Hexhold Privacy Policy

Last updated: October 5, 2026

This policy explains what information Hexhold uses, why, and the choices you have. Hexhold is a strategy game for iPhone and iPad by Conrad Sasinski ("we", "us").

The short version

• You can play offline. Your saves, campaign progress, and settings stay on your device.
• The free version shows a full-screen ad sometimes, between games. Ads come from Google AdMob, and Google collects some data to show them.
• We ask your permission through Apple's tracking prompt before the advertising identifier is used. You can say no. That prompt does not decide ad consent in the UK, the EEA, or Switzerland, and it is not a US state opt-out of sale, sharing, or targeted ads.
• In the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland, the game does not request any ad unless Google's consent form allows it. If you refuse, you see no ads. The consent section has the details.
• "Remove Ads" is a one-time purchase. The game stores that purchase on your device and uses it so the game does not request ads.
• Online play is optional. If you use it, we keep a profile with your player name, friends, ratings, and online games so those games work. You can delete the profile in the game. Some records can remain. The retention section says which ones, and why.
• Phone notifications for online play are optional. If you turn them on, we keep a notification token for your device so we can tell you when it is your turn.
• Party games can have text chat. Chat messages are not stored. They appear on screen during the game and are gone when it ends. The only exception is a message a player chooses to report.
• We do not sell your personal information for money. Letting Google use ad information can still be "sharing" for targeted ads. Under some US state laws it can also be a "sale." Apple's tracking prompt does not opt you out of that. The Settings switch "Do not sell or share my personal information" is the choice for that. The US section says exactly what it does.

Information that stays on your device

Hexhold stores these on your device so the game works:

• Saves and autosaves, campaign progress and stars, and tutorial progress.
• Settings, custom maps, and recent skirmish seeds.
• A small ads record: how many games you have finished, when the last ad was shown, and whether you have answered the privacy questions. This is how we keep ads rare.
• A record that you bought Remove Ads.
• If you use online play, a few online settings: that you have used online play on this device, the games where you muted emotes, and which finished online games have already been counted for ads.

This information is not sent to us. If you delete the app, it is deleted too. Device backups such as iCloud Backup may keep a copy, under Apple's terms.

Ads (Google AdMob)

The free version of Hexhold shows full-screen ads only between games: after you finish a match and go back to the menu or map. There are no ads during a match, during the tutorial, around story scenes, or in your first few games. There are no banner ads and no ads that give game rewards.

Ads are provided by Google AdMob, a service of Google LLC, and of Google Ireland Limited for users in the EEA, the UK, and Switzerland. The ad system does not start until you have finished your first match. When it runs, Google's software in the app may collect:

• Device identifiers. The Apple advertising identifier (IDFA), but only if you allow tracking through Apple's prompt, plus identifiers Google uses on its own for this app.
• Coarse location. A general area worked out from your IP address. Not GPS.
• Advertising data. Which ads were shown, and whether you tapped them.
• Product interaction. For example, app launches and taps on ads.
• Diagnostics. Crash data, performance data, and other technical data about the ads.

Google uses this information to show ads, limit how often you see the same ad, measure ads, prevent fraud and abuse, and improve its services. If you allow tracking, Google may use the advertising identifier to show ads based on your activity in other companies' apps and websites. Google's use of this information is covered by Google's Privacy Policy and by How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services.

We do not receive your advertising identifier or your location. We receive only overall reports from Google, such as how many ads were shown and how much they earned.

We ask Google to limit ads to content rated "PG" (parental guidance) or milder, and we block sensitive ad categories in our AdMob settings. Those settings limit the subject of the ad. They do not stop the ad data described above from being collected, and they are not a parent's permission.

Apple's tracking prompt

After you finish your first match, iPhone and iPad may ask whether you allow Hexhold to track your activity across other companies' apps and websites. We ask your permission through Apple's tracking prompt. We do not ask Apple for permission instead of you. The prompt is not shown when the app first opens.

If you choose "Ask App Not to Track," the advertising identifier is not shared for tracking. Ads may still appear. You can change this later in Settings > Privacy & Security > Tracking.

That choice stands on its own. It does not answer Google's consent form in the UK, the EEA, or Switzerland. It does not opt you out of sale, sharing, or targeted advertising under US state law.

Consent in the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland

If you are in the UK, the European Economic Area, or Switzerland, Google's consent form (User Messaging Platform) appears after your first finished match. It asks whether Google, and the ad partners named in that form, may use your information for the purposes on the form.

