Privacy Notice

In this Privacy Notice, we describe how we collect and process your personal data:

• when you visit our website embark.law;
• in the course of handling legal mandates;
• when you apply for a position with us;
• when we receive personal data about you for other purposes in the course of our business activities.

Contact details
EMBARK.LAW AG
Genfergasse 11
3011 Bern
hello@embark.law

This Privacy Notice explains how we handle personal data from a general data protection perspective. Data entrusted to us by our clients in the context of a legal mandate is additionally subject to attorney-client privilege. Attorney-client privilege may require other and/or additional safeguards and rules.

Please note that contacting us through our website, by email or through similar communication channels does not establish an attorney-client relationship. Please do not send us confidential information through these channels.

When you visit our website, the server automatically logs general technical information about your visit. This data includes, for example, the IP address and operating system of your device, the date and time of use, the website from which you visit us and the type of browser you use to access our website.

When you contact us through the website (for example, through the contact form, the email address provided on the website or another contact channel made available through the website), we process your contact details, the content of your communication, the associated metadata and any other relevant personal data you provide on that occasion.

When you subscribe to our newsletter, contact us through the website or download content from our website, we collect your contact details and any other relevant personal data you provide to us in the process, as well as technical data that is generated automatically in the course of this use.

As a rule, we only use necessary cookies on our website. These cookies enable you to use the website effectively; without them, parts or all of our website may not function properly. However, our blog includes embedded media (YouTube videos). If you view these videos, YouTube places its own cookies on your device. For this reason, we ask for your consent before loading embedded media.

You can manage your browser's security settings yourself and block cookies used by us or delete stored cookies. Please note that our website may no longer function fully if you block cookies that are necessary for its operation.

We use etracker (www.etracker.com) to analyze usage data on our website. etracker is a privacy-friendly tracking tool: it does not use cookies, and all data that could potentially be linked to an individual, such as IP addresses, registration IDs or device IDs, is anonymized or pseudonymized as early as possible. etracker has been independently audited and certified in this respect and has been awarded the ePrivacyseal data protection seal.

You can object to data processing by etracker at any time by clicking the toggle below. Objecting will not have any adverse consequences. If no toggle is displayed, data collection has already been prevented by other blocking measures.

You can find further information about data protection at etracker here.

We process personal data that we receive, collect or create in the course of handling our mandates (providing legal advice to our clients). This typically includes the following categories of personal data:

• contact details (e.g. name, email), and, where applicable, documents used to verify identity (copies of identity documents or similar);
• communication content, including the associated metadata;
• legal and other documents;
• other data whose processing is necessary to handle our legal mandates;
• where applicable, technical data, for example in connection with electronic signatures.

We receive this data either directly from you or from other sources, such as our clients, our clients' negotiating partners and other contacts, as well as from publicly accessible sources (e.g. commercial registers).

When you apply for a position with us, we collect and process the personal data necessary to review your application and conduct the application process. This includes in particular:

• contact details (e.g. name, email, address, telephone number, etc.);
• communication content and the associated metadata;
• information about your professional background and qualifications;
• the content of your application documents;
• other data necessary to assess your application.

You provide most of this personal data directly as part of your application. We also process information from other sources, in particular from references (if you have consented to us obtaining references) and from publicly accessible sources (e.g. professional social networks and the internet).

In the course of our business activities, we process personal data relating to other individuals, such as our contacts at business partners, suppliers and service providers, or people who are interested in and enquire about our services. The personal data processed generally consists primarily of identification data, contact details and communication content, including the associated metadata, as well as any other personal data required in this context.

We receive this data either directly from you or from other sources, such as other people in your company, business partners and other contacts, as well as from publicly accessible sources (e.g. professional social networks, the internet and commercial registers).

We process your personal data in particular:

• to prepare, enter into, perform and enforce contracts in the course of our business activities (e.g. engagement agreements with our clients and contracts with our service providers and business partners);
• to communicate with you and third parties (including outside the preparation or conclusion of a contract);
• to provide you with the website and optimize your user experience;
• to maintain and, where appropriate, expand our business relationship with you or your employer;
• to improve, expand and market our services;
• to ensure IT security and data protection (e.g. monitoring our IT infrastructure and creating backups);
• to assert, defend against or otherwise address legal claims;
• to comply with legal obligations (e.g. compliance obligations and obligations to retain business records);
• on the basis of and within the scope of your consent, where relevant. You may withdraw consent at any time.

To perform contracts, safeguard our interests or comply with legal requirements, it may be necessary for us to disclose your personal data to third parties. This includes in particular:

• our IT service providers and other third-party providers whom we engage for the purposes described above;
• clients, our clients' negotiating partners, authorities, etc., where necessary to handle a legal mandate, as well as our partner law firms where we involve them in handling a legal mandate in consultation with our clients;
• situations in which disclosure is necessary to (i) comply with a legal obligation, (ii) ensure IT security and data protection, or (iii) assert, defend against or otherwise address legal claims;
• third parties to whom we transfer our company or parts of it, or with whom we merge.

In doing so, we also transfer personal data abroad. In particular, we use IT service providers whose data is located in the EU or EEA. We limit transfers of personal data to countries outside Switzerland, the EU and the EEA as far as possible, but they cannot be avoided entirely. If the countries concerned do not provide a level of data protection recognized by Switzerland, we generally use standard contractual clauses to ensure adequate protection, supplemented where necessary and possible by additional security measures.

We do not sell or rent personal data to third parties.

We protect your personal data with appropriate technical and organizational security measures against accidental, unlawful or unauthorized manipulation, deletion, alteration, access, disclosure, use or loss.

These measures include:

• state-of-the-art IT infrastructure;
• monitoring our IT infrastructure for security purposes;
• regular backups;
• employee training;
• regular security audits.

We only retain your personal data for as long and to the extent necessary for the purposes described above or for legal reasons.

Subject to the conditions of applicable data protection law and to the extent provided for therein, you have the following rights in connection with your personal data:

• the right to access the personal data we process about you;
• the right to have inaccurate personal data rectified;
• the right to have your personal data erased ('right to be forgotten');
• the right to restrict the processing of your personal data;
• the right to data portability (transfer of your personal data to you or a third party);
• the right to object to the processing of your personal data.

Please note that exceptions apply to these rights. In particular, we may be required or entitled to continue processing your personal data in order to perform a contract, protect our legitimate interests, such as asserting, defending against or otherwise addressing legal claims, or comply with legal obligations. In these cases, we may or must reject certain requests or comply with them only to a limited extent.

If you are not satisfied with how we process your personal data, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the competent supervisory authority (the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner, FDPIC).

Please contact us before submitting a complaint so that we can try to resolve your concern directly. The easiest way to reach us is by email at hello@embark.law.

Our website links to third-party websites that are not operated or controlled by us. We are not responsible for whether or how these third parties comply with data protection requirements.

We may amend this Privacy Notice at any time. New versions take effect for you as soon as we notify you by publishing them on our website.