Data protection statement and Specific terms and conditions for the use of the EURES portal services

This website processes personal information. The European Labour Authority (hereafter 'The Authority ') is committed to protect your personal data and to respect your privacy. The Authority  collects and further processes personal data pursuant to Regulation (EU) 2018/1725¹ , which is applicable to processing of personal data by European Union institutions and bodies. The information in this Data protection statement is given pursuant to Articles 15-16 of that Regulation. Regulation (EU) 2016/679, the General Data Protection Regulation is applicable for any processing of data by organisations external to the EU institutions and bodies.

This privacy statement explains the reason for the processing of your personal data, the way we collect, handle and ensure protection of all personal data provided, how that information is used and what rights you have in relation to your personal data. It also specifies the contact details of the responsible Data Controller with whom you may exercise your rights, the Data Protection Officer and the European Data Protection Supervisor.

The purpose of the EURES portal is to provide information and e-services for the benefit of jobseekers interested in finding a job or other opportunities in Europe, employers and organisations interested in finding candidates from other countries as well as any citizen wishing to benefit from the principle of the free movement of persons.

The EURES "Find a job" service on the EURES portal provides access to job vacancies published by EURES Member and Partner organisations, in particular the public employment services in the participating countries (the EU Member States, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland).

The EURES CV Online service offers jobseekers the opportunity to publish their CVs/Jobseeker profiles online and employers the opportunity to search for and view CVs/Jobseeker profiles of potential candidates.

The EURES portal matching engine offers an automated service matching job vacancies and CVs/Jobseeker profiles using algorithms based on a number of criteria, such as candidates' education, experience, skills, current and desired location, desired occupation etc.

Jobseekers and employers may register and obtain a EURES account. Registered users can create and store search profiles, be alerted by e-mail when there are job vacancies or CVs that match a profile, and also subscribe to newsletters and other information.

Personal data will not be used for automated decision-making including profiling.

We process your personal data because:

• processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the Union institution or body, and
• you as the data subject have given consent to the processing of your personal data for one or more specific purposes.

This is in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 of 23 October 2018, in particular Article 5(1).

Regulation (EU) 2016/589 , "the EURES Regulation", and in particular its Chapter III, defines the purposes of the processing, namely to enable matching of job vacancies with CVs/Jobseeker profiles and sets out general conditions for the processing. Further provisions for the data processing, in particular with regard to the roles and responsibilities of the various parties involved in the processing are laid down in the Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2017/1257.

In order to carry out this processing operation, the Data Controller (European Labour Authority - Information and EURES Unit ) collects the following categories of personal data:

Jobseekers

The personal information related to the creation of an account for jobseekers is limited to the data necessary to identify a particular person.

Only name, address and e-mail address for contact purposes are mandatory. In addition, users may optionally indicate other contact details (phone, mobile phone and fax number) and data that can be used for sending out targeted information (date of birth, nationality, language preference, sex).

In addition to the personal data already entered in order to create the account, when creating and posting a CV, users are requested to provide information on their educational and professional background, language and personal skills, as well as their desired employment/occupational field.

Before a CV can be published in the system, the jobseeker is invited to review the information that will become visible to other users. He/she may then indicate that all or selected personal data, as well as the names and addresses of current and previous employers should be hidden.

Employers/Organisations

Any company or undertaking lawfully registered in the European Economic Area or Switzerland can apply for an account on the EURES portal, providing the company's name and address, VAT or official registration number and the name, address, telephone number and e-mail address of a main contact person. If the application is approved , the main contact person may add additional user accounts for other locations or contact persons within the same company, by providing the names, addresses, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses of these locations and persons.

CVs/Jobseeker profiles stored in the system and not updated or checked by the user for a period longer than twenty-six weeks will no longer be accessible to employers. If a jobseeker has not visited his/her CV/Jobseeker profile for one year it will be removed from the system. There will be no archiving of deleted CVs/Jobseeker profiles except for statistical purposes as described below.

EURES accounts that have not been visited for a period of two years will be deleted and no data will be stored.

Daily backups of the EURES portal CV database are made as a protection against data corruption, and hardware or application failure. Personal data contained in back-up copies is not disclosed , unless used to restore the database, and will in any case only be kept for a maximum of one month.

When a CV/Jobseeker profile has been deleted , we will continue to store a limited set of data that has been anonymised and use it for research and statistical purposes. Data that is rendered anonymous in such a manner that the data subject is not or no longer identifiable is not considered personal data.

In line with the provisions of Article 6, 44(1) and recital 45 of Regulation (EU) 2019/1149², stipulating that ‘the Authority shall manage the European Coordination Office of EURES’, the EURES European Coordination Office (ECO) of the European network of employment services (EURES) has been transferred to the European Labour Authority.

However, according to the Article 6 of Regulation 2019/1149,  the Commission will continue to ensure the operation and development of IT infrastructure of the EURES portal and related IT services.

Data is stored in a database located in the Data Centre of the European Commission and access to this data is protected by an authentication mechanism. Access to the service is made available through the EUROPA web servers, also located in the Data Centre, where the application is hosted.

