data_privacy.txt

Data privacy information
========================

The PIA team is collecting usage statistics for quality control and funding
purposes. We will never give out your personal data. You may disable the
tracking functionality by setting the appropriate settings for the command line
versions (see below) or inside the KNIME preferences. 

For the analysis of the tool's (PIA's) usage, we collect data via the internet.
This data is stored on our servers anonymised (the last part of the IP address
is deleted). A user ID is used to combine the statistics of multiple calls from
the same machine. This user ID is created on the first call of PIA and is stored
either in the user/home directory at ".pia" for a command line call, or directly
inside the KNIME preferences.

To turn off any recording of usage data, use the command line argument
"disableUsageStatistics" or turn off the sending of usage data inside the KNIME
preferences, inside the settings for PIA.

The following data are transmitted and recorded:
- PIA version
- name and version of the operating system
- executed function of PIA (compiler, analysis, visualization)
- information, whether PIA was called on the command line or via KNIME
- user ID (random string of letters and numbers, to combine allow association of
  multiple calls by one user)

To allow communication via the internet, the IP address of the user is stored
for the sole purpose of communication with our servers. As required by laws, we
log these addresses for up to 7 days on our servers before deletion, to
facilitate the analysis of abuses of and attacks on our servers.