Your consent is required before information is stored on or read from your device for ads, where the law requires that consent, and before ads are personalized from your activity. Legitimate interest cannot replace that consent.

A non-personalized ad is still an ad that can use an identifier or storage on the device. Google uses that storage for fraud checks, to limit how often an ad appears, and for combined ad reports. Calling the ad non-personalized does not remove the need for consent for that storage.

What a refusal means

• You allow storage on the device, and you refuse personalized ads. Google may show non-personalized ads. Those ads are not chosen from your past activity. They may still use a mobile identifier or storage on the device for fraud, frequency capping, and combined reports.
• You refuse storage on the device, or the choices left on the form are not enough for an ad. The game does not request an ad. You see no ads. The game carries on without them.

To change your choice later, open Settings > Ad Privacy Choices in the game. That screen is Google's consent form for the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland. It is not the US state opt-out.

US state privacy choices

Some US state laws give residents a right to opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information, or of targeted advertising. This policy does not decide which of those laws apply to Hexhold. Applicability depends on the statute and on facts this text does not contain, including Hexhold's size and where players live.

In laws such as California's, "sale" is broader than exchanging a file of data for money. It can include disclosing personal information to another company for other valuable consideration. "Sharing" can include disclosing personal information for advertising across other companies' apps and websites, whether or not money is paid for the disclosure.

We do not sell your personal information for money. We do allow Google AdMob to collect the ad information described above to deliver, measure, and protect ads. That disclosure can be sharing for targeted advertising. Where a state law counts value other than money, it can also be a sale. Hexhold does not keep a separate list of ad companies. Ad requests go to Google. Google may use its own partners under Google's policy.

Apple's tracking prompt does not send this opt-out to Google.

Anyone can use the Settings switch "Do not sell or share my personal information," wherever they live. When it is on, the game turns on Google's restricted data processing for ad requests the game makes after that, from that device. Restricted data processing is a Google setting that tells Google to limit how it uses personal information in those ad requests. Google's policies say how it applies that limit. The switch does not undo information Google already holds, and it applies only on the device where you turned it on. You can also use Google's My Ad Center.

If you email sasheenmusic@gmail.com with a "Do not sell or share" request, we will reply and point you to the switch. We cannot apply the request to your device from an email, because we cannot tell which device is yours.

The in-game screen Settings > Ad Privacy Choices is the UK, EEA, and Switzerland consent form. It is separate from the "Do not sell or share my personal information" switch, and this policy does not describe it as a US state opt-out.

Purchases (Remove Ads)

"Remove Ads" is a one-time in-app purchase. Apple handles the payment. We do not see or store your name, payment card, or Apple Account details. The game saves on your device that you bought Remove Ads, together with Apple's transaction number, and uses that record so the game does not request ads. This policy does not promise that Google's ad software never loads. If ads still appear after a completed purchase, email us.

"Restore Purchases" in Settings asks Apple to confirm earlier purchases for the Apple Account you are signed in with. Your purchase is not sent to our server.

Online play (optional)

Online play is optional. Every other part of Hexhold works without it. It lets you:

• add friends and play them, as a single game or a best of 3 or 5
• find a ranked opponent
• challenge a campaign lord, which is an AI opponent and is clearly labelled as one
• play a Party game with up to 4 players

Games can be Daily, where each player has a day (or three days, in friend games) for each turn, or live Rapid and Blitz games, where both players are online and on a clock.

You sign in with Apple Game Center. Apple tells our server your Game Center player ID and proves it belongs to you. We do not receive your Game Center nickname, your email address, or your real name from Apple.

When you use online play, our game server stores:

• Your Game Center player ID, a code from Apple that identifies you to our game, and an account number our server makes for you, so your profile works on all your devices.

• Your player name, banner, and colour, which other players can see. You choose the name. We check names against a filter, and players can report offensive names.

• Your friend code, your friends list, and the players you have blocked. Anyone who has your friend code or friend link can add you as a friend. You can remove or block any player.

• Your online games. Challenges you send and receive, the moves in each game, results, the preset emotes sent in each game, and when games were played. This lets you play across devices and lets our server check that every move follows the rules.

• Reports you make about a player's name, and reports made about yours.

• Technical data. Your IP address, your device's connection details, and connection times appear in server logs. We use them to run the service, keep it secure, and stop cheating or abuse.

• For Rapid and Blitz games, the time control, each player's remaining time, and when each clock started, stored with the moves and result. Our server keeps the official clocks.

