Privacy policy

Igama is a word game made by Crafted Bits in South Africa. This page says what the app collects, why it collects it, and how to get rid of it. It covers the Igama mobile app and the website.

Playing without an account

You do not need an account to play. Open the app and your levels, your streaks and your stats are stored on your device.

What we collect if you sign in

Signing in with email, Google or Apple unlocks the leaderboard and the language chat rooms, and keeps your streak if you change phones. At that point we hold:

• Your email address, from whichever sign-in method you used. Apple's Hide My Email gives us a relay address instead, which is fine.
• Your display name and avatar, which you pick and can change.
• Your scores, streaks and levels, per language, so the leaderboard has something to rank and your progress survives a new phone.
• Messages you post in a chat room, which are visible to everyone else playing that language.
• Reports and blocks you make. A report records the message, the reason you chose, and that it was you who filed it. A block records who you blocked. Neither is shown to the other person.

Accounts and game data are held by a third-party hosting and database provider, on infrastructure we configure and control.

Moderation

When you report a message, the message itself, the reason you chose, and the account identifiers of both people involved are emailed to our moderators through a third-party email provider, so that somebody can look at it within a day. A block is recorded and we are told about it too, because one account collected by several different people is worth looking at before anyone gets round to reporting it. We keep reports so that a repeated pattern stays visible.

Analytics

We use a third-party analytics service to understand how the app is used: which screens people open, where they get stuck, whether a change made things better. This is tied to a random identifier rather than to your name, and we do not use it to build a profile of you or sell it on.

Ads

Hints are paid for with a short video ad, served by a third-party advertising network. That network may use an advertising identifier to decide which ad to show you. On iOS the app asks first, and if you say no you still get exactly the same hints, just less relevant ads. You can change your mind in your device settings at any time.

Notifications

Reminders are scheduled by the app on your own device. There is no push server behind them and no token to store, so nothing about when you play, or when you asked to be reminded, leaves your phone. Turn them off in the app or in your device settings and they stop.

Third-party services

Igama does not run all of this itself. We use outside providers for hosting and the database, for analytics, for the ads that pay for hints, and for delivering moderation reports to us by email. Each one gets only what it needs to do that job, is bound by its contract with us to use it for nothing else, and some of them process data outside South Africa. If you want to know who is doing what at any given time, email us and we will tell you.

Children

Igama is not aimed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect anything from them. If you think a child has given us something, email us and we will remove it.

Deleting your account

You can delete your account from inside the app, under Account. It is a real delete rather than a deactivation: your profile and your email address, your scores and leaderboard places, your progress in every language, the hints and streak freezes you are holding, the messages you have posted in chat rooms, and the reports and blocks you made all go, along with what the app was keeping for that account on your phone. There is no deactivated copy waiting to be switched back on.

Because your messages go with the account, the rooms you posted in lose them too, and other people playing that language stop seeing them. If you signed in with Apple, we also hand back the permission you gave Apple to share your details with us. If you would rather we did all of this for you, email hello@craftedbits.co.

Your rights

Under South Africa's POPIA, and under the GDPR if you are in the EU or UK, you can ask us what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, and ask us to delete it. Email hello@craftedbits.co and we will answer within 30 days.

Changes to this page

If this policy changes in a way that matters, we will say so in the app rather than quietly editing this page. The date at the top always reflects the current version.