Privacy Policy

1. Controller

The controller for the processing of personal data on this website within the meaning of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR, in German: Datenschutz-Grundverordnung, DSGVO) is:

Zigarrenexpertise, Oliver Markus
Im Kräutergarten 13
49401 Damme
Telephone +49 176 20150975
Email info (at) zigarrenexpertise.com

The full provider details are set out in the Imprint.

2. Hosting

This website is hosted by STRATO GmbH, Otto-Ostrowski-Straße 7, 10249 Berlin. When you open these pages, STRATO processes the data your browser transmits on my behalf, in particular your IP address. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR, my legitimate interest in providing this website in a technically sound and secure manner.

A data processing agreement under Art. 28 GDPR is in place with STRATO. At STRATO it forms part of every contract concluded after 18 July 2022.

3. Server log files

With every request, the host automatically stores information that your browser transmits: browser type and browser version, the operating system used, the previously visited page (referrer), the host name of the accessing computer, the date and time of the request, and the IP address.

These data are not merged with other data sources and are not evaluated for advertising purposes. Collecting them is necessary for the operation and security of the website; the legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

STRATO stores full IP addresses for no longer than seven days, in order to detect and fend off attacks. In the logs I can see as the operator, the IP address is anonymised; those logs go back six weeks.

4. Encrypted transmission

This website is transmitted in encrypted form only (TLS). You can tell by the address, which begins with https://. Some browsers show that part only once you click into the address bar. While the encryption is active, the content you open here cannot be read by third parties.

5. Contact form

The contact form on this website transmits nothing to a server. There is no script that receives your entries, and no database they are written into. Your entries are assembled into an email solely within your own browser, and that email is then opened in your own email program.

That means no personal data is collected on this website while you fill in the form. As long as you do not send the prepared email, none of it leaves your device. Only when you send it yourself do your details reach me, by the same route as any other email, that is through your email provider and mine. What happens to your message after that is described in section 6.

You are of course welcome to write to me or call me without the form. The form is only a writing aid.

6. Enquiries by email and telephone

If you write to me or call me, I process your details in order to answer and deal with your enquiry. If an engagement comes about, I also process what I need for it: name, address, photographs of your cigars and the invoicing details. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR where your enquiry relates to a contract or to steps taken before entering into one, otherwise my legitimate interest in replying under Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

Your details stay with me until you ask me to delete them or the purpose no longer applies, for example because your matter has been dealt with. Mandatory statutory retention periods, in particular under tax law, remain unaffected.

My emails are held in a mailbox with STRATO GmbH, that is with the same provider that runs this website (section 2). Beyond that I do not pass your details on to third parties, except to bodies I am required by law to transmit them to, such as the tax office (Finanzamt).

7. Cookies and local storage

This website sets no cookies. The only thing stored is your confirmation that you are 18 or older, and it is stored in your browser's local storage (localStorage). Without it, the age check would have to appear again on every page you open.

Two values are stored for that purpose, under the names ze-alter-bis and ze-alter-fassung: the time until which the confirmation is valid (365 days), and the version of the age check. These values stay on your device. They are not transmitted to me or to third parties, they are not evaluated, and they are not used to recognise you.

The storage is strictly necessary for the function you have called up (section 25(2) no. 2 of the German Telecommunications Digital Services Data Protection Act, TDDDG). You can remove the values at any time by deleting the website data for this site in your browser. The age check will then appear again.

8. No third-party services

Nothing is loaded from external servers when you open this website. In detail:

• Fonts are delivered with the website and are not fetched from a font service. Your IP address therefore reaches no third party.
• Maps are not embedded.
• Web beacons, audience measurement and tracking are not used, nor is there any analysis of user behaviour.
• Social network buttons and videos embedded from external platforms are likewise not used.

That is why no window asking for your consent appears on this website. There is nothing for you to consent to.

9. Your rights

In respect of your personal data, you have the following rights against me:

• Access to whether and which data I process about you (Art. 15 GDPR).
• Rectification of inaccurate data or completion of incomplete data (Art. 16 GDPR).
• Erasure of your data, unless a statutory retention obligation stands in the way (Art. 17 GDPR).
• Restriction of processing (Art. 18 GDPR).
• Data portability, that is release of the data in a common, machine-readable format (Art. 20 GDPR).

Right to object under Art. 21 GDPR: where I process data on the basis of my legitimate interest (Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR), you may object at any time on grounds arising from your particular situation.

For all of these matters an informal message to the address given in section 1 is enough. Exercising these rights is free of charge for you.

10. Right to lodge a complaint with the supervisory authority

If you take the view that the processing of your data infringes data protection law, you can lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority. The competent authority is:

Der Landesbeauftragte für den Datenschutz Niedersachsen (the State Commissioner for Data Protection of Lower Saxony)
Prinzenstraße 5
30159 Hannover
www.lfd.niedersachsen.de