LINKAGE | Terms of Services and Privacy Policy

PLEASE READ THIS LINKAGE TERMS OF SERVICE & PRIVACY POLICY (“PRIVACY POLICY”) CAREFULLY. THIS PRIVACY POLICY PERTAINS TO YOUR ACCESSING AND USING THE LINKAGE-LCPI.COM WEBSITE (THE “WEBSITE”).

The Website is operated by the Laboratory of Product Design and Innovation (“We” or “LCPI”) of Les Arts et Métiers Institute of Technology (“ENSAM”), Paris 75013, France. This Privacy Policy describes the Website copyrights and the information collected through Your use of the Website, how We use it, how We share it, how We protect it, and the choices You (“You”) can make about Your information.

ATTENTION: PLEASE READ OUR PRIVACY POLICY CAREFULLY BEFORE USING THE WEBSITE. ACCESSING, DOWNLOADING CONTENT FROM, OR USING THE WEBSITE INDICATES THAT YOU ACCEPT AND AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THIS PRIVACY POLICY IN FULL. IF YOU DO NOT ACCEPT THIS PRIVACY POLICY, DO NOT ACCESS, DOWNLOAD FROM, OR USE THE WEBSITE. You acknowledge (a) that You have read and understood this Privacy Policy; and (b) for users outside the European Union, this Privacy Policy shall have the same force and effect as a signed agreement.

Unless explicitly stated otherwise, any new features that augment or enhance the current Website shall be subject to this Privacy Policy.

Please review the Privacy Policy each time You use the Website. BY USING THE WEBSITE, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE MOST RECENT VERSION OF THE PRIVACY POLICY. If We materially change this Privacy Policy, We will update this page to reflect any changes to this Privacy Policy and will let You know by sending an email to the email address We have on record for You.

1. Information about the Website

A. Editor

The Website www.linkage-lcpi.com is edited and published by the LCPI, a research laboratory part of Les Arts et Métiers Institute of Technology, 151 Boulevard de l'Hôpital, 75013 PARIS, FRANCE

B. Host

The host of the Website is OVH, having its registered office at 2, rue Kellerman – 59100 ROUBAIX, FRANCE. You may contact OVH by phone (00 33 8 20 69 87 65) for any further information.

C. Website development

Director of the laboratory and scientific supervisor: Pr. Améziane Aoussat Scientific supervisor: Dr. Nicolas Maranzana Scientific development: Eliot Graeff Web development: Martin Marx

D. Copyright and intellectual properties

The entire Website of LINKAGE, including its content and presentation, is a work protected by International and French copyright laws.

The ownership, as well as its content and elements, is the exclusive property of LCPI and/or the ENSAM.

In order for this tool to remain free and scientifically relevant (please contact Us for any questions, remarks or projects), the content of the Website is submitted to a Creative Common License: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND)

This license allows others to download any elements of linkage website and share them with others as long as they credit Us, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially.

To credit this work, refer to the scientific publication presenting the tool:

For any questions, or adaptation for scientific publication, please contact Us at [email protected]

Any failure to comply with these terms and conditions or any misuse will be the subject of appropriate legal action.

2. Information We Collect

We collect information from You when You create a profile, use the Website, join a LINKAGE’s project or model, contact or interact with Us, fill out the project or model pages of the tool, and other contents in connection with using the Website.

A. Personal information You Provide to Us

When You create a profile, We may collect: Your name, email address, and Your field of expertise. Your password remains encrypted without Us having any access to.

When You contact Us, We may collect: Your name, email address, and any other information that You provide to Us voluntarily.

When You created, invite or join a Design team We may collect: Information regarding the team composition and organization.

B. Work information You Provide to Us

When You create a project or a model We may collect: All information that You enter, text or files You upload and references You add to the project.

C. Information We May Collect Automatically When You Use the Website

When You access and use the Website, We automatically collect information regarding You and Your device, including Your user name, roles/permissions for the Website, Your location, the Website features You use and the time of Your use and aggregated information that cannot be used to specifically identify You. Additional information collected is described in the Analytics and Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies sections below.

3. How We Use Your Information

We may use the information that We collect for several purposes, including:

The purposes for which You provided it;
To provide information and services to You;
To process and respond to Your inquiries and comments;
To send You information about Your relationship or transactions with Us;
To administer, operate, and improve the Website or develop new services;
To generate and review reports and data about Our user base and Website usage patterns;
To nurture scientific research and scientific publication of anonymized usage data (See section How Your information is disclosed);
To analyze the accuracy, effectiveness, usability or popularity of the Website;
To prevent fraud and abuse of the Website and to otherwise protect users and visitors and Our organization;

4. Legal Bases for Processing Your Information (For Users in European Union)

A. Performance of a Contract

The use of Your personal information may be necessary to perform the agreement You have with Us to provide products and services. For example, to register, to correspond with other users, to join LINKAGE tool for deeper access to the Website, and to respond to Your requests.

