Springer Medicine Privacy Policy

This is the privacy policy (“policy”) for the website springermedicine.com and the related apps which is run and provided by Springer Medizin Verlag GmbH, Heidelberger Platz 3, 14197 Berlin, email: info@springermedicine.com (we, us and our).

We will only use the personal data gathered over this website as set out in this policy. Below you will find information on how we use your personal data, for which purposes your personal data is used, with whom it is shared and what control and information rights you may have.

I. Summary of our processing activities

The following summary provides you with a quick overview of the processing activities that are undertaken on our website. You will find more detailed information under the indicated sections below.

When you visit our website for informational reasons without setting up an account, only limited personal data will be processed to provide you with the website itself (see section III).

In case you register for one of our services (e.g. discussion forum, blog or web shop) or subscribe to our newsletter, further personal data will be processed in the scope of such services (see sections IV, V and VI).
Furthermore, upon your consent we may use cookies and comparable ad-tech tools to provide you with interesting advertising for our services and products (see section VIII) and for statistical analysis that helps us to improve our website (see section VIII.5). Additionally, we improve your website experience with third party content (see section IX).
Your personal data may be disclosed to third parties (see section IX.2), that might be located outside your country of residence; potentially, different data protection standards may apply (see section IX.3).
We have implemented appropriate safeguards to secure your personal data (see section X) and retain your personal data only as long as necessary (see section XI).
Under the legislation applicable to you, you may be entitled to exercise certain rights with regard to the processing of your personal data (see section XII).

II. Definitions

Personal data: means any information relating to a natural person who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, or an online identifier.
Processing: means any operation which is performed on personal data, such as collection, recording, organisation, structuring, storage, adaptation or any kind of disclosure or other use.

III. Informational use of the website

When you visit our website for informational reasons, i.e. without registering for any of our provided services listed under section IV and without providing us with personal data in any other form, we may automatically collect additional information about you which will contain personal data only in limited cases and which is automatically recognised by our server, such as:

your device type, name and screen resolution;
information on your browser version;
information on your operating system, including language settings;
the date and time of your requests;
the content of your requests;

We use such information only to assist us in providing an effective service (e.g. to adapt our website to the needs of your device or to allow you to log in to our website).

The personal data automatically collected is necessary for us to provide the website, Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b GDPR, and for our legitimate interest to guarantee the website’s stability and security, Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f GDPR.

Personal data that is collected automatically is retained for 1 month and properly erased afterwards.

In the event of an error or technical problem occurring on the website, certain data is stored in so-called log files. A log file consists of the date and time of the occurrence of the error. In this context, we would like to point out as a precaution that our log files do not contain IP addresses. Our log files are therefore completely anonymous.

IV. Registration for our services

With springermedicine.com we provide a specialist portal aimed at European health care professionals, e.g. physicians, dentists, veterinarians, pharmacists and other persons who legally trade in prescription-only medicines. In order to use the aforementioned services you have to set up an account (“registration“).

With regard to the registration of an account and its subsequent use, we use the authentication service of Springer Nature GmbH, Heidelberger Platz 3, 14197 Berlin, a separate service used as a global platform for user identification and login for springermedicine.com and the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature Group. To read the General Terms and Conditions of Use applicable to the Authentication Service please click here, the Authentication Service Privacy Policy can be found below.

When logging in on springermedicine.com through the authentication service with your login data after registration we send the data you enter into the login form (usually your email address and a password) to the server of the authentication service together with a service URL. Based on these data the service validates your access requests. If access is granted the authentication service transfers the unique user ID generated for your user account. With these data we can provide you with the personalised settings you may already have selected on springermedicine.com. In addition we can request relevant data required for providing services from the authentication service via a web service e.g. to enable access to your subscriptions or other services you have booked.

For registration we process at least:

Information (such as your name and email address) that is provided by registration;
Information in connection with an account sign-in facility (e.g. log-in and password details);
Your area of expertise and speciality.

Whenever you complete transactions using our website, further mandatory information may be required, e.g. a birth date, area of interest or address to participate in online training (eLearning), of which you will of course be separately informed.

Data required for providing a service are marked as mandatory, provision of additional information is optional.

We will process the personal data you provide to:

Identify you at sign-in
Provide you with the services and information offered through the website or which you request
Administer your account
Communicate with you

For this, the legal basis is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b GDPR.

We may use the personal data and contact data you provide by registration for direct marketing of our own goods or services which are similar to the goods and services purchased from us, provided that you have not objected to the use of the e-mail address for this purpose. The use of your personal data for directly advertising related products and services is a legitimate interest for us as a provider of this website, Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f GDPR.

You can object to the use of your personal data for direct marketing at any time. We will then refrain from any processing to the extent it is related to such purposes. You can inform us about your objection by contacting us at: info@springermedicine.com.

Your personal data is, in the absence of exceptions within the specific services mentioned below (e.g. when obtaining certificates in medical training), retained for as long as your user account is used. After deletion of your account, your personal data will be erased with the next regular data cleansing usually within 1 month. Statutory storage obligations or the need for legal actions that may arise from misconduct within the services or payment problems can lead to a longer retention of your personal data. In this case, we will inform you accordingly.

V. Information about the specific uses that require registration/identification

For the use of the following services you have to set up an account as described in section IV. Your customer account retains your personal data for future purchases and other activity.

1. Remember Me

If you activated the “remember me” functionality when logging in through the authentication service, we place a cookie on your device that provides us with your login data (see section IV) and enables us to automatically log you in on your next visit.

In addition, we place temporary cookies to identify the sites (URL) you have visited on springermedicine.com. We do not collect any personal data or IP addresses of our users in these cookies. They are used exclusively to ensure the correct display of the site based on your preferences and are deleted as soon as you log out or close the browser window.

2. Subscription or test subscription

As a registered user, you are able to enter into a subscription for access to certain areas (e.g. training, databases) and/or periodicals and/or purchase individual issues of periodicals or individual articles. In addition, in some circumstances you may be granted access to content free of charge for a limited period. Orders are placed directly online. Our order form requests the following data in order to allow us to process the form and carry out order (including in the case of the free trial access):

Your forename(s) and surname, gender, title,

Your postal address as well as a separate delivery address if your selected subscription includes printed materials,
Your area of specialisation and focus of your role.
If ordering as for a business, the company name, type, sector and EU VAT number.

If you are a customer with a print subscription and access online content provided through your print subscription, we also collect and process the following data:

Postal address
Licence code of your business subscription or
Customer number of your print subscription.

3. Registration from IP-Range

If you register as part of an enterprise cooperation agreement, during the registration process we use all but the final part of the IP address of the device used to register to verify whether your device’s IP address is in the range specified by your company/organisation and we place a cookie on your device for the duration of the agreement. To do this we collect the IP address of the device from which you access springermedicine.com when you log in, and check whether this is within an IP range that is permitted to access the content. We do not store the full IP address; we remove the final part. This is a necessary step to provide you with access to the specific offering and information under your cooperation agreement.

4. Webshop

For the use of our web shop you have to set up an account as described in section IV. Your customer account retains your personal data for future purchases. You can delete the personal data as well as the account in your account’s settings. This processing is based on Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b. In order to carry out purchases from our shop, your personal data is transferred to our web shop operator (Springer Nature Customer Service Center GmbH); see section IX on the Transfer of personal data to third parties. The lawful basis for this processing is our legitimate interest in operating a central purchasing process for the Springer Nature Publishing Group pursuant to Article 6 sec. 1 sent.1 lit. f GDPR.

By statutory law we are required to retain the provided financial data in relation to transactions (including address, payment and order information) for ten years. However, after 2 years we will restrict the processing of your personal data to comply with the statutory requirements and will not process the personal data any further. Regarding this, the retention of your personal data is based on Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. c GDPR.

5. Live webinars

The offer includes live web seminars for which users have to actively register. Most of the webinars offered are for physicians.

We work with two technology providers for our webinars:
a) GoToWebinar of LogMeIn Inc.
b) MotionMakers of EMG Belgium

5.1 Registration for live webinars

a) GoToWebinar of LogMeIn Inc.
You must register separately in advance for a live webinar. This is possible after you have registered at Springermedicine.com or logged in with your Springermedicine.com login. When you open your account, we check whether you have the access authorisation to register for a webinar. To this end, information is compared with your personal user account.

When registering directly for a webinar, you will be redirected to a page of the provider LogMeIn Inc. There you will have to enter your email address to register.

b) MotionMakers of EMG Belgium
You must register separately in advance for a live webinar. This is possible after you have registered at Springermedicine.com or logged in with your Springermedicine.com login. When you open your account, we check whether you have the access authorisation to register for a webinar. To this end, information is compared with your personal user account.

When registering directly for a webinar, you will be redirected to a page of the provider MotionMakers (quadia.live domain). There you will have to enter your email address to register.

Be aware that Webinars provided via MotionMakers are sponsored and that we will share your personal information with the sponsor once you register and thereby give consent to us to share your personal information with the respective sponsor. You can find more information in section 5.5 of this privacy policy.

5.2 Live participation

a) GoToWebinar of LogMeIn Inc.
As soon as you call up a live webinar, we automatically record your navigation in the course with the help of the service Google Analytics (see section VIII.7) and GoToWebinar of LogMeIn Inc. for the purpose of technical (user-friendliness) and content-related (course structure, TOC) improvement. A personalised analysis of user behaviour is expressly not carried out. Information such as the time of exit when closing the course, re-entry page when re-opening the course, participation in interactive surveys and chat questions, the length of stay, are recorded.

A live webinar is recorded and then made available to users on demand behind the Springermedicine.com login.

b) MotionMakers of EMG Belgium
As soon as you call up a live webinar, we automatically record your navigation in the course with the help of the service Google Analytics (see section VIII.7) and MotionMakers of EMG Belgium for the purpose of technical (user-friendliness) and content-related (course structure, TOC) improvement. A personalised analysis of user behaviour is expressly not carried out. Information such as the time of exit when closing the course, re-entry page when re-opening the course, participation in interactive surveys and chat questions, the length of stay, are recorded.

A live webinar is recorded and then made available to users on demand behind the Springermedicine.com login on the MotionMakers platform (quadia.live domain).

5.3 Live webinars with continuing medical education (CME) certification

CME-certified live webinars cover all your password-protected activities on springermedicine.com in connection with certified continuing education courses and the administration of your completed continuing education courses or participation results. Most of the courses offered are certified for physician, so-called CME continuing education courses, which are (can be) completed with an evaluation questionnaire and an evaluation questionnaire.

a) Opening the continuing education courses

Upon opening, we check whether you have the access authorisation to open the selected CME continuing education course; for this purpose, information is compared with your personal user account.

b) Participation and completion of CME continuing education courses

After sufficient participation in a CME Live Webinar and the completion of evaluation questions, the participant receives a certificate of participation via email about the successfully completed CME Live Webinar and the number of points reached. This certificate can be submitted to the competent medical association or authority for recognition of the CME points. The certificate shows the day of participation, the full name of the participant, the postal address, the title of the completed training and the result of the participation (CME points).

c) Evaluation of your participation

Within the framework of a standardised evaluation questionnaire, the participant is asked - following the final test - questions on the nature and use of the CME course. The user can also freely comment on his or her experience with the course. This evaluation is obligatory for obtaining a CME certificate.

The data thus obtained are stored in the system of the live webinar (GoToWebinar or MotionMakers). The data will be forwarded anonymously to the European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (EACCME).
This evaluation is carried out anonymously as part of a scientific review of this type of continuing medical education in accordance with the specifications of the certifying institution.
There is no linking of personal information with user characteristics, but demographic information (such as date of birth, type of employer ("clinic/established"), speciality, gender) is processed.

d) Storage of the collected data for certified webinars

If you acquire certificates of participation within the scope of the certified webinar offer that are approved as proof of continuing medical education (e.g. online continuing education with CME points), the data required for the proof will be stored for at least the respective registration period (5 years for physician) plus a security period of 6 months. Log files documenting your activities (e.g. time of course start and course completion) are stored for a period of 12 months to clarify any queries.

5.4 Storage of the collected data

The collected data will be stored until the webinar series has ended and the data has been evaluated.

5.5 Sponsors and data sharing in context of webinars

Some of our webinar offers provided via MotionMakers and GoToWebinar are sponsored.

The webinar sponsors do not have any involvement in the content of the webinars.
By reserving your place for a webinar you give consent to us to share your personal information with the sponsor and to be contacted by the sponsor for purposes related to the webinar.

You can withdraw consent with effect for the future at any time by reaching out directly to the sponsor via email.

If and by whom a webinar offer is sponsored is shown right above the respective registration button of a webinar. Contact information of the sponsor is also shown above the registration button.

5.6 Objection of processing

You can object to the processing of your personal data for the purpose of participating in live web seminars at any time. If you object to the processing, you will not be able to participate in live web seminars. You can send us your objection as follows: info@springermedicine.com

VI. Newsletter

After Login you can sign-up to different editorial newsletters our newsletter that provides you with the latest news about our products and services. If you consent to receiving such newsletters they will be sent to the email address that you provided on registration. The legal basis for this processing is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. a GDPR. Your email address will be retained as long as you keep your account active.

The newsletters contain two categories of cookies that cannot be managed by the cookie settings of the website independently from the newsletter. We use one cookie to ensure proper display of the newsletter and to collect statistical usage information (e.g. whether the newsletter was opened and which content was clicked). Our marketing partners may use similar cookies to identify if and out of which newsletter an advertisement was accessed. These cookies do not collect any personally identifiable information.

You can unsubscribe from this service by opting out via the link provided in each newsletter, by editing your newsletter settings in the My Newsletters section of “My Profile“ or by sending an email with your unsubscribe request to info@springermedicine.com.

VII. Automated decision making

We use your personal data to perform automated decision making. These decisions are used to identify your access rights to content areas limited to specific user groups and are based on matching the data provided in your user profile with the access criteria for specific medical training or society content of a cooperating society.

If your access is not activated automatically in spite of existing access rights, please send an email to info@springermedicine.com.

VIII. Cookies and comparable technologies

This website uses cookies or similar technologies (in the following referred to as “cookies”). Some of the cookies described below are so-called first party cookies where we are responsible for dropping the cookies and processing the personal data. Other cookies we use may be provided by third parties (third party cookies). These third parties drop the cookies and process the collected personal data for their own purposes, e.g. to provide you with advertisement.

a) Strictly necessary cookies

Strictly necessary cookies are cookies that are necessary to provide the services and features available through the website or the apps. Without the cookies, the service cannot be provided. Therefore, these cookies are always activated and cannot be rejected. The legal basis for the use of the cookies and the respective data processing is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b GDPR. You may find more information on the cookies, e.g. information on the provider, purpose of the cookie, lifespan of the cookies and the data categories processed as well as the retention period, in our cookie banner/cookie policy.

b) Other cookies / third party cookies

We may also use other categories of cookies that are not strictly necessary. These categories may include, for example, analytics cookies or marketing cookies. We will only use these cookies if you have provided your explicit consent via our cookies banner/preference center. The legal basis for the use of the cookies and the respective data processing is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. a GDPR. You may find more information on the cookies, e.g. information on the provider, purpose of the cookie, lifespan of the cookies and the data categories processed as well as the retention period, in our cookie banner/preference center.

1. OneTrust consent management

Our website uses the cookie consent technology provided by OneTrust, having two representations in the US and in England: Atlanta, GA, USA (Co-Headquarters), 1200 Abernathy Rd NE, Building 600, Atlanta, GA 30328 United States, +1 (844) 847-7154 and London, England (Co-Headquarters), Dixon House, 1 Lloyd’s Avenue, London, EC3N 3DQ, +44 (800) 011-9778 ("Onetrust") to collect and document your consent to store cookies within your browser.

As soon as you access our website Onetrust stores a cookie in your browser to manage your consent or withdrawal choices:

OptanonConsent

The data is stored until you either request deletion, delete the Onetrust cookie yourself or the purpose of the processing has expired. Statutory storage obligations remain unaffected. You can find details regarding data processing of Onetrust cookies in the Onetrust privacy policy: https://www.onetrust.com/privacy/

The legal basis for the use of OneTrust cookie consent technology to collect the consent to cookie usage required by law is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. c GDPR.

We have concluded a data transfer agreement with Onetrust to ensure that data of our website visitors is only processed on our behalf and according to our instructions for compliance with the GDPR.

2. contentpass

On our website we offer a service for ad- and tracking-free access.

This service is called contentpass and is offered by Content Pass GmbH, Wolfswerder 58, 14532 Kleinmachnow, Germany. When you sign up for the Service, contentpass becomes your contractual partner. For more information about this service and the contentpass Terms & Conditions, please visit https://my.contentpass.net/terms.

In order to display and offer this service on our website, contentpass, on our behalf, processes your IP address at the beginning of your website visit. For the registration as well as the contract processing of contentpass and the associated data processing, contentpass is the controller in the sense of the GDPR. We are exclusively responsible for the processing of your IP address. The processing is necessary for technical reasons in order to display and offer you the service of contentpass. For more information regarding data processing at contentpass, please read the contentpass privacy policy (https://my.contentpass.net/privacy).

The basis for the data processing of the IP address, within the scope of our commissioned processing with contentpass, is our legitimate interest in offering you the possibility to access our website free of advertising and tracking and your legitimate interest in using our website practically without advertising and tracking Art. 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f GDPR.

You can log in to your contentpass account here (https://my.contentpass.net/), and register for contentpass here (https://my.contentpass.net/).

a) Access to your consent settings

You can withdraw your consent to advertising tracking for free access to our online offers at any time, for example by pressing the "Reject all" button, which can be accessed via the "Manage cookies" link (in the footer). An unrestricted and further use of our online offer, without the use of advertising tracking, is only possible within the framework of the paid "contentpass subscription".

Withdraw consent

If you withdraw your consent, you will be shown the selection page again the next time you visit our website or app. You can only continue to use our offers without advertising tracking if you choose the contentpass offer, which is subject to a fee. A withdrawal of your consent has no influence on the admissibility of the data processing that took place up to the time of withdrawal.

3. Facebook Custom Audience

For this Website and our apps, we use the service "Website Custom Audiences" of the social network Facebook provided by Meta Platforms Ireland Ltd., 4 Grand Canal Square, Dublin 2, Ireland, hereinafter referred to as “Facebook”. You can find more information about Website Custom Audiences using this link: https://www.facebook.com/business/help/449542958510885/. The options regarding your marketing preferences with Facebook are provided here: https://www.facebook.com/help/568137493302217.

Facebook claims to create a non-reversible hash value without relation to the user from the usage data that is used for analytics and marketing purposes. With regard to the use of Website Custom Audiences we would like to point out that Facebook uses cookies, web beacons or similar technologies to collect or gather information on this website and may place such information on your device. Please note that we as the provider of the webpages do not receive any information on the contents of data transferred and their use by Facebook. The data will be encrypted and transferred to Facebook and is anonymous for us, e.g., we cannot see personal data of individual users. Based on the data gained we can make our Facebook activities more efficient and, e.g., arrange for contents or ads to be shown only to visitors of our Website.

For further information on the scope of data processing, the privacy policy of Facebook and Custom Audience please refer to https://www.facebook.com/privacy/policy/ or https://www.facebook.com/business/a/online-sales/custom-audiences-website.

If you do not wish your data to be collected via Website Custom Audiences, you can deactivate Custom Audience using this link: https://www.facebook.com/ads/website_custom_audiences/.

4. Bing Ads

We use Bing Ads to advertise on our site and third party websites to previous visitors of our site. Bing Ads (bingads.microsoft.com) is provided by Microsoft Corporation, One Microsoft Way, Redmond, Washington 98052, USA. Phone: (+1) 425-882-8080 (“Microsoft”).

