YOUR WORD DECKS DATA

Privacy Policy

Last updated 3 October 2026

This notice covers Word Decks and Word Dextreme, their daily challenges, Word Decks practice mode, Extra Dextreme, and the shared account, leaderboard, friends, league, trophy, feedback and sharing features.

Who is responsible for your data?

Word Decks is operated by David Richard Owens, an independent operator based in England, United Kingdom. For support, complaints or privacy requests, email hello@worddecks.com.

David Richard Owens is the data controller: the person responsible for deciding how Word Decks uses your personal information.

What we collect and where it comes from

• Accounts: information you supply, including your email, username/display name and password. We store a password hash rather than your readable password. We also keep account settings, status, sign-in sessions and security or recovery records.
• Gameplay: game and mode, challenge date, submitted scores, attempt/run identifiers, round details, words played where included in a result, streaks, trophies and league records. Some guest history and preferences stay in your browser; eligible account results are stored on our server.
• Friends and Facebook: Word Decks friend codes, connections and searchability settings. If you choose Facebook sign-in or linking, Meta supplies the authorised account identifier and available profile details, such as your name and email. Facebook-friends features depend on permission and which friends also use the app. Linking is optional.
• Support: feedback text, game context, your contact email if you ask for a reply, and correspondence or information you give us when requesting help or exercising your rights.
• Technical and security records: cookies, browser identifiers, consent choices, request details and hosting/security logs. Requests to our host and external providers expose information such as your IP address and browser/device details to those providers.
• Optional analytics: page and game events, game/mode/score, pseudonymous browser and session identifiers, referral activity and, if signed in, an account association in our own analytics. Google Analytics measures visits and activity; Microsoft Clarity provides interaction data, heatmaps and masked session recordings.

Why we use data and our lawful bases

• Providing the service you request: account access, saved results, friends, leagues and account preferences. We rely on performing our agreement with you where the data is necessary to provide those features.
• Legitimate interests: protecting accounts, preventing abuse and manipulated scores, maintaining reliable games, investigating bugs, handling support and keeping proportionate administrative records. We consider your rights and use only information needed for those purposes.
• Consent: optional behavioural analytics and referral measurement. Declining does not stop you playing, signing in, submitting eligible scores or sending feedback. You can withdraw analytics consent using the Cookie Notice controls.
• Legal obligations: responding to applicable data-rights requests and retaining information where the law requires it.

An email, username and sign-in method are needed to create and secure an account. You do not have to provide them to play as a guest. Choosing Facebook does not replace the need for a lawful basis for our use of the data; it is simply an optional sign-in method.

What other players can see

Submitted leaderboard and league results can show your username, score, rank and relevant challenge or game details. Friends features expose the information needed to find and recognise your account according to your settings. Your account email, password hash and sign-in tokens are not displayed on leaderboards.

Using Share creates a link that anyone with the link may open or forward. It may show your username, score, game, mode, date and selected result details. Social platforms can cache the preview. Shared challenge previews are designed to avoid revealing the puzzle answers, but sharing is not private messaging. Contact us if you want a share removed; copies or previews already held by others may remain.

A shared-link visitor can separately choose to appear as a suggested friend to the person who created the link. The choice starts unchecked. After signed-in play or account creation/sign-in, we store that permission and show the visitor’s public name to that person, who may send an ordinary friend request. We do not share the visitor’s email address or automatically create a friendship. This optional friends feature does not require analytics consent. The visitor can withdraw it in Manage friends; permissions and dismissals expire after 90 days. The browser keeps an unfinished opt-in only in the current tab for up to 24 hours.

Optional analytics and recordings

Our behavioural analytics and referral measurement require your analytics choice to be Allowed. Google Analytics 4 and Microsoft Clarity also require that choice and must be enabled for the site. We do not load these third-party trackers on account or admin pages, or pages whose URL contains a query string or fragment. This protects sign-in/recovery links and other URL data.

Clarity records page structure and interactions, such as clicks and scrolling. Page content is masked before the tracker is loaded so account names, game text and form content are not intentionally recorded as readable text. We do not deliberately send email addresses, passwords, Facebook IDs or authentication tokens in Google Analytics events. Advertising consent signals are denied; we do not use these integrations for personalised advertising.

Who receives information?

