Privacy and Cookie policy

1. Navigation / Technical data

The information systems and software procedures relied upon to operate this website acquire some data as part of their standard functioning; the transmission of such data is an inherent feature of Internet communication protocols.

This data category includes, among other things, IP addresses or the domain names of the computers used by any user connecting with this web site and other parameters related to the user’s operating system and computer environment.

Thanks to the technical measures taken by METIS and described below, these data are only used to extract anonymous statistical information on website use as well as to check its functioning and to prevent abuse. The data might be used to establish liability in case computer crimes are committed against the website.

2. Data provided by the user

Contact Form and e-mail: Completing the contact form and/or sending e-mail messages to METIS by the addresses mentioned on this website, which is done on the basis of a freely chosen, explicit, and voluntary option, entails acquisition of some sender’s personal data which are necessary in order to reply to any request, as well as of possible additional personal data as is contained in the message(s).

3. Processing of special categories of personal data (“sensitive data”)

METIS does not process the special categories of personal data described in Art. 9 – GDPR (“sensitive data”).

Personal data and Navigation / Technical data, eventually gathered by the site or voluntarily provided by the User, are collected for the purposes and with the modalities indicated below.

Personal data are processed without recourse to profiling and subject to the free express consent pursuant to art. 6, par. 1, lett. a) – GDPR, through appropriate technical measures. The legal basis lies also in art. 6, par 1, lett. b) and in art. 6 para. 1 lit. f) – GDPR. Our legitimate interest is to improve the quality of our website and its security and defense against unwanted, automated access in the form of spam or similar.

METIS will use the personal Data exclusively for the purposes indicated below:

• Statistical purposes;
• Answering specific requests for information by the user;
• Comply with the obligations related to METIS’ activities;
• Allowing METIS to defend himself in Court, or prior to a Court action, from user’s abuse.

The processing of personal data is made by manual, computerized and telematic means, with methods strictly related to the aforementioned purposes and, in any case, in such a way as to guarantee security and confidentiality in compliance with current legislation.

METIS declares its commitment to keep and control all data automatically gathered by the site or voluntarily supplied by the User in such a manner and with such measures as to reduce to the minimum all risks relating to destruction, loss, unauthorized access, not permitted or inappropriate processing of said data for objectives that are inconsistent with the original purpose of their collection.

For the fulfillment of the aforementioned purposes user’s personal data may be shared with individuals involved in the business organization of METIS (e.g., administrative, commercial, legal department, and system administrators), or external third parties (e.g., postal carriers, foreign distributors).

These third-parties will be given only the information that is strictly necessary for the execution of the requested activities. They are required to process the data as pro tempore Processors in compliance with this Privacy Policy and current legislation.

All personal data provided is kept for the time strictly necessary to answer to the requests made by the user.

In any case, the data will be deleted when the user exercises the right of erasure of personal data provided that the erasure is not in conflict with the need of any statutory storage requirements, as happens in the event of a subsequent contract execution.

The navigation / technical data are kept for the time described in the following section (cookie policy).

This section explains the cookie policy implemented by METIS Systems S.r.l. (hereinafter METIS).

The information on cookies provided only applies to this website and does not concern any other website or email that may be visited by a user via external links. These links are being provided as a convenience and for informational purposes only.

1) About cookies

Cookies are files or pieces of information that may be stored on user’s computer (or other internet enabled devices, such as a smartphone) each time a website is visited. Cookies can be classified into one or more of the following categories: first- or third-party cookies; technical or profiling cookies; session or persistent cookies.

a. first or third party cookies

First-party cookies are those managed by the site owner. Third-party cookies are those not managed by the site owner.

b. Technical cookie

Technical cookies are used for example to surf the Internet and websites or provide a service requested by the user. They are not used for other purposes and are normally installed directly by the owner of the website. Belong to this category of cookies:

• navigation cookies that allow the normal navigation and use of the website;
• functional cookies, that allow the user to navigate according to a series of criteria (e.g., the language) in order to improve the use of the site;
• analytical cookies: These cookies are used directly by the owner of the site to collect information, in aggregate form, on the number of users and how they visit the site. For these, as third-party cookies, prior consent is necessary.

c. Profiling cookies

Cookie profiling, also called web profiling, is the use of persistent or permanent cookies (profiling cookies) to track a user’s overall activity online. This tracking does not just happen when users are on a particular site, but it occurs the whole time they are browsing. This kind of profiling activity is often done by marketers who buy advertising rights on thousands of popular websites in order to collect and collate cookie information and create a single “profile” of a user.

d. Session or Persistent cookies

– Session cookies are temporary cookie files, which are erased when the user close the browser. These cookies allow users to be recognized within a website so any page changes or item or data selection they do is remembered from page to page. These cookies are also used by the server to store information about user page activities so users can easily pick up where they left off on the server’s pages. By default, web pages really don’t have any ‘memory’. Cookies tell the server what pages to show the user so the user doesn’t have to remember or start navigating the site all over again. Cookies act as a sort of “bookmark” within the site.