The advertisements are displayed on the basis of information that is stored in cookies which Microsoft places on your computer, if you have been directed to our website from a Microsoft Bing Ad. This way we and Microsoft can identify that a user has clicked on the Ad and has been directed to a pre-defined target site ("Conversion page"). We only receive the information how many users have been directed to the Conversion page.

The text files include information, on your visit of our website, in particular product views that is read-out in the course of subsequent visits of this or third party websites for specific product recommendations. The cookie includes a random alias. In case you visit our website within a certain period of time and view our products, Microsoft is able to recognize you by means of the alias. However, the information cannot be attributed to you personally. We or Microsoft will not merge this information with your personal data and will not disclose any of your personal data to any third party.

You can prevent being tracked by choosing the appropriate preference in the privacy options of your browser or disable cookies. To withdraw your consent to the processing of your data by Microsoft you may also use the link https://account.microsoft.com/privacy/ad-settings/signedout?lang=en-GB. For more information about Bing Ads security see https://secure.bingads.microsoft.com/. For more information about Microsoft privacy policies see https://privacy.microsoft.com/en-us/privacystatement or contact the data controller office Microsoft Ireland Operations, Ltd., Attn: Data Protection, Carmenhall Road, Sandyford, Dublin 18, Ireland.

5. General tracking information

For statistical analyses we use web analytics services to collect information about the use of this site. The tools collect information such as

Device and browser information (operating system information, Mobile device identifier, mobile operating system, etc.)
IP address
Page accessed, URL click stream (the chronological order of our internet sites you visited)
Geographic location
Time of visit
Referring site, application, or service

We use the information we get from the providers to determine the most useful information you are looking for, and to improve and optimise this website.

We will track your behaviour online for the purposes described above; this data will not be shared outside of Springer Nature. You can stop this tracking by clicking on the Manage Cookies/Do Not Sell My Data” link in the footer of the page. The legal basis for this processing is consent, Art. 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit.a GDPR, to analyse our website’s traffic, improve the user’s experience and optimise the website in general.

We do not share information on your web behaviour with any 3rd party providers without your explicit consent. Consent is provided by clicking the appropriate button on the web banner that appears on your first visit to the website, see section Consent Management VIII.1. To manage your consent settings, you can click on the “Manage cookies/Do not sell my data” link in the footer of the page. The legal basis for this processing is Art. 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. a GDPR and represents you consent to accepting 3rd party targeting cookies.

Depending on the provider the information generated about your use of the website may be transferred to and processed in third countries, e.g. the United States. For further information about the potential risks of a cross border data transfer please refer to section VIII.3. The tools collect only the IP address assigned to you on the date you visit this site, rather than your name or any other identifying information. The provider will use this information in order to evaluate your use of the website, to compile reports on website activities and to provide other services relating to website and internet use to us.

6. Google Ads

On our website and in our apps we use Google Conversion Tracking, an analytics service provided by Google Ireland Ltd. (Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland; “Google“).

The advertisements are displayed on the basis of information that is stored in cookies ("conversion cookie") which Google places on your computer if you accessed our website from a Google Ad. The cookie includes a random alias and is valid for 30 days. In case you visit our website within that period of time and view our products, Google is able to recognize you by means of the alias. The text files include information, on your visit of our website, in particular product views that is read-out in the course of subsequent visits of this or third party websites for specific product recommendations. However, the information cannot be attributed to you personally. We or Google will not merge this information with your personal data and will not disclose any of your personal data to any third party. We receive conversion statistics with accumulated figures about clickrates on our advertisements.

You can prevent the storing and using of information in a cookie placed by Google by

managing your consent settings via the Manage cookies/Do not sell my data” link in the footer of the page
clicking on the following link http://www.google.com/ads/preferences and configuring your preferences there
choosing the appropriate preference in the privacy options of your browser or disable cookies or delete the cookie
deactivating cookies from third parties by opening the website of the network advertising initiative http://www.networkadvertising.org/choices/.

For more information about Google privacy policies see https://safety.google/ and https://policies.google.com/privacy

7. Google Analytics / Google Tag Manager / Big Query

We use Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google Ireland Limited, Gordon House, Barrow Street, Dublin 4, Ireland (“Google”). The cookie set by Google Analytics on your device causes your web browser to transmit corresponding information to Google each time our website is called up. For example, Google Analytics collects data about the website from which a data subject has accessed a website (so-called referrer URL), which subpages of the website have been accessed or how often and for how long a subpage has been viewed. On our behalf Google will use the information generated by the cookie 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 activity in connection with the use of the website and according to your consent preferences.

The processing affects the following data categories:

IP addresses
Online identifiers (including cookie identifiers)
Device identifiers
Technical characteristics of users (e.g., browser type and version, device type, operating system)
Measurement of user behaviour (e.g., views of individual pages / content, views of content from different areas, session duration / dwell time, bounce rate
Use of individual website functionalities (e.g. timetable information, search queries, downloads)
Referrer URL

We use the addition "_gat._anonymizeIp" for web analysis via Google Analytics. By means of this add-on, your IP address is shortened and anonymized by Google before transmission to the USA if our website is accessed from a member state of the European Union or 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.

The legal basis for the data transfer is Art. 28 GDPR in conjunction with the data processing agreement. The transfer of your personal data is subject to your consent according to Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. a GDPR. You can consent to the processing of your data by Google Analytics using our Consent Manager, prevent the collection of your data or revoke consent once given. For revocation, call up the cookie settings again at the bottom of our website.

The information processed by Google about your use of this website may be transmitted to a Google server outside the EEA and processed there. The cross-border transfer is safeguarded by the Standard Contractual Clauses 2021.

Your personal data will be anonymized by Google 14 months after your last activity, unless there is a legal obligation to retain it.

You may refuse the use of cookies by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser or by amending your preferences. In addition to that you may prevent the collection of the information generated by the cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) and the processing of this data by Google if you download and install the browser plug-in available at the following link: http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout. You can access the Google Analytics privacy policy here.

8. Optimizely

We use Optimizely, a web analytics service provided by Optimizely Inc., 631 Howard Street, Suite 100 San Francisco, CA 94105 (“Optimizely”). Optimizely also uses cookies and tracking pixels. The information generated by the cookies and pixels regarding your use of this website will, as a rule, be transmitted to and stored on a server of Optimizely in the US. Optimizely will use this information on our behalf to analyse your use of the website and to compile reports on website activities.

In particular, the following information will be stored:

the total number and percentage of users who opened a website variation
the number of clicks on links
your browser type and version
campaign IDs through which the website was reached.

You can disable Optimizely tracking (and thus prevent the data generated by cookies and pixel, and relating to your use of the website, from being collected to and processed by Optimizely) at any time by either changing your cookie consent settings or following the instructions at http://www.optimizely.com/opt_out.

