Privacy Policy

Click here for the German version.

General information

The protection of your personal data is very important to us. We therefore ask you to read the following privacy policy carefully and thus inform yourself about your rights.

The aim of this statement is to inform you about the purpose and extent to which your personal data is processed when you use our website. If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact the responsible person at any time.

This website uses SSL or TLS encryption for security reasons and to protect the transmission of personal data and other confidential content (e.g. orders or requests to the person responsible). You can recognize an encrypted connection by the string https:// and the lock symbol in your browser line.

Name and address of the controller

The responsible party within the meaning of the General Data Protection Regulation (hereinafter: GDPR), other data protection laws applicable in the Member States of the European Union and other provisions of a data protection nature is:

PowChess GmbH
Schmaler Weg 14B
61352 Bad Homburg
Germany
Tel: +49 157 71946466
E-Mail: info@powchess.com

Your rights

  1. Nach den anwendbaren Gesetzen haben Sie verschiedene Rechte bezüglich Ihrer personenbezogenen Daten.
    • Right to confirmation and information
    • Right to rectification
    • Right to erasure (right to be forgotten)
    • Right to restriction of processing
    • Right to data portability
    • Right to object
    • Right to revoke consent granted under data protection law

    If you wish to exercise these rights, please send your request by e-mail or by post, clearly identifying yourself, to the above address.

  2. You also have the right to complain to a data protection supervisory authority about the processing of your personal data by us.

Collection of personal data when visiting our website

  1. During the mere informational use of our website, i.e. if you do not register or otherwise transmit information to us, we only collect the personal data that your browser transmits to our server (so-called "server log files"). If you wish to view our website, we collect the following data, which is technically necessary for us to display our website to you and to ensure the stability, functionality and security of our website:
    • our visited website
    • IP address used (in anonymized form, if applicable)
    • date and time of access
    • time zone difference to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)
    • access status / HTTP status code
    • amount of data transferred in each case in bytes
    • website from which you came to the page (source/reference)
    • browser used
    • operating system used and its interface
    • language and version of the browser software.
  2. If registration takes place, we also collect personal information such as the username and email address. The legal basis for this collection is Art. 6 para. 1 p. 1 lit. b GDPR.
  3. You may also post voluntary information, such as your real name, location information, links to your personal social media sites (Twitter, YouTube, Chess.com, lichess, Twitch), pictures and connections to other players ("Friends"). Providing the additional information described in this section is completely voluntary.

Handling comments and posts

If you leave a post or comment on this website, your IP address and possibly your username will be stored. This is done on the basis of our legitimate interests within the meaning of Art. 6 para. 1 lit. f. GDPR and serves the security of us as website operator: Because if your comment violates applicable law, we can be prosecuted for it, which is why we have an interest in the identity of the comment or post author.

Data processing via the use of our website with cookies

  1. Like many other websites, we also use so-called cookies. Cookies are small text files that are stored on your hard drive associated with the browser you are using and through which certain information flows to the entity that sets the cookie. Cookies cannot execute programs or transmit viruses to your computer. They are used to recognize the user's device and to make any default settings immediately available and help us to make the website as a whole more user-friendly and effective and to enable the use of certain functions.
  2. We use essential cookies whose use is necessary for the proper functioning of the website. In addition, we use statistical and marketing cookies that help us understand how visitors use our website and allow us to serve personalized advertising by tracking visitors across multiple websites.
  3. We also use session cookies. These cookies temporarily store your username and user ID, allowing us to track your movements from one page to another without asking you for such information again to authenticate you.
  4. The use of cookies is based on your consent given in the cookie consent, legal basis is Art. 6 para. 1 p. 1 lit. a) GDPR.
  5. You can configure your browser settings according to your preferences and, for example, refuse to accept third-party cookies or all cookies. You can also choose to be informed about the setting of cookies and decide individually whether to accept them. Each browser differs in the way it manages cookie settings. This is described in the help menu of each browser, which explains how you can change your cookie settings.

    You can find these for the respective browsers under the following links:

    Please note that if you do not accept cookies, the functionality of our website may be limited.

Leaderboards

  1. To determine the most active players on our website, we have introduced a leaderboard. There all players from all over the world can compete against each other. In order for the rankings to be visible to every player, profile names and profile pictures, as well as ratings and player statistics of the individual accounts are stored and made publicly available. Also stored is how many Activity Points, transactions and winnings (only from the Activity Leaderboard) a profile has made on this website.
  2. The legal basis for the aforementioned data processing is Art. 6 para. 1 lit. b) GDPR.

