Privacy Statement

Your privacy matters!

Short version

Privacy is a basic right of each individual. Therefore, we want to be your trusted partner and do everything to process personal data with respect and in a correct and transparent manner, to safeguard the privacy of each individual and to prevent misuse of personal data.

IMEC VZW, Stichting IMEC Nederland, IMEC Inc. and IMEC USA NANOELECTRONICS DESIGN CENTER, Inc., hereinafter referred to as ‘imec’, are committed to protecting and respecting your privacy.

With this privacy statement we would like to inform you about what personal information we collect, why we do so, how long we keep it, what your privacy rights are and how you can exercise them.

Imec may update its privacy policy from time to time. When these changes affect you and/or your rights, a notice will be posted on our website.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

Who is protected by this policy?

This privacy policy only applies to activities where imec, as the data controller, is responsible and accountable for processing your personal information.

We potentially process your personal information when you:

• visit our offices, surf our websites, use our apps, attend our events, ...
• take part in market research, surveys, competitions, campaigns, ...
• use our products and services

We distinguish the following categories of individuals:

• visitors – This refers to people who are not employees, consultants or contractors of imec and who are invited to imec offices (e.g. to attend meetings, seminars, conferences) or visit our websites.
• research subjects – This refers to people who participate in imec research projects. We have very strict guidelines concerning who processes your information and for what purposes.
• third parties – This refers to people employed by customers, vendors and contractors, prospects, alumni, temporary and agency staff, and other relevant individuals of whom imec processes personal information.

Your personal information will always be treated and secured with the utmost care and efficiency, in accordance with this privacy statement and the applicable privacy legislation.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

What personal information do we collect?

In order to provide our services, we collect personal information. Some is provided to us directly (e.g. when you participate in a research project or visit our offices), some is collected automatically by us (e.g. when you surf the imec website, or when you’re registered by CCTV when you visit imec premises), and some is collected by third parties (e.g. those we collaborate with in research projects).

Personal information: this is information related to an identified or identifiable person, e.g. your name, address, telephone number, email address, date of birth, gender, ... This information remains yours, and yours only. Imec only processes your personal data when that is necessary and relevant.

We collect different types of personal information, depending on the purpose for which we need it.

• identification information – In cases where we need to be able to identify you, this information enables us to do so.
  • Examples: name, age, visual images (photographs and videos), ID number
• contact information – This is information we collect to be able to contact you.
  • Examples: email, telephone number, address
• financial information – In some cases, we need to be able to carry out financial transactions and obligations such as paying salaries and invoices.
  • Example: bank and payment details
• education and professional information – This information can be collected about our contractors or suppliers.
• connective information – This information is needed to secure and improve our websites, applications and digital services.
  • Examples: IP addresses, web cookies, host information, approximate host location, pages visited
• research-related personal information – This is information we collect when you participate in a research project. This might entail information about your location and Personal Sensitive Data such as: health-related information, racial or ethnic origin, biometrics and genetic information.
  • Examples: dietary and medical requirements, DNA, EEG, ECG, blood, tissues (bone, skin), foot/fingerprints, iris scans, movement tracking and tracing of individuals participating in a research project

When you participate in a research project, you will be informed separately about what personal data will exactly be processed for the purposes of the specific research project.

Important: we anonymize or pseudonymize personal information as much as possible.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

Why do we collect your personal information?

Imec processes your personal information in order to comply with all its legal obligations and to offer a correct and complete service in the context of employment, research & development and education.

We ensure that we collect and process the minimum amount of personal information required to meet our obligations and provide our services, such as:

• scientific research – We can process personal information to be able to perform scientific research projects. Collecting up to date and relevant personal data can enable imec to achieve the most efficient and innovating results.
• sales & marketing – We can use your personal information to contact you for events and campaigns. Other areas where we might use personal information are customer engagement, account management, marketing and market research, business development, complaints handling.
• legal obligations – In order for us to comply with our legal obligations, we might process your personal information.
• handling of data subject rights – We also need to process your personal information to be able to identify you when imec handles your data subject request. This is why we ask your date of birth or email address on our consent forms.
• enhancing of digital experience – We collect user statistics for technical, functional and security improvements of our websites and digital services.
• guaranteeing of security – We collect information in order to secure our facilities. This is done via visitor registration and camera surveillance.
• information security and audit – We implement, audit and adapt our policies and procedures to protect your personal information accordingly.
• finance – We process personal information in order to fulfill our financial obligations such as paying fees, entering into and executing agreements with customers, suppliers and commercial partners, paying financial contributions for participations in projects, etc.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

Who has access to your personal information?