For more information about privacy policies and Optimizely, please refer to the Optimizely website: https://www.optimizely.com/privacy/

9. Hotjar

Our website and apps use Hotjar, a web analytics service provided by Hotjar Ltd, Level 2, St Julians Business Centre, 3 Elia Zammit Street, St Julians STJ 1000, Malta. The information generated by Hotjar's cookies about your use of the website and apps is usually transmitted to and stored on a Hotjar server. Hotjar will use this information to evaluate your use of the website and apps, to compile reports on website/app activities and may in some cases create recordings of your movements and actions on the site.

In particular, the following are stored:

IP address in anonymised form;
Web pages viewed and movement patterns on these pages;
Number and position of clicks on links;
Browser type and version;
Screen size of the end device used.

Personal data or movements on profile pages that contain personal data are not stored. In particular, according to Hotjar, IP addresses are only stored in anonymised form. You can find more information about data protection and Hotjar in Hotjar's data protection declaration: https://www.hotjar.com/privacy.

If you do not want information about your behaviour to be used by Hotjar as explained above, you can adjust your cookie preferences or generally deactivate the automatic setting of cookies required for this in your browser settings.

In addition, Hotjar offers the possibility to object to the data processing by the cookie for the future by observing the "Do Not Track" function of browsers. You can find out how to activate this here: https://www.hotjar.com/opt-out.

IX. Third party content

1. Third parties

(a) VideoManager Pro

We use the “VideoManager Pro” service operated by MovingIMAGE24 GmbH, Stralauer Allee 7, 10245 Berlin (“Movingimage”) in order to ensure that video content can be viewed correctly on our website and played back by you. The lawful basis of this processing is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f) GDPR. This provides us with the legitimate interest to improve your user experience and to optimise our services.

MovingImage places a cookie containing certain information that is transferred to MovingImage about the presentation and playback of video content on your device. We have no influence on the data processing by MovingImage. Further information can be found in the MovingImage privacy policy: https://www.movingimage.com/gtc/privacy-policy-of-movingimage-evp-gmbh. This contains information on your rights and data protection options.

(b) Surveys

From time to time we issue user surveys on our website and in our apps regarding different topics. The participation in such surveys is completely voluntary. To provide the survey and analyse your feedback we usually use a feedback function operated by SurveyMonkey der SurveyMonkey Europe UC 2nd Floor, 2 Shelbourne Buildings, Shelbourne Road, Dublin, Ireland. The information collected via this service is processed according to our instructions on SurveyMonkey servers located in the USA. You can find more information regarding the usage and security of your data here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/mp/legal/privacy/

In single cases we may also use GoogleForms provided by Google LLC, Limited Gordon House, Barrow Street Dublin 4, Ireland (“Google”). With the survey, data required for the service is sent to Google. The deviating data protection regulations of Google Inc. apply here. You can find further information under https://policies.google.com/privacy

(c) reCAPTCHA

In order to protect our websites from spam, we use the reCAPTCHA service of Google LLC, 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA ("Google") in certain cases. This serves to distinguish whether the input is human or abusive through machine processing. With the query, your IP address and eventually other data required by Google for the service will be sent to Google. The deviating data protection regulations of Google Inc. are applicable for this service. For more information about reCAPTCHA and the privacy policy of Google Inc., please visit https://www.google.com/recaptcha and https://policies.google.com/privacy.

(d) Podigee

We use the podcast hosting service Podigee from the provider Podigee GmbH, Ritterstr. 2A, 10969 Berlin, Germany. The podcasts are loaded by Podigee or transmitted via Podigee. This processing is based on Art. 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f GDPR. We use it to pursue our legitimate interest in enhancing your user experience and optimising our services. Podigee processes IP addresses and device information to enable podcast downloads/playbacks and to determine statistical data such as call-up figures. This data is anonymised or pseudonymised before being stored in Podigee's database unless it is necessary for the provision of the podcasts.

Further information can be found in Podigee's privacy policy: https://www.podigee.com/en/about/privacy

(e) Motionmakers

We work with Motionmakers, Hilversum office, Frits Spitsstraat 3, 1217 WC Hilversum, The Netherlands (www.Motionmakers.video)

Motionmakers is part of the EMG - Euro Media Group, 35 avenue Georges Sand, 93210 saint Denis

The lawful basis of this processing is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f) GDPR. This provides us with the legitimate interest to improve your user experience and to optimise our services.

Further information can be found in the Motionmakers privacy policy: https://www.motionmakers.video/privacy-policy

(f) Links to third party websites

This website or our apps may contain links to third party websites. We are not responsible for the content and the data collection on respective third party websites; please check the privacy policy of respective websites for information of respective websites’ data processing activities.

2. Data sharing

Your personal data will be disclosed to the following third parties:

Springer Nature Customer Service Center GmbH (SNCSC), Tiergartenstr. 15-17, 69121 Heidelberg, Germany. This is our reader and customer service.
Springer Healthcare - BeNeLux, Walmolen 1, 3994 DL - Houten, Netherlands.

Legal basis for the transfer of your personal data is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b and f GDPR; it represents our legitimate interest of enhancing your user experience and optimising our services.

Some of the recipients mentioned above reside outside the EEA. For further information about cross border transfer in general and transfers outside of the EEA see section IX.4.

We may disclose anonymous aggregate statistics about users of the website in order to describe our services to prospective partners, advertisers and other reputable third parties and for other lawful purposes, but these statistics will include no personal data.

We may disclose your personal data to service providers who assist us in providing the services we offer to you. Such a transfer will be based on data processing agreements in accordance with Article 28 GDPR. Therefore, our contractors will only use your personal data to the extent necessary to perform their functions and will be contractually bound to process your personal data only on our behalf and in compliance with our requests.

This particularly includes the following contractors:

Ternair, Floridalaan 6, NL-3404 WV IJsselstein
Optimizely Inc., 631 Howard Street, Suite 100 San Francisco, CA 94105
Springer Nature Customer Service Center GmbH, Tiergartenstr. 15-17, 69121 Heidelberg, Germany (for Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asiea, Oceania) or Springer Nature Customer Service Center LLC, 233 Spring St, New York, NY, 10013 United States (for North America, Central America, South America) Provider of the online shop to manage purchasing processes.

In the event that we undergo re-organisation or are sold to a third party, any personal data we hold about you may be transferred to that re-organised entity or third party in compliance with applicable law. The legal basis is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f GDPR. We have legitimate interests in performing respective business reorganisations.

We may disclose your personal data if legally entitled or required to do so (for example if required by law or by a court order). The legal basis is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. c GDPR as well as Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. f GDPR. We have legitimate interests in complying with official requests.