All processing operations are carried out pursuant to the Commission Decision (EU, Euratom) 2017/46 of 10 January 2017 on the security of communication and information systems in the European Commission.

Development, support and operations of the system could be delegated to external companies or organisations acting as "processor" on behalf of the European Commission. The Commission's contractors are bound by a specific contractual clause for any processing operations of your data on behalf of the Commission; and by the confidentiality obligations deriving from the transposition of the General Data Protection Regulation in the EU Member States ('GDPR' Regulation (EU) 2016/679).

In order to protect your personal data, the Commission has put in place a number of technical and organisational measures. Technical measures include appropriate actions to address online security, risk of data loss, alteration of data or unauthorised access, taking into consideration the risk presented by the processing and the nature of the personal data being processed. Organisational measures include restricting access to the personal data solely to authorised persons with a legitimate need to know for the purposes of this processing operation.

The personal information that a jobseeker consents to be processed on the EURES portal will be used by the search and matching engine on the EURES portal and may be displayed, as further described in this data protection statement, as a result of successful matching and searches. The jobseeker may, however, indicate that all or selected personal data should be hidden and not displayed to the recipients specified below. Certain information will never be used for search and matching purposes even if it has been provided, but may be displayed in search and matching results if the jobseeker has not chosen to hide it.

Information on CVs/Jobseeker profiles is made available on the EURES portal, for searching, matching and display purposes, to employers registered and verified by the site administrator acting on behalf of the controller, and to EURES staff, working in EURES Member or Partner organisations, in particular the public employment services of the EEA Member States and Switzerland.

By agreeing to this data protection statement a jobseeker also provides his consent to transmit the data to EEA Member States and Switzerland who are associated to the EURES network in compliance with Regulation (EU) 2016/589 and the Agreement between the European Community and its Member States and the Swiss Confederation³ .

Data may also be made available to EURES Member and Partner organisations via the EURES portal API (Application Programming Interface). Where this is the case, information on CVs/Jobseeker profiles can also be made available for searching, matching and display purposes on websites and via e-services provided by the concerned EURES Member and Partner organisations, to employers registered and verified by the site administrators of these services and to staff working in these EURES Member or Partner organisations. Further information on which EURES Member and Partner organisations provide such e-services can be obtained from the controller, see below under 9 . Contact information.

Employers who want to access and further process jobseeker's personal data, whether it is directly on the EURES portal or, when available, via e-services provided by a EURES Member or Partner organisations can only do so if they have agreed to and committed to comply with the specific terms and conditions for use, reproduced below.

Any further processing of data obtained from the EURES portal outside the strict scope of the system must be in compliance with Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 and the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679). One example of such a processing is the evaluation of the jobseekers' skills and suitability for a given vacancy, carried out independent of the search criteria provided by the system. This does not fall within the EURES portal's explicit functions and is thus outside the control and responsibility of the European Coordination Office.

Information on registered jobseekers or employers will not be disclosed to anybody external to the EURES network for other purposes than those described above. The data stored will not be used for sending out any kind of information to the registered users unless they have explicitly agreed to it, apart from messages relating directly to the service, its availability and development, such as surveys and the like conducted for evaluation purposes.

The EURES portal uses cookies. For all information about cookies and how to accept or refuse them see the cookie statement.

No personal information is contained in the log files of the application and we do not store any personal information outside the application.

You have specific rights as a 'data subject' under Chapter III (Articles 14-25) of Regulation (EU) 2018/1725, in particular the right to access, rectify or erase your personal data and the right to restrict the processing of your personal data. Where applicable, you also have the right to object to the processing or the right to data portability.

Notice to you, as the data subject, as required by Regulation (EU) 2018/1725, is provided by the system under the responsibility of the controller through this Data protection statement, the acceptance of which is a mandatory condition to be able to create an account.

You have consented to provide your personal data to the Data Controller for the present processing operation. You can withdraw your consent at any time by notifying the Data Controller. The withdrawal will not affect the lawfulness of the processing carried out before you have withdrawn the consent.

You can exercise your rights by contacting the Data Controller, or in case of conflict the Data Protection Officer. If necessary, you can also address the European Data Protection Supervisor. Their contact information is given under Heading 9. Contact information.

Where you wish to exercise your rights in the context of one or several specific processing operations, please provide their description (i.e. their Record reference(s) as specified under Heading 10. Where to find more detailed information ?) in your request.

How can you verify, modify or delete your information in the EURES portal database?

Users are responsible for the quality of their own data. They can at any time access, modify, unpublish and delete their data.

Once a CV has been placed in the EURES portals' CV database, jobseekers will be able to modify their data at any time. All they need to do is to log on to the portal using their password-protected personal account and modify or update their CV. CVs already published can be made inaccessible to employers for a specified period of time or until further notice. A user can deregister at any time and thereby delete the EURES account and all related registered information including CVs. Users will be asked to confirm before final deletion.

Data are periodically controlled for correctness and completeness and jobseekers will be asked by e-mail about updating their CV.

Users have the right to obtain a copy of their personal data held on the EURES portal by sending an e-mail to: data-protection@ela.europa.eu  

The Data Controller

The EURES portal is managed by the European Coordination Office for EURES, established within the European Labour Authority - Information and EURES Unit who is the ‘controller’ EURES who is the “controller” under Regulation (EU) 2018/1725.

