Ballarious Privacy Policy
Last updated 22 October 2026
The app version of Ballarious collects nothing and sends nothing to us. It has no accounts, no ads, no analytics, no trackers and no third party code. It does not ask for your name, your email, your location, your contacts, or your photos. Everything the game remembers about you stays on your device, and on iPhone also in your own iCloud if iCloud is on, so your other iPhones can pick up where you left off. We never see that copy. The web version sends something to us only if you switch on its optional leaderboard, and then only what is listed below.
This policy covers the Ballarious app for iOS and Android and the version you can play in a web browser. It is written to be read, not to be survived. If something here is unclear, that is a fault worth reporting: the contact address is at the bottom.
Who is responsible
Ballarious is made and published by Ergyn Pelinku, an independent developer, who is responsible for the data described here (the "controller" under data protection law). Contact: ergyn.pelinku@gmail.com.
What the game keeps on your device
So the game can remember you between sessions, it saves the following in your device's own storage. None of it is sent to us.
- Your progress: races unlocked, stars earned, best scores and times, and the path of your best run on each track (the "ghost" that races beside you)
- Your coins, upgrades and which ball you are using
- Your daily streak, quests and challenge progress, and simple counts of what you have played
- Your settings: sound, motion, display, controls and assistance
- A racing name such as Swift Gull 42: made up by the game, or picked by you from the game's own lists of words. It is never typed, and never derived from anything about you or your device
- A random code that names this install of the game inside your save, so that coins earned on two of your iPhones add up instead of overwriting each other. It is made up on the device and identifies nothing else
- If you leave a race or voyage mid-way: where you were, so you can carry on
- A spare copy of your last good save, used only if the main one is damaged
- In a browser: a copy of the game's own files, so it can start offline
The game uses no cookies. When something goes wrong, it keeps a short list of recent errors in memory while it runs; it is never saved or sent. Settings → Diagnostic report lets you copy it, and you decide whether to send it to anyone (see Contacting us).
You can erase all of it at any time from Settings → Delete my data inside the game.
iCloud, on iPhone
When iCloud is on for Ballarious on your iPhone, the iOS app also keeps one copy of the same save in your own iCloud account, using Apple's iCloud key-value storage. It is the save described above and nothing more. Apple holds it in your Apple account and gives it only to your own devices signed into that account, so another iPhone of yours can continue your progress. We cannot read it, and the game does not send it anywhere else. Apple's handling of iCloud data is covered by Apple's own privacy policy.
- Delete my data on an iPhone erases the save on that iPhone and the copy in iCloud. Another iPhone of yours keeps its own copy, and will put it back into iCloud, until you press Delete my data there too.
- Deleting the app removes the save from that iPhone, but not the iCloud copy. Reinstall the game and your progress comes back. Use Delete my data first if you want it gone everywhere.
- To stop the copy, turn iCloud off for Ballarious in your iPhone's Settings (your name → iCloud). Without an Apple account the copy simply stays on the iPhone, as Apple's documentation describes.
- The Android app and the web version have no iCloud copy. The web version offers a backup file instead (Settings → Back up my progress), which is saved wherever you choose.
What leaves your device
| Version | What is sent |
|---|---|
| iOS / Android app | Nothing to us. Network access is switched off in the app build and cannot be turned on, so the app has no leaderboard. The game is fully playable offline because it never needed to be online. On iPhone, the iCloud copy described above travels only within your own Apple account. |
| Web browser | Nothing to us, unless you switch on the optional Global leaderboard in Settings. It is off until you turn it on. With it on, the game sends four things each time you beat your own record: which leaderboard it was, your racing name, your score, and the version of the game's rules it was set under. When you open a leaderboard, the game asks the server for its top 20. Nothing about you or your device is sent with either. |
The game contains no advertising, no analytics, no crash reporting, no social media buttons and no software from any other company. It loads no fonts, images or scripts from other websites.
Hosting (web version)
The website and the leaderboard run on Cloudflare (Cloudflare, Inc., United States), our hosting provider. Like any web host, Cloudflare receives your IP address and the usual browser information with each request, because that is how a page reaches you. We do not receive, store or analyse those logs. Cloudflare also asks your browser to report failed connections to it (a standard called Network Error Logging), so it can find network faults; those reports go to Cloudflare, not to us. Cloudflare describes its handling in its own privacy policy. For data from the EU, the UK and Switzerland, Cloudflare states that it takes part in the EU–US Data Privacy Framework and uses Standard Contractual Clauses as the fallback.
