We (UNICO.ai CZ, s.r.o., business registration number: 06118313) are a Czech IT company that aims at improving cooperation between universities and businesses. We want this cooperation to be efficient, transparent and beneficial for researchers, universities, entrepreneurs and the society at large. As one of our contributions towards this goal we have created this smart platform: a database in which everyone may search for experts with relevant focus and expertise. The database is based largely on public data and on data provided for this purpose by researchers and universities.
We may collect your personal data in four ways: information from publicly accessible sources (or given to us by third parties); information you directly give us; information we collect from your use of the platform; and information we collect from cookies, also known as tracking technologies.
In order for the platform to function, we obtain information about you from publicly accessible sources. This refers in the first place to information about you that can be used to contact or identify you. Such personal information may include, but is not limited to, your name, email address, telephone number, home and business postal addresses, age (date of birth), gender, education, institution (employer) and occupation.
We also collect information that may relate to you or your professional activities such as biographical information, publications, authorship of articles, academic or research expertise or interests, conferences you have attended or groups (societies) of which you are a member.
We do not collect sensitive information such as information about your race, political views, religious views, or health conditions unless you have voluntarily shared them with the public.
We obtain the information about you and your professional activities from the following principal sources:
You may register with our platform and create your own account. During the registration process you may provide us with your basic personal information such as your name, surname, email address, institutional affiliation and your role in relation to the platform’s activity. Once you register, you may also link your account with a profile we may have created based on the publicly available data.
During your use of the platform you may decide to provide us with further details on your professional activities or you may ask us to modify any information related to you that you consider incorrect. That will enable us to provide our users with as accurate information as possible. Providing such information is voluntary; you will always be notified if a certain piece of information is necessary for a certain service to be provided or a certain feature to function.
We also collect information when you contact us for customer support. When you contact our customer support services, we may collect the information we need to categorize your question and respond to it. We also use this information to track potential problems and trends and customize our support responses to better serve you.
When you visit our website and/or use the platform, whether as a registered user or a visitor just browsing, we and service providers acting on our behalf automatically record information that your browser sends whenever you visit a website (hereinafter the Log Data). We do this to monitor and analyze use of the website (platform), for the website’s technical administration, to increase our website’s functionality and to better tailor it to our visitors needs.
We and our service providers use cookies or similar technologies to collect information relating to you and your use of the website (platform).
Cookies are small files that enable us to store and collect specific information related to you and your use of the website (platform) and help us to analyze use of the website (we use Google Analytics for this purpose) and then to increase security and tailor our services to your needs.
We use cookies for two purposes. First, we use “session cookies” to better understand how you interact with the website (platform) and to enable certain features of the website (platform). The session cookies are automatically deleted when you close the window or your browser. Second, we use persistent cookies to save your registration ID and password for future logins to the platform (in order to save you time). We also use persistent cookies for personalisation of the platform, i.e. for the website to remember the choices you previously made about the layout, themes etc.
We use cookies (both session and persistent) only with your prior consent. You may always withdraw your consent in the settings of your account or by notifying us. Please note that if you do not accept cookies some features may be limited.
We use the information we collect to facilitate communication and improve cooperation between universities and businesses. For this purpose we create research profiles based on publicly accessible information so that any interested user may be able to find an expert best fitting to specified themes (keywords). When you register and when you claim a profile (link a profile to your account), you may let us know how you want us to use various types of information we have collected about you.
We assume that when researchers publish their research outcomes, they want to be associated with them. We are aware, however, that this may not always be the case. Therefore we offer you the possibility of tailoring the visibility of various types of information to your needs; you can change the settings any time after your registration. Should you find proposed options not fitting your needs or wishes, do not hesitate to contact us.
We use the information we collect to communicate with you. We may contact you about your registration and use of the platform. We may contact you with service messages related to your profile (including changes to our Privacy Policy, times of maintenance, new functions etc.).
