Data privacy notice – Communications about doctoral dissertations

The university communicates the upcoming doctoral dissertations. This privacy notice applies to the information that is collected and processed on the doctoral dissertation notification form.

Data privacy notice updated 10.09.2026

Data controllers

University of Oulu
Pentti Kaiteran katu 1, Linnanmaa
P.O. Box 8000
90014 University of Oulu
Phone +358 294 48 0000

Units in charge of the processing

Communications, Marketing and Community Relations
Communications Director
Marja
Jokinen
viestinta@oulu.fi
Oulu University Library
Library Director
Minna
Abrahamsson-Sipponen
kirjasto@oulu.fi

University Data Protection Officer:

dpo(at)oulu.fi

Purpose of processing personal data and legal basis for processing personal data

Purpose of processing personal data

The university communicates the upcoming doctoral dissertations on its website, and a link to the upcoming dissertations is also available on the university’s intranet service. In addition, the media is informed of doctoral dissertations. For the purposes of communication, the doctoral candidate must fill in an online form and send the notification no later than fourteen days before the thesis defence. The online form is used in the Oulu.fi online service.

In addition, the information collected on the form is forwarded to the National Library’s Agent Metadata Service.

Personal data to be processed

In a form of the public defence of doctoral dissertation

Name of the candidate
Current degree
Faculty and unit
Date and place of birth
Dates and places of completion of previous degrees
Current job and position
E-mail address of the sender of the form
Title of the dissertation
Title of the dissertation in plain language
Description of the dissertation in plain language
Time and place of the thesis defence and remote link to the thesis defence
Information on the opponent and custos (name, title, unit)
Subject of the study
Publication address of the dissertation
Additional information

On the basis of the information on the submitted form, the University publishes the following information on the dissertation in the Oulu.fi web service:

Name of the candidate
Current degree
Faculty and unit
Title of the dissertation
Title of the dissertation in plain language
Description of the dissertation in plain language
Time and place of the thesis defence
Information on the opponent and the custos
Subject of the study
Publication address of the dissertation
Remote link to the thesis defence

Oulu University Library stores the following information on the online form about the author of the dissertation in the Asteri database of the National Library:

Name(s) of the candidate (variations of the name)
Profession and field (subject of study), associated community (faculty/unit)
Degrees and titles
Date of birth
Place of birth (country and/or place related to the person)
In addition, the library collects data from public sources (e.g. ORCID identifier) and stores it in the Asteri database.

Recipients or categories of recipients of personal data

Personal data are processed by the Unit for Communications, Marketing and Public Affairs of the University of Oulu and Oulu University Library.
The press release about the doctoral dissertation is accompanied by the contact information provided by the doctoral candidate, if the doctoral candidate has separately given consent to that.
The University of Oulu discloses personal data to third parties only to the extent that third parties need it for the purposes of the communication requested by the controller.

Using data from the online form, Oulu University Library prepares an authority record, which is stored in the Asteri database of the National Library. Asteri is a name or agent database maintained by the National Library, which describes the agents included in the publication data. The authorised or standard name forms in Asteri collect different name forms together (e.g. forms in different languages or different spellings), and they also help to distinguish between persons or organisations with the same name. The agent data contained in the Asteri database can be retrieved as open data in the Finto service.

Information of transfers of personal data to third countries or international organisations

The personal data will not be transferred outside the EU or EEA. Information on thesis defences can be found on the university Oulu.fi web service.

Information of data storage time

Your personal data is being processed to communicate the doctoral dissertation. The University of Oulu fulfils the statutory task provided for in Section 2 of the Universities Act, based on the public interest, when it engages in research, teaching and social interaction. According to Section 20 of the Act on the Openness of Government Activities, the university must promote the openness of its activities and see to it that the information that is essential to the general public’s access to information is available.

The data will be retained for the time necessary for the purpose and will not be used for any other purpose.

The doctoral dissertation notifications are stored in the online service of the University of Oulu for at least two years, after which the data can be deleted upon request or if the university considers that the storage of the data is no longer appropriate due to the purpose of the processing. If the data in the doctoral dissertation notification is requested to be deleted, the information about the thesis defence will also be removed from the university’s online service.

Data subject rights

You have the following rights as a data subject:

  • Right to access your data
  • Right to have inaccurate data corrected (make sure to keep your contact information up to date)
  • In certain situations, the right to have data erased ("right to be forgotten")
  • In certain situations, the right to restriction of processing
  • In certain situations, the right to object to processing
  • In certain situations, the right to have data transferred from one system to another if the processing is based on consent or agreement and is performed automatically.

Please note that the applicability and scope of your above-mentioned rights will be specified on a case-by-case basis in accordance with the EU General Data Protection Regulation, depending on e.g. the grounds for processing the data, and that you do not have the above-mentioned rights in all cases.

How can you exercise your rights?

If you have questions concerning your rights, you can contact the data protection officer or unit’s contact person.

If you wish to exercise your rights mentioned above, please send your request to: kirjaamo(at)oulu.fi.

You will get a reply with necessary instructions.

Right of appeal to the supervisory authority

In addition to the rights mentioned above, you have the right to file a complaint about the processing of your personal data with the Office of the Data Protection Ombudsman as the supervisory authority.

The contact details and opening hours can be found on the website of the Data Protection Ombudsman.

Automated decision-making or processing the personal data for other purposes

No

General description of the technical and organisational protection measures

The University as the Data Controller uses appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect personal data against unauthorised or unlawful processing and against damage or loss of personal data.