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Lead Generation

Cognism

UK / wider Europe Report an error

Panel rating · 6 judges · How to read the stars

Category median

Sovereignty: 2 of 4 dimensions proven

0–5 in half steps. 5 means the rubric's top anchor is met on the evidence.

by Cognism Limited · www.cognism.com

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Read this page as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.

The Skeptic

Weighted verdict

Has read "98% accuracy" and "GDPR-compliant data" on every homepage in the category. Reads instead for the refresh cadence, the credit-back rule for a bounced email, what a mobile number costs in credits, and the source the privacy notice admits to.

Same scores as the panel view — this lens weights them the way this judge cares.

Scored by The Skeptic

Coverage, accuracy & freshness

How this is scored

How much of the target market the database actually covers — judged on DACH and EU coverage as much as North American — and what the vendor documents about verification and refresh, because accuracy claims cannot be checked from outside.

0 — No stated coverage, no refresh cadence, no verification method; accuracy asserted as a percentage with nothing behind it.

3 — Headline record counts for the whole database, thin or unstated European coverage, and no description of how often records are re-verified.

5 — Coverage stated per country or region including DACH, email verification described, a stated refresh cadence, and firmographics beyond name and domain.

8 — Coverage broken down by country, industry and data type (email, direct dial, mobile), verification method and refresh cadence documented, company data drawn from official registers where available, and a bounce or credit-back guarantee with stated terms.

10 — The vendor is accountable for its data: per-country coverage and accuracy methodology published, every field carrying a last-verified date visible to the user, register-sourced company data, and credit-back terms that make inaccuracy the vendor's cost rather than the buyer's.

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The Skeptic

The positioning line "Nicht die Datenmenge entscheidet, sondern ihre Qualität und Nutzbarkeit" is the only coverage statement on the captured pages — I found no record counts, no per-country or DACH figures, and no refresh cadence for anything. Firmographic filters, verified-mobile filters and verification-on-demand are described as features, but we found no public information on the verification method, last-verified dates, or credit-back and bounce terms. 1 2

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Data sources & lawful basis

How this is scored

Where the personal data in the database comes from and on what legal basis it is processed — as evidenced on the vendor's own pages. Covers Art. 6(1)(f) legitimate interest, the Art. 14 notice to the people in the database, and whether they can find, object to and remove their record.

0 — No statement of where contact data comes from or on what legal basis; "GDPR-compliant" asserted without explanation, and no way for a listed person to object.

3 — Sources described in general terms ("public sources", "partners"), legitimate interest named without any balancing, and an opt-out request form as the only route for data subjects.

5 — Source categories named (registers, company websites, contributory networks, licensed partners), legitimate interest stated as the basis for EU records, a dedicated privacy notice for the people in the database, and a self-service opt-out or removal process.

8 — The above plus an Art. 14 notification practice described (people informed when added), contributory or browser-extension collection disclosed as such, a legitimate-interest assessment summarised publicly, and EU records handled differently from US records where the law differs.

10 — Provenance is traceable per record: the source and collection date available for each contact, Art. 14 notices sent and documented, the balancing test published, objections honoured across the whole dataset and suppressed permanently, and no data sourced by scraping behind logins or from contributors' address books without their contacts' knowledge.

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The Skeptic

The privacy notice names its source categories — licensed third-party data vendors (list only on request), customers under data sharing agreements, direct correspondence — and honestly discloses that business emails may be generated approximately from the employer's email pattern, with a self-service Privacy Centre opt-out and platform data removed after 5 years from collection. But the GDPR FAQ survives on the homepage as a question with no captured answer, no legal basis is stated for the records, and we found no public information on an Art. 14 notification practice or a published balancing test. 1 3

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Visitor identification & intent signals

How this is scored

Identifying companies behind website visits and surfacing buying intent — scored on what is identified (company or person), how the tracking works, and whether the vendor states that its script needs consent under §25 TDDDG and how it behaves without it.

0 — No visitor identification or intent data, or person-level identification of EU visitors with no statement of legal basis.

3 — Reverse-IP company identification with a cookie-setting script, no statement about consent, and match rates claimed without method.

5 — Company-level identification with filters, visit history per company, a stated position that the script requires consent where it sets cookies, and a consent-mode or cookieless option.

8 — Company-level only for EU traffic by design, cookieless operation documented, integration with common consent management platforms, intent topics or page-level signals with the source of third-party intent data named, and alerts routed to owners.

10 — Identification that survives a DPO review: no personal data of visitors stored, the TDDDG and GDPR position published and specific, third-party intent data sourced from a named co-op or panel with its consent basis stated, and scoring on intent that the user can trace back to the underlying visits.

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The Skeptic

Intent signals — buying intent, hires, funding and M&A, job changes — are marketed as account-prioritisation features, but we found no public information on how companies or visitors are identified, whether a tracking script sets cookies, or any statement on consent under §25 TDDDG. The source of the intent data is not named on the captured pages. 1 2

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Prospecting workflow & outreach rules

How this is scored

Search, list building and outreach — and whether the product helps the buyer stay within UWG §7 and the GDPR once the list exists, rather than leaving the legal risk entirely with the customer.

0 — A search box and an export button; nothing on the pages about what the buyer may lawfully do with the contacts.

3 — Filters on firmographics and job title, saved lists, and a terms clause making the customer solely responsible for compliance.

5 — Advanced filters including technographics and triggers, company-level lists and alerts, a global suppression or do-not-contact list, and guidance on cold outreach rules in the main EU markets.

8 — The above plus country-aware handling (for example flagging German contacts where cold calls and emails require consent), phone numbers checked against national do-not-call registers where they exist, and opt-outs from outreach synced back to the database.

10 — Compliance is part of the workflow: outreach channels restricted or flagged per country and contact type by default, suppression shared across the whole account and every export, the Art. 14 notice supported at first contact, and a documented record of how each contact entered the buyer's pipeline.

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The Skeptic

The filter set is real — firmographic, technographic and signal-based filters, verified-mobile filters, CSV enrichment and export — though "rechtskonforme Daten" is sold as a property of the data rather than a workflow. We found no public information on a suppression or do-not-contact list, on checking numbers against do-not-call registers, or on guidance for cold outreach rules in the main EU markets; the website terms limit liability without allocating compliance duties. 1 2 4

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CRM sync, enrichment & export

How this is scored

Getting the data into the systems where sales works — CRM sync, enrichment of existing records, API — and what happens to exported data, and to the buyer's access to it, when the subscription ends.

0 — Manual CSV export only; no CRM integration and no API.

3 — A one-way push to one CRM, CSV export, and no statement on whether exported data may be kept after cancellation.

5 — Native sync with the major CRMs including field mapping and deduplication, enrichment of existing CRM records, and a documented API with stated limits.

8 — Bidirectional sync with scheduled re-enrichment, update and deletion propagated when a record changes or a person objects, webhook or API access with credit costs per call published, and data retention rights after cancellation stated plainly.

10 — The vendor treats the buyer's CRM as the system of record: objections and corrections propagated into synced records automatically, full change history per field, a versioned API with a deprecation policy, and exit terms that say exactly which data the customer may keep and for how long.

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The Skeptic

Direct export to Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive (with further systems named), a CRM enrichment add-on that keeps records current, and Data-as-a-Service access via API and bulk delivery are all evidenced. We found no public information on field mapping, deduplication, API rate limits or credit costs per call, and nothing on whether exported data may be kept after the subscription ends. 1 2 3

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European sovereignty

How this is scored

Where a database of EU residents' personal data is held, who the contracting entity and controller are, and which subprocessors see it. Independently sourced by the sovereignty pipeline; weighted heavily here, because the product itself is personal data about people who never chose the vendor.

0 — Non-EU vendor and contracting entity, hosting unstated, subprocessors unnamed, and EU residents' contact data processed outside the EU with no stated transfer basis.

3 — Non-EU contracting entity with an EU representative under Art. 27, or EU hosting offered while enrichment, support or AI processing stay non-EU.

5 — EU contracting entity and EU hosting as standard, but parts of the chain — data partners, enrichment sources, tracking infrastructure — are non-EU without an explained safeguard.

8 — EU contracting entity and controller, EU hosting on named infrastructure, subprocessor and data-partner list published, and any non-EU transfer named with its legal basis.

10 — Sovereign end to end and evidenced: vendor, controller, hosting, data partners and every subprocessor European, certification published, and a DPA covering both the customer's data and the database records the customer exports.

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The Skeptic

The privacy policy names Cognism Limited (England and Wales) and Cognism d.o.o. (Croatia) as joint controllers, storage inside the EU on Amazon Web Services in Ireland, and SCCs for third-country recipients, with a Macedonian affiliate and UK and French affiliates named as data recipients. The contracting picture stays non-EU — the website terms are governed by England and Wales, the third-party data vendor list is only available on request — and independent sourcing could not confirm jurisdiction, ownership, residency or subprocessor exposure beyond the privacy policy's own statements. 3 4

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Pricing transparency not rated — the vendor publishes no price

How this is scored

Whether a buyer can compute the real annual cost from public pages alone — including credits per email, phone number and mobile, credit expiry, seat pricing, visitor-identification tiers and the API — in a category where the unit of billing is often invented by the vendor.

0 — No public prices at all; every tier is a sales conversation.

3 — A monthly headline exists, but what a credit buys, whether credits expire, or the cost of an additional seat is unstated — the invoice is unknowable.

5 — Tier prices public with credit allowances given, but at least one commonly needed piece (mobile numbers, extra seats, API access, CRM sync) is unpriced or behind a sales call.

8 — Every tier priced publicly with credits per data type, credit expiry and rollover, per-seat costs, overage rates, minimum term and VAT treatment stated.

10 — Complete price computability: the annual invoice derivable for a given number of seats, exported contacts by data type, identified companies and API calls, with every credit cost and the refund rule for inaccurate data published.

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The Skeptic

The pricing page ends every tier in "Individuelles Angebot anfordern" — Standard and Pro each show five licenses with no price, and the Data-as-a-Service and CRM-enrichment pricing questions sit collapsed with no figures. Credit them this much: the billing unit is unusually public — "1 Credit = 1 freigeschalteter Kontakt", browsing and reuse free, credits pooled account-wide — but without tier prices, credit allowances, expiry or per-seat costs, the annual invoice cannot be computed from public pages. 2

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European sovereignty — proven facts

2 of 4 dimensions proven

Built only from facts shown on the vendor's own pages. A dimension we could not prove is left open, not scored as zero.

Ownership Not determined — uncited Report an error
Data residency Not determined ⚠ unverified — uncited Report an error
Subprocessors US CLOUD Act reach ⚠ unverified 0/2 pts 3 Report an error

Where this could be wrong

What we left out

A claim that does not survive our checks costs us the claim, not the page. This is what was taken off this one.

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Sources (11)

The pages every claim on this page was read from — each one checked, dated, and kept verifiable.

  1. 1 Vendor homepage www.cognism.com Checked 22 Sep 2026 Details →
  2. 2 Pricing page www.cognism.com Checked 22 Sep 2026 Details →
  3. 3 Privacy policy www.cognism.com Checked 22 Sep 2026 Details →
  4. 4 Terms of service www.cognism.com Checked 22 Sep 2026 Details →
  5. 5 Imprint — found from the homepage www.cognism.com Checked 30 Sep 2026 Details →
  6. 6 Coverage, accuracy & freshness — found from sitemap www.cognism.com Checked 1 Oct 2026 Details →
  7. 7 Coverage, accuracy & freshness — found from sitemap www.cognism.com Checked 1 Oct 2026 Details →
  8. 8 Prospecting workflow & outreach rules — found from sitemap www.cognism.com Checked 1 Oct 2026 Details →
  9. 9 Prospecting workflow & outreach rules — found from sitemap www.cognism.com Checked 1 Oct 2026 Details →
  10. 10 CRM sync, enrichment & export — found from sitemap www.cognism.com Checked 1 Oct 2026 Details →
  11. 11 CRM sync, enrichment & export — found from sitemap www.cognism.com Checked 1 Oct 2026 Details →