Budget Battle

Privacy policy

Last updated:

The short version

You can play the entire standard game without an account and without giving us an email address. We do not sell personal data, we do not build advertising profiles from game activity, and we do not store anything about your run beyond the anonymous summary you submit to the leaderboard.

What we collect

Three categories, and nothing else:

  • Gameplay data: your selected measures, indicator values at the end of each season, and an optional display name you type yourself. Runs are stored in an anonymous leaderboard table.
  • Technical data: a random session identifier stored in your browser, the page you viewed, your browser language, and a coarse country derived from your connection. Used for aggregate traffic reporting and bug diagnosis.
  • Contact data: your email address, if — and only if — you send us a message or subscribe to the newsletter.

Cookies and local storage

The game itself uses local storage to keep your run, your language and your theme preference. The analytics provider sets its own cookies to count visits and distinguish unique browsers. Advertising, where shown on editorial pages, is served by Google AdSense, which may use cookies to select ads.

You can clear local storage at any time from your browser settings; the game will reset to a new run and nothing breaks.

Analytics and advertising

We use a self-hosted Plausible instance and Google Analytics 4 with IP anonymisation. Both receive page-view events and the custom events listed in the game (run submitted, checkout started). Neither receives your email address.

Google AdSense may use the DoubleClick cookie to serve ads based on prior visits to this and other sites. You can opt out of personalised advertising in Google’s ad settings.

Data retention and your rights

Leaderboard rows are kept indefinitely because that is the point of a leaderboard; they contain no personal data beyond a display name you chose. Contact emails are kept for as long as the conversation requires, then deleted. Analytics events are retained for fourteen months at most.

If you are in the EEA, the UK or a jurisdiction with similar law, you can request access, correction, export or deletion of your data, and object to processing based on legitimate interest. Write to the address on the contact page and we will act within thirty days.

Children

The game is not directed at children under 13 and we do not knowingly collect their data. Teachers using the game with younger students should run it without the email form.