The optional leaderboard, in detail
This applies only to the web version, and only if you switch it on.
- Stored: your racing name, your best score on that leaderboard, the rules version it was set under, and the time it was recorded (so equal scores are listed first come, first served). This is kept in Cloudflare's database for as long as the leaderboard exists. Each leaderboard keeps its best 200 scores; a score pushed below 200th is deleted. The top 20 are shown to anyone who opens the leaderboard.
- Older boards: scores sent before 20 October 2026 are also held, read-only, in an older Cloudflare store, until each board has been moved into the current one. They are the same kind of entry: a name and a score.
- Protection against fake scores: the server counts posts per minute from each connection. It does not keep your address. It keeps a SHA-256 hash of it with the count, and like any hash of an address, we treat that as personal data. The count and the hash are deleted the next time the leaderboard is used after that minute has passed: normally within minutes, or as soon as anyone next opens or posts to a leaderboard. They are used for nothing else.
- Not stored: IP addresses, device identifiers, or anything else that could link a score to a person.
- The racing name is built only from the game's own words (an adjective, a racer and a number). You cannot type one, precisely so that no one puts their real name, or anything unkind, on a public board. The server refuses any other name.
- Why we may do this: the leaderboard runs on your consent: it is off until you switch it on. The fake-score protection and the hosting rely on our legitimate interest in keeping the game working and safe.
- Changing your mind: switching the leaderboard off stops all sending immediately. Scores already on a board stay there unless you ask: email us the racing name and the race, and we will delete them. Because a racing name is not tied to you, we cannot tell whose it is, so we take your word for it.
Sharing and challenge links
"Share your run" makes an image or a link on your device and hands it to your phone's or browser's share
options; it goes only where you send it. A challenge link carries your racing name, the course, your time and the path of
your run, in the part of the link after #, which browsers do not send to the website when it is opened.
The move to ballarious.com
The web game used to live at ballast-3jm.pages.dev. Browsers keep a game's progress separately for each
address, so when you open the old address, the game copies your progress from there to ballarious.com for you: your
browser carries it across in the part of the link after #, which is not sent to any server, and the new
page removes it from the address bar at once. It is merged with any progress you already have at ballarious.com (nothing
is lost or counted twice), and it is sent only once. The leaderboard setting is not carried: it stays off at
ballarious.com until you switch it on there. The copy at the old address stays in your browser, as before; Settings →
Delete my data at either address erases that address's copy.
Contacting us
If you email us, we receive your email address and what you write, including a diagnostic report if you paste one (it holds the game version, your browser or device type, language, screen size and recent error messages). We use it only to answer you and to fix the problem, keep it only as long as that takes, and then delete it.
Children
Ballarious is made to be suitable for children. The app version collects no personal information at all (its iCloud copy is the player's own, held by Apple). The web version's leaderboard is off unless switched on; even then it receives only a racing name made by the game (not something anyone can use to contact a child) and a score. The hashed address is used only to protect the service and is deleted as described above. The game does not contain advertising, in-app purchases, chat or links out to stores. A parent who wants a child's leaderboard entry removed can email us, as above.
Selling, tracking and "Do Not Track"
We do not sell or share personal information, show targeted ads, or track anyone across apps or websites. There is therefore nothing for a browser's "Do Not Track" or Global Privacy Control signal to switch off. The game makes no automated decisions about you.
Your rights
Data protection laws, including the GDPR in the EU and the UK GDPR, give you the right to access, correct, delete or export personal data held about you, to object to its use or restrict it, and to withdraw consent at any time.
- Your save is on your device (and in your own iCloud on iPhone), so you can see, export (web) and delete it yourself, instantly, with no one's permission.
- For a leaderboard entry or an email you sent us, write to the address below. We will answer within one month.
- You also have the right to complain to a data protection authority: in the EU, the one where you live; in the UK, the Information Commissioner's Office (ico.org.uk).
Keeping it safe
The website and leaderboard are served only over encrypted connections (HTTPS). The leaderboard checks every score it receives and accepts only the four fields listed above. The best protection, though, is that there is almost nothing to protect: the game keeps everything it can on your device.
Changes to this policy
If the game ever starts collecting something new, this page changes first, and the game says so in Settings before the change takes effect. The date at the top always reflects the current version.
Contact
Questions, requests, corrections, or anything that reads as untrue: ergyn.pelinku@gmail.com. Help with the game itself: the support page.