Last updated: 04.07.2024

This Privacy Notice describes how your personal data, including sensitive data, are collected and processed, related to the use of our community platform, the Sennheiser Explorers Community.
We take the protection of your personal data and the confidential handling thereof extremely seriously. The processing of your personal data complies, according to your country, with local law requirements, including the Swiss Federal Data Protection Act (“FDPA”), the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 (“GDPR”).

This Privacy Notice may be updated from time to time. In this case, we will inform you that this Privacy Notice has been modified and the “last updated” date on top of this document will be modified. We recommend that you periodically review the latest version of this Privacy Notice.

1. Who we are 

Sonova Consumer Hearing GmbH, Am Labor 1, 30900 Wedemark Deutschland (hereinafter referred to as “Sonova”), acts as a Controller for the processing listed in the following section.

2. Personal data we collect from you and why 

Sonova processes your personal data for the following purposes:

Based on your consent (this processing is not mandatory and will occur only if you agree and consent to it):

• Create an account to register to the Sennheiser Explorers Community: your account information (user name, first name, last name, email, password, date of birth, country of living, gender, Sonova owned products)
• Conduct specific data processing activities, such as video calls or interviews: video, images, audios. In this case, a specific consent will be asked for this specific type of activity. The specific details of the scope and purpose of the consent will be described in the wording of the declaration of consent at the contact point.
• Update images and videos from end devices to strengthen your feedback in relation to your experience with our products and services: some modules, for example the forum area in the Sennheiser Explorers Community allow you to upload images and videos from end devices in case you freely decide to do so (not mandatory field)
• Process self-reported assessment regarding hearing loss level to send target group specific surveys and improve products: level of hearing as self-reported by you.

Based on the performance of your contract (this processing is mandatory as it is necessary to perform your request as part of the performance of the contract to be part of our Explorers Community  and to provide you with the service requested)

• Guarantee your participation to the community such as through forums: your contribution and user name
• Guarantee technical operation and functionality: Date and time of access, Duration of visit, Type of device, Browser used, Operating system used, Functions that you use, Quantity of sent data,Type of event, IP address, Domain name
• Guarantee the availability, operation and security of technical systems, as well as technical data management.
• Reply to any enquiry submitted by you through the contact form in the FAQ section under About&Team or via email: Reason for contacting us, Contact information (email address)
• Process warranty and goodwill claims, dealing with enquiries and requests from customers

Based on our legitimate interest:

• Send you target-group specific surveys and other Community activities to improve our products and services and, hence, enhance your experience with us : your account information, data about yourself and/or your household necessary to improve your experience with us, such as your age, gender, professional occupation, leisure activities, your feedback on our products, information on your audio device and usage, spending level and intention to spend.
• Improve and optimize the functioning of our platform
• Develop products, services, service provision and support packages as well as other measures for the management of business cases and processes
• Improve the product quality, elimination of faults and disruptions including with the help of the analysis of customer feedback
• Risk management as well as coordination of product recalls

2.1. Cookies collected

When you visit the Sennheiser Explorers Community, so-called “cookies” and “similar technologies”, i.e. generally small files, may be stored on your device, in order to offer you a more comprehensive range of functions, to make your user experience more pleasant and to enable us to optimise our offers. This processing is conducted through the usage of cookies and therefore it is based on the logics of the cookie settings and privacy notice of the concerned websites. You will find further information on the type, scope and purposes of data processing as well as options for objecting to the use of cookies and similar technologies in our Cookie Policy and under our Cookie Settings that you can change at any time.

3. How we share your personal data 

Your personal data will be processed according to the instructions we provide to our employees who have received the necessary training in data protection and are subject to an obligation of confidentiality.

Your personal data may also be disclosed to:

• Other companies in our group of companies, such as our subsidiaries, all of which are required to protect personal data in accordance with applicable privacy and data protection laws;
• Our business partners, contractors and third-party service providers. These third parties only process personal data that are strictly necessary for the services they provide to us, according to our instructions and in compliance with our privacy and security requirements.
• Other organizations and public bodies, supervisory and control authorities, including law enforcement agencies,as may be required by law.

By using the Sennheiser Explorers Community platform, only personal data that are strictly necessary for the following purposes are shared:

• SKOPOS CONNECT GmbH: support in the operation of this Community
• Qualtrics: collect survey responses
• Other companies in the SKOPOS group to collect user feedback (e.g. SKOPOS Research)

Before we disclose any personal data to other third parties than those listed above, we will explicitly ask you for your consent. However, if we are obliged to disclose personal data without your consent, we will only disclose personal data that are strictly necessary for that purpose to fulfil our legal obligations.

4.  International personal data transfers 

Please note that some of the above-mentioned third parties can be located outside your country. Therefore, your personal data may be transferred to countries that do not provide the same level of protection of personal data as your own country. In such cases, we undertake to:

• implement adequate procedures to comply with applicable law;
• adopt appropriate organizational, technical and legal safeguards in order to ensure an adequate level of protection of the personal data transferred;
• implement, if necessary, and according to applicable law, standard contractual clauses as adopted by the European Commission;
• depending on the country of the importing third party, take additional measures such as a transfer impact assessment.

5. How long we keep your personal data

Sonova will retain your personal data for a minimal period proportional to the time required to fulfil the purposes outlined in Section 2. For example, The personal data you provide in connection with your participation in this Community is generally kept at least for as long as you remain a Community member subject to applicable storage periods and statute of limitations. You can opt to unsubscribe from invitations to activities thus terminating your membership. We then delete personal data linked to your survey results. Your contributions visible to other members such as forum contents are not automatically deleted once you choose to unsubscribe from the Community. User names are pseudonymous data, and after you ceased to be a member of the Community, we are in no position to identify you as author of a particular contribution.

We may keep anonymized and aggregated survey results for the purposes of improvement and development of our products. We are in no position to determine who took the survey based on anonymized survey results.

In the event applicable law or other regulations require a longer retention period, we will apply the longer retention period in order to fulfill our legal obligations.

6. Your legal rights 

Within the framework of the collection and processing of your personal data, and as per applicable law, you may have the right to request access, rectification, erasure of your personal data, or restriction of processing. In addition, you may object to the processing, request data portability and withdraw your consent at any time. According to your country, you may have other rights such as providing instructions for how your personal data should be processed posthumously.

Please note that the exercise of such rights is subject to the limitations provided by applicable law.

If you consider that the processing of your personal data infringes applicable law, then you may also lodge a complaint with the local supervisory authority or the competent regulator.

7. Third party links on Mobile App

Websites as well as services from other providers that are linked to the Sennheiser Explorers Community have been and are designed and provided by third parties. We have no influence over the design, contents and function of these third party services. We expressly distance ourselves from all the contents of all the linked offerings from third parties. Please note that all the linked offerings from third parties on the Sennheiser Explorers Community possibly install their own cookies on your device and/or collect personal data. We have no influence on this. Please obtain information about this directly from the providers of these linked third-party offerings

8. How to contact us

In the event of questions about this Privacy Notice, or the processing of your Personal Data, please contact our Data Privacy Team at  privacy@sonova.com.