Privacy Policy

Effective Date: May 25th, 2018

Current version available at: https://yandex.ru/legal/toloka_privacy

1 What does this Policy cover?

The Privacy Policy (the “Policy”) covers any and all information about you that may include personal data in the sense given by applicable legislation (“Personal information”) that Yandex Services AG or its affiliates¹, including all persons belonging to the same group with Yandex Services AG (“Yandex”), may obtain in the course of your use of any of Yandex’ websites, programs, products or services, including: search service, e-mail service, map service, storage service and all other programs, products or services (together the “Services”), information about which you can find on yandex.com, yandex.ru, yandex.ua, yandex.by, yandex.kz, yandex.com.tr and other Yandex’ websites (together the “Sites”) as well as during the performance of any agreements Yandex or its affiliates conclude with you in relation to the Services.

Please note that your use of the Sites and/or certain Services may be subject to additional terms and conditions, which may amend or supplement this Policy.

2 Who is in charge?

To provide you with the Sites and Services, your Personal information about you (also known as “personal data”) is collected and used by Yandex Services AG, a company incorporated under Swiss law, with registered office located at Werftestrasse 4, 6005 Luzern, (Switzerland) (“Yandex Services AG”) or its affiliates for particular Services.

3 What is the purpose of this Policy?

The protection of your Personal information and your privacy is extremely important to Yandex. Yandex therefore protects and processes your Personal information while using the Sites and Services in strict compliance with applicable law.

As part of our commitment to protect your Personal information, we want to inform you and have described in this Policy in all transparency:

(a) why and how Personal information is used (also known as “processed”) by Yandex when you access the Sites and the Services;

(b) Yandex’s role and responsibilities in this context as the legal entity deciding why and how your Personal information is processed (also known as the “controller”);

(d) what your rights are in relation to the above processing.

4 What type of Personal information does Yandex collect about you?

Personal information collected in the course of operation of the Sites and provision of the Services may differ depending on whether you access the Sites and the Services while logged in to your Yandex and Toloka user accounts (“Accounts”) or without logging in. When you are logged in to your Accounts, Personal information collected about you by Yandex while using the Sites and the Services may be associated and combined with other Personal information collected by Yandex in the framework of your user account (such as your identity, contact details, age and gender, if communicated to us). Yandex will not verify Personal information provided by you and cannot judge whether you possess legal capacity. However, Yandex assumes that you provide true and sufficient Personal information and keeps such information up to date.

Yandex may collect the following categories of Personal information about you during your access to, interaction with and operation of the Site, provision and/or receipt of the Services:

(i) information provided by you during registration (creation of a user account), such as your name, citizenship and/or residency country, education information, mobile number, address, date of birth, email;

(ii) electronic identification data (http header fields, IP address, cookies, web beacons/pixel tags, browser identification information, information on hardware and software);

(iii) date and time of accessing the Sites and the Services;

(iv) information about third parties’ websites referred to by the Sites or the Services;

(v) information related to your activity during the use of the Sites and the Services (e.g. search queries history, search results provided to you in response to your query, web pages you visited by reference from the search results, email addresses of your correspondents, email content and attachments as well as files stored on Yandex’s systems);

(vi) subject of advertisements clicked or scrolled over;

(vii) (geo)location information;

(viii) other information about you required to be processed according to the terms and conditions governing the use of particular Yandex’ Sites or Services; and

(ix) information about you that we may receive from our partners in accordance with terms between you and particular partner.

In addition, Yandex uses cookies (including tracking cookies) and web beacons (including pixel tags) to collect Personal information about you and associate such Personal information with your device and web browser (see Section 11 below).

We do not actively collect any sensitive personal data (such as racial origins, political opinions, health and biometric data). However, you may voluntarily provide us which such data and we may process it as part of providing you with our Services (e.g. if you perform search queries related to your health). As we do not know in advance the potentially sensitive nature of the personal data you may provide to us, you must be aware that we may not be able to request your consent with such processing. We will however not further process any such voluntarily provided data with a view to extracting/collecting sensitive information about you without your explicit consent.

