Privacy Policy
Last updated 9 September 2026
The short version: FLUTTER records anonymous gameplay and crash statistics so we can tell which realms are too hard and which builds are broken. There is no account and nothing that identifies you personally, and you can switch the statistics off in the game at any time. The game is free and carries a single banner ad, served by Google, which is the one part of it that involves an advertising identifier — and you can pay once, through your app store, to remove the ads entirely (on Android today, on iOS in a later update). We never sell your data to anyone.
This policy covers the FLUTTER game on iOS and Android and the website at flutter.smugfacegaming.com (also reachable at smugfacegaming.com/flutter). The data controller is Smug Face Gaming, contactable at admin@smugfacegaming.com. Google acts as a separate, independent controller for the advertising data described below, and Google or Apple — whichever store sold you the game — does the same for purchase data.
The game
Three separate things happen in the game, and they are worth keeping apart because they involve different data, different companies, and different controls: anonymous statistics that we collect, ads that Google serves, and the “Remove ads” purchase that your app store sells.
Anonymous gameplay statistics
| What | Examples | Why |
|---|---|---|
| An install identifier | A random number generated on the device the first time you open the game, stored only on that device. | So a series of events can be recognised as coming from one installation rather than being an unrelated jumble. |
| Gameplay events | Starting and ending a flight, score reached, realm reached, challenges completed, birds unlocked or selected, opening the shop. | To see where players get stuck, whether the difficulty curve works, and which content actually gets used. |
| Device and app information | Device model, operating system name and version, the app version, and whether the build is a debug build. | To reproduce bugs on the hardware they actually happen on. |
| Crash and error reports | Whether the previous session ended unexpectedly, plus the tail of the game's own log file when it recorded an error. | To find and fix crashes and script errors. |
| Store interactions | That you tapped “Remove ads” or “Restore purchase”, and that the entitlement was granted or later revoked. | To see whether the purchase flow works and where it goes wrong. No payment details, order number, or store account is involved — see purchases below. |
Log excerpts are filtered before they leave the device to remove filesystem paths that would otherwise contain your computer or account name.
How to turn statistics off
Open Settings in the game and switch off Share anonymous stats. This takes effect immediately: nothing further is recorded, and anything recorded but not yet sent is discarded from the device rather than delivered. This switch governs the statistics on this page only — it does not remove ads, which are covered separately below.
Who processes statistics
Statistics are sent to PostHog, an analytics provider that stores and processes the data on our behalf on servers in the European Union. They are not permitted to use it for their own purposes. We do not sell, rent, or share this data with anybody else, it is never combined with the advertising data described below, and it is not used to build advertising profiles or to track you across other apps or websites.
Ads
FLUTTER is free, and it pays for itself with one banner ad at the top of the screen. There is no video, no interstitial, and no ad in your first session before your first game over. The ads are served by Google AdMob, whose software is built into the game on both iOS and Android.
We do not receive any of the data below, and we cannot see who you are from it. Google collects it directly and acts as its own data controller:
| What | Examples | Why |
|---|---|---|
| An advertising identifier | On Android, the Google advertising ID. On iOS, the Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA) — and only if you allow it when iOS asks you. | To limit how often you are shown the same ad, to measure whether an ad worked, and — only where you have consented — to choose which ads to show. |
| IP address and approximate location | Your IP address, and the country or region it implies. Not GPS: the game never asks for and never receives your device's location. | So the ads shown are legal, in the right language, and priced for the right market. |
| Device and ad interaction data | Device model, operating system version, and whether an ad was requested, shown, or tapped. | To bill advertisers correctly and to detect invalid or fraudulent traffic. |
What Google does with this is governed by its own Privacy Policy and by How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services.
Consent, and how to change your mind
Where UK and EU data protection law applies, you are asked before any personalised ad is shown, using Google's own consent form. If you decline, the game keeps working exactly as before and you are shown non-personalised ads instead — these still need an ad request, an IP address and frequency capping, but they are not selected from a profile of you. You can reopen that choice at any time from Settings in the game.
On iOS, personalised ads additionally require the system's App Tracking Transparency permission. If you say no — or never say yes — the IDFA is not available to the game or to Google, and ads are non-personalised. You can change this later in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking. On Android, you can reset or delete your advertising ID in Android Settings → Privacy → Ads.
Getting rid of the ads
A one-off purchase through your app store removes the banner permanently — see below, including which platforms it is available on today.