Other functions and services of our website

  1. In addition to the purely informational use of our website, we offer various services that you can use if you are interested. For this purpose, you usually have to provide further personal data, which we use to provide the respective service and for which the aforementioned data processing principles apply.

    In some cases, we use external service providers to process your data. These have been carefully selected and commissioned by us, are bound by our instructions and are regularly monitored.

  2. Furthermore, we inform you in the respective offer about a transfer of your data outside the European Economic Area (EEA).

Requests via e-mail

  1. If you send us inquiries via e-mail, your information will be stored for the purpose of processing the inquiry and in case of follow-up questions. It is necessary to provide your name and an e-mail address. The provision of a telephone number and other data is voluntary and serves to facilitate contact and to be able to address you personally. This data is stored and used exclusively for the purpose of responding to your request or for contacting you and the associated technical administration. The legal basis for processing the data is our legitimate interest in responding to your request pursuant to Art. 6 (1) lit. f GDPR.
  2. Your data will be deleted after final processing of your request. This is the case when the circumstances indicate that the matter in question has been conclusively clarified and provided that there are no statutory retention obligations to the contrary.

Social Media

  1. In addition to the online presence on this website, we also present ourselves on YouTube, Instagram, Twitch, Discord, Telegram and Twitter. This website contains corresponding links to our respective presences. If you click on these, you will be redirected to the respective page of the selected social network, where you can either log in with your own profile (if you are not already logged in) or view our profile as a non-logged-in user.
  2. Data is collected by the respective provider whose page you have accessed. By merely viewing our page, no data is transmitted to the respective providers due to the social media links.
  3. You can view the privacy statements of the respective providers on their websites. Further information on the purpose and scope of data collection and its processing by the provider can be found in the data protection declarations of these providers communicated below. There you will also receive further information about your rights in this regard and setting options for protecting your privacy.
  4. Addresses of the respective plug-in providers and URL with their privacy notices:

Use of Google Analytics

  1. This website uses Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google Ireland Ltd. (Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland, hereinafter "Google"). Google Analytics uses "cookies", which are text files placed on your computer, to help the website analyze how users use the site. The information generated by the cookie about your use of this website is usually transmitted to a Google server and stored there.
  2. The legal basis for the use of Google Analytics is your consent given when you first visit our website pursuant to Art. 6 para. 1 p. 1 lit. a) GDPR. You can revoke your consent at any time with effect for the future by making the appropriate selection in the cookie settings or by preventing the storage of cookies through an appropriate setting in your browser software; however, we would like to point out that in the latter case you may not be able to use all the functions of this website to their full extent.
  3. However, since we have activated IP anonymization on this website, your IP address will be truncated beforehand by Google within member states of the European Union or in other contracting states to the Agreement on the European Economic Area. Only in exceptional cases will the full IP address be transmitted to a Google server in the USA and shortened there. On our behalf, Google will use this information for the purpose of evaluating your use of the website, compiling reports on website activity and providing other services relating to website activity and internet usage. The IP address transmitted by your browser as part of Google Analytics will not be merged with other data from Google.
  4. Please see our current notice on the EU-US Privacy Shield Agreement at the end of this statement.

Objection and revocation regarding the processing of your data

  1. If you have consented to the processing of your data, you have the permanent option to revoke this processing for the future. This means that your data will no longer be processed for the agreed purpose.
  2. If your data is processed on the basis of a balancing of interests according to the legal basis Art. 6 para. 1 p. 1 lit. e or f GDPR, you can object to this if you provide specific reasons against the processing of the data.
  3. Likewise, you have the option to object to the processing of your data for the purpose of direct marketing. Thus, your data will no longer be processed for the purpose of direct marketing.

Current notice

In its ruling of July 16, 2020, the ECJ determined that the EU-US Privacy Shield Agreement is invalid because the European level of data protection cannot be guaranteed for data processing operations that take place in the USA. However, providers such as Google in particular also process personal data in the USA. According to the ECJ, the USA is a so-called "unsafe third country". This means in particular that, for example, U.S. authorities can access the user data available to the service and that there are no legal protection options against this, as provided for in the GDPR. The consents that you have declared as part of the cookie consent therefore expressly extend to the fact that the corresponding personal data will also be processed in the USA.