3. Cross-border data transfers

Within the scope of our information sharing activities set out above (see section IX.1), your personal data may be transferred to other countries (including countries outside the European Economic Area (EEA)) which may have different data protection standards than your country of residence. Please note that data processed in a foreign country may be subject to foreign laws and accessible to foreign governments, courts, law enforcement, and regulatory agencies. However, we will endeavour to take the required measures to keep up an adequate level of data protection when sharing your personal data with recipients established in such countries.

In the case of a transfer to a country outside of the EEA, this transfer is safeguarded by international agreements, e.g. a Commission’s adequacy decision, EU Standard Contractual Clauses. You can obtain further information about the aforementioned safeguards by contacting our Group Data Protection Officer via dataprotection@springernature.com.

X. Security

We have reasonable state of the art security measures in place to protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of personal data under our control. For example, our security and privacy policies are periodically reviewed and enhanced as necessary and only authorised personnel have access to personal data. Whilst we cannot ensure or guarantee that loss, misuse or alteration of information will never occur, we use all reasonable efforts to prevent it.

You should bear in mind that submission of information over the internet is never entirely secure. We cannot guarantee the security of information you submit via our website whilst it is in transit over the internet and any such submission is at your own risk.

XI. Data retention

We strive to keep our processing activities with respect to your personal data as limited as possible. In the absence of specific retention periods set out in this policy, your personal data will be retained only for as long as we need it to fulfil the purpose for which we have collected it and, if applicable, as long as required by statutory retention requirements.

XII. Your rights

Under the legislation applicable to you, you may be entitled to exercise some or all of the following rights:

require (i) information as to whether your personal data is retained and (ii) access to and/or duplicates of your personal data retained, including the purposes of the processing, the categories of personal data concerned, and the data recipients as well as potential retention periods;
request rectification, removal or restriction of your personal data, e.g. because (i) it is incomplete or inaccurate, (ii) it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected, or (iii) the consent on which the processing was based has been withdrawn;
refuse to provide and – without impact to data processing activities that have taken place before such withdrawal – withdraw your consent to processing of your personal data at any time;
object, on grounds relating to your particular situation, that your personal data shall be subject to a processing. In this case, please provide us with information about your particular situation. After the assessment of the facts presented by you we will either stop processing your personal data or present you our compelling legitimate grounds for an ongoing processing;
take legal actions in relation to any potential breach of your rights regarding the processing of your personal data, as well as to lodge complaints before the competent data protection regulators;
require (i) to receive the personal data concerning you, which you have provided to us, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and (ii) to transmit those data to another controller without hindrance from our side; where technically feasible you shall have the right to have the personal data transmitted directly from us to another controller; and/or
not to be subject to any automated decision making, including profiling (automatic decisions based on data processing by automatic means, for the purpose of assessing several personal aspects) which produce legal effects on you or affect you with similar significance.

You may (i) exercise the rights referred to above or (ii) pose any questions or (iii) make any complaints regarding our data processing by contacting us using the contact details set out below.

XIII. Contacting us

Please submit any questions, concerns or comments you have about this privacy policy or any requests concerning your personal data by email to our Group Data Protection Officer. You can contact our Group Data Protection Officer via dataprotection@springernature.com.

The information you provide when contacting us regarding data protection or customer service questions (info@springermedicine.com or written to Springer Medizin Verlag GmbH, z.Hd. Kundenservice Springer Medizin, Heidelberger Platz 3, 14197 Berlin), will be processed to handle your request and will be erased when your request is completed. Alternatively, we will restrict the processing of the respective information in accordance with statutory retention requirements.

XIV. Amendments to this policy

We reserve the right to change this policy from time to time by updating our website respectively. Please visit the website regularly and check our respective current privacy policy.

This policy was last updated on 21 December 2023.

Privacy Policy Authentication & Authorisation Service

This is the privacy policy (“policy”) for the authentication and authorisation service of Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, Heidelberger Platz 3, 14197 Berlin (we, us and our).

We will only use the personal data gathered over the authentication and authorisation service as set out in this policy. Below you will find information on how we use your personal data, for which purposes your personal data is used, with whom it is shared and what control and information rights you may have.

I. Summary of our processing activities

The authentication and authorisation service is the shared identification and login platform for all participating internet portals of the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature Group.

You will find more detailed information under the indicated sections below.

In case you book services on one of the participating internet portals (e.g. access restricted content, subscriptions), further personal data will be processed in the scope of such services (see sections II.2 and II.3).
Furthermore, upon your consent we may use cookies and comparable ad-tech tools to provide you with interesting advertising (see section IV).
Your personal data may be disclosed to third parties (see section VI).
We have implemented appropriate safeguards to secure your personal data (see section VII) and retain your personal data only as long as necessary (see section VIII).
Under the legislation applicable to you, you may be entitled to exercise certain rights with regard to the processing of your personal data (see section IX).

II. Registration for our services

The authentication and authorisation service enables every user, after a one-time registration and authentication, to log in to all access-restricted areas and contents of the connected Internet portals (participating specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature Group) that have implemented the services, using uniform access data, without having to go through a registration process again.

Through the service, the user receives a cross-portal "identifier" that can be recognised and verified by the participating Internet portals. In this way, the authentication and authorisation service additionally enables data of the user stored in the data memory of the service (such as their name and address as well as the subscriptions they have concluded) to be used automatically in order to, for example, be able to give the user access to subscription magazines without having to enter the data required for access again manually and have it verified.

1. Registration

For registration we process at least:

your email address
a password that is conform with the security requirements

In addition, we will use your email address to provide you with an initial registration confirmation (double-opt-in) and to be able to contact you about any affairs regarding your central user account.

For certain occupational groups, additional data is required in addition to the above-mentioned mandatory data, such as, for example, for physicians, the indication of the field of specialisation and the medical association or for students, the field of study. You can find out what data is involved in each case from the registration form, which is adapted to your basic details. The following data is collected and stored:

your first and last name
your birth year
your profession and current activity (e.g. doctor, pharmacist, employee in pharma industry)
your work area (doctor's practice, clinical, university/research)

You can also provide further information about your professional activity, for example, your main areas of interest.

Further personal information may be stored when you add data to your user account later.

Data required for providing a service are marked as mandatory, provision of additional information is optional.

We will process the personal data you provide to:

Identify you at sign-in;
Provide you with the services and information offered through the participating portals or which you request;
Administer your account;
Communicate with you.

For this, the legal basis is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b GDPR.

2. Data added during usage of your account

If you use the services of the participating internet portals of specialist publishers within the Springer Nature Group after your registration, further data may be collected.

Which subscriptions, newsletters and/or other services of the participating internet portals you subscribe to is stored in the record.

Please refer to the data protection declarations of the respective internet portals to find out what other types of data may be added to your user account when you use internet portals of the Springer Nature Group.

