Privacy policy

Translation generated by artificial intelligence, without human review. Only the French version is authoritative.

Last updated: 2 October 2026.

1. Commitment

The Observatoire Européen pour la Transparence des Coopératives (OETC) processes your personal data in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and French law. This policy describes which data we process, why, for how long, and what your rights are.

2. Data controller

Observatoire Européen pour la Transparence des Coopératives (OETC), a non-profit association governed by the French law of 1 July 1901, 200 rue de la Croix Nivert, 75015 Paris, France.

3. Data protection contact

For any question about this policy or to exercise your rights: dpo@oetc-rights.eu.

4. Data we process

  • Contact form: e-mail address and the content of your message (first name and surname are optional). Messages are received and stored by our hosting provider's form service, then processed by the OETC.
  • Voice assistant (telephone number given on the Contact page): the message you leave and the number you call from, as transmitted by the telephone network. Please do not describe a personal situation in your message.
  • Technical data: the Site uses no tracking or audience-measurement cookies and does not profile its visitors. Limited technical data (such as the IP address) are processed for a short period by our hosting provider to deliver the Site and ensure its security.
  • Information from public sources: for its studies and analyses, the OETC processes information from public sources (official registers, filed accounts, statutes, published court decisions, press). These documents may contain personal data of persons holding office in cooperatives or named in published decisions. The OETC processes them only for its general analyses, does not use them to assess individual situations and names organisations or persons in a critical context only where a final court decision or an official act allows it. The persons concerned are informed through this policy (Article 14(5)(b) GDPR).

For the time being, the OETC does not collect individual requests for help or any information about the personal situation of cooperative members: please do not send us any. Should such information reach us anyway, it would not be analysed or passed on and would be deleted as soon as possible. Only the e-mail address and the message are needed to reply to you.

5. Purposes and legal bases

  • Replying to your messages and calls — the OETC's legitimate interest in communicating with the people who contact it (Article 6(1)(f) GDPR).
  • Ensuring the operation and security of the Site — the OETC's legitimate interest.
  • Documenting the governance of cooperatives from public sources and informing the public — the OETC's legitimate interest (Article 6(1)(f) GDPR), in accordance with its statutory purpose.

6. Artificial intelligence

The OETC's content is prepared with the assistance of AI and undergoes an automated AI check of legal aspects, personal-data protection and tone, which does not replace legal advice. Every publication is approved by the OETC. Translations are generated by AI, without human review; only the French version is authoritative.

The voice assistant is an artificial intelligence system: it records your message so that the OETC can reply. It does not provide any advice and does not handle individual situations. No decision producing legal effects concerning you is taken in an automated way.

7. Recipients

The OETC does not sell or rent your data. The OETC does not disclose any information about your personal situation to lawyers, experts or other professionals. Your data are processed by:

  • our technical service providers, acting on our instructions: the hosting provider of the Site and of its form service (Netlify, Inc., United States), the domain and e-mail provider (Register S.p.A., Italy) and the technical provider of the voice assistant; the list of providers and their country of establishment can be obtained by writing to the address given in section 3;
  • the competent authorities, only where the law requires it.

8. Transfers of data outside the European Union

Our hosting provider, Netlify, Inc., is established in the United States. According to its privacy policy, it adheres to the EU–US Data Privacy Framework, recognised by Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2023/1795 of 10 July 2023, and applies the standard contractual clauses adopted by the European Commission. For any other provider established outside the European Economic Area, the transfer is based on an adequacy decision of the European Commission or on the standard contractual clauses adopted by the European Commission, so that your data continue to enjoy a level of protection equivalent to that guaranteed within the Union. You can obtain a copy of the applicable safeguards by writing to the address given in section 3.

9. Retention periods

  • Messages received through the contact form and voice messages: a maximum of 12 months after the last exchange, then deletion.
  • Technical data processed by the hosting provider: technical periods limited to the delivery and security of the Site.
  • Information from public sources: for the time needed for the analysis concerned and its publication.

10. Your rights

Under the GDPR, you have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction of processing and objection. To exercise these rights, write to dpo@oetc-rights.eu. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the competent supervisory authority: the CNIL in France, or the authority of the EU country where you live or work (in Italy, the Garante per la protezione dei dati personali).

Right to object. Because we process your data on the basis of our legitimate interest, you may object at any time, on grounds relating to your particular situation, to the processing of your data by writing to dpo@oetc-rights.eu. We will then stop the processing unless there are compelling legitimate grounds that override your interests, rights and freedoms.

11. Security

We implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your data against destruction, loss, alteration or unauthorised disclosure.

12. Changes to this policy

We may change this policy at any time. Any change is published on this page.