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Privacy Policy

This English version is provided for convenience. Only the German version is legally binding.

1. Who is responsible

iQ-ME GmbH Eupener Straße 59 50933 Köln Germany Represented by the managing director Heinrich Ingensiep Email: kontakt@iq-me.de

2. The key points in brief

  • Our website does without analytics and advertising tools. It sets no cookies when you visit and embeds no content from third-party providers.
  • You write a message to us in your own email program. We only receive your details once you send it.
  • In the iQ-ME BASE platform, we process our customers’ data on their behalf. The respective customer company is responsible for this data, not us.

3. Who is responsible for what

Website: For processing when you visit our website and when you contact us, we are the controller within the meaning of Art. 4(7) GDPR.

iQ-ME BASE platform: Each customer uses the platform in its own instance. The customer company is the controller for all data that is entered, uploaded or provided through connections there. This also applies to the accounts of its users. We process this data exclusively as a processor under Art. 28 GDPR, on the customer’s instructions and in accordance with the data processing agreement concluded with the customer.

If you are a user at one of our customers, please therefore first contact your employer or client with questions about your data. We forward any requests we receive to them.

Within the platform, we are a controller in our own right only for the data that we ourselves need for performing the contract with the customer, for billing and for the security of our systems.

4. Visiting our website

4.1 Accessing the pages

When you access the site, our server processes technically necessary data: IP address, date and time, the address requested, the amount of data transferred, the page visited before, and browser and operating system. Without this data, the page cannot be delivered.

We use the data to deliver the page, to remedy faults and to fend off attacks. The data is not combined with other data. We delete the access logs after [14] days, unless a security incident has to be investigated.

The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR. Our legitimate interest lies in a secure and functioning service.

4.2 Language

We display the site in the language of your browser: German if your browser is set to German, otherwise English. We store nothing for this.

If you choose a language yourself using the language switcher, we store this choice in a cookie named “sub_locale” for one year. It contains only the language code. Storage is strictly necessary to provide the service you have expressly requested and is therefore permitted without consent under Section 25(2) no. 2 TDDDG.

4.3 Light or dark mode

The site follows your device’s setting. If you choose light or dark yourself, your browser stores this choice locally under “nuxt-color-mode”. This information does not leave your device. The same legal basis applies as for the language.

4.4 Fonts and icons

We deliver fonts and icons from our own server. No connection to providers such as Google is established when you visit.

4.5 No analytics, no advertising

We use no analytics, tracking or advertising tools, no pixels and no embedded content from social networks, videos or maps.

4.6 Contact by email

The buttons “Book a first conversation” and “Let’s talk about it” open your own email program with a prepared text. If you have marked places on the page with “I know this”, this selection appears in the text. Your selection is neither stored nor transmitted on the page itself.

We receive your details only when you send the message: your email address, your name and the content. We use them to answer your enquiry and to prepare a conversation.

The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR insofar as your enquiry aims at a contract, and otherwise Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR. Our email mailbox is operated by [provider, registered office] on our behalf.

Please note: an ordinary email is not encrypted in transit in every case. Please therefore send us confidential documents only after we have agreed a secure channel.

4.7 Preview image when sharing

If you share a link to our website in a network or messaging service, its server retrieves a preview image from our site. What that service processes in doing so is determined solely by its operator in accordance with its own privacy terms.

4.8 Links to other sites

If a link leads to a third-party site, the privacy policy of its operator applies there. We are not responsible for processing on third-party sites.

5. Using the iQ-ME BASE platform

This section explains how the platform handles data technically. Which data a customer enters into its instance, for what purpose and on what legal basis is decided and is the responsibility of the customer (see Section 3).

5.1 Account and login

For an account, we process name, email address, role, password (only as an encrypted verification value) and, if set up, the details of two-factor authentication. After login, the platform sets a session cookie. It is technically necessary for login and ends on logout or when the session expires. For each session we store the IP address and browser identifier in order to detect misuse.

For invitations, password resets and notifications, we send emails through a delivery service (Section 5.6).