– Persistent cookies stay in one of the user browser’s subfolders until he or she delete them manually or the browser deletes them based on the duration period contained within the persistent cookie’s file. Persistent cookies are also employed to store user preferences.  These cookies help websites remember user’s information and settings when he or she visit them in the future.

On the first visit, the website is presented in default mode. During the visit, the user may select some preferences and these preferences are remembered, through the use of the persistent cookie, the next time the user visit the site. For example, a website may offer its contents in different languages. On the first visit, the user may choose to have the content delivered in French and the site may record that preference in a persistent cookie set on user’s browser. When the user revisit that site it will use the cookie to ensure that the content is delivered in French.

For more information about cookies, including categories and how to find out which cookies have been set and how to manage and remove them, visit:

• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_cookie
• www.allaboutcookies.org
• or www.aboutcookies.org

2) How we use cookies

METIS does not collect either profiling or third-party profiling cookies, but only technical cookies which are strictly necessary for the operation of this site.

Google Analytics (with anonymization function)

This website use Google Analytics web analysis tool belonging to Google llc, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043 USA, that through use of cookies stored on the user’s computer helps website owners to collect information, only in aggregate form, concerning use of the site by visitors (IP address, number of visitors, page views, time spent, geographic areas of origin, tools used, etc.). That information, normally generated through mere access to the site, is automatically transmitted and stored into Google’s server machines. In the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland, Google’s services are provided by Google Ireland Limited, incorporated and operating under the laws of Ireland (Registered Number: 368047), Gordon House, Barrow Street Dublin 4, Ireland.

METIS has set Google Analytics tool and this website to anonymize user’s IP address, so the information collected is used for statistical purposes and no other. Indeed, according to Google, the IP anonymization feature in Google Analytics shortens and then anonymizes the user’s IP address before transferring it from the member states of the European Union or from the signatory states to the Agreement on the European Economic Area.

Google affirms that “the IP anonymization/masking takes place as soon as data is received by Google Analytics, before any storage or processing takes place”. Google also affirms that “only after this anonymization process is the request written to disk for processing. If the IP anonymization method is used, then at no time is the full IP address written to disk as all anonymization happens in memory nearly instantaneously after the request has been received.”

METIS also informs the users that it has accepted the Amendment on data processing provided by Google Analytics in compliance with the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (Google Ads Data Processing Terms). With this additional agreement, Google commits itself to the Customer (METIS), as a Company established in the territory of a member state of the European Economic Area, to process the data as a pro tempore Processor, according to the requests of the Customer (METIS) and the applicable law, which it may provide through the settings of the services. Google warrants that it will only process the Personal Data of the Customer within the limits of the instructions given and will not share any Data with other additional Google products unless the Customer (METIS) itself activate them.

For the foregoing, METIS informs the users that in this website all of the options provided by Google Analytics, including advertising, marketing and data sharing with Google, have all been disabled. Doing so, Google states that it will never associate users’ IP address with other data held by Google. Therefore, on this website, the processing of anonymized personal data is carried out for mere statistical purposes.

The Google Analytics Data Retention controls give the Customer the ability to set the amount of time before user-level and event-level data stored by Google Analytics is automatically deleted from Analytics’ servers. For greater user’s data protection, METIS has set the retention period for anonymized data at its minimum (14 months). In addition, METIS has set to “OFF” the option that allows to reset the retention period of the user identifier with each new event from that user, avoiding that the set expiration date becomes void. With these technical measures, when data reaches the end of the retention period, it is deleted automatically.

More information on the aforementioned data retention is available at the following link.

For more info about Google Privacy Policy, click here.

For more info about Google Terms of service, click here.

(Suggestion)

Furthermore, Google gives internet users an opt-out browser add-on for the Google Analytics JavaScript (ga.js, analytics.js, dc.js) that gives users the ability to prevent their data from being used by Google Analytics. If you want to opt-out, download and install the add-on for your web browser. Google designed the opt-out add-on to be compatible with Chrome, Internet Explorer 11, Safari, Firefox and Opera. For more information on this add-on and to disable the use of cookies by Google Analytics you can download the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on here.

