Privacy Policy

1. The protection of your privacy

Ethics
With .blue, we´re working to provide a search engine with protection of your privacy and the security of your data as a guiding principle. We believe that your data belongs to you alone, so we´ve put privacy protection tools at the center of our mobile apps. Check the anti ad-and tracking tools of and check out who is tracking you on your favorite wesites.

Motives
As a 100% charitable foundation owned business, we are free from any profit-driven external investors. This allows us to maximize for positive impact, not for profit. We don´t collect your information, nor do we have insight into your searches. We work with technology partners who do not sell your information and searches to advertisers.

Search Safety
We’ve set a higher level of protection against inappropriate content than most other search engines. Because we want to be a family-friendly search engine. When you do land on a site flagged as inappropriate, our apps will auto-suggest moving you to private mode.

Useful Data
To analyze the performance of our search engine, we use an open source tool that maximizes privacy. We reduce the information we process to the minimum needed for providing relevant search results. Among these will always be the region of your location and the language of your system/browser.

Our limits
We´re doing our best, but we can’t offer 100% security. It is our policy to take these issues seriously, to communicate openly and to transparently and continuously work on solutions to further improve the protection of your privacy.

—

Governing Law
.blue is subject to German data protection law. As a European search engine, we comply with all applicable data protection laws of the EU, including the very strict General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Mandated Transparency
A large number of important transparency aspects are mandatory by these laws. For example: Your IP address as an identifier transmitted by your computer with every search query will only be stored anonymously and be deleted automatically. In addition, all data must be transmitted through secure encryption technologies.

Technology Partners
We work exclusively with technology partners who are subject to the European Data Protection Directive or – in the case of partners outside the European Union – who have been certified to voluntarily comply with the GDPR. Unlike in the US, for example, European governments cannot legally force service providers such as Gexsi to implement a comprehensive spyware program.

—

The detailed privacy statement below provides specific information on how and for what purpose we process personal data and explains in detail the rights to which you are entitled. We are aware of how important the protection of the personal data is to our users is and we uphold all German and European data protection provisions.

The Blue Search Websites (www.blue-search.org, sealegacy.blue-search.org, oceana.blue-search.org et al) and the respective Blue Search Apps are operated by Gexsi, a Certified B Corporation registered in Berlin, Germany, and are covered by Gexsi’s privacy statement:

2. Your rights

You have the following rights with respect to us regarding the personal data relating to you:

• Right to information
• Right to correction or deletion
• Right to restriction of processing
• Right to refuse processing Right to data transferability
• In addition, you have the right to complain to a data protection supervisory authority regarding our processing of your personal data.

3. Processing by external service providers

In some cases, we avail of external service providers to process your data. We select and commission these carefully and they are bound by our instructions and inspected on a regular basis.

4. Gathering of personal data while visiting our website

In the case of use of the website for purely informational purposes without using the search function, we gather only the personal data which your browser transmits to our server. If you wish to view our website, we gather the following data, which we technically require in order to show you our website and to guarantee stability and security. The legal basis for the temporary storage of the data is Art. 6 Para. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation.

•       IP address
•       Date and time of enquiry
•       Difference between time zone and Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)
•       Content of the request (specific webpage)
•       Access status / HTTP status code
•       Respectively transferred data quantity
•       Website from which the request comes
•       Browser
•       Operating system and its surface
•       Language and version of the browser software.

The data is saved in the logfiles of our system. This data can never be connected to other personal data of our users. The data are deleted once they are no longer required to achieve the purpose of your gathering. In the event that the data are saved in log files, this occurs at the most seven days later.

It is possible to save the data for longer than this. In this case, the users’ IP addresses are deleted or anonymised so that they can no longer be associated with the visiting client.

In addition, while you are using our website, cookies are saved on your computer. See below and section 5 in this regard.

We gather anonymous data in order to identify and gather errors and problems in Gexsi products and services. These data include data in connection with program crashes. We use several third-party providers for the gathering of error logs. During the use of the Gexsi’s website, various pieces of personal data that are necessary for the performance are saved on the technical infrastructure of the third-party supplier a limited period of time in encrypted form.

