Privacy Policy

This policy covers our four games for children and families, on Android and on the web: Bonk Buddies, ChessQuest, Carrom Quest and Ludo & Snakes (the "games"). "We" and "us" means Helpivy, the maker of the games.

1. What we collect

Nothing that identifies you or your child. The games have no accounts and no sign-up, and they never ask for a real name, email address, phone number, photo, location, contacts or any other personal information. There are no ads, no analytics and no third-party tracking or advertising code (SDKs) in the games.

2. What stays on your device

To remember where you were, each game saves its settings (sound, vibration, look), progress (levels, stars, badges, unlocked heroes or boards) and a game in progress only on your device, inside the app's own storage. Names typed for games played on one device (for example, pass-and-play) stay on the device too. None of this is sent to us.

When you first play online, the game also makes a random device code and a made-up nickname (like "Bouncy Otter") and keeps them on the device. The device code is just random letters and numbers; it is not your phone's hardware ID or advertising ID, and it isn't linked to you.

3. Online play with a friend

Online play is optional. Everything else in the games works offline. When you create or join a room, the game connects to our room server and sends only what is needed to play together:

• the room code;
• the made-up nickname and an emoji picture (never a typed name);
• the random device code, so that if the connection drops you get your own seat back;
• the game itself: moves, shots or button presses, plus quick emoji reactions chosen from a fixed list.

There is no chat and no way to type messages, share photos or send personal information to another player. Players only see each other's nickname, emoji and moves.

How long room data is kept: a room deletes itself automatically once nobody has used it for a while — about 1 hour for Bonk Buddies, and 3 days for ChessQuest, Carrom Quest and Ludo & Snakes (so a slow game can be picked up again). We don't keep a history of rooms or players after that.

If you choose to share a room code or link (for example with your phone's Share button), it goes only where you send it.

4. Our service provider: Cloudflare

Our websites and room servers run on Cloudflare. Like any internet service, Cloudflare processes the IP address of a device that connects, in order to deliver the traffic and protect the service from abuse, and it may keep short-lived technical logs (for example, the time and address of a request) for troubleshooting. We don't use IP addresses to identify anyone, and we don't combine them with anything else. Cloudflare acts as our processor under its own privacy policy. Data is sent over encrypted connections (HTTPS and secure WebSockets).

5. What we don't do

• No advertising of any kind, and no ad identifiers.
• No analytics, crash-reporting or tracking tools.
• No selling, renting or sharing of data with anyone.
• No in-app purchases at the moment. If we add an optional purchase later, it will be handled by Google Play, and we will update this policy first.

6. Permissions on Android

• Internet — only for online play with a friend.
• Vibrate — for little buzzes on taps and hits. You can turn it off in each game's Settings.

The games don't ask for the camera, microphone, location, contacts or files.

7. Links that leave the game

Each game has a "More games" page that links to our other games on Google Play and on this website. It sits behind a grown-up check (a simple maths question), so children don't leave the game by accident.

8. Children's privacy

The games are made for children aged 4 and up and their families. Because we don't collect personal information from anyone, there is nothing for a parent to consent to before a child plays. We designed the games with children's privacy laws in mind, including the U.S. Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and the UK and EU rules for children's data (GDPR and the Age Appropriate Design Code): online nicknames are made up by the game, there is no chat, and there are no ads or tracking.

9. Your choices and deleting data

• On the device: use "Reset" in a game's Settings to clear progress, or uninstall the game (or clear its storage in Android settings) to delete everything it saved.
• Online rooms: deleted automatically as described in section 3. If you'd like a room deleted sooner, email us the room code.
• Questions from parents: you can contact us at any time (below). Because we don't know who anyone is, we can't look up a child — but we're happy to explain anything.

10. This website

We don't set cookies or run analytics on helpivy.com or the game sites. The pages load fonts and styles from Google Fonts and other content networks, which see your IP address when your browser fetches them.

11. Changes to this policy

If we change how the games handle data, we'll update this page and the date at the top before the change reaches the games. If a change is important, we'll mention it in the game's release notes.

12. Contact

Parents, guardians and teachers: email a@startupmachine.co. We read every message and usually reply within a few days.