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Terms of service

  • At the beginning of the Project a general Project Agreement is concluded between Astroserver and Client including the terms and conditions specified as follows:
    • The Client appoints Astroserver and Astroserver undertakes to act on behalf of the Client to perform specific services (hereinafter referred to as Services). Astroserver conducts the Services or seeks for the best available provider to perform the Services. In the latter case Astroserver acts on behalf of the Client.
    • The project assignment is effective for a fixed period, commencing on the following day after the Project Agreement is signed and expiring by fulfilling the Services and delivering the final product, or, at the latest on the date agreed by the parties. The term can be extended in a separate written agreement.
    • Astroserver represents to have appropriate knowledge for the proper performance of the task. Astroserver represents that the provider holds all the licenses and qualifications required for rendering the Services. The Client agrees to make available all the information required by Astroserver to provide the Services. Astroserver makes all reasonable efforts to assure that the applied methods (e.g.: models) are appropriate to seek for solutions and the services are performed conscientiously to provide the state-of-the-art in the given task.
    • Astroserver shall not be entitled to employ, include or share information with any third party in the performance of their obligations hereunder, except the qualified provider of the Services. The project related communication between the Client and the provider goes through Astroserver. The parties are not identified in this process, unless the project requires it and all parties mutually agree on listing their identity.
    • Astroserver requests a fee for their services plus a project cost (approx. 5 EUR/day/CPU-thread for computing tasks). In general, the project cost depends on the nature of the project (computational, rendering, development or observing), therefore it is always negotiated. The fee and project cost represent all expenses incurred by Astroserver in connection herewith. The payment method shall be online payment, or bank-transfer of which an electronic invoice will be provided at the end of the project.
    • Astroserver (or the service provider) agrees to perform their Services on their premises using their infrastructure. The parties may deviate from this provision in a separate agreement.
    • The Client undertakes to make available to Astroserver all the necessary documentation and information required to carry out the Services, so that the tasks could be fully performed in compliance with the Project Agreement. The Client pays the fee and reimburses the project costs to Astroserver for the Services.
    • Astroserver undertakes to inform the Client of any delay, or additional requirements to perform the tasks in compliance with the Project Agreement. Astroserver shall assume no liability for incorrect data supplied by the Client. Astroserver provides the best service available in its network and regular feedback on the project development. Astroserver stores all online documentation for one year after completing the project. An extension of this period is possible in a separate agreement.
    • Astroserver offers its service as-is. The Client understands that all research is experimental in nature and that the outcome of the Services is inherently uncertain and unpredictable. The Client agrees and acknowledges that Astroserver has not made and does not make any guaranty or financial liability, expressed or implied, regarding the results of the Services. In no event shall either party be liable to the other party for any claims by the other party for indirect, incidental, consequential, special, punitive, or exemplary damages, including lost profits, arising or alleged to raise from the Project Agreement, its breach, or the transactions contemplated herein, however caused, under any theory of liability.
    • The parties may terminate the Project Agreement anytime in a written (email) notice. In the event of material breach hereof, the parties may terminate the Project Agreement in writing (email) with immediate effect.
    • If the Client terminates the agreement, Astroserver is entitled for a proportional part of the agreed costs. In case of the final results are failing to comply with the expectations laid out in the Project Agreement, the Client agrees to reimburse the project costs to Astroserver. If Astroserver terminates the agreement, it is not entitled for any compensation.
    • The Client agrees to include the standard acknowledgement in all publications and presentations of the results: "This research has used the services of www.Astroserver.org under reference XXXXXX." In general, co-authorship is not requested by Astroserver. However, for collaborative science publications in refereed journals with text contributions, or observing support from Astroserver, it is recommended to include the contributing Astroserver researcher as a co-author. For media contents the credits shall include the name of the producer with their Astroserver affiliation and/or logo.
    • The Client owns all rights of the supported data and intellectual property of the research. Astroserver provides the know-how and assistance to the project and does not circulate, publish or make available any data or any derived data products. The Client agrees to inform Astroserver about their published results, which Astroserver may use as reference work to demonstrate its services.

Privacy and data protection policy

    Visitors and Users

    Astroserver must distinguish Visitors and Users. With a basic Visitor access, only the public content of the website is accessible, and therefore, no personally identifiable information is generated or recorded by Astroserver. Visitors may chose to browse the web site completely anonymously. With cookies enabled, Astroserver records tracking information to ensure the security of its services and measure performance. Such non-personally identifiable information are stored for up to 12 months, or the minimum period offered by tracking poviders. All personal data generated are stored within the infrastructure of Astroserver and its server provider (MHosting Kft.), accessible only to Astroservers' Data Protection Officer (DPO) and never shared with third parties.

    Unlike Visitors, Users must be identified to secure access to their personal (or research group) accounts. To this end Astroserver must collect some personal information to provide its services. For Users with personal accounts Astroserver needs to keep a name, email address and user defined password combination on file. In addition we ask for an official affiliation of our Users, without checking the validity of these information.

    Data transfer

    Astroserver applies standard encryption solutions in all its data transfers secured with an SSL certificate.

    Data storage

    All project and User data are distributed among several nodes in the Astroserver computer system at different physical and network locations. All sensitive data are encrypted.

    Direct communications

    Astroserver does not do marketing, remarketing, profiling and automated decision making activities. During project work, such as interactive data analysis in the Sandbox services, automatic email updates are sent to registered Users about project development. We offer an opt-out of these email updates on the project level, or globally for the User account. Astroserver reserves the right to send occassional updates once a year to its registered Users to inform them about updates and important changes.

    All messages sent to Astroserver through the web page are logged. These logs record the sender's name, email and IP address without checking their validity.

    Personal accounts

    In order to provide data analysis services personal accounts can be opened. These accounts grant access to a personal folder where Users can upload data, start computations, comment and export results. Astroserver can monitor these projects for quality assurance.

    Closing an account

    Users may close their account anytime. In such a case the account is first suspended for 3 days with login disabled. Within this period the account can be fully restored by the User through their registered email address. After 3 days the account will be closed and all associated data will be immediately removed from Astroserver by our automatic account management procedure. It may take up to one month to entirely clear deleted accounts from the backup system.

    Other

    All personal data are stored in Astroserver's electronic system at the hosting provider's web-server (MHosting Kft.). Contact and billing information are shared only with Astroserver's online invoice provider (www.szamlazz.hu, KBOSS.hu Kft.)

    In addition Astroserver must collect contact an billing information to perform its paid services. For billing and invoicing Astroserver must collect customer data: name, street address, email address and tax number. These data can be managed by Users through their personal Dashboard. These data are stored in Astroserver's computer system and shared only with its invoice provider (www.szamlazz.hu, KBOSS.hu Kft.).

    All research data (reference data, observations and supporting material) are stored only within the Astroserver computer system, which includes the web-server and the nodes of the MAIDS server (Model Atmosphere Investigation Data Server).

    Registered users have access to an account overview page (Dashboard) where all personal data (stored preferences, login information, etc.) can be retrieved. Upon request the DPO can provide tracking information collected by tracking providers (Google Analytics and StatCounter). Such requests can be made only from the Dashboard.

Payment solutions

    We inform our customers that the service rates and bank card payment transactions on the website of Astroserver are EUR basis, regardless of the currency of credit card used. The actual amount of the payment debited on your bank account may be marginally different as a result of the exchange rate and conversions applied by the card companies or the issuer bank.

    SimplePay simplepay

    SimplePay is an online payment service of OTP Mobil Ltd., Hungary. Payments are accepted with any bank cards without registering a Simple account. More about SimplePay and their general terms and conditions are available at: SimplePay Terms & Conditions. The nature and purpose of the data processing activity performed by SimplePay can be found in the Privacy Policy at the following link: SimplePay Privacy Policy (pdf).

    Accepted bank cards:
    cards

    PayPal paypal

    PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American company operating a worldwide online payments system that supports online money transfers and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper methods like checks and money orders. The company operates as a payment processor for online vendors, auction sites, and many other commercial users, for which it charges a fee in exchange for benefits such as one-click transactions and password memory. Paypal is used as a backup payment solution of Astroserver, which is available on request. The nature and purpose of the data processing activity performed by PayPal can be found in the Privacy Policy at the following link: PayPal Privacy Policy.