We do not perform profiling with the potential to significantly impact your rights and freedoms.

5 On which legal basis and for which purposes is your Personal information processed?

Yandex is not allowed to process your Personal information if it does not have a valid legal ground. Yandex will therefore only process your Personal information if:

(i) the processing is necessary to perform our contractual obligations towards you including providing you with Sites and Services (i.e. providing you with the results of your search query);

(ii) the processing is necessary to comply with our legal or regulatory obligations; or

(iii) If it is provided by applicable law the processing is necessary for the legitimate interests of Yandex and does not unduly affect your interests or fundamental rights and freedoms. Please note that when we process your Personal information on this basis, we will always seek to maintain a balance between our legitimate interest and the protection of your privacy.

Examples of such ‘legitimate interests’ referred in (iii) immediately above are:

(a) to better understand how you interact with our Sites and Services;

(b) to enhance, modify, personalize or otherwise improve the Sites and the Services for the benefit of all users of the Sites and the Services; and

(c) to offer you other products and services from Yandex or other companies which we think they can be of interest to you (i.e. direct/targeted marketing).

(iv) For specific purposes we may ask your consent to the processing of your Personal information.

Yandex always processes your Personal information for a specific purpose and only processes Personal information which is relevant to achieve that purpose. In particular, we process your Personal information for the following purposes:

(i) providing you with the Sites and Services (i.e. delivery of search results and content in response to your search queries, taking into account your preferences, search history and other Personal information about you available to Yandex);

(ii) provide you with an possibility to access to your user account, including Yandex’s email and document storage, if you registered with these Services;

(iii) communication with you in order to forward notices, requests and information related to the Sites and Services, performance of our agreements with you and process your requests and applications;

(iv) provision of advertising and offers tailored to you, taking into account your preferences, search history and other Personal information about you available to Yandex;

(v) enhancement of user experience, including responding with more relevant search results and provision of a more personalised Sites and Services, as well as improvement of other products, utilities and offerings of Yandex;

(vi) development of new products, utilities and offerings of Yandex;

(vii) protection of your rights and the rights of Yandex; and

(viii) collection, processing and performing statistical, big data and other research and analysis of Personal information;

(ix) providing you with compensation for your services.

6 How does Yandex protect your Personal information?

Access to Personal information is only granted to members of our personnel who need it in order to perform their tasks. All such members of personnel must comply with the internal rules and processes in relation to the processing of Personal information to protect them and ensure their confidentiality. They are also required to follow all technical and organizational security measures put in place to protect your Personal information.

Yandex has also implemented adequate technical and organisational measures to protect Personal information against unauthorised, accidental or unlawful destruction, loss, alteration, misuse, disclosure or access and against all other unlawful forms of processing. These security measures have been implemented taking into account the state of the art of the technology, their cost of implementation, the risks presented by the processing and the nature of the Personal information.

7 Who else has access to your Personal information and with whom it is shared?

7.1 Within the Yandex Group

Yandex may transfer your Personal information to our members of personnel (within the limits set out in Section 6 above). Yandex may also transfer your Personal information to other companies of the group to which Yandex belongs (the “Yandex Group”). In all cases, the Personal information will continue to be processed only for the purposes set out in Section 5 unless otherwise stated by the terms of use of the Sites and Services that are provided by companies of Yandex Group, i.e:

In case where you use services of the company “Yandex Services AG” public company, through websites https://toloka.yandex.com/, https://toloka.yandex.ru/, your personal data may be transferred to “Yandex.Probki LLC” a company incorporated under Russian law, with registered office located at 16, Lva Tolstogo Street, Moscow, 119021, Russia, a representative of “Yandex.Toloka” service in Russia, for processing on the terms and for the purposes set forth in Terms of Use of “Yandex.Toloka” (https://yandex.com/legal/toloka_useragreement/).