• While you are in live online play, a short "online now" signal, so the game can find an opponent and show when a player is away. The signal expires about 15 seconds after your device stops sending it. We do not keep a history of these signals. Ordinary server logs are separate and follow the log rules in the retention section.

• For Party games: the party code, who joined, their seats and colours, the host, who left or was removed, the moves, the result, and when the game was played. If a player leaves, our server's AI can play their seat until they return.

Our game server and its database are hosted by DigitalOcean in San Francisco, in the United States. If you live outside the United States and you use online play, that information is transferred to and stored in the United States. The transfer section below says what legal protection this policy does, and does not, claim for that transfer. Apple provides Game Center under Apple's own privacy policy.

Each mode has its own rating. Your Profile shows your ratings, results, win rates by land and your last 20 games. Your friends list shows friends' ratings and when you last played together. These summaries use the existing online game records.

For ranked play, our server keeps your rating, how certain the rating is, your rated game count and results, and the times of those games. It also keeps your current match search and recent opponents and first-move history. We use this information to find opponents, balance who moves first, calculate ratings, prevent repeat pairing and enforce blocks. Your opponent can see your player name and rating.

The top list shows eligible players' chosen player names, ratings and positions to other signed-in online players. Eligibility depends on recent ranked games. We do not use your rating, match-search information or friends list for advertising or cross-app tracking.

Phone notifications (optional)

If you turn on online alerts and allow notifications, we keep:

• your device's notification token
• your notification choice
• when the device last registered

We use them to send gameplay alerts, such as "It's your turn" or "You have a new challenge." Alerts go through Apple Push Notification service.

Alerts use fixed wording and the name another player chose. They never include chat messages or emotes. We do not use notification tokens for advertising or tracking.

Turning alerts off and removal:

• You can turn alerts off in Settings with "Online alerts". That choice applies to all your devices.
• Apple's notification permission is set on each device.
• We remove saved tokens:
  • when you turn alerts off or delete your online profile
  • when Apple reports a token as invalid
  • after 90 days without the app registering again
• Alerts waiting to be sent expire within 72 hours. An alert already handed to Apple can still arrive after you turn alerts off.

Game Center friends (optional)

If you choose "Invite Game Center Friends" and allow Apple's friend-access request:

• What we use: Hexhold uses the friends Apple lets us see to find which of them have Hexhold online profiles. Their Game Center player IDs are sent to our server only to answer that lookup.
• What we keep: we do not save your Game Center friend list. We do not receive your friends' real names, email addresses, or phone contacts.
• Your choice: you decide whom to add or challenge. A friendship you add follows the same rules as any other Hexhold friendship.

Party games and chat

Joining. A Party game is private. Players join with a party link or code that the host shares. Anyone who has the link can ask to join until the game starts. The host can remove a player.

Chat. Party games can have text chat between the players in that game.

• How messages travel: our server passes each message straight to the other players in that game, after an automatic check for offensive words, links, phone numbers, and email addresses. A message that fails the check is blocked or hidden.
• Messages are not stored. We do not keep chat messages in our database, in server logs, or on your device. They show on screen during the game and are gone when the game ends. A player who rejoins does not see earlier messages.
• Reporting. If you report a message, we keep that one reported message, who sent it, the game, and the time. That lets us review it and act on it, for example by removing a player's access to online play. This is the only way a chat message is kept. We do not keep the rest of the conversation.
• Your controls: you can mute any player, mute all chat, block a player, or turn off Party chat in Settings.
• Age: Party chat is for players 13 and over. Before chat turns on, the game asks whether you are 13 or older. Your answer stays on your device only. If you answer no, you can still play Party games, with chat hidden. The game does not verify the answer. If you are under 13, do not use Party chat. A player who gives a false age is responsible for that answer, and we may remove their access to chat or online play if we learn of it.
• Other games: there is no chat in 1v1 or ranked games. Those games have preset emotes only.

Deleting your online profile

In the game, open Play Online > Profile > Delete Online Profile. This deletes your profile, name, banner, friend code, friends list, blocks, challenges, the name reports linked to you, and our server account for you. Online games still in progress end as a loss.

Finished games stay in the other player's list. Your chosen name on those games is replaced with "Deleted player." That change hides the name. It does not make the underlying record anonymous. The record can still show the moves, the result, the time, and the other player. It can still be connected to you if other information remains, including a server log or a backup, and including by us. We keep those finished games because they are that other player's game history.

