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Privacy policy

This translation is provided for information only. The German version is legally binding. Deutsche Fassung

1. Controller

The controller within the meaning of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is:
Robert Jank, Backesweg 32a, 63477 Maintal, Germany
Email: kontakt@openmyconet.de · Phone: +49 6181 4346300

2. Hosting and server log files

This website runs on a server of Hetzner Online GmbH, Industriestr. 25, 91710 Gunzenhausen, Germany, in a data centre in Helsinki (Finland, EU). A data processing agreement (Art. 28 GDPR) is in place with Hetzner.

When the website is accessed, the server automatically stores the following information in log files: IP address, date and time, requested address, status code, amount of data transferred, previously visited page (referrer), and browser type and operating system. This data is not combined with other data sources and is deleted automatically after 14 days. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (legitimate interest in the secure and stable operation of the website).

3. Domain and email

The domain openmyconet.de and the email mailbox are provided by ALL-INKL.COM – Neue Medien Münnich, Hauptstraße 68, 02742 Friedersdorf, Germany. The website also sends its emails (confirmations, sign-in links, newsletters) via this mailbox, transmitted in encrypted form (TLS). A data processing agreement (Art. 28 GDPR) is in place with ALL-INKL.

4. Registration (member account)

When you register, we store: email address (required), name, country, area of interest and language (optional), and, as proof of registration, the IP address and time. We delete the IP address automatically after six months; the time is kept as proof. You confirm your email address via a link (double opt-in). You then sign in without a password using a sign-in link that we send to you by email. The account gives you access to the protected area, e.g. the BioComm Data Lab.

We use the data for your account and for project-related communication with you; it is not passed on to third parties. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (use of the account you requested). You can have your account deleted at any time by emailing kontakt@openmyconet.de.

5. Newsletter and news notifications

We only send newsletters and notifications about new posts if you have expressly consented — by ticking the box when registering or via a confirmation link. We store the time of your consent as proof. Each of these emails contains a link that lets you unsubscribe with one click. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR (consent); you can withdraw your consent at any time without affecting the lawfulness of processing carried out before the withdrawal.

You will receive emails needed to use your account (address confirmation, sign-in link) regardless of this.

6. Applying as a node operator

If you apply to operate a BioComm measurement node, we store: name, email address, role, profession, substrate, address or location with coordinates, your motivation, language and IP address. We use this information solely to select and support node operators. Exact locations are never published (see section 13). The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (pre-contractual measures). Applications that are not accepted are deleted automatically 6 months after the rejection.

7. Contact form

If you write to us via the contact form, we store your name, email address, phone number (optional), subject, message and IP address in order to handle your enquiry. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) or (f) GDPR. We delete the enquiry automatically 6 months after receipt.

8. Contact initiated by OpenMycoNet

If we approach you by email about the project as an expert or organisation, we store your name, your academic title where applicable, your email address, the language, the date of our first contact and of any follow-ups, your response and internal notes on the occasion, in order to keep track of the contact. This information comes from publicly accessible sources, such as your institution’s website, or from previous contact. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR; our legitimate interest is professional exchange and the initiation of cooperations. You can object to this processing at any time, for example with a short reply to our email; we will then delete your information and not contact you again. If you do not object, we delete the information automatically 2 years after the last contact.

9. Scientific exchange by invitation

If we continue a professional conversation that began, for example, on LinkedIn or by email in a protected exchange space, we invite you to it by email. For this we store your name, your email address, your institution where applicable, your preferred language and form of address, a title and a short topic overview and – visible only to our team – where applicable a link to your public profile, the date the conversation began and a short summary of the previous conversation written by us. We do not copy third-party texts such as LinkedIn messages. This information comes from our previous contact with you. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR; our legitimate interest is continuing the professional exchange. The invitation also contains this information.

