Shuv – privacy policy

The short version

Shuv has no accounts and no sign-in. The game itself does not send any data anywhere – your settings, your saved game and your move history never leave your device. We run exactly one small service, and only people who bought Shuv on this website ever reach it: it checks that a purchase is still valid. It stores nothing.

The one exception is advertising in the free version, which is served by Google AdSense. If you buy the ad-free unlock there are no ads, and the app makes no network requests at all beyond checking your purchase with the store.

In short, and for the avoidance of doubt:

• no cookies set by us, ever – see below
• no analytics, telemetry or crash reporting of any kind
• no account, email address or password
• no contacts, photos, files, microphone or camera access
• no precise location – the app asks for no location permission
• no selling or sharing of personal data, in any sense including the meaning under US state privacy laws

Who is responsible

Shuv is published by Generax Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales, number 17138639. Generax Ltd is the data controller for the limited processing described here.

Questions, or any request about your data: [email protected].

What is stored on your device, and how

Everything below is kept using your browser’s local storage – on the web that is the browser’s own store for this site, and in the installed app it is the same store inside the app. It is readable only by Shuv, is not transmitted, and is deleted when you clear this site’s data or uninstall the app.

We set no cookies. Not for analytics, not for sign-in, not for anything – there is nothing to sign in to. Local storage is not a cookie: unlike a cookie it is never attached to a request, which is why nothing in the lists below can reach us even in principle.

The one exception is advertising. Google’s advertising library, which the website loads so that Google will review the site, may set its own cookies and its own storage under its own names. That is Google’s, not ours, and we cannot read it. It is described under Advertising below.

Data always stored, whichever version you have:

• your game in progress and its move history, so it is still there when you come back
• your settings – difficulty, board, sound, reduced motion, your chosen name
• the language you chose, if you picked one rather than using your device’s
• whether you have seen the tutorial
• which puzzles you have played, so the app can offer you one you have not seen
• whether you asked the installed app to remind you to play, and the time you chose
• which shared hexagon puzzles you have opened, and how many are left today
• whether you have bought the ad-free unlock
• your unlock receipt, if you bought Shuv from this website rather than a store
• whether you dismissed the offer to get the app, so we do not keep asking

Data stored only while using the free version, and deleted when you buy the unlock:

• a count of games you have started, and when an ad was last shown, used only to decide how often an ad appears
• your advertising-consent answer
• how many games you have won against the computer, and how many free games on the hexagon board you have earned from them
• storage and cookies set by Google AdSense itself, under its own names, which we cannot read

Advertising

The free version shows ads supplied by Google AdSense. To do that, Google receives information from your device: typically your advertising ID, IP address, approximate location derived from it, device model and operating system, and how you interacted with the ad. Google acts as an independent controller for this, and their handling of it is governed by their own policies.

One thing does happen before that: the website loads Google’s advertising library on each visit, because Google requires it to be present before it will review the site. Loading it tells Google your IP address and browser, as fetching any file from another company does, and it may store an identifier or a cookie on your device. No ad is requested, no ad is shown, and nothing about your game is involved.

If you agreed to personalised ads, that data may also be used to select ads based on your interests. If you did not agree, or you are outside the regions where we ask, ads are non-personalised – Google still receives the data needed to serve and measure an ad, but does not use it to build an advertising profile for you.

In the UK, EEA and Switzerland we ask before any ad is requested. In the app we use Google’s own consent flow, which determines where you are; on the website we ask directly, and work out whether we need to from your device’s time zone – if we cannot tell, we ask anyway. You can change your answer at any time from Settings. Where we ask, personalised advertising relies on your consent, and you can withdraw it as easily as you gave it.

Buying the unlock removes advertising entirely, and with it every transfer described in this section.

If you bought Shuv on this website

Buying here goes through Paddle, who are the merchant of record: they take the payment, handle the tax and hold the record of it. We never see your card details.

Your receipt carries an order reference. Shuv sends that reference – and nothing else – to a small service of ours, which asks Paddle whether that order is still valid and tells the app yes or no. It is the only request Shuv makes of its own.

That service stores nothing. It keeps no database, no account and no log of who asked. It holds the answer only long enough to validate the purchase, which is why there is no data there for us to lose, sell or be asked to hand over.

The check runs when you first redeem, and occasionally afterwards so that a refunded or reversed payment stops unlocking the game. If it cannot reach us, nothing changes and you keep playing.

Purchases

The in-app purchase is sold through Google Play. Google is the merchant of record: they take the payment and hold the record of it. We never see your card details, your name or your address, and we operate no payment or receipt server of our own.

The app asks the store whether this account owns the purchase, and remembers the answer on your device so the app works offline. That is why restoring it on a new device works without you giving us anything.

If you write to us

The app has a “Report a bug” link. It opens your own email app with a message you can read, edit or delete before deciding to send it – the game itself sends nothing. The only request Shuv makes of its own is the purchase check described below, and only for people who bought it here.

The prefilled note carries the app version, which board you were playing and your chosen language. Nothing that identifies you or your device.

If you do send a message, we hold your address and what you wrote for as long as it takes to deal with it, and then no longer. It is used to answer you and to fix the problem – never for anything else, and never added to any mailing list.

Children

Shuv carries a PEGI 3 content rating – there is nothing in a board game to shield anyone from – but its declared target audience on Google Play is 13 and over, and it is not published under the Designed for Families programme. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children under 13. Where a store age signal indicates a child user, ads are requested as child-directed and non-personalised.

Your rights

Under the UK GDPR and the EU GDPR you have rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, objection and portability over personal data held about you.

Because we hold no personal data on any server, most of these you can exercise yourself and immediately: clearing the app’s data, or uninstalling it, erases everything the app has stored. To reset your advertising ID, use your device’s own settings. For anything about the data Google holds as an ad provider, contact Google directly.

If you would like us to help, write to [email protected]. If you are not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ico.org.uk), or to your national supervisory authority in the EEA.

Privacy laws elsewhere give comparable rights – among them Brazil’s LGPD, Singapore’s PDPA, Hong Kong’s PDPO and Taiwan’s PDPA. Wherever you are, the answer is the same one, because we hold nothing: clearing the app’s data erases everything it has stored, and the contact address above reaches us from any country.

International transfers

We transfer nothing ourselves. Google may process ad-related data outside the UK and EEA under its own safeguards, including the standard contractual clauses and applicable adequacy decisions.

Changes to this policy

If this policy changes in a way that affects you, the app will show the updated policy and, where the change requires it, ask for your consent again. The effective date above always reflects the current version.