Buying “Remove ads”
The game offers a single one-off in-app purchase that removes the banner for good. It is never sold by us directly: it is sold through the store you installed the game from — Google Play Billing on Android, the App Store on iOS — and in both cases that store is the merchant of record. The entire payment happens inside Google's or Apple's checkout, on their terms, and your money goes to them rather than to us.
Whichever store it is, the arrangement is the same:
- We never see your payment details. No card number, no name, no billing address, and no Google or Apple account ever reaches us or the game.
- What the game is told is a yes-or-no answer to one question: does this store account own “Remove ads”? That answer is stored in a file on your device and nowhere else.
- What we record is that a purchase, restore, or refund happened, as an event against the anonymous install identifier described above. No order number, purchase token, price, or account identifier is included.
- Restoring re-asks the store the same question, which is how the purchase follows you to a new device or survives a reinstall.
- Refunds are handled entirely by the store, not by us. If a refund is granted, the entitlement ends and the ads come back.
The store's own handling of the purchase — the order record, the payment, and its retention of both — is covered by the Google Privacy Policy and the Google Play Terms of Service, or by the Apple Privacy Policy and the App Store Terms, depending on which store sold it to you.
Availability. The purchase is live on Android today. On iOS it is not in the current version, so the iOS build is ad-supported for everyone; it is coming in a later update, and this section describes how it will work when it arrives. Nothing above changes when it does — only which stores it applies to.
What we deliberately do not collect
- No name, email address, account, or login — the game has none.
- No hardware or device serial number. The install identifier described above is a random number belonging to the installation, not to you or your device; deleting the app discards it, and reinstalling produces a new one.
- No advertising identifier for our own purposes. The game never reads it, never stores it, and never sends it to us; it is used by Google's ad software only, for the ads described above, and never joined to our statistics.
- No location data. The game requests no location permission on either platform; Google's approximate, country-level guess from your IP address is the only geography involved anywhere.
- No contacts, photos, microphone, or camera access.
- No free text you have typed.
- No payment details, card numbers, or store account identifiers.
The website
The website no longer collects anything you type: the pre-launch “notify me” form was removed when the game launched on Android. If you signed up before that, your address and the date you gave it are still held in a database on our own server for exactly the one thing you were promised — a single email saying the game is out — and are deleted once that email has been sent, or sooner if you ask. They have not been passed to anyone else, and there is no newsletter.
The site sets no cookies and loads no third-party scripts, fonts, or trackers — everything it serves comes from our own server. As with any website, our web server keeps standard access logs, which include IP addresses, for security and troubleshooting.
Legal bases
Where UK and EU data protection law applies, we rely on:
- Legitimate interests for anonymous gameplay and stability statistics — understanding whether the game works is necessary to maintain it, and the data is minimal, not linked to an identity, and can be switched off.
- Consent for personalised advertising, given through Google's consent form (and, on iOS, the App Tracking Transparency prompt) and withdrawable at any time as described above.
- Legitimate interests for non-personalised advertising — advertising is what funds a free game, and without a profile of you the data involved is limited to what serving and counting an ad requires.
- Performance of a contract for the “Remove ads” purchase — we cannot deliver something you have paid for without knowing you own it.
- Consent for the pre-launch waitlist email, given when the form was submitted and withdrawable at any time.
How long we keep it
Gameplay and diagnostic events are retained for up to 24 months, then deleted. Pre-launch waitlist addresses are deleted once the launch email has been sent, or sooner on request. Advertising data is held by Google, and purchase data by Google or Apple, under their own retention policies rather than ours — we hold no copy of either.
Your rights
You can ask us for a copy of the data we hold about you, ask us to correct or delete it, or object to our processing it. Email admin@smugfacegaming.com and we will respond within one month.
Because the game holds no account, we cannot connect game statistics to you from your name or email alone. To have game data deleted, open Settings in the game, tap Install ID to copy the identifier, and include it in your email. For pre-launch waitlist data, simply write from the address you signed up with. For advertising and purchase data, which we do not hold, those requests go to the company that holds it: Google, through your Google account or the contact routes in the Google Privacy Policy; or, for a purchase made on iOS, Apple, through your Apple Account or the Apple Privacy Policy. You also have the right to complain to your local supervisory authority — in the UK, the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk.
Children
FLUTTER is not directed at children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect data from them. Because the game is aimed at a general audience, ads are not requested under Google's child-directed configuration. If you believe a child has provided us with personal data, contact us and we will delete it.
Changes
If this policy changes, the new version will be posted here with an updated date above. Material changes affecting data already collected will be announced in the game.
Contact
Smug Face Gaming — admin@smugfacegaming.com