Is Mailchimp GDPR compliant?

What does Mailchimp do?

Email marketing, usually present as an embedded signup form or a connected site script. The form itself can be necessary; the site tracking script that follows visitors is not.

Does Mailchimp need consent?

Yes. Mailchimp is Advertising, which is never strictly necessary for a website to function. Under ePrivacy Article 5(3), and its national transpositions, storing or reading anything on the device for that purpose requires consent first, and that consent has to be as easy to refuse as it is to give.

ePrivacy Art. 5(3) · TDDDG § 25 (DE) · TKG 2021 § 165(3) (AT) · GDPR Art. 6(1)(a)

Does Mailchimp send data outside the EEA?

Yes. Mailchimp processes data outside the European Economic Area, so you need a transfer mechanism under Chapter V and you have to say so in your privacy policy. In practice this means standard contractual clauses, or a provider certified under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework.

GDPR Art. 44 · GDPR Art. 46

How do we detect Mailchimp?

We load your page in a real browser as a first-time visitor who clicks nothing, then look at what it contacted. Mailchimp is recognised by requests to chimpstatic.com, list-manage.com and mailchimp.com, and we report whether it merely loaded or actually sent data, and whether it set a cookie before any choice was made.