3. Metadata

A set of metadata is also associated with the dataset consisting of your inventory and content data. In particular, this is the following data:

The password assigned to you;
The date the record was created;
The creator of the record (usually you, or in some cases a member of the customer service team you have contacted);
A user ID assigned to you;
The customer number assigned to you;
A so-called Identkey, which enables you to unsubscribe from subscribed newsletters without logging in;
The respective date of your last login via the authentication and authorisation services as well as the date of the last change to the data record;
A note that you have consented to the transfer of data in accordance with section VI.

III. Automated decision making

We use your personal data to perform automated decision making. These decisions are used to identify your access rights to

Internet portals with limited access for members of a specific profession and that require membership verification
services provided in cooperation with societies or institutionally sponsored services where access is limited to society members or students of that institution

They are based on an automated verification of the access authorisation you have provided (proof of profession, company affiliation, login from an institutional IP range). If the authentication and authorisation service in your user account cannot identify a corresponding legitimation, access to the services will not be activated.

If the access is not activated despite existing access authorisation, please contact our customer service, see section X.

IV. Online advertising

If you have entered your occupational group and/or a specialisation in your user profile, we use this information in order to be able to play out advertisements with suitable content for the specified occupational group or specialisation. The legal basis for this use of your personal data is Art. 6 sec. 1 sent 1 lit. a GDPR (your consent) and Art. 6 sec. 1 sent 1 lit. f GDPR. We use it to pursue our legitimate interest in enhancing your user experience and optimising our offer. Apart from the use of the information you have provided us with on occupational group and/or specialisation, no other information from your user profile is used for this purpose. The information is only passed on to advertisers in aggregated form (e.g. number of users from a particular discipline). If you have any questions about this procedure, please contact one of the contacts named in section X.

V. Analysis

During registration, certain data is stored in so-called log files. A log file provides information on:

technical characteristics of users (e.g., browser type and version, operating system),
the domain name of the website, from which you were directed to the registration page,
start and end time of usage of the authentication and authorisation service,
data volume transferred by the authentication and authorisation service.

In this context, we would like to point out as a precaution that our log files do not contain IP addresses. Our log files are therefore completely anonymous.

1. Login

The respective internet portal sends the data you enter into the login form (usually your email address and a password) to the server of the authentication service together with a service URL. Based on these data the service validates your access requests. If access is granted the authentication service transfers the unique user ID generated for your user account.

With these data we can provide you with the personalised settings you may already have selected on the internet portal (e.g. your preferences regarding geographical area, profession, area of speciality). In addition, the internet portal can request relevant data required for providing services from the authentication service via a webservice e.g. to enable access to your subscriptions or other services you have booked.

2. Cookies

The authentication and authorisation services use various authentication cookies. Cookies are small text files that are stored locally in the memory of your internet browser. The authentication cookies allow your internet browser to be recognised even across the boundaries of the participating portals. They thus serve as an identification feature that saves you further login procedures on the participating websites.

When you log on to one of the participating Internet portals, an identification feature is assigned to you for (at least) the session (the active session), which allows you to use the other participating Internet portals and the offers there without additional login procedures (Single Sign On).

While the "standard authentication cookie" is deleted when you log out of the single sign-on, it is also possible to set an authentication cookie that is valid for a longer period (30 days), which has an effect beyond the session boundaries. This only happens if you actively select the "remember me" option. However, you should not select this option under any circumstances if you are working on a public computer or a computer used by several users.

If you wish to prevent the use of cookies, you have the option in your browser to prevent the acceptance and storage of new cookies. However, if cookies are automatically rejected by the settings made in the browser, you will no longer be able to use the functions of the authentication service. If you automatically delete the stored cookies after each session, the "remember me" function will not be available.

VI. Data sharing

Your personal data or parts of them will be disclosed to the following third parties:

Participating internet portals are provided with access to the data to enable assignment of access rights.
If you have indicated during registration or afterwards that you are a member of a cooperating society, we transfer your name and birth date to the society to obtain confirmation of your membership.
Springer Nature Customer Service Center GmbH (SNCSC), Tiergartenstr. 15-17, 69121 Heidelberg, Germany.

Legal basis for the transfer of your personal data is Article 6 sec. 1 sent. 1 lit. b and f GDPR. This provides us with the legitimate interest to improve your user experience and to optimise our services.

VII. Security

VIII. Data retention

Storage of the data in your user account mentioned in section II is necessary for the use of the authentication and authorisation service and is separated from (and may in part be identical to) other data regarding your person.

IX - Authentication Service

To be able to use the restricted content and restricted offerings of the participating specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, users first need to register an account and wait for the necessary login details to be sent and activated. Access to the specialist information on the portals is restricted, e.g. by requirements of the legislator – specifically, in the case of springermedicine.com, to the groups of persons specified in Sec. 10 Para. 1 of the German Act on the Advertising of Medicinal Products [Heilmittelwerbegesetz – HWG], or by the requirement to have a paid for subscription. To ensure compliance with this requirement, it needs to be verified that the user is a member of one of the groups of persons entitled to be given access to the restricted information.

By offering its registration service (hereinafter referred to as the “Single Sign-on authentications service” or “SSO authentications service“), Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA offers a single platform from where users can obtain the necessary login data for all participating portals of the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA. After registration, the SSO authentications service is available to the participating portals and to users as a single tool for logging in to the various participating specialist portals.

1. Scope of application

1.1 This privacy policy shall apply to the use of the Single Sign-on authentications service and all other services offered and provided by Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA here under. The SSO authentications service is provided by Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, represented by the General Partner Springer Nature Management AG, itself represented by its Managing Directors Frank Vrancken Peeters, Dr. Ulrich Vest, Marc Spenlé, Steven Inchcoombe, Rachel Jacobs and Carolyn Honour, of Heidelberger Platz 3 in D-14197 Berlin.

1.2 The contractual relationships between users and the participating specialist portals and their respective online offerings in which the SSO authentications service is or can be used may be governed, if applicable, by privacy policy or notice, by general terms and conditions of business, or general terms and conditions of use, of the respective service providers for the various specialist portals.

2. Services

2.1 For the purposes of the SSO authentications service offered by Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, Single Sign-on (abbreviated “SSO”) means that after initial registration and authentication, users can log into, and access, all restricted services, areas and applications on all internet portals of the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, or other offerings (e.g. mobile apps) which use the SSO authentications service, using the same login details, without having to complete another registration process for each of those internet portals, as would otherwise be the case.

2.2 The SSO authentications service generates a unique user “identity” for each user which can be recognised and verified by all participating internet portals. This allows users, in addition, to have the data stored in their SSO account (e.g. their name and address and subscriptions purchased) used automatically, e.g. to access their subscribed journals without having to re-enter and re-verify the access data manually.

