soon as you visit such a webpage, and a cookie is stored. You can obtain information about, and opt out of, data processing by Google anytime at

https://policies.google.com/privacy
http://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en&gl=de

If you do not agree to have your data transmitted to Google when using Google Maps in the future, you also have the option to disable the Google Maps web service completely by turning off JavaScript in your browser. This will fully disable Google Maps and, by extension, the display of maps on the Website.

Data Security

WACKER takes all necessary technical and organizational security measures to protect your personal data against misuse or loss. By way of example, your data are stored in a secure, non-public operating environment. In certain cases, your personal data will be encrypted during transmission by means of Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology. That is, an approved encryption method will be used for communication between your computer and WACKER’s servers, provided that your browser supports SSL. When contacting us by email, you should keep in mind that the secrecy of the transmitted information cannot be assured. The content of your email messages can be read by third parties.

Consequences of Not Providing Your Data

What happens if you do not provide your data? The provision of personal data is required neither by law nor by contract. It will, however, be necessary to provide certain data in order to visit the Website or use other services we provide. Non-provision of personal data may lead to disadvantages for you. One consequence could be that you cannot receive or use our services (e.g. access to the Website may not be possible). However, unless otherwise stated, you will not incur any legal disadvantage from non-provision.

Categories of Recipients

To whom do we transmit your data? Please note that we may transfer your personal data to third parties for the aforementioned processing purposes as follows:

To contract data processors: certain third-party service providers such as IT support providers or hosting providers (“contract processors”) will receive your personal data in order to process these data pursuant to relevant instructions, to the extent necessary for the processing purposes outlined above. Contract processors will be subject to contractual obligations to implement appropriate technical and organizational security measures to protect personal data and to process personal data solely as instructed. In accordance with applicable law, we may share your personal data with third parties such as existing or potential business partners, public authorities, courts, suppliers, external consultants, other service providers, or potentially acquiring companies or those potentially to be acquired. Any access to your personal data is limited to those individuals who must have access to the data in order to fulfill their work obligations.

Retention Periods

How long will we keep your personal data? Your personal data will be stored to the extent necessary to fulfill our obligations and for the period of time necessary to achieve the purposes for which the personal data are collected, in accordance with applicable data protection laws. If Wacker Chemie AG no longer needs your personal data for its use, we will remove [A1] [A2] these data from our systems and from our records and/or take steps to properly anonymize them so that you can no longer be identified by these data (unless we must retain your personal data in order to comply with legal or regulatory obligations to which Wacker Chemie AG is subject). You can request additional information on retention periods by contacting us as indicated below.

Your Rights

What are your rights, and how can you exercise them? Additional data protection rights: in accordance with applicable data protection laws, you have the right (i) to request access to your personal data, (ii) to request rectification of your personal data, (iii) to request erasure of your personal data, (iv) to request restriction of processing of your personal data, (v) to request data portability; and/or (vi) to object to the processing of your personal data. Below you will find further information about your rights. Please note that these rights may be restricted under (local) applicable data protection laws.

(i) Right of access to your personal data: to the extent provided for by applicable data protection laws, you have the right to obtain from us confirmation as to whether or not your personal data are being processed, and, where that is the case, you have the right of access to these personal data. The access information includes, among other things, the purposes of the processing, the categories of personal data concerned, the recipients or categories of recipient to whom the personal data have been or will be disclosed. This right is not absolute, however, and the interests of other persons may restrict your right of access. You further have the right to receive a copy of the personal data undergoing processing. Should you require any further copies, we may charge a reasonable fee based on administrative costs.

(ii) Right to rectification: to the extent provided for by applicable data protection laws, you have the right to obtain from us the rectification of inaccurate personal data concerning you. Depending on the purposes of the processing, you have the right to have your incomplete personal data completed, including by means of providing a supplementary statement.

(iii) Right to erasure (right to be forgotten): to the extent provided for by applicable data protection laws, you have the right to obtain from us the erasure of personal data concerning you, and we can be required to erase such personal data.

(iv) Right to restriction of processing: to the extent provided for by applicable data protection laws, you have the right to obtain from us restriction of processing of your personal data, and we can be required to restrict the processing of your personal data. Should we be so obligated, the personal data subject to restriction will be identified as such and may be processed by us only for certain specific purposes.

(v) Right to data portability: to the extent provided for by applicable data protection laws, you have the right to receive personal data concerning you that you have provided to us in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, and you have the right to transmit those personal data to another entity without hindrance from us, provided that the processing is carried out by automated means and is based on consent pursuant to point (a) of Article 6(1) GDPR or on a contract pursuant to point (b) of Article 6(1) GDPR.

(vi) Right to object: Under certain circumstances, you have the right to object at any time, on grounds relating to your particular situation, to our processing of your personal data based on point (f) of Article 6(1) GDPR (balancing of interests), and we have the obligation to no longer process your personal data. If you have a right to object and are exercising this right, your personal data will no longer be processed by us for these purposes. You can exercise this right by contacting us as indicated under heading 18 below. Any right to object may be precluded if processing your personal data is necessary for entering into, or performance of, a contract between us and you. To exercise your rights, please contact us as indicated below. You have the right, moreover, to file a complaint with a competent data protection supervisory authority in the relevant member state (e.g. in your member state of residence or employment, or in the member state of alleged infringement of the GDPR).

Changes

Our Privacy Policy may be updated at irregular intervals in order to comply with changes in legal requirements, or to implement changes to our services such as, for example, the insertion of new offerings. The new Privacy Policy will automatically apply to your next visit. Please take the time to inform yourself frequently about changes. By using the WACKER website, you agree to this Privacy Policy. The Website may contain links to websites of other providers to which this Privacy Policy does not extend. Where the use of the websites of other providers involves the collection, processing or use of personal data, please take note of the privacy statements of the respective provider. WACKER takes no responsibility for such content.

Cookies and Other Tracking Technology

When you visit the Website, information in the form of a cookie may be placed on your computer enabling automatic user recognition when you next visit. Cookies allow us, for example, to tailor a website to your interests or to save your location, so you do not have to re-enter the information each time you visit. Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer when you visit certain webpages. Please note that you can set your browser to inform you when a webpage wants to set a cookie and let you decide whether or not to accept it, or you can allow or block cookies for specific cases or in general. Each browser differs in how it manages cookie settings. This is described in the Help menu of each browser, which explains how to change your cookie settings. Please note that disabling or deleting cookies may cause certain features on the Website to stop working as expected. Some of the cookies we use are deleted after the end of the browser session, i.e. after you close your browser (these are “session cookies”). Other cookies remain on your device and allow us (“first-party” cookies) or our partner companies (“third-party” cookies) to recognize your browser on your next visit (these are “persistent cookies”). Persistent cookies are automatically deleted after a specified period, the length of which may vary depending on the cookie involved. In some cases, cookies are used to simplify the ordering process by storing settings (e.g. remembering the contents of a virtual shopping cart for a subsequent visit to the Website). If personal data are also processed via individual cookies set by us, such processing takes place either in accordance with point (b) of Article 6(1) GDPR for the performance of a contract or in accordance with point (f) of Article 6(1) GDPR for the protection of our legitimate interests in delivering the best possible functionality of the Website and designing a customer-friendly, effective site visit.

Questions and Contact Information

If you have any questions regarding this Privacy Policy or your rights as described above, please contact us:

Mr. Jan Weiß

Wacker Chemie AG
Hanns-Seidel-Platz 4
81737 Munich, Germany

Tel.: +49 89 6279-0
Email: privacy@wacker.com