Privacy Policy

Introduction

Respite Studios LLC ("we," "us," or "our") respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal information. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you visit our websites, play our games, or interact with our services.

Information We Collect

Information You Provide

• Account registration details (email address, username)
• Contact information when you reach out to us
• Feedback, bug reports, and survey responses
• Payment information for purchases (processed by third-party providers)

Information Collected Automatically

• Device information (browser type, operating system)
• Usage data (pages visited, time spent, interactions)
• IP address and approximate location
• Cookies and similar tracking technologies

How We Use Your Information

• To provide, maintain, and improve our games and services
• To communicate with you about updates, news, and support
• To personalize your experience
• To detect and prevent fraud or abuse
• To comply with legal obligations
• To analyze usage patterns and improve our offerings

Information Sharing

We do not sell your personal information. We may share your information with:

• Service providers who assist in operating our services (hosting, analytics, payment processing)
• Legal authorities when required by law or to protect our rights
• Business partners with your consent for specific collaborations

Ads in the Game

In the game, some players see a small banner ad from Google (AdSense in the browser, AdMob in the apps). Where the law requires it, including in the EEA, the UK and Switzerland, Google asks for your consent before ads load. You can change that choice at any time in the game under Settings > Privacy > Ad privacy choices. Google's use of data is described in its partner sites policy.

What Criminal Overlords Stores

When you play Criminal Overlords, our game servers keep:

• Your account: a sign-in key created on your device, and your email address and password if you add them (the password is stored only as a hash)
• Your profile: the names you choose for yourself, your kingdom and your alliance, and a profile picture if you upload one
• What you write: mail, alliance chat, alliance mail and descriptions. An automatic filter masks offensive words, and messages you or others report are kept for review
• Your game: buildings, armies, battles, rankings, alliances and the actions you take
• Purchases: what you bought, when, and in which store
• Sign-ins: when you signed in, on which platform and with which version of the game
• Usage data: which screens you open, banner ad events, and whether the game last closed unexpectedly. You can turn this off in Settings > Privacy > Usage data
• Support requests you send us, with a scrambled (hashed) copy of your IP address to stop spam

Computer-controlled players (bots) share the world with you. Their mail replies and alliance chat lines may be written by an AI language model. When you write to a bot, or chat in an alliance that has bots, that text and the bot's name are sent to the model to write the reply. Your account details are never sent.

Service Providers

These companies process data for us to run the game. They may only use it to provide their service to us.

• Vultr: hosts our game servers and database
• Google (AdMob and AdSense): banner ads, for players who see ads
• Apple App Store, Google Play, Steam and Stripe: take payments. We never see your card number
• Amazon Web Services (Rekognition): checks uploaded profile pictures that our own filter cannot decide
• DigitalOcean and Vultr AI inference: write bot replies, as described above
• Postmark: sends our emails (email verification, password reset and support replies)

Deleting Your Account

You can delete your Criminal Overlords account at any time in the game under Settings > Privacy > Delete account, or by email without the game. See how to delete your account for both ways and what is deleted. You can also download a copy of your data under Settings > Privacy > Download my data.

How Long We Keep Data

• Account and game data: until you delete your account. After you ask, you have 30 days to change your mind, then it is deleted for good
• Mail: removed after 30 days, or the time you choose in the game
• Records of staff viewing your email address: 90 days
• Support requests: as long as we need them to answer you and stop abuse

After your account is deleted we keep a few records that no longer name you: purchase records (for taxes, refunds and payment disputes), bans and other sanctions (so they can't be dodged with a new account), sign-in session records (for security), and reports other players filed.

Data Security

We implement reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect your information. However, no method of transmission over the Internet or electronic storage is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

Your Rights

Depending on your location, you may have the right to:

• Access, correct, or delete your personal information
• Object to or restrict processing of your data
• Data portability
• Withdraw consent at any time
• Lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority

Children's Privacy

Our services are not directed to children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If we become aware that we have collected such information, we will take steps to delete it promptly.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of any material changes by posting the updated policy on our website with a revised "Last updated" date.

Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us at:

Respite Studios LLC
Springfield, MO
privacy@respite.studio