Beat the Letter is a party game. It collects the least it can get away with,
shows no advertising, and sells nothing to anybody. It does count how the game
is used, without knowing who you are — and you can switch that off.
If you just play
You can play the whole game without an account. When you do, we store:
An anonymous account. A random identifier so the game
knows which player at the table is you. It is not linked to your name,
your email or your device, and it disappears if you clear your browser
data.
The nickname you type before a round, so the other
players can see whose answer is whose. It is whatever you type; it does
not have to be your real name.
Your answers — the songs you picked, when you picked
them, and how many guesses each one took. This is what the game is.
If you sign in
Signing in is optional and exists for one reason: to keep your score between
rounds. You can sign in with Google, or with a link sent to your email
address.
Your email address, so the same account can be
recognised next time. It is never shown to other players and never
appears on the leaderboard.
A display name of your choosing, which is public — it
is what appears on the leaderboard. It starts as the nickname you were
already using, not as the name on your Google account, and you can
change it at any time on the account screen.
We do not receive, request or store your password, your contact list, your
friends, your photos or anything else from those accounts.
Usage statistics
To find out where rounds get stuck, the game counts what happens in it, using
Google Analytics for Firebase. You can switch this off at any time.
What is counted. Which screens are opened; when a game is
created, joined, dealt and finished; whether a song you typed was accepted or
refused, and why — never what you typed; the points and badges a letter
earned; hints bought; when an invite or a result is shared; how quickly
pages load; and errors. Along with that, what any website visit reports: the
kind of device and browser, the language, the site that sent you, and a rough
location (country and city) worked out from your IP address, which Google
does not store.
What is never sent. Your name, your nickname, your email
address, the songs you typed or picked, or which game you were in. Web
addresses are reduced to the kind of screen before anything leaves your
device — a shared round's address becomes /r/:gameId, never the
round itself.
A cookie. Google Analytics keeps a random identifier in a
cookie on this site (_ga), so that a return visit is counted as
one. It is not linked to your account.
No advertising. Every advertising feature is switched off,
including Google signals. Nothing counted here is used to show anyone an ad.
Kept for up to fourteen months, then deleted by Google.
To switch it off, open your account
and turn off Share anonymous usage statistics. It is remembered on
that device, it applies to these pages as well as the game, and the analytics
code is then never loaded at all. If your browser sends Global Privacy
Control or Do Not Track, it starts switched off.
Who else sees anything
Deezer receives the song titles you type, because that
is how the game checks a song exists. It receives nothing about who
typed them.
Spotify receives the list of songs a finished round
chose, so it can build a playlist. The playlist is created on a single
account belonging to the game — never yours — and is deleted about two
days later.
Google, through Firebase, holds the database, the
sign-in and the website itself, and — through Google Analytics — the usage
statistics above. It acts on our behalf, and its own handling of that data
is covered by Google Cloud's and Google Analytics' terms.
That is the complete list. Nothing is sold, and nothing is shared with
advertisers or data brokers.
How long it is kept
Playlists are deleted after about two days.
Usage statistics are deleted after at most fourteen months.
Lobbies that never start are deleted after a day.
Finished rounds and scores are kept while your account exists, because
the leaderboard is made of them.
Deleting it
You can do it yourself, immediately. Open
your account and choose Delete my account.
Your login, your display name, your scores and every answer you have
given are erased on the spot. Nobody reviews it and nobody has to approve
it.
Rounds you hosted carry on without you — they are other players' games
too, and their answers are theirs, not ours to delete on your behalf.
Nothing in them still points at you.
If you played as a guest, clearing your browser data already detaches you
from everything recorded — there is nothing left tying it to you.
Something not working, or a question about any of it?
maty@michalsky.co.
Children
The game is not aimed at children under 13 and we do not knowingly keep
information about them. If you believe a child has signed in, email the
address above and it will be removed.
Changes
If this page changes in a way that affects what is collected, the date at
the top changes with it.
Beat the Letter Back to the game עברית