    Accepted bank cards:
    paypal

Cookie policy

    Cookies in general

    Cookies are tiny data files stored by web browsers on the Vistor's computer. There are certain information categories websites need to keep over longer periods of time for the convenience of the Visitor, like user preferences or connection identification for a secure communication with the server. There are different types of cookies: Some are absolutely necessary for a proper operation of a web site. Some store only convenience information and some are used to show different content based on the Visitors' preference, which are mainly used (sometimes misused) for advertising. Some cookies have a predefined lifetime, extending from minutes to years. And there are one-time cookies, such as session cookies that expire when the browser is closed. For more information on cookies please visit Cookies & You or Wikipedia.

    A good example for the use of cookies is the cookie consent itself. We wish to ask our Visitors for a cookie consent only on their first visit, therefore we save a tiny data file that tells the web-server that the Visitor has already set their preference. Then, from the next visit the browser "remembers" (retrieves the cookie) this preference and shows content accordingly, without bothering the Visitor with an already accepted cookie policy.

    Cookies from Astroserver

    Just like any modern website, Astroserver also needs to use cookies. Astroserver does not store any personal or sensitive information in cookies and does not do remarketing activities. Our cookies are not shared with third parties and have a maximum lifetime of 12 months. Cookies can be managed upon first visit by using our cookie policy and consent module. The consent can be revised anytime at the bottom of the current page. In addition, we inform the Visitor that cookies can be disabled in browsers as well. For details on how to disable cookies in major browsers, please visit Cookies & You. However, please note: By doing so some pages may not function as originally intended.

    Astroserver uses Visitor tracking provided by Google Analytics and StatCounter across its web pages. These services are widely used on many sites and can be considered as industrial standards. These services apply their own set of cookies under the .astroserver.org domain. The information we collect: URL, IP address, geolocation, time of visit and browser type. These data serve two purposes: By analyzing visitor paths we can improve our services and the structure of the website. The same information is used to get an additional layer of security to the website. No personally identifiable information is collected with tracking and all data are stored in an aggregate form by the providers. The cookie lifetimes are defined by the tracking providers and Astroserver has no control over it. Astroserver stores tracking information for 12 months, or the minimum available period set by the providers. Google Analytics keeps the derived tracking information for 14 months and Statcounter keeps these logs for 12 months.

    Astroserver offers three levels of access to its website, in cookie terms these are in increasing order:

    1. Basic Visitor access
      No cookies. No browser session. For security reasons we cannot provide access to all parts of the website, internal pages, contact form and third party contents. This is, indeed, a limited access.
    2. Standard Visitor access
      Basic cookies and browser session are enabled. Necessary minimal setup to render the pages and access our contact form and dynamic content. Basic cookies enable tracking that help us improve the pages and evaluate performance.
    3. User access
      All cookies are enabled. All previous features, plus access to User accounts and interactive data processing.

    Astroserver and its subdomains (*.astroserver.org) use the following cookies:

    PHPSESSID Session ID of the Vistor's browser that identifies the connection to the web-server. It allows the web-server to send the proper content to the browser.
    _ga _gat _gid Google Analytics tracking cookies.
    sc_is_visitor_unique Statcounter tracking cookie.
    cookieconsent_status Cookie consent status.
    gdpr GDPR compliance cookie.
    autorefresh Controls the refresh rate of several pages.
    UID User ID.
    *notice *wt Various pop-up notifications and walk-through tutorial control flags.

    Cookies currently set by Astroserver

    Third party cookies

    Some of our web pages may ocassionally play video content from Youtube, like the slider on the main page. Beyond movies, the slider integrates content from the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) site, from NASA and from the Astronomy.com web sites. These mirrored contents draw some cookies, just like visiting the orginal sites would do. These third party cookies are not under the .astroserver.org domain and Astroserver cannot control them. However, we make an effort to link and mirror contents only from reliable sources.

    Astroserver uses native javascript codes and the services of JQuery.com.

Notification of changes: Astroserver reserves the right to change these terms and conditions without prior notice.

Last modified: April 12, 2024

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