5.2 Change log

The platform records who changed or confirmed what in the model and when. The log serves the traceability of the company model and is part of the service ordered by the customer.

5.3 AI functions in basic access

Functions such as suggestions, evaluations, reading out documents and research use large language models. For this, the platform transmits the content required in each case to a language model and receives a response. In basic access, these requests run through an AI gateway to the provider set in the instance. All parties involved are named in Section 5.6.

The response of a language model is a suggestion. It enters the customer’s model only once a person has reviewed and confirmed it.

5.4 The customer’s own AI model

If a customer stores its own key from an AI provider, the requests go directly to that provider. The customer has its own contract with the provider. The customer alone is responsible for ensuring that this transmission is permissible, including to third countries. In this case, the provider is neither our subprocessor nor our recipient. Research functions always use a model from Anthropic: with the customer’s own Anthropic key, if stored, otherwise through basic access.

5.5 Connections to other systems

If a customer connects its own systems, such as ERP, SharePoint, Shopware or Akeneo, the platform takes over data from these systems into its instance. The customer determines which systems are connected and which data flows. We store the access credentials in encrypted form.

5.6 Service providers and recipients

We use carefully selected service providers who process data only on our instructions and with whom data processing agreements are in place.

Service providerTaskRegistered office
[hosting provider]Operation of servers and databases[country]
Vercel Inc.AI gateway in basic accessUSA
Anthropic PBCLanguage models (Claude), researchUSA
OpenAILanguage models (GPT), only if selected in the instanceUSA
GoogleLanguage models (Gemini), only if selected in the instanceUSA
ResendSending the platform’s emailsUSA
seven.ioSMS notification in case of faults, only if set upGermany

5.7 Transfers to third countries

Some service providers are based in the USA. We transfer data there only if the recipient is certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework (Art. 45 GDPR) or if the EU Commission’s standard contractual clauses have been agreed with it (Art. 46(2)(c) GDPR). You can obtain a copy of the safeguards on request.

5.8 Institute: anonymous patterns only

To improve the method and the platform for all customers, we derive anonymous, aggregated patterns on our customers’ instructions, such as frequent questions or impact relationships. A pattern contains no names, no content verbatim and nothing from which a company or a person can be identified. It is used only once it originates from at least five tenants and no characteristic applies to fewer than three companies. Anonymous patterns are no longer personal data.

6. How long we store data

We store personal data only as long as the respective purpose requires. After that, we delete it, unless statutory retention periods require otherwise, in particular up to ten years under commercial and tax law. We delete data in a customer’s instance on the customer’s instructions and, after the end of the contract, in accordance with our contract with the customer.

7. Security

We protect data through technical and organisational measures under Art. 32 GDPR. These include encrypted transmission, separate instances for each customer, encrypted storage of access keys and a permissions concept with graded roles. Nobody can guarantee complete protection during transmission over the internet.

8. Your rights

Under the GDPR, you have the right to

  • access to your data stored by us (Art. 15),
  • rectification of inaccurate data (Art. 16),
  • erasure (Art. 17),
  • restriction of processing (Art. 18),
  • data portability (Art. 20).

Right to object: If we process data on the basis of Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR, you may object at any time on grounds relating to your particular situation (Art. 21 GDPR). We will then no longer process the data, unless we demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds or the processing serves the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims.

To do so, write to us at kontakt@iq-me.de. If your request concerns data in the instance of one of our customers, we forward it to that customer (Section 3).

9. Complaint to a supervisory authority

You can lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority. The authority responsible for us is the State Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information of North Rhine-Westphalia (Landesbeauftragte für Datenschutz und Informationsfreiheit Nordrhein-Westfalen), Kavalleriestraße 2–4, 40213 Düsseldorf, Germany.

10. No automated decisions

We make no decisions based solely on automated processing that produce legal effects concerning you (Art. 22 GDPR). In the platform, too, a person always decides.

11. Changes

We adapt this policy when our offering or the legal situation changes. The version published here from time to time applies.

Last updated: [date of publication]