If you accept the invitation, you confirm this with a code that we send to your email address. We then create an account or link your existing account without changing its role or settings; you will not receive a newsletter as a result. In the exchange space we store the tasks, comments and files that you or we share there; they are visible only to you and the OpenMycoNet team. We inform you of new entries by email. Before your first visit we show a personal foreword by the initiator and store the time and version of your acknowledgement. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (use of the exchange space). Taking part is free of charge and independent of any financial support.

Storage period: if you do not accept an invitation, we delete the information 2 years after our last contact – the same period as for contact under section 8; invitations that were only prepared and never sent are deleted after one month. We delete the profile link, the start date of the conversation and the summary 24 months after the last activity in the exchange. We delete an ended or blocked exchange space, including all content and files, 6 months afterwards. In individual cases, for example where statutory documentation obligations apply, we may suspend deletion for a limited period. You can object or request deletion at any time (kontakt@openmyconet.de); we will then delete immediately, regardless of these periods.

10. Scientific topic rooms

In the topic rooms, participants discuss scientific questions together. Currently invited persons can take part; in future, presumably all registered members – we will announce such an extension in advance. On your first visit you choose a display name and agree to the rules of use; we store the display name, the time and version of your agreement and your display settings. For your subject areas, discussions and posts we store the text, the chosen language, the optional type of post, attached files and the times. This content and your display name are visible to all participants of the topic rooms, your email address is not. Before your first visit we show a personal foreword by the initiator and store the time and version of your acknowledgement. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (use of the topic rooms).

Notifications: anyone who creates a discussion, posts in it or follows it via “Follow” receives an email notification about new posts – with the title of the discussion and the display name, without the text of the post – and the next one only after their next visit to the discussion. For this, we store which discussions you follow and when you last viewed them or received a notification; this information is deleted together with your account or the discussion. You can unsubscribe at any time via the link in every notification, via “Unfollow” or in the topic room settings. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR.

Posts are licensed under CC BY 4.0 and may be reused with attribution to the display name. You can remove your own posts at any time; the text, files and translations are then deleted and a placeholder remains. If your account is deleted, your posts remain without a name as “former member”, so that knowledge built up together and the replies of others remain understandable; your display name and participation data are deleted. The legal basis for this is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR; our legitimate interest and that of the other participants is a complete scientific discussion. You can object or request the deletion of individual posts, for example if they contain personal information (kontakt@openmyconet.de); we review this case by case.

Our team may hide posts that violate the rules of use; hidden posts are deleted permanently 6 months after being hidden. Apart from automatic translation (next paragraph), we do not pass on the content.

Automatic translation: So that participants with different languages can discuss with each other, titles, descriptions and posts in the topic rooms are translated automatically when someone views them in another language of the website. For this, we transmit only the respective text to Anthropic, without display name, email address, IP address or other identifiers; Anthropic generates the translation from it. The contractual partner, processing in the USA, Standard Contractual Clauses and the exclusion of training are governed as for the chatbot (section 12). We store the translation alongside the original and delete it at the latest together with the original; if the original changes, the translation is no longer shown. The original is always authoritative; translations are marked as automatic and may contain errors. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR; our legitimate interest and that of the participants is a multilingual scientific discussion. You can object at any time: in the settings of the topic rooms you can switch off the translation of your own texts; we then delete existing translations, and this continues to apply after an account is deleted. Please do not write anything in the topic rooms that should not be transmitted to this service provider.

11. Supporters, cooperations and payments

For support and cooperation agreements, we store the information from the application (company or organisation, contact person, email address, description, website, category, logo, amount) as well as the invoice number and payment details. After review and your approval of the preview, we publish the name, logo, short description and website link on the supporters page.

PayPal payments are processed by PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. et Cie, S.C.A., 22–24 Boulevard Royal, L-2449 Luxembourg; PayPal's privacy statement applies there. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR (contract) and, for invoices, Art. 6(1)(c) GDPR (statutory retention obligations of up to 10 years).