5. Cookies

Cookies are small text files which are saved on your hard drive assigned to the browser you have used and through which the location which the cookie sets (here by us) accrues specific pieces of information. Cookies cannot execute any programs or transmit viruses to your computer. They serve to make Gexsi more user-friendly and more effective in general.

We set one or several persistent cookies in order to save the user’s settings and to make our website more user-friendly, to analyse user behaviour and as necessary carry out web analytics (see below in this regard) or A/B testing (see below also). The legal basis for the processing of personal data using cookies is Art. 6 Para. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation.

Persistent cookies are automatically deleted after a specified length of time, which may differ from one cookie to another. You may delete the cookies in the security settings of your browser at any time. You may configure your browser setting the way you want it and e.g. refuse the acceptance of third-party cookies or all cookies. Cookies that have already been saved may be deleted at any time. This can also be done automatically. Please note that you may not be able to use all functions of this website within the full scope if you deactivate cookies for our website.

6. Blue Search Mobile App

The Blue Search App provides another means of access to the Blue Search Website. Accordingly, we use your data within the app as if you were accessing the Blue Search engine via our website. This applies, for example, also to the use of your data and cookies, which will be used for the same purposes on the same legal basis. Thus, the statements made in the present privacy policy will apply to the app.

We reserve the right to use a safe and fully encrypted analysis service in order to analyse and continuously improve the use of our app. The legal basis for this processing of your personal data is Art. 6 Abs. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation.

Additionally to the data described under 7.e. we collect the following data when you use our app:

• Usage statistics of the app, e.g. which interface elements are interacted with
• Data relating to your app or your end device, e.g. the name of the device, its manufacturer, model, operating system number, app number or SDK version and the device number (IMEI)

The Blue Search App may use your locational data in anonymized, respectively pseudonymized, form if you have allowed access to these data on your device. We use the locational data in order to give you a better search experience or to show more relevant search results or advertising to you. Personal data such as names, addresses or dates of birth will not be collected, stored or transmitted.

This data is anonymised after a short space of time, generally 7 days. The anonymised data is saved for as long as is necessary for the evaluation. The data is not transferred to any third party. We will not access your data located outside of the app, such as your calendar, photos, messages or such like unless you have permitted us to do so.

7. Special forms of use of the Blue Search Website

a. Search

Blue Search is a search which is supported by third-party suppliers. If a search is carried out with Blue Search, data are transferred to Bing. Bing is operated by: Microsoft Ireland Operations Ltd, Carmanhall Road, Sandyford Industrial Estate, Dublin 18, Ireland (referred to below as: Bing). This is done in order to display search results and to prevent fraudulent activities. The following data are transferred to Bing during a search enquiry: IP address, user agent string, search term, country and language settings, filter settings for adult content, active search filter settings (e.g. filter search results by date).

Our relationship with Bing is managed through the Bing accredited syndication partner, System 1 LLC, headquarted in 1501 Main St, Suite 201, Venice, CA 90291 with its controlled US affiliate Infospace Holdings LLC, leading provider of white label search and monetization solutions.

Bing, System1 and Infospace are certified under the EU-US Privacy Shield Framework and the Swiss-US Privacy Shield Framework and undertake to uphold the EU data protection provisions regarding the collection, use, and retention of personal information from European Union member countries and Switzerland. To learn more about the Privacy Shield program, please visit https://www.privacyshield.gov/

b. Third party content

Blog posts or news feeds may contain third-party embeds, which may in some cases collect and store personal data. These “embeds” are hosted by a third-party, e.g. by marine conservation organizations and embedded in a news feed or Blog. For example: YouTube videos, Facebook or Instagram posts and feeds or Twitter tweets that appear within a Blog post. These files send data to the hosting site just as if you were visiting that site directly. For example, when you load a Blog post page with a YouTube video embedded in it, YouTube receives data about your activity. Gexsi does not control what data third parties collect in cases like this, or what they will do with it. The use of personal data by embedded content providers is not covered by this statement, but by the privacy policies of those sites or services.

c. Newsletter

You can subscribe to our newsletter through which we inform you about the projects which are supported through Blue Search, and other updates. We use the “Mailchimp” newsletter delivery platform to send our newsletter. Mailchimp is operated by The Rocket Science Group, LLC, 675 Ponce de Leon Ave NE, Suite 5000, Atlanta, GA 30308 USA.