 3) Technical cookies currently used on this website:

• _ms, first-party navigation cookies, remember the user’s choices, duration 30 days;
• _ga (Google Analytics): This purely technical cookie is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site’s analytics report. The cookies store information anonymously and assign a randomly generated number to identify unique visitors; 2 years duration;
• _gat_gtag_UA_106862220_1, (Google) This purely technical cookie is used to distinguish the service user; 1 minute duration;
• _gid Google Analytics): This purely technical cookie is used to store information of how visitors use a website and helps in creating a report of how the website is doing. The data collected anonymously includes the number of visitors, the source from which they come and the pages visited; 24 hours duration.

 4) Additional information about third-party cookies:

• The privacy policy of Google is available at the following link
• Find more information about Google cookies here
• More information about Google Analytics can be found here
• More information on IP Anonymization in Analytics can be found here

5) YouTube privacy-enhanced mode

In our website we have embedded some of our videos with the technology provided by YouTube LLC 901 Cherry Ave., San Bruno, CA 94066, USA, Fax: +1 650-253-0001, a company belonging to Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA. In the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland, Youtube services are provided by Google Ireland Limited, incorporated and operating under the laws of Ireland (Registered Number: 368047), Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland.

In the embedding we used the privacy-enhanced mode option. According to the information provided by YouTube, with the “iframe” code created with the privacy-enhanced mode option enabled YouTube won’t store information about visitors on our website unless they play the video. Then, this option avoids the user to be automatically tracked by YouTube simply displaying one of our webpage that contains a video. This is acceptable by some laws because it sets cookies after the user starts playing video.

The user should therefore be aware that choosing not to start the videos will not be tracked by YouTube but also will not be able to see our website special contents.

More information on Google’s privacy policy here.

6) Social buttons

On our website footer there is an icon representing YouTube, the video sharing platform provided by of YouTube LLC., 901 Cherry Ave., 94066 San Bruno, CA, hereinafter referred to as “YouTube. This button is a simple link to METIS’ page on YouTube where the user can view all the videos published by METIS. The user should therefore be aware that choosing to visit our YouTube’s page, Youtube will track him/her as described by Google’s Privacy Policy.

More information on Google’s privacy policy here.

7) Cookies deletion (withdrawal of the given consent) – management of preferences

Users can change their cookie preferences and choices at any time by changing the browser’s settings. The easiest and safest way to clear cookies installed on user computer (and to withdraw the given consent) is to clear the recent history from the used browser. There is no one standardized way to remove cookies since different browsers clear cookies using different procedures.

The instructions of major browsers on how to manage cookie preferences can be accessed for:

• Internet Explorer: here
• Firefox (manage cookies): here
• Firefox (delete cookies): here
• Chrome (clear, enable, and manage cookies): here
• Chrome (clear browsing data): here
• Safari: here
• Opera: here
• Edge: here

More information at:

• https://www.aboutcookies.org/how-to-delete-cookies/
• http://www.allaboutcookies.org/manage-cookies/stop-cookies-installed.html

The personal data of subjects (users) must be processed lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner. In addition, they have the right, as applicable and at any time:

– to be informed about how their personal data are being used, such as through this privacy policy statement;

– to request from the controller access to (art. 15) and rectification (art. 16) or erasure (art. 17) of personal data we hold, or restriction of processing concerning the data subject (art. 18) as well as the right to data portability (art. 20);

– to withdraw consent at any time (art. 7), without affecting the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal. Please note that if the user opts to withdraw the consent, this could affect the correct and current management of any pre-contractual and contractual relations of the user with METIS. In particular, the consent already given by the user on the use of cookies can also be revoked at any time by exiting the site and deleting the history and cookies from the used browser (to know how look at what has been previously described in the “Cookie Policy” section). In addition, the consent already given by the user on the processing of personal data provided through the contact form or by mail or telephone can also be made by communicating this intention with the same contact form or by email at info@metis-group.com;

– to object, on grounds relating to his or her particular situation, at any time to processing of personal data concerning him or her which is based on point (e) or (f) of Article 6(1), and, in particular, for direct marketing purposes (art. 21). METIS does not use direct marketing.

– Furthermore, every data subject shall have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, in particular in the Member State of his or her habitual residence, place of work or place of the alleged infringement if the data subject considers that the processing of personal data relating to him or her infringes this Regulation. The Italian supervisory authority is the “Garante per la protezione dei dati personali” (http://www.garanteprivacy.it/).

The Data Subject may have further information on the described rights including the circumstances in which they apply by contacting the supervisory authority of the Member State of his or her habitually resident.

The exercise of all the aforementioned rights can be made by writing to data Controller (METIS Systems S.r.l.) at any time. Likewise, for any questions or concerns regarding this Privacy Policy and / or the site’s Cookie Policy, the user can contact METIS at the same address.