Privacy Policy

Effective 12 July 2026 · Last updated 30 July 2026

Cozy Culprits (“the app”, “we”, “us”) is a daily murder-sudoku puzzle game for iPhone, made by Alejandro Portillo Guerrero, a solo developer based in Spain. This policy explains what data the app touches, why, and the choices you have. We’ve written it in plain language and kept it honest — the app is built to need as little of your data as possible.

The short version: The app has no accounts and no server of ours. Your progress lives on your device. We don’t collect your name, email, contacts, photos, or location. The only data that leaves your phone goes to Apple (Game Center leaderboards, App Store purchases) and — if and when ads are enabled — to our advertising partner, only with your permission.

1. Data stored on your device

Almost everything the app remembers is kept locally on your iPhone and never sent to us. This includes your hint balance, which cases you’ve solved, your solve times and streaks, your daily-challenge records, and your settings. We have no ability to read this data — it stays in the app’s local storage and is removed when you delete the app.

2. Apple Game Center (optional)

If you’re signed in to Game Center, the app submits your daily-challenge solve times and streak to Apple’s leaderboards so you can compare with other players. Game Center is an Apple service governed by Apple’s Privacy Policy. Your leaderboard display name and country are managed by you in Apple’s settings, not by us. If you’re not signed in to Game Center, no scores are submitted. We never receive your Apple ID or email.

3. Purchases (In-App Purchases)

The app offers optional in-app purchases — hint packs and a one-time “Remove Ads” — processed entirely by Apple through the App Store using StoreKit. Apple handles all payment information; we never see or store your card details, billing address, or Apple ID. The app only learns whether a purchase succeeded, so it can credit your hints or remove ads on your device. Purchases are covered by Apple’s Media Services Terms.

4. Advertising

The free version of the app may show ads, delivered through Google AdMob (provided by Google Ireland Limited for users in the EEA, Switzerland and the UK, and by Google LLC elsewhere) and the ad networks buying through it. Ads fund a free game made by one person.

Your choice comes first. On iOS, before any advertising identifier is used for tracking, the app shows Apple’s App Tracking Transparency prompt. If you decline, ads are not personalized based on a tracking identifier.
Consent flow. Where required (for example under the EU GDPR), Google’s User Messaging Platform asks for your permission before any ad is requested. Until that question is resolved the app requests no ads at all. Where a consent choice applies to you, an “Ad privacy choices” row appears in the app’s Settings so you can change your answer at any time.
What ad partners may process: a device advertising identifier (only with your permission), general device and app information, and approximate, non-precise location inferred from your IP address. We do not share your name or email with advertisers, because we don’t have them.
Rewarded ads are always optional — you only ever watch one if you choose to, in exchange for hints. Declining costs you nothing but the hints.
“Remove Ads” disables interstitial ads entirely. Optional rewarded ads remain available, so you can still earn hints if you want to.

You can learn more in Google’s Privacy Policy and in how Google uses information from apps that use its services. To limit ad tracking at any time, use Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking on your device.

5. Analytics & crash reporting

To understand which puzzles are fun and to fix problems, the app may use privacy-respecting analytics and crash-reporting tools (such as Amplitude for product analytics and Sentry for crash diagnostics). These record anonymous, aggregated events — for example “a daily case was solved”, a screen was viewed, or a crash occurred with its technical stack trace. They are not tied to your real-world identity, and we do not use them to build a personal profile of you. Crash reports help us diagnose bugs and contain no personal content from your device.

6. Notifications

If you allow notifications, the app schedules local reminders (for example, a nudge to keep your daily streak) directly on your device. These are generated on your iPhone — there is no remote push server, and no notification data is sent to us. You can turn notifications off any time in iOS Settings.

7. Children

Cozy Culprits is a cozy, non-graphic puzzle game suitable for a general audience, but it is not directed at children under 13 (or the equivalent minimum age in your country). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided us personal information, contact us and we will address it.

We do not sell your personal information.
We do not collect your name, email, phone number, contacts, photos, calendar, health data, or precise location.
We do not run our own servers that store your gameplay data.
We do not share data with anyone except the service providers named above (Apple, and — when ads or analytics are enabled — our ad and analytics partners), strictly to operate the features they power.

9. Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or restrict processing of your personal data, and to withdraw consent (for example, the EU/EEA and UK under the GDPR, and California under the CCPA/CPRA, including the right not to be discriminated against for exercising them).

Because we hold almost no data about you, the most complete way to erase everything the app stores is to delete the app, which removes all local data. For data held by Apple (Game Center, purchases), use your Apple ID settings or contact Apple. For advertising choices, use the App Tracking Transparency and consent controls described above. For anything else, email us and we’ll help.

10. Data retention & security

On-device data is kept until you delete it or remove the app. Data processed by Apple, Google, and any analytics provider is retained according to their own policies. We take reasonable measures to protect data, but no method of transmission or storage is 100% secure.

11. International transfers

Our service providers may process data in countries other than yours, including the United States. Where required, these transfers rely on appropriate safeguards (such as the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses) provided by those partners.

12. Changes to this policy

If we change how the app handles data, we’ll update this page and its “Last updated” date. Material changes will be reflected here before they take effect.

13. Contact

Questions, requests, or concerns about privacy? Email hello@cozyculprits.com and we’ll respond. The data controller is Alejandro Portillo Guerrero (Spain).