• File Sanctuary: our hosting provider processes the website, database and associated operational logs on our behalf.
• Google and Microsoft: receive optional analytics data when you allow analytics. See Google’s privacy policy and Microsoft’s privacy statement.
• Meta: processes Facebook sign-in and permissions if you use those features. See Meta’s privacy policy. Removing a Facebook link does not delete your Word Decks account.
• Brevo: delivers account verification, password reset and password-change notices for both games. We provide your email address, display name and message content, including a short-lived recovery or verification link where needed. Brevo processes delivery and security records. These are service messages; creating an account does not subscribe you to a newsletter. See Brevo’s privacy policy.
• Support and email providers: process messages you send to our support mailbox. An external donation or social website processes information under its own notice if you choose to visit it.
• Other recipients: we may disclose limited information where lawfully required, to protect people or the service, or to resolve a legal dispute. We do not sell your personal information.

Processing outside the UK

Google, Microsoft, Meta, Brevo and their service providers may process information outside the UK, including in the United States. A restricted transfer needs a valid UK adequacy arrangement or appropriate safeguards, such as approved contractual clauses and any required risk assessment. You can ask us which arrangement applies to your data and how to obtain a copy of the relevant safeguards by contacting us. Your analytics choice does not waive these protections.

How long we keep information

• Account and associated game/social records: while your account remains open and the records are needed for your history, leaderboards and requested features. On a verified account deletion request, we remove the account and its linked server records across both games, including owned share links. Any justified exception or separate provider/backup work is explained when we respond.
• Sessions and play authorisation: sign-in sessions and recovery tokens are removed after expiry; used recovery tokens are removed after seven days. Authentication rate-limit records are removed after seven days without an update. Expired play/reward sessions and share-delivery records are removed once older than 90 days. Period-specific play usage and guest attempt history are removed after 400 days. All-time access counters and credits remain while needed to provide access, and linked counters are removed with an account.
• Feedback: server feedback is removed 365 days after its last update. Account deletion also removes linked feedback and guest feedback sent using that account email. Support mailbox correspondence is reviewed separately and kept while needed to respond, investigate or resolve a complaint; we remove identifiable details once they are no longer needed.
• Shares and administrative records: guest share links are removed after 365 days. Revoked or expired links are removed after 90 days without an update. Active account shares remain until revoked, expired or the account is deleted. Administrative audit records are removed after 365 days.
• Our analytics: the routine retention period for raw first-party events, run analytics and share-referral events is 365 days. Non-identifying aggregate statistics may be kept longer.
• Third-party analytics: Google’s retention depends on its property settings and the type of report. Microsoft states that ordinary Clarity playback is kept for 30 days, while heatmaps/click data and labelled or favourited sessions can remain for nine months. See Google’s retention guidance and Clarity’s retention guidance.
• Account emails: verification links expire after 24 hours and password reset links after one hour. Our production application does not keep email content or raw recovery links in a mail log. Brevo delivery records are managed through its retention settings and separately when handling a deletion request; they are not erased by deleting your database account alone.
• Logs, backups and dispute records: for the period needed for security, recovery or a specific legal obligation or claim. Deleted data may remain in restricted backups until those backups are replaced; we do not restore deleted accounts into normal use.

Routine server cleanup runs daily; records become eligible at the periods above and are removed by a subsequent successful run. Large backlogs may need more than one run. Browser storage, provider systems and backups have separate lifetimes.

Your rights

Depending on the data and lawful basis, you can request access, correction, erasure, restriction of use, or a portable copy of data you provided. These rights have legal limits; if a request cannot be met in full, we explain why.

Withdraw analytics consent at any time using the cookie controls. Withdrawal stops future optional collection; it does not automatically erase data collected lawfully before withdrawal. You can separately request deletion.

Email hello@worddecks.com to exercise a right. Requests are normally free and we normally respond within one month. If identity checks, clarification or a permitted extension affect the deadline, we explain what is needed and why. For a complex request or multiple requests, the law can allow up to two additional months.

You can complain directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). You do not have to contact us first, although we welcome the chance to resolve a concern.

Young players and automated decisions

Accounts are intended for people aged 13 or over. If you are under 18, involve a parent or guardian before creating an account or sharing information. Do not include personal details in a username or feedback. A parent or guardian can contact us about a child’s data. An age statement is not a claim that we verify everyone’s age.

Games automatically calculate scores and ranks and may validate submissions. We do not use your data for solely automated decisions with legal or similarly significant effects. You can ask us to review a rejected result or restricted account.

Changes and further information

We update this notice when our practices change and highlight material changes where appropriate. Read the Cookie Notice and Data Deletion page for controls and practical instructions.