2.3 Moreover, the SSO authentications service allows certain information to be presented to users in a tailored and individual way. This makes the use of the participating portals more comfortable for users. For instance, users may be informed after logging in of whether new content has been added in their specific areas of interest.

2.4 The SSO authentications service allows users to manage their SSO account easily and through a single user interface using the “My Area” tool. In this way, users can, for instance, manage and correct the master data stored about them (e.g. their residential address), change their password and view information related to the contracts they entered into via the SSO authentications service.

2.5 Use of the SSO authentications service itself is free of charge for the user.

3. Identification and registration

3.1 To be able to use the SSO authentications service, users need to register an account.

3.2 If and when a user registers on an internet portal of a participating specialist publishing house access to which is restricted to users with a common interest in a particular subject area (e.g. if access is restricted to members of a certain professional group), or if and when a user visits such a portal for the first time, his or her eligibility to have access to it will be verified by asking him or her to fill in an additional form.

3.2.1 If the user registers via SSO for a platform with access restriction to medical specialists, by filling in this form, the user represents and warrants that he or she holds a medical licence or licence to practise as pharmaceutical chemist or is a member of any other of the eligible groups of persons listed on the additional form. Within ten days of registration, the user must then send appropriate proof of his or her eligibility (e.g. a copy of his or her doctor’s ID card or medical licence) to the customer service of Springer Medizin:

by email to: info@springermedicine.com

by post to: Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, z. Hd. Kundenservice Springer Medizin, Heidelberger Platz 3, D-14197 Berlin

Further details of this are provided on the registration forms.

3.2.2 As an alternative to the procedure described in section 3.2.1, users may provide electronically verifiable proof of their eligibility via the registration form, e.g. their unique CPD number [einheitliche Fortbildungsnummer – EFN] or other registered professional ID code. If this number or code can be verified, no further proof of profession is required and Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA will be able to activate the user account immediately.

3.3 Moreover, the user represents and warrants that the personal information provided on his or her registration form, including, without limitation, his or her first and last name, postal address, date of birth and email address, is true and correct. In particular, users must not enter the details of others and are required to notify Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA without undue delay if there is any change in the personal information they supplied.

3.4 Completion and submission of the registration form by the user constitutes an offer to Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA to enter into the Agreement on Use of the SSO authentications service (hereinafter also referred to as the “User Agreement”). Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA will accept this offer, subject to the provision of section 3.10, by sending an email to the user’s email address confirming their successful registration, or by enabling the user to access the areas or content requiring registration once the registration form has been submitted. In either of these cases, the User Agreement shall be deemed to have been entered into.

3.5 Promptly after receipt of the registration form by Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA, the user will receive a confirmation email containing a unique link. By clicking this link, the user confirms that he or she received the email and that the address is really his or hers. This confirmation is required before users are able to use the SSO authentications service to log in or to use services of other internet portals immediately after successful registration.

3.6 There is, however, no entitlement for users to be granted access to the portals.

3.7 Contracts may be entered into in German or English.

3.8 We reserve the right to refuse registrations on a case-by-case basis without stating reasons.

4. Use of login details, access to portals

4.1 Users will be able to access restricted content and offerings of the participating internet portals by entering their login details, i.e. usually their email address and password, into the respective login form.

4.2 The login details are intended to be used only by the respective user personally. Users must not disclose their login details, in particular their password, to anyone (including family members and co-workers). Users must ensure that their login details, in particular their password, are kept confidential and secure at all times and are required to prevent any unauthorised use of the participating portals by third parties.

4.3 If a user becomes aware of or suspects any misuse of his or her login details, he or she shall notify Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA without undue delay. In the event of actual or suspected misuse of a user’s login details, Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA shall have the right to terminate his or her access to the internet portals of the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA immediately. If a user is responsible for such misuse of access details, he or she shall be liable for all consequences of use by a third party. In particular, a user shall be deemed responsible already if he or she enabled the unauthorised use of his or her login details through negligence. The liability of the user ends only if and when he or she has notified the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA customer service by email (sso-service@springer.com) of the unauthorised use of his or her login details and changed the password, if necessary.

4.4 section 4.3 shall apply mutatis mutandis if a user has selected the “Remain logged in” option while working on a public or shared computer and third parties thereby gain access to the internet portals.

4.5 The scope of access provided by the login details depends on the terms of use of the respective internet portal of the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA. Moreover, the scope of access may differ depending on the professional group to which a user belongs.

4.6 Users are hereby informed that each of the internet portals of the specialist publishing houses of the Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA is operated by the company identified as provider of the portal concerned. Unless an offering is operated by Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA itself, Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA accepts no responsibility for the content offerings provided thereon.

5. Termination or withdrawal of access

5.1 In the event that a user breaches this privacy policy or notice or the General Terms and Conditions of Use, in particular if a user

provides incorrect data during or after registration and/or
discloses or shares his or her login details, in particular his or her password, without authorisation,

Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA reserves the right to disable the login details of that user temporarily or permanently and/or terminate his or her access with immediate effect or within a period to be determined at our discretion and/or to terminate the User Agreement by extraordinary termination without notice. If this is the case, the user concerned will not be allowed to re-register without the express prior consent of Springer Nature AG & Co. KGaA.

5.2 Moreover, user access will terminate automatically as soon as a user ceases to be a member of any of the eligible groups of persons listed on the specialist portal concerned. Users are required to notify the customer service (using the contact details specified in section 3.3 above) without undue delay of any forthcoming or recent changes of their professional or employment status.

6. Termination of the User Agreement

6.1 The User Agreement is for an indefinite term. It may generally be terminated by either Party, for convenience, without notice (subject, however, to section 6.2) at any time. This shall be without prejudice to the right of either Party to terminate the User Agreement by extraordinary termination for good cause. Notice must be given in text form, i.e. at least by email.

6.2 However, termination of the User Agreement with immediate effect would result in the user becoming unable to log in and, depending on the respective offering of a participating internet portal, possibly also to access subscriptions he or she purchased, or other restricted areas of the internet portal otherwise accessible to him or her. Therefore, any termination of the User Agreement shall only take effect when the user has terminated or otherwise ended any subscriptions or other fixed-term agreements which may remain in place with the internet portals at the time in question or when such other agreements have expired. Therefore, we are also unable to delete the SSO account of the user until this has been done.

IX. Your rights

Please refer to section XII of the privacy policy for the website springermedicine.com, see above.

X. Contacting us

You can contact our Group Data Protection Office at dataprotection@springernature.com.

For further information regarding data processing when contacting us please refer to section XIII of the privacy policy for the website springermedicine.com, see above.

XI. Amendments to this policy

We reserve the right to change this policy from time to time by updating our website respectively. Please visit the website regularly and check our respective current privacy policy. This policy was last updated on 26 July 2023.

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