12. Chatbot

The website offers a chatbot that answers questions about OpenMycoNet. Your question is transmitted, together with matching passages from our website, to Anthropic, which generates the answer. Our contractual partner is Anthropic Ireland, Limited (Ireland); processing also takes place in the USA, in particular at Anthropic PBC, 548 Market Street, San Francisco, CA 94104. The transfer to the USA is based on the EU Standard Contractual Clauses (Art. 46(2)(c) GDPR), which form part of our data processing agreement with Anthropic. According to these contractual terms, Anthropic does not use the data to train its models. We do not transmit your IP address or any other identifiers, and the chat window points this out. We store the question and answer without the IP address for 90 days to improve the chatbot and then delete them automatically. Please do not enter any personal data in the chat. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (legitimate interest in a helpful information service).

13. Measurement data from BioComm nodes

Measurement data transmitted by BioComm nodes contains no personal data. We publish the location of a node only as a 10 × 10 km grid cell; the exact location is stored separately with special protection and is never published. Nodes are identified by a device ID, not by the operator's name. All measurement data is published under the Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 licence.

14. Cookies and local storage

We do not use cookies for advertising or analytics and do not use any tracking services.

  • Language cookie omn_lang: When you choose a language (flag or language link), we store this choice in a cookie for one year so that all pages appear in your language. It contains only the language code (e.g. “en”).
  • Sign-in cookie: When you sign in to the members' area (e.g. the Data Lab), the supporters' area or the admin area, we set a session cookie. It contains only a signed session identifier and is deleted when you close your browser.
  • Local storage in the browser: Display settings such as the language or the playback position of the music player are stored in your browser's local storage; they are not transmitted to us.

This storage is strictly necessary for the functions you request; the legal basis is § 25(2) no. 2 TDDDG (German Telecommunications Digital Services Data Protection Act) in conjunction with Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR. No consent is required for this.

The PayPal payment route takes you to the PayPal website; cookies set there are outside our control.

15. Fonts

This website uses fonts (Playfair Display, JetBrains Mono, Lora) that are stored locally on our server. No data is transmitted to third parties.

16. Map service (OpenStreetMap)

The Leaflet map library is served from our own server; no data is transmitted to third parties in the process.

In the application form for a BioComm node you can use a location map with address search. It is switched off at first. Only when you click “Enable map and address search (OpenStreetMap)” are map tiles loaded from the servers of the OpenStreetMap Foundation (tile.openstreetmap.org) and the address you entered sent to the Nominatim geocoding service (nominatim.openstreetmap.org); in each case your IP address is also transmitted to the server concerned. The legal basis is your consent (Art. 6(1)(a) GDPR), which you give by clicking; it applies only to the current page visit. You can submit the application just as well without the map. Further information: privacy policy of the OpenStreetMap Foundation.

17. Error log and backups

If a technical error occurs on the website, we store the time, requested address, IP address and error message in order to fix the error; we delete these entries automatically after 90 days. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

For login attempts to the administration area, we store the time, IP address and result in order to detect attacks, and delete these entries after 90 days. After repeated failed attempts, the IP address is temporarily blocked (for at most one hour). The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

To protect against data loss, we back up the database daily in encrypted form to storage provided by Hetzner Online GmbH in the EU. Deleted data disappears from these backups as they expire on their regular schedule.

18. Your rights

You have the following rights with regard to your data:

  • Right of access (Art. 15 GDPR)
  • Right to rectification (Art. 16 GDPR)
  • Right to erasure (Art. 17 GDPR)
  • Right to restriction of processing (Art. 18 GDPR)
  • Right to data portability (Art. 20 GDPR)
  • Right to object (Art. 21 GDPR)
  • Right to withdraw consent with effect for the future (Art. 7(3) GDPR)

To exercise your rights, please contact: kontakt@openmyconet.de

19. Right to lodge a complaint

You have the right to lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority about the processing of your personal data. The competent authority for Hesse is the Hessian Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information.

20. Changes

We reserve the right to update this privacy policy to adapt it to changes in the law or in our services. As of: 28 September 2026.

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