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Privacy policy for AI Sweden’s NLU Initiative

Lastly updated 2023-01-03

Introduction

Lindholmen Science Park AB, company organization number 556568-6366, (“Lindholmen Science Park”, “we”, “our”, “us”) is the host of ten different programs and projects (the “Programs”). The respective Programs have their own websites and newsletter etc., but they are not legal entities as such. Lindholmen Science Park is the controller for all processing of your personal data conducted by the respective Programs.

AI Sweden is one of Lindholmen Science Park’s Programs and hence, the main privacy policy for Lindholmen Science Park is applicable also for the processing within the program AI Sweden. AI Sweden has initiated an initiative in relation to Natural Language Understanding. In order to provide you specific information about 

our processing of your personal data in relation to AI Sweden’s Strategic Initiative Natural Language Understanding (the “NLU initiative”) we have created a specific Privacy policy to inform you about the processing of personal data in relation to the NLU initiative. We will therefore link you to the main Privacy policy for Lindholmen Science Park when the general information is applicable. If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us through the contact information found below. 

AI Sweden has established the NLU initiative with the goal to accelerate the development and use of applied language technologies in Sweden—in both the private and public sectors. Financed by the Swedish government through Vinnova, the NLU initiative focuses specifically on building very large-scale language models for the Swedish language. Such models require intensive amounts of data, compute and competence, and are thus greatly facilitated by collaborative efforts. The NLU initiative promotes and facilitates such efforts in Sweden and in the Nordic region. Moreover, the Initiative connects models, results, methods, data, and networks across a collaborative project portfolio, initiates national and international research collaborations, attracts and educates talent, and acts as an international thought leader in the field of Natural Language Understanding. 

This part of the Privacy Policy includes the following information: 

  1. How we process personal data when you as a user access the NLU initiative’s resources such as models. 
  2. How we process personal data for community facilitating purposes. 
  3. How we process personal data potentially present in a training dataset.

We may update this Privacy Policy and the respective sections listed above from time to time. If you have any questions or concerns about our processing of your personal data, do not hesitate to contact us. Please see our contact details below. 

Your rights 
Below you can read about the rights you have in relation to our processing of your personal data. To exercise your rights, you are welcome to contact us in accordance with our contact information below. 

Right to withdraw your consent and object to our processing 
For processing activities that we base on the legal basis, consent, you have the right to, at any time, withdraw your consent. It is important to note that, if you withdraw your consent, it only applies to processing that has already taken place. You have the right to object to our processing of your personal data for marketing purposes. You also have the right to object to the processing of your personal data that is based on the legal basis that the processing is necessary for the purposes of a legitimate interest. 

Right to access 
You have the right to obtain a confirmation from us as to whether or not we process your personal data. If we process your personal data, you have the right to receive information about our processing of your personal data. You also have the right to request a copy of the personal data we process about you. 

Right to rectification 
You have the right to have incorrect personal data corrected and to have incomplete information completed by providing us with the correct information. 

Right to erasure (right to be forgotten) and limitation of our processing You have the right to request that we erase your personal data (for example, if the personal data is no longer necessary for the purpose of the processing). You may also request that we restrict certain processing of your personal data (for example if you object to the accuracy of the data). 

Right to data portability 
If you have given your consent to our processing of your personal data or if the legal basis for our processing is to fulfill an agreement with you, then you have the right to obtain the personal data that you have provided to us in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format. You also have the right to request that we transmit such personal data to another controller or that we assist you in transmitting the data to another controller when this is technically feasible. 

Right to complain
You have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority concerning our processing of your personal data. The supervisory authority in Sweden is (Integritetsskyddsmyndigheten - IMY). See contact information to IMY below. 

Our contact information 
If you want to contact us with regards to our processing of your personal data, or if you want to exercise your rights in relation to our processing of your personal data, you are welcome to contact us through the contact details below. 

CONTROLLER 
Name: Lindholmen Science Park AB
Company organization number: 556568-6366
Postal address: Lindholmspiren 3-5, Box 8077, SE-402 78 Gothenburg
E-mail address: privacy@lindholmen.se
Telephone number: +46 (0)70-820 29 69 

SUPERVISORY AUTHORITY 
Name: Integritetsskyddsmyndigheten, IMY
Postal address: Box 8114, 104 20 Stockholm, Sweden
E-mail address: imy@imy.se
Telephone number: +46 (0)08-657 61 00

1. How we process personal data when you as a user access the NLU initiative’s resources such as models. 

As a result of that you and/or your employer or principal request access to any of the NLU resources, we will process your personal data. We will process your personal data to be able to comply with your request and to provide the services (the “NLU services”). The NLU services are provided in three ways, one being an API solution, the second being a web interface that interacts with the API, and the third is access to models through download. 

What personal data do we process? 

Facilitation and networking Section 
We process your first and last name, email address, title/professional position and company affiliation if applicable, credentials needed for you to access the NLU services such as authentication tokens or usernames and passwords, username (user ID), any profile or biographical information you choose to provide and other required contact details, other relevant credentials for third party solutions, information about when you apply for access, when you are granted access, intended use case, your voluntary given user experience and results. 

Use Section 
We also process personal data about you in relation to your use of the NLU services: 

a. When you use one of our API-/Web Interface-solutions we will process information about your activities such as logs of your use, your IP-address, the content you send to the API and statistical information of your activities. 

b. When you through download and self hosting get access to one of our models we will process information about your user experience, use case and model performance, if you choose to share such information with us. 

The two sections above are together called (“User Details”). 

We may, when legally required, collect and process information about your nationality to comply with export control regulations to which we are subject. 

What are the purposes of our processing of your personal data and what legal basis do we base such processing on? 

We process your User Details for the following purposes: 

  • Providing the NLU services;
  • Collaborative knowledge building; 
  • Improving our services; 
  • Associated communication by email or other communication channels;
  • Providing support to the User; 
  • Resolve disputes and enforce our policies, licenses, and agreements. 

We process your User Details based upon that the processing is necessary for the purposes of our legitimate interest to be able to provide the NLU services and to fulfill our contractual rights and obligations. 

If we are legally required to collect and process information about your nationality, such processing is based on the legal basis of complying with regulations to which we are subject, such as export control. 

From where do we collect your personal data? 
We receive personal data directly from you in connection with your request to use the NLU services and when you use the NLU services. We may also collect personal data from your employer or principal or from our processors for the NLU services. 

Who do we share your personal data with? 
We share your personal data with third parties that process personal data on our behalf, so-called processors. These processors are, e.g., suppliers of support and maintenance. 

We may also transfer personal data to third parties acting as independent controllers or joint controllers with Lindholmen Science Park if such transfer is required by applicable law, or if we have another legal ground for such transfers. You can find specific information about how AI Sweden collaborates with joint controllers on AI Sweden’s website here

For how long period of time is your personal data stored? 
Personal data processed for the purpose of providing the NLU services will be processed for the duration of use for the NLU service and as long as we have any contractual rights and obligations towards you or your employer or principal. When you are no longer a user of the NLU services, we will save your information for six (6) months. After that, we will delete your personal data. 

Our processing of your nationality for the purpose of complying with relevant export control regulations that we are required will be processed for the duration of your use of the NLU services and six (6) months after. This retention period may be prolonged if legally required.

Transfer of personal data to countries outside the EU/EEA 
We strive to only process personal data within the EU/EEA. When we transfer your personal data to third parties acting as our processors these processors may transfer data outside the EU/EEA on our behalf. In cases where our processors are transferring or processing personal data outside the EU/EEA, such processing is based either on a decision from the European Commission establishing that the country in question ensures an adequate level of protection or appropriate safeguards that ensure that your rights are protected such as standard contractual clauses adopted by the European Commission and supplementary security measures to such standard contractual clauses when necessary. 

2. How we process personal data for community facilitating purposes. 
We process your personal data to build and facilitate a community for sharing and building knowledge and networking connected to NLU. 

Information about how we process your personal data in relation to marketing and invitations can be found at Lindholmen Science Park’s main Privacy policy here

Information about how we process your personal data in relation to registration and participation in events can be found at Lindholmen Science Park’s main Privacy policy here

3. How we process personal data potentially present in a training dataset. 
We process your personal data when your personal data is included in a dataset that is used by the NLU initiative. 

To clarify, we will not collect nor process datasets for the specific purpose of collecting personal data and do not in any way attempt to identify the individuals that may be identifiable in a dataset. The personal information potentially present in the datasets is of no interest to the purpose of the Strategic Initiative Natural Language Understanding. 

What personal data may be processed in a dataset in the NLU initiative? The personal data processed will be in text format and may include personal information that is publicly accessible online. 

What are the purposes of our processing of your personal data and what legal basis do we base such processing on?

The processing of your personal data is based upon the legal basis that the processing is necessary for purposes of our legitimate interest to democratize the knowledge about, development of, and access to language models in Swedish and, as part of that, train very large Swedish and Nordic Language models. Training these types of models is a part of building the foundation for Swedish Language Technology to ensure a high level of citizen welfare and economic competitiveness in Sweden as well as contributing to state-of-the-art research. The personal data that is processed are processed in a non-structured way and the NLU initiative has no interest in the personal information potentially present in the datasets. 

From where do we collect your personal data? 
The datasets will be collected from open sources on the internet by the NLU initiative. 

Who do we share your personal data with? 
We will not share datasets (including identifiable markers for personal information) to external parties other than collaborative parties within the NLU initiative. 

We will also transfer personal data to third parties acting as our processors, e.g., suppliers of support and maintenance. 

For how long period of time is your personal data stored? 
We need to be able to validate our research and hence we need to keep the datasets we use for a longer period of time. For reasons of research ethics, transparency, and accountability the NLU-team will hence manage the data sources as long as this is necessary based on our purpose. 

Transfer of personal data to countries outside the EU/EEA 
We strive to only process personal data within the EU/EEA. When we transfer your personal data to third parties acting as our processors these processors may transfer data outside the EU/EEA on our behalf. In cases where our processors are transferring or processing personal data outside the EU/EEA, such processing is based either on a decision from the European Commission establishing that the country in question ensures an adequate level of protection or appropriate safeguards that ensure that your rights are protected such as standard contractual clauses adopted by the European Commission and supplementary security measures to such standard contractual clauses when necessary.