Database backups follow a short rotation that is intended to be about 7 days. A backup made before you deleted the profile may still exist during that rotation. A restored backup might recreate a deleted profile. The deletion note is meant to reduce that risk. It is not a guarantee, and this policy does not state that every backup copy is gone on day 7.

We keep a note that the deleted account number was deleted. We keep it so a restored backup is not supposed to recreate the profile. The note is still information about that account for as long as it can be tied to a person. We do not call it anonymous. We keep it while a restore could still recreate the profile. This policy does not give the note an end date.

Deleting your online profile also removes your match search, rating, and personal rating-result entries from the active service. You no longer appear on the top list. Finished games retained for opponents show Deleted player instead of your chosen name. The existing backup and deletion-note limits still apply.

Deleting your online profile also removes your notification tokens, any alerts waiting to be sent, and any party you are waiting in. Chat reports you made, and chat reports made about you, are deleted, the same as name reports.

Your Game Center account belongs to Apple and is not affected. Your offline progress stays on your device.

Websites and email

The hexholdgame.com website is hosted on our server at DigitalOcean in San Francisco. Cloudflare provides the DNS for hexholdgame.com, which is the lookup that sends a visitor to that server. The site that hosts this policy is hosted by Cloudflare (Cloudflare Pages). Both keep ordinary web server logs, such as an IP address and the page requested. We use those logs to run the sites and keep them secure.

If you email sasheenmusic@gmail.com, we receive your email address and whatever you write. We use that message to answer you, to handle a privacy or deletion request, and to handle a safety report.

Children

Hexhold is a general-audience game. It is not directed at children under 13. Its App Store rating is 13+. The game does not ask a player's age, except the one question before Party chat, described below.

Hexhold is a turn-based strategy game. It is not built as a product for young children. The game does not ask a player's age, except the one question before Party chat. People under 18, including children under 13, can download it and play. This policy does not say that we have measured the real age of the audience.

Ads can run for any player who finishes a match and has not bought Remove Ads, including a child. The "PG" content limit and the blocked ad categories limit the subject of the ad. They do not stop collection of the ad data listed above, and they are not permission from a parent. Refusing Apple's tracking prompt stops use of the advertising identifier for tracking. In the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland, Google's consent form still applies. None of these steps is verified permission from a parent.

Online play has no age check. 1v1 and ranked games have no chat. Players can send only preset emotes, and a player can turn emotes off. Party games can have text chat, but only after a player says they are 13 or older. That answer is not verified. A player who gives a false age is responsible for that answer, and we may remove their access to chat or online play if we learn of it. A player can report a name or a chat message, mute a player, or block a player.

If you tell us that a child has used online play, we will delete that profile in the way the deletion section describes, and we will stop using that profile for online play. Deleting the profile does not call back ad information already sent to Google. It does not erase a server log or a website log that is still being kept. For ad data Google already has, use Google's My Ad Center as well as emailing us.

United States. If we know that an online profile belongs to a child under 13, we will delete it and we will not keep using it. The game asks age only before Party chat, and that answer stays on the device, so we may not know a player's age. A complaint is one way we can learn. Deleting the profile after the complaint does not undo ad collection that already happened.

United Kingdom. UK rules can apply to a game that is likely to be used by people under 18, including a game that was not made for children. This policy does not say that Hexhold has finished that audience assessment. It does not say that the UK Children's code is met. The limits that are true of the game today are the ones in this section: online play is optional, 1v1 and ranked games have no chat; Party games have text chat that is not stored, behind a self-declared 13+ question; precise location is not collected, and ads are full-screen ads between games. This policy does not claim an age check, a separate children's advertising mode, or a way to undo tracking that already happened.

Legal bases (UK, EEA, and Switzerland)

• Personalized ads, and storing or reading information on your device for ads where consent is required, including storage used for non-personalized ads: your consent, given in Google's form. You can withdraw that consent in Settings > Ad Privacy Choices. Withdrawal stops us relying on consent after that. It does not erase collection that already happened. Legitimate interest is not the basis for these uses.

• Ads in the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland: the game requests an ad only when Google's consent form allows it. If you refuse, no ad is requested. Personalized ads, and storage used for non-personalized ads, rest on your consent, as the first line of this list says.

• Security of online play, server logs, website logs, and the deleted-account note: our legitimate interest in running the service, dealing with cheating and abuse, and avoiding recreation of a profile you deleted. You can object by emailing us.

• Emails you send us: to take the step you asked for, and our legitimate interest in keeping a record of safety and privacy requests.

• Online play: to provide the online service you chose.