If you would like to exercise your rights under Regulation (EU) 2018/1725; or for any questions, complaints or other requests regarding the data transmitted to and processed on the EURES portal; please contact the controller at the following e-mail address:  data-protection@ela.europa.eu

The Data Protection Officer (DPO) of European Labour Authority  

You may contact the Data Protection Officer (data-protection@ela.europa.eu ) with regard to issues related to the processing of your personal data under Regulation (EU) 2018/1725.

The European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS)

You have the right to have recourse (i.e. you can lodge a complaint) to the European Data Protection Supervisor (edps@edps.europa.eu) if you consider that your rights under Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 have been infringed as a result of the processing of your personal data by the Data Controller.

For further information see: https://edps.europa.eu/data-protection/our-role-supervisor/complaints.

The Authority  Data Protection Officer (DPO) publishes the register of all processing operations on personal data by the Authority  , which have been documented and notified to him. You may access the register via the following link: https://www.ela.europa.eu/en/eures-data-protection-register

¹ Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2018 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by the Union institutions, bodies, offices and agencies and on the free movement of such data (repealing Regulation (EC) No 45/2001)

² Regulation (EU) 2019/1149 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 establishing a European Labour Authority, amending Regulations (EC) No 883/2004, (EU) No 492/2011, and (EU) 2016/589 and repealing Decision (EU) 2016/344 (Text with relevance for the EEA and for Switzerland) OJ L 186, 11.7.2019, p. 21–56

³ Agreement on the free movement of persons, air and land transport, public procurement, scientific and technological cooperation, mutual recognition in relation to conformity assessment, and trade in agricultural products, Official Journal L 114, 30/04/2002.

1. In accepting these conditions, individuals agree to use EURES CV Online solely to announce their availability as jobseekers to employers and EURES staff having access to the system.

A jobseeker's profile and CV, once published, remains accessible to employers for a defined period. After this period, if a jobseeker has not updated his/her profile or extended the publication period, it will no longer be accessible to employers or to EURES staff.

2. In accepting these terms and conditions, employers agree to use the EURES service solely to search for and contact jobseekers for the purpose of offering real and concrete jobs or assignments with the employer's own undertaking, or with an undertaking which the employer is directly representing. Any offer of employment shall be consistent with the wishes expressed by the jobseeker in his/her profile.

Employers may not demand a fee or any other form of payment from jobseekers for access to information on vacancies or to obtain an employment or other contract .

The information obtained may not, under any circumstances, be used to advertise or sell services or products, or to send out labour market information or offers of a general nature, such as requests for registration of CV/Jobseeker profiles in other CV databases.

Information received from the EURES portal CV database may contain personal information which must be treated in full compliance with current legislation in force regarding protection of personal data, in particular Regulation (EU) 2016/679. All data processing instructions received together with the data, such as data retention times, restrictions on further processing etc., must be fully respected.

Data that has been downloaded from the EURES portal CV database may only be stored for the time strictly necessary to contact potential candidates and to carry out the following steps in the recruitment process⁴. If no other instructions regarding retention of data are provided together with the data received, all data must be completely erased, as soon they are no longer needed for the initial purpose of finding and contacting candidates for a real and concrete job or assignment, as specified above. The data about the jobseeker can only be stored by the employer for a longer period of time if the individual jobseeker has given his/her explicit consent to this.

3. Users are responsible for any activity that occurs through their account and are responsible for keeping their password secret and secure.

4. Users are not permitted to use ‘web crawling’, ‘screen scraping’ or any other automated or manual system to extract data from CVs or job vacancies in order to further process or republish the information’. Users are not allowed to take any action that imposes an unreasonable or disproportionately large load on the website or related infrastructure. Only EURES partner organisations, recognised by a EURES National Coordination Office, are allowed to extract data using our API or similar technologies.

5. In order to prevent abuse and other unintended usage of the service, the controller reserves the right at all times to verify the identity and other information provided by users, e.g. by consulting VAT and company registers or any other publicly available records or sources of information.

6. The controller reserves the right to delete without warning any information inserted that can be regarded as unlawful, unethical or in any other way unsuitable. Likewise, any user using the EURES portal in a way judged to be inconsistent with the service's purpose may have the account closed and all data deleted. The controller accepts no liability for loss or damage resulting from such an action.

7. Non-respect of these terms and conditions or any other processing instructions from the data controller or other bodies working on behalf of the data controller may, without prejudice to any other administrative or judicial remedy, constitute an infringement of Regulation (EU) 2016/679.

8. The Data protection statement and the Specific terms and conditions may be changed from time to time. Users agree that they will be notified of such updates by a posting published for twelve weeks on the EURES portal and that their use of the portal services after the effective date of the updated terms and conditions constitutes their agreement to the updated terms. The updated terms will be effective as of the time of posting unless a later date is stated in the posting.

⁴ Accessing to CVs are limited by the decision of the EURES Coordination Group on 11 March 2021 to 100 candidate result pages, 150 details CV views and 100 CV print views per day.