Iron Frontier is a free browser strategy game published by The Great Lakes Gleaner (Arthur Cady, Michigan, USA). We are the controller for the personal data described here. You can play without an account.
For anything about your personal data, contact us at arthur@gourmetgleaner.com. In this policy “we”, “us” and “our” mean The Great Lakes Gleaner, which runs Iron Frontier.
| What | Why we use it | Legal basis | How long we keep it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Commander name you type (please don’t use your real name) | Shown on the leaderboard and in multiplayer lobbies | Contract: needed to provide what you asked for (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)) | Kept in your browser until you clear it |
| Global leaderboard: your commander name, score, game mode and date | To show public high scores | Contract: needed to provide what you asked for (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)) | Until we reset the leaderboard; ask us to remove an entry |
| Multiplayer lobbies: lobby name, game settings and optional lobby password, held by our lobby server while the lobby is open | To match players | Contract: needed to provide what you asked for (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)) | Only while the lobby exists (in memory, not saved) |
| Multiplayer connection: the game data of a match travels directly between players’ browsers (WebRTC). To set this up, your browser shares its network addresses, including your IP address, with the other players and with Google’s STUN server (stun.l.google.com) | To play multiplayer | Contract: needed to provide what you asked for (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)) | Not stored by us |
| Forge (optional): if you use the Forge tool with your own Google Gemini API key, the key is kept in your browser only if you tick “remember”, and your prompts go straight from your browser to Google. They never pass through our server | To run the tool you chose | Contract: needed to provide what you asked for (GDPR Art. 6(1)(b)) | Not stored by us |
Our pages load a small script from our own domain (/_hub/e.js) that reports to our own server. It is not Google Analytics or any other third-party analytics service, and nothing it collects is shared with advertisers. When it is allowed to run (see your choices below) it records:
utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign) and whether an ad click ID was present (never the ID itself);These IDs are random numbers, not your name or email address, and our server scrambles them with a secret key (hashing) before saving them. Your IP address is used for a moment to block floods of fake requests and is not saved by this measurement. We use the results to learn which pages help people, to find errors and slow pages, and to decide what to improve. Detailed records are deleted after 400 days (about 13 months); a visitor record is deleted 400 days after its last visit.
Legal basis: if you are in the EU/EEA, the UK or Switzerland, your consent (GDPR Art. 6(1)(a) and the ePrivacy rules on storing information on your device). