Privacy policy
This is a draft, to be reviewed before Cufflinks is submitted to the App Store. Items marked [to confirm] are still open.
Cufflinks is a small independent word game. We collect as little as we can, only to run the game, and we never sell it.
The short version
- No accounts with email. You never give us an email address, phone number or password to play.
- Playing on your own stays on your device. Solo, Zen and Duel pass-and-play send nothing to us.
- Online play uses Google Firebase. It stores an anonymous player ID, the player name you choose, and the moves of your online games.
- No ads or purchases yet. Ads (Google AdMob) and a Remove Ads purchase (Apple In-App Purchase) are planned. Neither is live, and this policy will be updated before they are.
- This website has no cookies, analytics or trackers.
What we collect, and why
When you play on your own
Your settings, best scores, recently seen words and similar game state are saved on your device (in the app’s storage, or your browser’s storage when you play at playcufflinks.com/play). They are not sent to us. Deleting the app or clearing your browser data removes them.
When you play online (Head to Head and Random Match)
Online games run on Google Firebase (Firebase Authentication and Cloud Firestore). When you first open an online mode:
- An anonymous sign-in. Firebase creates a random player ID for your device. It is not linked to your name, email or Apple ID. A sign-in token is kept on your device so you stay signed in.
- Your player name. You choose it (up to 12 characters). It is shown to your opponent and stored with your invite codes, your Random Match searches and your games. You don’t need to use your real name.
- Your games. For each online game we store its settings, the words for the game, each move (guesses, passes and hints), the scores and when each move was made, so both players see the same game and can come back to it.
- Invite codes. When you challenge a friend, we store the code with your player name and the game settings until your friend joins or the code expires.
Like any internet service, Google’s servers receive your IP address and basic technical information about the request when the game talks to them. Firebase uses this to provide and secure the service. See Firebase’s privacy information.
Checking your connection
To tell whether you are online, the game sends a tiny request to a Google connection-check address. Nothing about you is sent with it, though Google sees the IP address the request comes from.
Ads (planned, not live)
We plan to show ads in the free version of the iPhone app using Google AdMob. When we do, AdMob may collect device information, an advertising identifier (only if you allow tracking when your iPhone asks) and how you interact with ads, to show and measure them. We will update this policy, and the App Store privacy details, before any ads go live. [to confirm: whether ads appear in the browser version]
Purchases (planned, not live)
We plan to offer a one-time Remove Ads purchase through Apple In-App Purchase. Apple handles the payment; we never see your card details or Apple ID. The app only learns whether the purchase was made, and keeps that on your device.
This website
playcufflinks.com is hosted on Cloudflare Pages. It sets no cookies and runs no analytics or trackers, and its fonts and images are served from this site. Cloudflare processes standard request data, such as your IP address and browser type, to deliver the site and protect it from abuse. When you open an invite link, the code is read from the link inside your browser and is only used when you choose to play.
How long we keep it
- Invite codes work for 48 hours and are deleted automatically 30 days after they are made. We keep them that long so an old message never points at someone else’s game.
- Random Match searches expire after a minute or so and are deleted automatically soon after.
- Online games are kept while they are being played, so both players can return to them, and for a while after they finish so you can see the result. [to confirm: how long finished games are kept before automatic deletion]
- Anonymous player IDs stay until we remove inactive ones. [to confirm: inactive-account clean-up period]
Who we share it with
Only the services that run the game: Google (Firebase) for online play and, once they are live, Google AdMob for ads and Apple for purchases. Your player name and moves are shared with the opponent you play. We don’t sell or rent personal information, and we don’t share it for advertising beyond what is described above.
Google’s servers may be in the United States or other countries, so your data may be processed outside the country where you live.
Children
Cufflinks is a word game for a general audience. It doesn’t ask for anyone’s age, email or contact details. The only thing a player types for us to store is a player name. If you think a child has put personal information in a player name, contact us and we will remove it.
Your choices and rights
- Play Solo, Zen or pass-and-play to keep everything on your device.
- Change your player name at any time in the game (Head to Head shows it with a Change button).
- Ask us to see, correct or delete the data of your online games. Because there are no accounts, tell us your player name and an invite code or roughly when you played, so we can find it.
Depending on where you live (for example the EU, the UK or California), you have legal rights over your personal information, including access, correction and deletion. We will honour them wherever you live. We use online-play data only to provide the online games you ask for.
Changes
If this policy changes, we will update this page and the date at the top. For significant changes, such as turning on ads, we will also say so in the app.
Contact
Questions or requests: [email protected]. [to confirm: the developer’s legal name and contact address, which the App Store and some laws require]