B. Legitimate Interests

We may use Your personal information for Our legitimate interests. LINKAGE is the embodiment of academic research studies. LINKAGE is a free working platform, providing You with cutting-edge guidance based on engineering design research. In turn, the access of the tool is possible only if You consent to the use of Your information to support Our research studies. We rely on Our legitimate interest to deliver Our services to Our users, to administer, analyze and improve Our services and the content on the Website, to improve biomimetic practice through research studies (who may be performed in collaboration with other research institute that may have access to Your data – see further under the section How Your Information is Disclosed), to send You notifications about Our services, for archiving, records keeping, statistical and analytical purposes, or to use Your personal information for administrative, audit, training, security, or legal purposes.

C. Consent

Prior to accessing this site and providing Your personal data, You may have provided Your informed consent to the collection and use of certain personal data. Insofar as other legal bases referred to in this section 3 for the processing of Your personal information do not apply, We may rely on Your consent as the legal basis for processing. You are free to withdraw Your consent at any time. See also the Your Choices Regarding Your Information section below.

D. Compliance with Legal Obligations

We may use Your personal information to comply with legal obligations to which We are subject, including to comply with legal process.

5. How Your Information is Disclosed

Information may be disclosed to third parties in accordance with Our Privacy Policy. Except in the case of an additional consent given by You, please note that all of Your data will be anonymized before any disclosure.

A. Partner Research Entities

We may collaborate with research partners to perform functions in connection with the Website and Our scientific studies, such as delivering announcements by email, website searching, analyzing and improving the Website usefulness, reliability, user experience, and operation, storing data, securing data, hosting data, migrating data, scientific studies, scientific communication including publication and conferences. We may share Your personal information with these providers and partners for their scientific inputs and expertise.

B. Scientific publications and conferences.

We may use Your information for scientific purposes leading to scientific publications and conferences. In these cases:

Your information will be anonymized and aggregated into clusters,
The information that You provide on the project and models will be anonymized and aggregated into clusters,
Before any scientific publication of conferences disclosing data gathered on the Website, You will receive an e-mail presenting You with the data that is to be published. Once the mail is received, You will have two weeks to ask for any changes based on the terms presented in this section. In the absence of a response, the dataset is considered as reviewed and authorized for publication.

C. Communication purposes.

We may also share anonymized statistics about the website (such as the number of users, completed project, the sector using the tool, etc.) for communication and dissemination purposes.

D. Affiliates.

We may also share Your information with Our affiliates for purposes consistent with this Privacy Policy. Our affiliates will be required to maintain that information in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

E. Investigations and Law.

We may disclose information about You to third parties if We believe that such disclosure is necessary to:

Comply with the law or guidance and cooperate with government or law enforcement officials or private parties;
Investigate, prevent or take action regarding suspected illegal activities, suspected fraud, the rights, reputation, safety, and property of Us, users or others, or violations of Our policies or other agreements with Us;
Respond to claims and legal process (for example, subpoenas); and/or
Protect against legal liability.

H. Analytics.

We use third party analytics tools to better understand who is using the Website and how people are using it. These tools may use cookies and other technologies to collect information about Your use of the Website and Your preferences and activities. These tools collect information sent by Your device or the Website and other information that assists Us in improving the Website. This information may be used to, among other things, analyze and track data, determine the popularity of certain content, and better understand Your online activity.

We use Google Analytics to conduct user ID tracking for logged-in users and to better understand who is using the Website and how people are using it. Google Analytics uses cookies, pixel tags, and other technologies to collect and store information such as Website pages visited, places where users click, time spent on each Website page, Internet Protocol address, type of operating system used, location-based data, device ID, search history, gender, age, and phone number. We use this information to improve the Website and as otherwise described in this Privacy Policy. Please see http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/ for information about how Google Analytics uses this information, and visit https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout for information about the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on. Google may track Your activity over time and across websites.

We use Hotjar to better understand how the Website is being used. Hotjar conducts user ID tracking for logged-in users and uses cookies, pixel tags, and other technologies to collect information regarding users and their actions on the Website including clicks, taps, swipes, form submissions, and page views. For more information about the information that Hotjar may collect, please visit https://www.hotjar.com/legal/policies/terms-of-service.

I. Cookies

We use cookies to ensure the proper functioning of Our site (session cookies) and to measure its audience (count the number of visitors and know their paths) and produce statistics./p>

These cookies allow Us to improve Your experience on Our Website, but no personally identifiable information from cookies is stored.

