Privacy policy

This policy covers the iPhone and iPad game Comet the Shiba, developed by Barqawiz. It applies to the app itself and to this website.

No personal data is collected

The game does not collect, store or transmit personal data. There are no accounts to create, no sign-up, no email capture, no ads in the game and no tracking. What it does report is anonymous usage analytics, described in the next section, and nothing in that data identifies you.

Anonymous analytics

The game uses Google's Firebase Analytics to report anonymous gameplay events: the app was opened, a level was started, a level was finished or lost, a level was cleared for the first time, a region was completed, a pal was unlocked, an unlock offer was shown, and a purchase was completed or refunded (which purchase and from which screen, never a price). Each event carries the level number, score or offer involved, plus the general device and app-version information Firebase gathers to make the numbers add up (device model, iOS version, country, a random per-install identifier).

I use this to make the game better, mostly by seeing where players get stuck, and to see whether my ads for the game lead to downloads and purchases. It contains no name, no email, no contacts, no location beyond country, and no advertising identifier: the game is built without ad-identifier support, so it cannot read your IDFA even in principle. Two of these anonymous events, first opened and purchase completed, and aggregated usage totals are shared with Google Ads to measure those ads. Nothing is used to show you ads, nothing is linked to you, and nothing else is shared with anyone beyond Firebase processing it on my behalf, under Google's Firebase privacy terms. The random identifier is reset if you delete the app.

What is stored on your device

Your progress is saved locally with Apple's standard on-device storage (UserDefaults), and it never leaves the device. That means: which levels you have unlocked and completed, your best score, your points balance and which pals you own, your lifetime stats, your sound, music and haptics settings, whether the rating card has already been shown, which purchases are unlocked (cached so the game works offline, including whether this copy was bought before the game went free), the date the game was first opened, and which levels and purchases were already reported, so nothing is reported twice.

None of it is synced to a server, because there is no server. Deleting the app deletes all of it, although your purchases themselves stay with your Apple Account and can be restored. You can also erase your progress yourself at any time from Settings → Reset progress inside the game; that leaves your purchases alone.

Game Center is optional

If you are signed in to Game Center, the game submits your best score to a leaderboard and reports achievements. That data is handled by Apple under Apple's privacy policy, not by me: I receive no identity information, no email address and no player details.

Game Center is entirely optional. Signed out, the game is fully playable and simply skips the leaderboard and achievements. You can sign out at any time in the iOS Settings app.

In-app purchases

The game is free to download and Levels 1 and 2 are free to play. It offers two optional one-time purchases: Full Game, which unlocks every level after the first two, and All Pals, which unlocks all five dogs at once instead of earning them with points. There are no subscriptions.

Both purchases are handled entirely by Apple through the App Store. I never receive your name, card details, billing address or any other payment information; the game learns which of the two items your Apple Account owns, and whether a purchase was just made on this device, so it can unlock them and count the sale once. Apple's handling of your purchase is covered by Apple's privacy policy. To recognise players who bought the game before it went free, the game also asks the App Store, on your device, which version you first downloaded; nothing about that check is sent to me.

When a purchase completes, Firebase Analytics may also report an anonymous purchase event of its own with the product, its price and the currency. It contains no payment details, is not linked to you and is not used for tracking. It is used only for analytics, never to measure ads.

No ads

The game shows no ads. To measure its own ads on Google, the anonymous events above are also used by Google Ads: when the game is first opened and when an in-app purchase is made on the device (which purchase and from which screen, never a price). The game also reports its progress to Apple's SKAdNetwork, Apple's privacy-preserving ad measurement, as a single number: installed, first level cleared, free levels cleared, or purchased. The only third-party code is the Firebase Analytics library, and everything else is Apple's own frameworks. There is no advertising identifier (IDFA), no tracking prompt, and nothing is linked to you or used to track you across apps.

Ratings and feedback

After finishing a region the game may ask, at most three times per install, how you are enjoying it. A high rating hands off to Apple's own review prompt. A lower one offers to open your mail app with a pre-filled message to me. Nothing is sent unless you press send yourself, and your star choice stays on your device.

If you do email me, I see whatever you write plus your email address, and I use it only to reply to you.

Children

Comet the Shiba is rated 4+ and suitable for all ages. The game collects no personal data from anyone, so it collects none from children either; the anonymous analytics described above contain nothing that identifies any player, of any age.

This website

This site is a set of static files hosted on GitHub Pages. It sets no cookies and runs no analytics. GitHub may log ordinary web-server request data as part of serving the pages; see GitHub's privacy statement. Web fonts are loaded from Google Fonts, which receives the request for the font files.

Changes to this policy

If this policy ever changes, the effective date at the top of the page changes with it.

Contact

Questions about privacy, or anything else: barqawicloud@icloud.com.