Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how Callie's Mahjong (the "App") handles your information. The short version: playing the game requires no account and tells us nothing about you. The only thing the App sends us on its own is an anonymous daily summary of how the game was used, described below, and you can turn it off at any time in Settings. If you choose to join the leaderboard, you sign in with Apple or Google and pick a username. That is the one part of the App that uses an account, and even then signing in never gives us your name or your email address. If you email us or send feedback, we see the address you use.

Data We Collect

No personal data of any kind from playing the game. We do not collect your name, your email address, your location, or any identifier for you or your device. Nothing you type and no card you import ever leaves your device.

There are three things we receive. The anonymous daily play summary described in the next section is sent by the iPhone, iPad and Mac versions of the App unless you turn it off in Settings; the Android version does not send it. The account information described under Leaderboard and Accounts is sent only if you join the leaderboard. And we receive anything you send us through the feedback form.

Anonymous Play Data

If Share Anonymous Play Data is on in Settings, once a day the App on iPhone, iPad and Mac sends us a small summary of how the game has been used: which tile set, theme and card year are selected, your difficulty and timing settings, whether animations, spoken play, haptics and accessibility mode are on, how many games were started and finished, how many hands were won or lost, and the names of hands from the card that were completed.

The summary carries no identifier of any kind: not your name, not an account, not a device identifier, and not a random one. Summaries cannot be linked to you, and they cannot be linked to each other, so there is no way for us to follow one player over time or to tell how many summaries came from the same device. We do not store your IP address, we do not store your location or country, and we store only the date a summary arrived, never the time.

We never collect, in this summary or anywhere else: your name, email, Apple Account or Game Center identity; your IP address; your location; any device or advertising identifier; imported card images or their contents; any text you have entered; or your purchase or subscription state.

We use it for one thing: deciding what to build next. It is not used for advertising, it is not used to track you across apps or websites, and it is never sold or shared.

Summaries are kept for 90 days and then reduced to daily totals. You can turn this off at any time in Settings, under Logging, in the Data section. Turning it off stops the sending and clears the counts held on your device.

Third-Party SDKs and Analytics

The App does not include any third-party analytics SDKs, advertising frameworks, or tracking libraries. There is no integration with services such as Google Analytics, Firebase, Mixpanel, or similar. The anonymous summary described above is sent only to a server we operate ourselves; no third party receives it, and no third party has any code running inside the App.

Playing on Your Own

Single player works entirely on your device and needs no internet connection and no account of any kind.

Playing With Other People

Playing with friends and family is optional, and nothing in this section applies unless you choose to use it.

In the same room. Devices on the same Wi-Fi network talk directly to one another to run the game. No account is required and nothing passes through us.

From anywhere. Online play uses Apple's Game Center, which requires you to be signed in to Game Center with your Apple Account. Game Center is operated by Apple under Apple's Privacy Policy, not by us. We do not create an account for you, we do not receive your Apple Account details, and we do not store anything about who you played with or what happened in the game.

What other players can see. When you sit down at a table with other people, they see the display name your device provides (your Game Center nickname for online play, or the name shown on your device for local play), along with the ordinary public events of the game, such as your discards and exposed tiles. Game information travels directly between the devices at the table. It does not pass through any server of ours.

There is no chat. Callie's Mahjong provides no messaging, text, voice, or free-form communication between players. The only thing players exchange is the game itself.

Leaderboard and Accounts

Playing Callie's Mahjong requires no account. Online play with other people uses your existing Apple Game Center sign-in, which is managed entirely by Apple.

The leaderboard is optional, and it is the one feature that uses an account of ours. If you join it:

• You sign in with Apple or Google. We ask for nothing about you: no name, no email address. Apple or Google gives us an opaque identifier that means nothing outside our service, and that is all we store about who you are.
• You choose a username, which is shown on the leaderboard. It is not your real name unless you make it one, and we ask that you do not use your name or email address.
• We store your hand results (which hands you played, whether they were won or lost, and when) so the board can be ranked.
• On an Android device, we also check that a request comes from a genuine, unmodified copy of the App installed from Google Play (a Google security check called Play Integrity); on an iPhone or iPad we use Apple's equivalent, called App Attest. Either check can flag a result for us to look at by hand; it never automatically removes a result, resets a standing, or blocks you from playing.
• We never see your payment details. Whether a subscription is active is confirmed by Apple or Google, whichever store you purchased through.

You can delete your account at any time, from within the App or at calliesmahjong.com/delete-account. Deleting it removes your username, your sign-in and your entire leaderboard history from our records; for a sign-in with Apple, we also ask Apple to revoke it at the same time. It does not cancel or refund a subscription; subscriptions are managed in your Apple Account or Google Play, whichever store you purchased through.

We keep encrypted backups of the leaderboard database so the service can be recovered if something goes wrong. Backups are kept for up to 30 days and then deleted automatically, so information from a deleted account disappears from our backups within that period. The public leaderboard page is rebuilt on its own schedule, so a deleted player's name may remain visible there for up to a day before it clears.

Feedback

If you send us feedback through calliesmahjong.app/feedback, we receive the email address you give us, your username if you include it, and your message. We use them only to read and reply to your feedback, and we delete them within 12 months. The form uses Cloudflare Turnstile to check that you're a person, which means Cloudflare processes your IP address for that check. We keep a scrambled form of it for one hour to limit spam, then delete it.

Your NMJL Card

If you choose to scan or import a personal NMJL card, that image or PDF is stored only on your device. It is never uploaded, transmitted, or shared with us or any third party.

Device Permissions

The App requests access to your camera or photo library only if you choose to scan or import your own scoring card, and that content stays on your device. It requests permission to use the local network only if you choose to play with people in the same room, so the devices can find each other. It requests permission to send notifications only if you choose to be reminded when you have stepped away from a game in progress. The App does not access your microphone, contacts, or location.

iCloud Backup

Stats, settings, and achievements can back up to your personal iCloud account so they survive reinstalling the app and carry over to your other devices. This data is stored in your own iCloud account under Apple's privacy terms; we do not have access to it.

Purchases

All purchases and subscriptions are handled by Apple through the App Store. We never see your payment details. We receive only the aggregate, anonymized sales reporting Apple provides to every developer.

Who Else Touches Your Data

Callie's Mahjong runs on Cloudflare, which stores the leaderboard database and serves this website. Cloudflare also runs the check on our feedback form (Turnstile). Sign-in for the leaderboard is handled by Apple or Google, whichever you choose. We do not sell or share your information with anyone else.

Support Communications

If you contact us directly at support@calliesmahjong.com, we will receive whatever information you include in that message (such as your email address and the contents of your message). If you choose to attach a game log to help us investigate a problem, we receive that file too. Anything you send is used solely to respond to your inquiry, is not stored in any database, and is not shared with third parties. Sending it is always your choice; the App never sends a log on its own.

Children's Privacy

The App collects no personal data about anyone, including children, and contains no advertising and no chat. The anonymous play summary described above carries no identifier and is the same whoever is playing; it can be switched off in Settings. Online play requires an Apple Game Center account, which is managed by Apple and subject to Apple's own age requirements and parental controls; parents can restrict or disable Game Center and multiplayer through Screen Time on the child's device. Because online matchmaking can seat a player with people they have not met, parents of younger players may prefer to use local play with people in the same room, or to play with invited friends only. Joining the leaderboard uses a sign-in with Apple or Google, each managed by that company under its own age requirements and parental controls.

Changes to This Policy

If our data practices ever change, we will update this page with a new effective date and notify users via an App Store update notice.

Contact

Questions? Email support@calliesmahjong.com.