Privacy Policy — Minesweeper

This app has no account. Your game and your records stay on the phone. To see how the app is used, it sends usage statistics to Firebase Analytics (Google), and this website counts visits with Google Analytics. An ad plays only when you choose to open a missed day's Daily Board from the Records calendar, and that ad is served by Google AdMob.

What the app sends

Usage statistics: the names and numbers of things that happened — which board you opened, its difficulty tier, whether you cleared it or hit a mine, how long it took, and which screens you opened. Firebase attaches an identifier it assigns to each install, along with the device model, OS version and an approximate region. No name, email or account is involved.

This is everything that goes out.

play_started — when you open the starting cell: the mode (Journey, Daily, Classic), the board's name ("3-12", a date, or a size and number) and its tier.
play_cleared — when you win: the mode, the board's name and tier, the seconds it took, the stars earned and the hints used.
play_lost — when you hit a mine: the mode, the board's name, and what percentage of the board you had opened.
hint_shown — when you look at a hint: the mode, and which kind of reasoning the hint used.
Screen names — which screen you opened, such as Home, the Journey map, Records or Settings.

Where the mines are, which cells you opened and where you put flags is never sent, and your records are never uploaded. A board's layout follows from its name, so nothing else about the board goes out.

Sharing a board picture or today's result opens your phone's share sheet. You choose what goes to whom; the app does not send it anywhere itself.

Tapping "Privacy policy" or "Contact" in Settings asks your browser to open this site. That is your browser fetching a web page; the app attaches nothing about you to it.

An ad plays only when you tap a missed day on the Daily Board calendar in Records and choose "Watch ad and play" (a rewarded ad). After the ad, that day's board opens. There are no ads while you play, between boards, or anywhere else. If you never choose "Watch ad and play", the ad network is never even started.

The ad is served by Google AdMob. To choose ads, count that they were shown, and prevent abuse, AdMob receives: the device's advertising identifier (only if you allow tracking), an approximate location derived from your IP address, how you viewed and tapped the ad, and information about the device and app. In the UK and Europe you are asked for consent first, and iOS asks whether to allow tracking. If you say no, ads still appear but are not personalized.

You can change your consent under Ad privacy choices in Settings (shown only where consent is required). How Google uses this information is described in Google's explanation.

This website

This website, outside the app, uses Google Analytics to see how many people visit. The page address and approximate information about your device and browser go to Google, and Google sets a cookie in your browser to do this. No name, email or account is involved, and nothing is used for advertising. It is counted separately from the app's statistics; we do not join website visitors to app users.

The server that serves these pages also keeps short-lived access logs, as any web server does.

What the app keeps on your device

Only these, all of which stay on the phone.

The games you were playing — so you can pick them up after closing the app: one each for Journey, Daily and Classic, with which board it is, which cells are open and where the flags are, and the time so far. Mine positions are not stored; they follow from the board's name.
Your settings — how taps work, hold time, sound, music, haptics, language, and the Classic board size.
Your records — the stars and best time for each Journey board and which new-rule cards you have seen; the days you cleared the Daily Board with their stars and time; for each Classic size, games played and won, best time and streaks. This is what the Records screen shows.

All of this lives in the app's own storage. If you have Apple's device backup (iCloud or a computer) switched on, that storage may be included in the backup, which is a matter between you and Apple.

Deleting the app deletes them. There is no copy anywhere else.

Children

This app is not directed at children. We never ask for or determine anyone's age.

Changes

If this policy changes, this page changes with it, along with the date below.

Contact