7.2 Outside the Yandex Group

Yandex may also transfer Personal information to third parties outside the Yandex Group to complete the purposes listed in Section 5 above. Such processors may include:

(i) advertisers providing Yandex with technical services related to the placement and display of advertisement on the Sites and Services;

(ii) third parties who process Personal information, such as our (IT) systems providers, banks, payment services providers, or consultants.

Yandex may also transfer Personal information to the following third parties outside the Yandex Group:

(i) any third party to whom we assign or novate any of our rights or obligations under a relevant agreement;

(ii) any national and/or international regulatory, enforcement or exchange body, central or local government department and other statutory or public bodies or court where we are required to do so by applicable law or regulation or at their request;

(iii) third parties if you expressed your consent to such transfer or transfer of your Personal information is required for your use of a certain Service or performance of a particular agreement or contract with you;

(iv) any third party in order to secure remedy for Yandex or third parties in the event of a breach by you of the User Agreement for Yandex Services and/or (https://yandex.com/legal/rules; https://yandex.com/legal/toloka_useragreement), this Policy or documents governing the use of particular Services, or there is a threat of such a violation.

8 Where is your Personal information stored and processed?

Your Personal information will be stored by Yandex in Russia and in EEA.

For Russian users Yandex performs recording, systematisation, accumulation, storage, clarification (update, change), extraction of Personal information of citizens of the Russian Federation using databases located on the territory of the Russian Federation.

For users from EEA or Switzerland Russia is a jurisdiction outside the European Economic Area (i.e. the EU plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway) that has not been recognized by the European Commission as providing an adequate level of personal data protection. Therefore, Yandex has taken appropriate measures to ensure such transfers are carried out in compliance with the applicable EU data protection rules.

In particular, Yandex relies upon Standard Contractual Clauses approved by the European Commission to ensure an adequate level of protection for your Personal information transferred to Russia. A copy of these Standard Contractual Clauses can be obtained upon request (see Section 10).

9 How long do we store your Personal information?

Yandex will only retain your Personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purpose for which it was collected or to comply with legal, regulatory or internal policy requirements.

Unless otherwise legally required or agreed, the emails and documents you store on our systems as part of the Services will remain stored as long as you have an account with us, but can be deleted by you at any time.

If you wish to have any Personal information about you removed from our databases, you can do so via your Yandex user account or using interface of the Sites or Services (where applicable).

10 Your rights

10.1 What are your rights?

You have a right of access to your Personal information as processed by Yandex under this Policy.

If you believe that any information we hold about you is incorrect or incomplete, you can log in to your user account and correct your Personal information yourself.

You also have the right to:

request erasure of your Personal information;
request the restriction of the processing of your Personal information;
request a copy of the Standard Contractual Clauses enabling the transfer of your Personal information to Russia, referred to in Section 7;
object to the processing of your Personal information for direct marketing and, under certain circumstances, to the processing thereof for other purposes.

Yandex will honour any such requests or objections as required under the applicable data protection rules.

Finally, if it is provided by law, you also have the right to data portability (i.e. the right to obtain the personal data you have provided to Yandex in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and to request the transmission of such personal data to a third party without hindrance from Yandex and subject to your own confidentiality obligations).

10.2 How can you exercise your rights?

To exercise the above rights, please log in to your user account which will provide you with the option to do so, or in case of absence of special function in user account interface please contact Yandex (see Section 13).

If you are not satisfied with how Yandex processes your Personal information, please let us know and we will investigate your concern. If you are not satisfied with Yandex’s response, you have the right to make a complaint to the competent data protection authority.

11 How do we use cookies and other similar technologies on the Sites or when using the Services?

11.1 What are cookies and what does Yandex use them for?

Cookies are small text files placed on the device you use to access our Sites and Services. They contain information that is collected from your device and sent back to the Sites on each subsequent visit so as to remember your actions and preferences over time.