Most browsers have options in their menus that allow You to set Your cookie management. Please note that if You choose to block Our cookies, Your browsing may be affected, and some features of Our Website will be disabled. If You configure Your browser to delete all cookies, the browsing preferences and data entered will be deleted when You close Your browser.

Please note that unless You have adjusted Your browser settings to refuse cookies, Our system will issue cookies as soon as You visit Our site.

To learn more about cookies, We invite You to visit the CNIL page: Cookies: the tools to control them.

6. Security

We implement a variety of security measures to protect the safety of Your personal information when You enter, submit, or access Your personal information.

While We take reasonable measures to protect the information You submit via the Website against loss, theft and unauthorized use, disclosure, or modification, We cannot guarantee its absolute security. No Internet, email, or mobile application transmission is ever fully secure or error free. Email or other messages sent through the Website may not be secure. You should use caution whenever submitting information through the Website and take special care in deciding with which information You provide Us.

We cannot guarantee that transmissions of Your personal information will be fully secure and that third parties will never be able to defeat Our security measures or the security measures of Our partners. WE ASSUME NO LIABILITY FOR DISCLOSURE OF YOUR INFORMATION DUE TO TRANSMISSION ERRORS, THIRD-PARTY ACCESS OR CAUSES BEYOND OUR CONTROL. Any information collected through the Website is stored and processed in France. If You use Our Website outside of France, You consent to have Your data transferred to France.

The entire elements of the LINKAGE Website are disclosed as is, without any warranty of any kind, express or implied, and in particular no guaranty of non-infringement. LCPI is not liable for any direct, indirect or immaterial damage, in particular that may result from a defect, error, omission, interruption, internet failure or computer virus.

7. Data Retention Policy, Managing Your Information

We will retain Your information for as long as You use the Website and for a reasonable time thereafter. We may maintain anonymized or aggregated data, including usage data, for scientific and analytics purposes.

8. Links to Other Websites or Applications

This Privacy Policy applies only to the Website. The Website may contain links to other websites or apps or may forward users to other websites or apps that We may not own or operate and to which this Privacy Policy does not apply. The links from the Website do not imply that We endorse or have reviewed these websites or apps. The policies and procedures We describe here do not apply to these websites or apps. We neither can control nor are responsible for the privacy practices or content of these websites or apps. We suggest contacting these websites or app providers directly for information on their privacy policies. Nonetheless, We seek to protect the integrity of Our Website, and welcome any feedback about these linked websites and mobile applications.

9. Your Choices Regarding Your Information

You have choices regarding the use of information by the Website.

Changing Your Information – You may request to review, update, or have deleted any personal information collected from You through the Website. Just send Us an email asking to review or update Your personal information, or to have Us delete Your personal information. To change Your information, please login to Your account and edit Your profile or contact Us at [email protected].
Withdrawing Consent – If You are an individual residing in the EU, and You provided Your consent for any particular processing of Your personal information, You have the right to withdraw Your consent to Our processing of Your information any time. You may also request that Your personal information be deleted. See further under the section EU Privacy Rights below. This deletion is permanent, and Your information cannot be reinstated. To proceed with this request, please email [email protected]. SINCE THE WEBSITE WORKS BASED ON DATA, BE AWARE THAT IF YOU WITHDRAW YOUR CONSENT FOR THE “TERMS AND POLICY”, YOUR ACCOUNT WILL BE DELETED AND THAT THIS DELETION IS PERMANENT, YOUR ACCOUNT CANNOT BE REINSTATED.

10. French and EU Privacy Rights

In accordance with the amended French law n°78-17 of January 6th 1978 and with the European General Data Protection Regulation n°2016/679 of April 14th 2016 relating to general data protection, You have the right to access, modify, delete and oppose for legitimate reasons Your information. If You wish to exercise this right and obtain information about yourself, please send Your request by registered mail with acknowledgement of receipt to LCPI-ENSAM, 151, boulevard de l'Hôpital, 75013 PARIS, FRANCE.

11. Changes to Privacy Policy

We reserve the right to update or modify this Privacy Policy at any time and from time to time without prior notice. Please review this Privacy Policy periodically, and especially before You provide any information. This Privacy Policy was made effective on the date indicated above.

12. How to Contact Us

For any enquiries or complaints relating to the use of Your personal information or this Privacy Policy, please feel free to contact Us by emailing Us at [email protected] or by writing Us at LCPI, ENSAM, 151 boulevard de l’hôpital 75013, Paris, France.

Terms of Service & Privacy Policy Last update on January 15, 2020