• The Remove Ads record stored on your device: to provide the purchase. Apple processes the payment under Apple's terms.

• Phone notifications: your choice to turn them on. You can turn them off at any time.

• Party chat: to provide the chat feature you chose, plus our legitimate interest in checking messages for offensive content.

• Reported chat messages: our legitimate interest in keeping online play safe and acting on abuse.

Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to access, correct, delete, or receive a copy of your personal information, to object to or restrict its use, to withdraw consent, to opt out of sale, sharing, or targeted advertising where that right exists, and to complain to a privacy regulator.

For information Google collects for ads, use the controls named in this policy and Google's own tools. For online play information we hold, use Delete Online Profile or email us. For a US opt-out of sale, sharing, or targeted advertising, use the US section. We will not treat you differently for using these rights.

You can ask us what protection applies to a transfer of your information to the United States. The transfer section says what we can tell you.

How long we keep information

We keep personal information only while the reason for having it still applies, unless the law requires a longer period. Where this policy cannot honestly give a number of days, it gives the reason instead.

• On your device: until you delete the app or reset that progress. A device backup, such as iCloud Backup, may keep a copy under Apple's terms.

• Online profile, friends, and games still in progress: until you delete your online profile, and then as the deletion section describes.

• Finished games after you delete your profile: kept as the other player's history, with your name shown as "Deleted player." These records are not described as anonymous. They remain while that other player's history is kept.

• The deleted-account note: kept so a backup restore is not supposed to recreate your profile. Kept while that restore risk remains. Not described as anonymous. No end date is stated.

• Server logs, meaning IP address, connection details, and connection times: kept to run online play, keep it secure, and deal with cheating or abuse. They sit in rolling files that overwrite the oldest entries when a file reaches a fixed size. How many days that covers depends on how busy the server is. A size limit is not a time limit. This policy does not say that these logs are copied to another store, and it does not say that they never are.

• Website logs, meaning IP address and pages requested: kept to run the websites and keep them secure. No number of days is stated.

• Emails you send us: kept to answer you, handle a safety or privacy request, and show what we did. Kept until that work is finished and the record is no longer needed for it. No number of months is stated.

• Database backups: a short rotation intended to be about 7 days. This is not a promise that every copy is destroyed on day 7.

• Ad information Google holds: kept by Google under Google's own rules.

• Notification tokens: until you turn alerts off, delete your online profile, or the token becomes invalid, and at most 90 days after the app last registered it.

• Alerts waiting to be sent: up to 72 hours, and usually removed much sooner.

• The "online now" signal: about 15 seconds after your device stops sending it.

• Chat messages: not stored. They exist only while they are passed to the other players during the game.

• Reported chat messages: kept until the report has been reviewed, then deleted.

• Party games: like other online games. Kept until you delete your online profile, and then as the deletion section describes.

Transfers outside your country

Online-play information is stored on a DigitalOcean server in San Francisco, United States. Logs for the hexholdgame.com website are kept on that DigitalOcean server. Logs for the site that hosts this policy are processed by Cloudflare. Ad information is processed by Google LLC and, for people in the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland, also by Google Ireland Limited.

If you are outside the United States and you use online play or visit the websites, the information described for those services is transferred to the United States. The city names the server. It is not, by itself, a legal safeguard.

People in the UK, the EEA, and Switzerland are not covered by an adequacy decision that protects every transfer to every recipient in the United States. This policy does not claim that a contract, a certification, or another formal safeguard is in place for the DigitalOcean transfer or the Cloudflare transfer. That claim is omitted because it was not verified. Transfers by Google are described in Google's Privacy Policy.

You can email sasheenmusic@gmail.com and ask what protection applies to a transfer that affects you. We will tell you what is actually in place, or that nothing further is in place, and where you can read it if a document exists.

Hexhold has no establishment in the UK or the EEA. No UK representative and no EEA representative is named in this policy, because none is appointed here. If one is appointed, this policy will give their name and contact details. Until then, contact Conrad Sasinski at the email above. A representative is a contact in that region for users and for the regulator.

Notifications pass through Apple Push Notification service (Apple Inc.) under Apple's own terms.

Changes

If Hexhold's privacy practices change, we will update this policy before the changed version is released, and we will change the "Last updated" date. A transfer safeguard, a fixed log-retention period, or a UK or EEA representative will be added here before we rely on it.

Contact

Conrad Sasinski

Email: sasheenmusic@gmail.com

Use this address for privacy questions, data requests, US opt-out requests, and safety reports.