The following types of cookies are used on the Sites.

strictly necessary cookies / technical cookies: these cookies are required to run the Sites and provide you with the Services and may, among other, allow Yandex to identify your hardware and software, including your browser type;
statistical/analytic cookies: these cookies enable us to recognise users, count the number of users and collect information such as your operations on the Sites and through the Services, including the web pages you visit and the content you retrieve;
performance cookies: these cookies collect information about how users interact with our Sites and Services, enabling us to identify errors and test new functionalities to improve the performance of the Sites and the Services;
functionality cookies: these cookies enable us to provide specific functionalities in order to improve your experience on the Sites, for example by storing your preferences (e.g. language and location);
(third party) tracking/advertising cookies: these cookies collect information about the user flows, sources of traffic, page visits and advertising displayed to you and followed by you. They enable us to display advertising which may be of interest to you on the basis of an analysis of the Personal information collected about you. They are also used for statistical and research purposes.

11.2 How long are those cookies stored on your device?

Yandex only uses the information contained in the cookies for the above purposes, after which the data collected will remain stored on your device for a period not exceeding two years after you stop visiting the Site or using the Services and will be automatically removed from your system thereafter.

11.3 Who else has access to the information contained in the cookies?

Personal information collected through cookies placed on your device may be transmitted to and accessed by Yandex and/or the third parties referred to in Section 7.2. The use of Personal information outside of the Sites for advertising purposes, if any, may be subject to separate policies available on the above third parties’ websites. Yandex and/or those third parties might also provide you with a possibility to opt-out from receiving targeted advertising, which shall be subject to legislation and regulations applicable to such products, utilities and offerings.

The first time that you enter the website, your approval for the use of these cookies may be requested. If after you have approved the use of cookies you want to make another choice, you can do this by deleting all the cookies stored by your browser (usually via the options or privacy menu of your browser – please refer to your browser’s manual or website). The popup requesting your approval may be then show up again and you can make a different choice. If you do not consent to the use of cookies, this may result in certain features of the website being unavailable and affect your browsing experience. You may also set up your browser preferences to accept or decline by default all cookies or cookies from specific websites, including the Site. If you approved the use of cookies on one of the Yandex Sites we assume that you approved the use of cookies on all Sites.

Yandex may also use web beacons (pixel tags) in order to access the cookies previously placed on your computer for the following purposes:

(i) determination of your actions on the Sites and in the course of use of the Services by accessing and interacting with cookies stored on your computer;

(ii) collection of statistical information related to operation of the Site, the Services or products, utilities and offerings of Yandex.

12 Updates to this Policy

This Policy may be subject to amendments. Yandex shall be entitled to make such amendments at its own discretion, including, without limitation, in order to reflect changes in the applicable legislation and implement amendments to the Site and the Services.

Yandex undertakes not to introduce significant changes, imposing additional obligations or reducing your rights under this Policy without proper notice to you. You will also be notified of any future changes or additions to the processing of personal data as described in this Privacy Policy. Changes will be advertised on the “Yandex.Toloka” Site prior to such changes taking effect and may be notified to you via other channels (e.g. by email) if you have provided us with your contact details.

13 Questions and Suggestions

Yandex welcomes your questions and suggestions with respect to the implementation or amendment of this Policy. Please use this feedback for communicating with us: http://feedback.yandex.com. You can also use this address in order to exercisese your rights or send complaints concerning inaccuracy of Personal information and illegality of its processing.

Yandex’s Affiliates are legal entities listed in Exhibit 8.1 to the Yandex N.V. Annual Report for Foreign Private Issuers, prepared in accordance with the requirements of the NASDAQ communications system, as well as all legal entities: 1) which directly or indirectly hold more than 50% of shares of Yandex; 2) where more than 50% of shares in the authorized capital are held, directly or indirectly, by Yandex; 3) where more than 50% of shares in the authorized capital or stock are held, directly or indirectly, by an entity which directly or indirectly holds more than 50% of shares of Yandex; or 4) which are entitled to make management decisions with respect to Yandex, or with respect to which Yandex is entitled to make management decisions. The report is available at http://ir.yandex.com/sec.cfm.