We use the “double opt-in” procedure for registration for our newsletter. This means that, after registering, you receive an email to the email address provided, in which you are asked to confirm that you want to receive the newsletter. If you do not confirm your registration within 24 hours, your information is locked and deleted automatically after one month. The aim of this procedure is to prove your registration and, as applicable, to resolve a potential misuse of your personal data.

The following are saved:

• The email address at which you would like to receive the newsletter.
• The time and IP address at which you carried out the registration so that the misuse of the email address of a person affected can subsequently be traced.
• Technical information which is important for the presentation (e.g. browser) as well as data to improve the service (e.g. time of access)
• Data gathered for statistical purposes such as the opening of the newsletter and your click behaviour on links in the newsletter

We explicitly do not give your email address to any third party. Mailchimp is certified under the “Privacy Shield” US-EU data protection agreement and undertakes to uphold the EU data protection provisions.

Your email address is saved for as long as the subscription to the newsletter is active. The other data gathered as part of your registration are generally deleted within a seven-day period.

You may unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time. This can be carried out using the link provided in each newsletter. This link also enables you to withdraw your consent to saving of the personal data gathered during the registration process.

We also refer you to the refusal options in data gathering for advertising purposes on the websiteshttp://www.aboutads.info/choices/andhttp://www.youronlinechoices.com/(for the European area).

d. Surveys

We use the “Typeform” platform to carry out our surveys. Surveys help us to better adapt our offerings to your needs. The legal basis for this processing of your personal data is Art. 6 Abs. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation. Typeform is operated by TYPEFORM S.L. Carrer Bac de Roda, 163, 08018 Barcelona, Spain. If you take part in a survey, the following data are processed:

• Your responses
• Data on your device, e.g. whether it is a smartphone or a desktop computer and what browser you use to show the webpages
• IP address
• As applicable, your email address if you provided this for the purpose of participating in the survey At the same time, we use cookies to gather data for statistical purposes and to avoid misuse.

These data are saved for as long as they are required for evaluation of the survey, generally up to two years. After this, they are deleted or anonymised. The data gathered in relation to surveys is not transferred to any third party.

e. Open source web analytics

We use the open source web analytics tool Matomo. This is based on the philosophy that people should have control over their own information. Matomo is developed by the Matomo team members as well as contributors around the globe. The data processed by Matomo are stored in Paris, France. Matomo allows to be configured in a way to anonymise data so no personal data is processed.

We use Matomo web analytics to continuously improve the use of our website. Using the statistics obtained, we can improve our offering and design it in a more attractive way for you as a user. The legal basis for this processing of your personal data is Art. 6 Abs. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation.

For this evaluation, cookies (see above) are saved on your computer and the following data are processed:

• IP address
• The website visited
• The website from which you arrived at the website visited
• The sub-pages visited following on from the website visited
• Access status / HTTP status code
• The length of time spent visiting the website
• The frequency of visits to the website
• Your click behaviour on the website

These data are anonymised after a short space of time, generally 7 days. The anonymised data are saved for as long as is necessary for the evaluation. The data are not transferred to any third party.

If you do not wish to take part in the tracking, you can deactivate the gathering of all usage data by activating the “Do not track” setting in your browser.

f. A/B testing

We reserve the right to additionally carry out analyses of usage behaviour by means of “A/B testing”. As part of this, based on the completion of a profile assignment, we can show you our websites with slightly varied content. Thus, we can analyse and continuously improve our offering, and make it more interesting for you as a user. The legal basis for this processing of your personal data is Art. 6 Abs. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation.

