Privacy Policy
Seeking for Hidden
This policy explains how this application handles information and how to contact us about privacy.
Information we process
Seeking for Hidden stores game progress on your iPhone: completed rounds, search times, inspected and moved hiding places, the current round and its hidden location, search-frequency weights, and your sound, haptic, caption, language, motion, backup and reminder preferences. The app creates a random installation secret and stores it in this device's Keychain. When cloud backup is enabled, round progress and search weights are sent to our backend; preferences remain local. The backend stores one progress record, a SHA-256 hash of the installation secret and its update time. The secret is transmitted over HTTPS to authorize requests but is not stored in plaintext by the backend. Requests to the API or this website also expose network information such as IP address, request time and HTTP metadata to Cloudflare, which proxies public HTTPS requests, and Railway, our application and database hosting provider. The application does not request your name, email, location, contacts, photos or advertising identifier.
How we use information
Local information runs the offline game, preserves a paused search, awards search badges and adapts future hiding-place selection using rules rather than machine learning. Optional cloud backup keeps a copy for the same installation secret. Short-lived, salted IP hashes in backend memory limit request abuse. Error logs contain a request identifier and event category to diagnose availability problems without intentionally logging installation secrets or game payloads. Optional local notifications remind you about an unfinished round and are scheduled on the iPhone, not sent through an email or remote messaging service.
Service providers and sharing
Cloudflare terminates public HTTPS for the API and website and proxies requests to the pinned Railway service origin. This means Cloudflare processes request contents, including the installation authorization header and progress sent through it, as well as network metadata. Cloud data is processed by the application's backend and PostgreSQL database hosted on Railway. Railway operates the network, compute, storage and related infrastructure and may process operational request metadata and infrastructure logs. We do not include advertising, analytics, social sign-in, third-party game tracking or email delivery SDKs. We do not sell your game data. Information may be disclosed if required by applicable law or to address abuse or security incidents. The application backend does not require cookies or login for this public policy page, and the page loads no third-party tracking resources. Cloudflare also processes operational and security information as part of its proxy service.
Data retention
Local progress and preferences remain on the device until replaced, reset or removed with the app's local data. A Keychain item can outlast app removal depending on iOS behavior; survival is not guaranteed. The current cloud record remains until you request deletion or it is replaced by later synchronization. We have not configured an automatic expiry period for progress records. Backend rate-limit buckets expire after their one-minute window and are pruned during later requests; they also disappear when the process restarts. Cloudflare controls retention of its proxy operational and security logs, while Railway controls its hosting logs and any infrastructure backups; this policy does not promise a fixed duration for those provider-managed records or copies. Deleted live records may remain in such copies until the provider's normal lifecycle removes them.
Deleting your information
Use Settings, Data, Delete cloud copy to delete the server record authorized by this installation secret. This disables automatic cloud backup while keeping your local game. When offline, the app retains a pending deletion and retries when connectivity returns or you choose Sync now. The app reports a waiting state until the server confirms deletion. Turning backup on again uploads local progress as a new copy. New game resets local round results; Reset creature memory clears search weights without removing progress, and these changes synchronize when backup is enabled. App removal removes app-container data according to iOS behavior, but does not itself send a cloud deletion request. Delete the cloud copy before removing the app if you want that record removed. If the installation secret is lost, the app cannot locate or recover the record through an account or email address. For privacy questions, contact keziahdavenant@icloud.com; do not send an installation secret in ordinary email.
Permissions and your choices
The game needs no location, camera, microphone, photo-library or contact access. Sound, haptics and sound captions can be changed in app Settings. Notifications are optional: permission is requested only if you enable the unfinished-search reminder. You can turn reminders off in the app, which cancels its pending reminder, or withdraw notification permission in iPhone Settings. You can disable cloud backup in app Settings; gameplay continues offline. Disabling backup stops future progress uploads but does not delete an existing cloud copy, so use Delete cloud copy for deletion.
Your privacy rights
Depending on your location, you may have rights to access, correct, delete or restrict processing of personal information and to contact a relevant privacy authority. You can view round results in Progress, reset your game or search memory locally, disable backup and delete the installation's cloud record in Settings. Send other privacy requests or questions to keziahdavenant@icloud.com. The app has no account or email-based identity directory, so we may need enough information to identify the relevant processing without asking you to reveal your installation secret through insecure channels. We cannot promise recovery or identification of a record after its secret is lost.
Security
Public connections use HTTPS terminated by Cloudflare, which forwards requests over HTTPS to the pinned Railway origin. The random 256-bit installation secret is stored with a device-only Keychain accessibility class and authorizes only its matching server record. The backend stores a cryptographic hash rather than the plaintext secret, validates payload shapes and bounds, limits request sizes and rates, and uses parameterized database queries. Database credentials stay on the server. Local game saves use iOS file protection and atomic writes. These measures reduce risk but do not guarantee that any device, network or hosting system is perfectly secure. Anyone who obtains an installation secret could access or change that installation's cloud progress.
Children’s privacy
Seeking for Hidden is designed for a general teen and adult audience, especially players aged 14 and above. It does not provide accounts, chat, advertising or social features and does not knowingly request children's identity information. If you believe a child has supplied personal information through our service, contact keziahdavenant@icloud.com so the request can be assessed. The game can be played offline with cloud backup disabled.
Changes to this policy
We may update this policy when the application's processing or hosting practices change. The effective date above identifies this version. We will publish the current policy at this page and keep the Privacy Policy link accessible in the app's Settings. Material changes will be explained in the updated policy and, where appropriate, in the app. Contact keziahdavenant@icloud.com with questions about a policy change.