Imec ensures that access to your personal information is limited to imec employees who need it according to their job function.

Your personal data can be shared between the different affiliates of imec, being IMEC VZW, Stichting IMEC Nederland, IMEC Inc. and IMEC USA NANOELECTRONICS DESIGN CENTER, Inc.

We only transfer your personal information to third parties when this is necessary to meet our obligations, provide our services and perform research studies. Third parties are always screened to ensure they handle personal information properly.

Such third parties can be:

• partners in research projects such as public authorities, universities, hospitals and research companies­ – We only share your personal information with these parties when you have consented to this and/or are properly informed about it.
• public authorities with whom we need to share personal data to comply with legal obligations
• suppliers with whom we collaborate to provide certain services, e.g. mailing providers for marketing purposes, service providers for IT services, platforms to manage contractors, etc.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

How long do we keep your personal information?

We keep or use your personal information for the duration necessary to meet the purposes for which we collected it, as explained in this privacy statement. We will delete your personal information if it is no longer needed, has no more relevance, or is simply outdated.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

How do we protect your personal information?

We have implemented various technical and organizational measures to ensure your information is protected against unauthorized access and non-authorized modification, publication or removal.

These are the most important technical and organizational measures:

• Corporate policies confirm imec’s commitment to protect information that imec owns or generates, as well as the information that imec’s partners entrust to imec under confidentiality and/or restricted use obligations.
• We have implemented security & privacy by design and privacy by default in our internal procedures for new initiatives. In that way, we ensure that security & privacy risks are tackled from the very beginning.
• We regularly audit & evaluate our methods in order to avoid data loss, including loss of personal information.
• We have implemented various security technologies & techniques that defend us against both inside & outside attacks.
• We regularly evaluate our practices regarding the collection, storage and processing of information, including logical & physical security measures, such as protection against unauthorized access to information (systems).
• Imec personnel receives regular training about how to handle personal information in their day to day job, and about the privacy & security policies, processes and procedures that exist within imec.

We can’t reveal in detail how we protect your information. But rest assured, we are audited on a regular base, both from an external as an internal point of view. We take immediate action if the audit reveals that certain aspects of our policies, processes or procedures are not up to our standards. Apart from your information, we must protect our own information and intellectual property as well.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

What are your privacy rights?

Would you like to access your personal details or receive a copy? Or would you like to edit your details, delete or restrict their usage, or adjust your email preferences? Just let us know by postal mail or email.

Please describe your question as accurate as possible when contacting us. To completely verify your identity, we could ask for additional information such as a copy of your identity card (front only).

The Privacy Office commits itself to provide an answer within the legal term of 30 days.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

What legal grounds do we use?

According to the privacy legislation, we’re required to tell you on what legal grounds we are processing your personal information. This means that we are only allowed to process your personal information if there is a legal basis for doing so.

At imec we have defined that we can use your personal information in the cases of:

• consent – We have received your permission to use your personal information.
  • Examples: subscription to a newsletter, participation in a (clinical) research project
• performance of a contract – We process your personal information to fulfill our contractual obligations
  • Example: we process personal information about our contractors to be able to pay their fees.
• legitimate interest – We use legitimate interest as a legal base for the effective and normal operation of our business, providing such interest does not outweigh your rights.
  • Example: we process your personal information to secure our websites during your visits to them.

Should you have any questions, please send them to the Privacy Office: privacy@imec.be.

How to contact the Privacy Office?

If you believe that the processing of your personal information is in breach of your privacy rights, you can submit a complaint or report an infringement to:

Privacy Office (via postal mail or email):

Name: imec VZW
Address: Kapeldreef 75, 3001 Leuven
Contact: directed to the Privacy Manager
E-mail: privacy@imec.be

Each complaint will be taken seriously and its follow-up monitored closely. The Privacy Office is committed to provide an answer within the legal term of one month.  

If you disagree with the outcome of the Privacy Office’s handling of your complaint, you can submit a complaint to the Belgian Data Protection Authority directly. You can find the procedure on www.gegevensbeschermingsautoriteit.be.