Data protection at City of Vaasa

What is personal data?

Personal data refers to all information relating to an identified or identifiable natural person, such as name, personal identification number, home address, telephone number, car registration number and patient information.

How the City of Vaasa handles personal data?

Most of the services in the City of Vaasa are based on the implementation of a statutory obligation, public interest or the exercise of public authority. In these cases, the processing of personal data does not require separate consent from the customer.

Personal data received will be processed carefully and will only be handled by those persons whose duties they belong to. This is done in accordance with a data-safe and customer-friendly policy. The persons who process the information are bound by a confidentiality requirement and receive appropriate training.

Various log systems monitor especially the processing of sensitive personal data. Information systems are protected using a firewall and constantly updated virus protection software, for example.

Where to find personal data and why is it collected?

As a rule, personal data can be obtained directly from the customer or obtained from the registers of various authorities, e.g. the Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela) and the Population Register Centre.

When a customer obtains a service, the City of Vaasa collects only the personal information needed to produce this service. The personal information collected is determined by the particular service being used.

Disclosure of personal data

Personal data may be disclosed to another department within the City of Vaasa or to another authority, such as the Finnish Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela) or the Tax Administration, within the limits of the law.

Individual rights

A customer may use, among other things, the following rights under the Privacy Policy:

• The right to information concerning what, how and why personal data is processed.
• The right to restrict the processing of data until the legality of the processing is verified.
• The right to data rectification, in which case incorrect or inaccurate information is corrected.
• The right to be forgotten. This right cannot be used in registers based on law.
• The right to access information, i.e. whether the city processes the customer’s personal data and what information is being processed. The city has one month to respond to this information request. If the information request is complex, the response time can be extended by two months.
• The right to object. The Customer may oppose the processing of their personal data, for example, to prohibit direct marketing. The City of Vaasa does not disclose personal information to direct marketing companies.
• Information on a data breach. In the event of a potential high-risk security breach, the city is obliged to notify the customer without undue delay.
• The right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority, if the Customer considers that his/her personal data are being infringed upon in the processing of his/her personal data.

Using Your Rights

If you wish to use your rights, contact the appropriate agency / institution or, if possible, use the electronic service.

An electronic service, for example via Suomi.fi, requires strong authentication with bank identifiers, a certificate card or a mobile certificate, so that the data user can be identified reliably. Data is generally provided free of charge. If information requests often come from the same person or are exceptionally extensive, a reasonable fee may be charged.

Request for verification of registry information (pdf, 95kb)

Data collection

The vaasa.fi website collects information on:

• the devices on which the site has been used;
• the web address from which website users have accessed the site;
• the specific page on which users have visited the site;
• the number of visitors to the site. Visitors to individual pages are only shown as quantities.

No data is collected on vaasa.fi to:

• obtain information about the user’s IP address;
• send any personal data to third parties;
• obtain information on the location of the user beyond their municipality.

Data is in a format that cannot be linked to an individual user without additional information.

Contact information may be requested through various forms. Access to this information is limited to city staff. The information provided in the forms will not be passed on to third parties unless otherwise stated in the form.

Intended use of the data

The information is used to ensure the technical performance and data security of the website, to analyse and develop the website and to target marketing communications as described below.

Website analysis and development

The vaasa.fi website uses the web analytics tool Matomo Analytics, which uses data from the website to compile statistical information. The data is collected to analyse visitor numbers, the attractiveness of the content, how the service is used, and the development of the website.

• For more information on Matomo Analytics’ privacy policy: https://matomo.org/privacy/

Note! Until 11 August 2023, the site vaasa.fi used the Google Analytics web analytics tool. The data collected up to that point, that is, 11 August 2023, will be deleted after 12 months.

Cookies

The vaasa.fi website uses cookies. Cookies make using our website easy, fast, and user-friendly. Cookies can also be used for targeting your marketing communications, read more under Targeting marketing communications.

You will be asked to choose whether to allow downloading all cookies, cookies of your choice, or only the necessary cookies. You can refuse the use of third-party cookies or change your consent at any time in the cookie settings.

A cookie is a small text file that an internet browser stores on your device. Cookies are only placed on your computer for pages that you visit. Only the server that sent the cookie can later read and use the cookie. Cookies or the diagnostics used by the site do not harm your computer or files, and they cannot be used to run programs or spread malware.

Chat service privacy

The chat service is one of the customer service channels belonging to the City of Vaasa. In chat, visitors can post anonymously and are not required to register.

In a chat, the conversation between the visitor and the customer advisor is deleted immediately after the conversation, and no personal information is stored about the conversation. The visitor is also not asked for any personal information and is unable to handle their personal affairs in the chat function.

During the conversation, the visitor can also subscribe to the conversation history in their own e-mail.

The chat service collects the following analytics data from conversations:

• The time of the conversation
• Name of the customer advisor
• Visitor location (country)
• The visitor’s email address when they subscribe to the conversation in their email. The email address will be deleted once the conversation has been sent to the customer.

Targeting marketing communications

In connection with campaigns, we use cookies to target content. The use of cookies used to target content requires the user’s consent. These cookies help the City of Vaasa to send targeted ads to users based on how the user has used the vaasa.fi website or other services. These cookies may be installed by our Selected Service Providers (media agencies) as third parties. These cookies are persistent. If you do not allow the use of these cookies, the content targeting functionality will be disabled.

We use advertising cookies in social media and advertising. The use of advertising cookies requires the consent of the user. Advertising cookies allow us to place targeted content for you. In marketing campaigns, cookies are precisely activated through our selection of marketing partners in our online services. Such third-party cookies may also be used by those companies to understand users’ interests with the objective of displaying relevant ads on other sites. Third-party cookies can also be used in social media services.

Adform and Facebook are used for targeting.