Our privacy policy

Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) is committed to protecting your personal data and to ensuring full compliance with data protection laws, including the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Please find below the most important information on the measures we take to protect your personal data and privacy, in particular on our website and in the context of our newsletter and campaign mailings.

Website

We use a third-party service (open-source web analytics application Matomo, formerly Piwik) on our website to collect log files that provide us with information about the behaviour patterns of visitors (such as the number of visitors to specific articles or sections of our website), which allows us to improve the way we present and communicate our work online.

We have opted for privacy-friendly settings in our configuration of Matomo and do not attempt to personally identify website visitors, with all collected log files processed in a way that prevents any links to specific IP addresses or persons.

In order to function correctly, Matomo places a cookie on your computer – a default setting which you can opt out of at any time. If you don’t want us to register any data related to your visit to the CEO website, you may opt out using a free javascript blocker like NoScript, or may tick the “Do not track” feature of your web browser.

Please note that links to other websites are not governed by this privacy notice.

Newsletter and other mailings

When signing up to our mailing list, we collect your name and email address to enable us to send you our newsletter, and other occasional fundraising and campaign mailings, and to contact you if we need to update our records or notify you of any changes to the newsletter service.

We do gather statistics on email opening to help us tailor our newsletters better to what our subscribers are interested in, but we do not personally identify users in this process.

Individuals who subscribe to any mailing lists maintained by CEO are required to give explicit consent. New subscribers signing up through the website have to pass through a double opt-in process, which requires them to confirm their subscription via a confirmation email sent out by us.

You can unsubscribe from our newsletter at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in the email footer. In addition, you may also unsubscribe by sending a request to unsubscribe-newsletterATcorporateeurope.org. Once we confirm your request to end your subscription, your email address and, if you provided it, your name will have been removed from our database.

Campaign actions

We occasionally run campaign actions which require the user to submit their name, email address, postcode, and country of residence, if they wish to support the action. This data will only be used in the context of the action ie. to update you on its progress, and will be deleted at the latest by two months after the action is complete.

Typically we would hand over the information concerning your name and country to the petition target - that way we can prove that there is a real person behind your signature. This may also involve sharing the data with campaign partners who coordinate communications with the petition target. Your email address will not be passed on to any third parties.

While signing up to a campaign action you will also be invited to join CEO's newsletter and mailing list. As described above, this is subject to the double opt-in process. 

Storing data

All personal data held by us is securely stored and treated confidentially.

Sharing personal data with third parties

We do not disclose your personal data to any third parties, except in the specific instances described above in the context of campaign actions.

Access to your personal information

You are entitled to access and request the deletion of any of your personal information that we may hold. Please send any such request to privacyATcorporateeurope.org.

For advice on privacy online, we recommend this website.