Cookies (see above) are saved on your computer for the purpose of allocation to a test group. Allocation to the test groups is always carried out on a random basis. We use the data gathered by our web analysis service (see above) for the evaluation.

Before carrying out the analyses, the IP addresses are processed further in a shortened form, thus preventing direct traceability to any particular individual. The IP address forwarded by your browser is not amalgamated with other data we have gathered.

If you do not wish to take part in the tests, you can deactivate the gathering of all usage data and the saving of the relevant cookies by activating the “Do not track” setting in your browser.

g. Online advertising

At Blue Search, advertisements are shown beside or above the search results. If you click on these ads, we earn commission. We use this to pursue our mission to support social entrepreneurship projects that innovate solutions which contribute tot he UN Sustainable Development Goals, and to cover our operational costs.

The ads are provided by advertising networks. We work with the Bing Ad Network. During the search and simple display of an ad, no data are transferred to this advertising network (only to Bing, see above). The following data are sent to the advertising network when you click on an ad: the search term, your IP address, place, date and time of the search inquiry and the browser configuration.

Bing and its partners such as System1 (Infospace) assign unique Property and Ad Units ID’s to the individual search requests, which are saved in a cookie and retrieved during future visits. These ID´s are used to track traffic metrics such as revenue and paid clicks, along with the quality of the conversions for their advertisers. This enables Bing to display more relevant ads from Bing or third-party suppliers from the Bing ad network for you, based in part on prior searches. The legal basis for the data processing referred to Art. 6 Para. 1 S. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation.

If “Do not track” is activated in your browser, the Client ID is automatically deactivated and neither saved nor sent

For further details on the data processing of the Bing Ad Network, go to:https://privacy.microsoft.com/privacystatement

h. Affiliate marketing

Blue Search’s autocompletion tool features, among others, links which allow to access various websites directly, without the intermediary step of a search results page. We entertain affiliate marketing partnerships with certain of these website operators. This allows us to earn a provision which further leverages the amount of funds which we can employ to pursue our mission and to cover our operational costs in an completely anonymous manner. The affiliate marketing revenues are linked to a Blue Search user account, not any individual user’s accounts, and are not linked to any data which is processed by our search partner Bing.

The autocompletion tool and the respective commercialisation of affiliate marketing revenues is operated by Searchturbo Ltd, 6 New Street Square, London, EC4A3LX, United Kingdom.

When clicking on a direct link in the autocompletion box, Searchturbo assigns a unique ID which allows to assign the purchase to Blue Search’s account afterwards. If you have made a purchase, the following information will be stored: Date of purchase, shop, purchase value, amount of commission. No data is store which products you have purchased. No personal data is stored as no personal data is transmitted to Searchturbo.

8.Refusal or withdrawal of the consent to processing of your data

If you have granted your consent to the processing of your data, you can withdraw this at any time. Such a withdrawal influences the permissibility of processing of your personal data, on the basis that you have stated this to us.

Insofar as we support the processing of your personal data on a balancing of interests in accordance with Art. 6 Para. 1 lit. f of the General Data Protection Regulation, you may at any time refuse the processing of data about you for reasons which arise from your specific situation. In the event of a refusal, we will inspect the matter and will stop or adjust the data processing, unless we can provide compelling and legitimate grounds for the processing which outweigh your interests, rights and freedoms, or the processing serves to assert, exercise or defend legal claims.

Of course, you may refuse the processing of your personal data for advertising purposes at any time. No justification is required to do so. This also applies to profiling if it is connected with such direct advertising.

To assert a refusal or a withdrawal of consent, please contact our Data Protection Officer at privacy@gexsi.com.

Last modification: September 3, 2019

 

Contact Us

If you have any questions, please contact us:

• By email: oceana@blue-search.org
• By visiting this page on our website: oceana.blue-search.org/contact