We use your personal information to generate statistics related to the use of the platform in order to improve it.
We are engaged in research and we cooperate with public universities. We may therefore use certain data for research purposes. However, in such circumstances we would always use aggregate anonymised or pseudonymised data.
As we collect information from publicly accessible sources, the profiles we create are visible to any user of the platform. We believe that by providing some platform users (businesses interested in specific areas of research) with researchers’ profiles matching the search criteria we help in achieving the goal for which the information was published (i.e. dissemination of knowledge).
Nevertheless, we acknowledge that researchers’ preferences change over time and that some researchers may not want to be associated with or contacted about their research (anymore). Therefore we offer our registered users various options of tailoring their profile visibility and contactability in search results.
Generally, we do not share any non-public information with third parties unless you give us your prior consent. However, we can share your personal information with contractors who assist us in running the platform (e.g. providers of infrastructure).
We may share your personal information with public authorities when the law requires us to do so. In such cases we share only the information that we have to and we communicate with the concerned users as soon as allowed.
We may also disclose personal information in order to identify, contact, or bring legal action against a person or entity who may be causing harm or endangering other users or the platform.
If we are involved in a corporate reorganization (e.g. acquisition, merger, asset sale), personal information may be transferred to the acquiring entity and become subject to a different privacy policy. Before the data transfer we will give you a notice and option to opt-out of the transfer.
We store and process personal information on servers located solely in the European Economic Area. Should there be any change in this respect, we would let you know and we would ensure that your personal information is handled in compliance with the principles set forth in this Privacy Policy and with Czech and European data protection legislation (such as GDPR).
We take all reasonable steps necessary in accordance with this Privacy Policy and applicable law to protect your personal data from unauthorized access, collection, use, disclosure, copying and disposal. We have implemented safeguards and security measures that protect the integrity of the data. Our servers have both physical and software security measures that minimise the risk of unauthorised persons intercepting, deleting, reading or modifying the data we store. We also perform routine penetration tests. Our policy stands on the principle that only essential, well-selected and trained personnel are allowed to interact with the database; furthermore, those interactions are monitored and logged. When interacting with our clients, all communication is done using secure measures. We recognise that all data are precious and should be kept as confidential as possible.
You are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of your account’s username and password. Please notify us if you think that your access details may have been compromised. If you do not follow these guidelines and do not act as a reasonably prudent user, we cannot be responsible for the unauthorized access to your account.
Please note that despite having taken all reasonable security measures it is not possible to guarantee that unauthorized persons will not ever be able to hack our system or otherwise defeat our security measures.
As a general rule, we retain your personal information to the extent and for as long as it is necessary to fulfill the purpose(s) for which it was collected, to provide our services, resolve disputes, establish legal defenses, enforce our agreements, comply with applicable law or do scientific research.
If you think that certain data that we collected from public sources should be either deleted or dissociated from you (your profile), please let us know.
All personal data that you directly gave us or that we collected from your use of the platform will be deleted or anonymized (i.e. nobody could attribute the data to you) within 30 days after closing your account unless we have reasonable grounds to believe that the personal information should be retained for one of the purposes identified above.
You may be entitled to exercise some or all of the following rights free of charge (such rights may vary depending on various factors, e.g. on the way how we collected your personal information):
You may (i) exercise the rights referred to above or (ii) pose any questions or (iii) make any complaints regarding the data processing by contacting us.
We do not offer any services and do not collect any personal information about children (except for texts of research papers on children). Should you have any concerns in this respect, do not hesitate to contact us.
We may change our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will post any changes to this Privacy Policy on this page. Please check this Privacy Policy from time to time for changes.
We will inform you about all substantial changes to this Privacy Policy and offer you an opt-out from our services should you not agree to the new rules.
If you have any additional questions or concerns about our Privacy Policy, please email our Data Protection Officer at standa@unico.ai or send a letter to Unico.ai, Salvátorská 931/8 110 00, Prague 1, Czech Republic.
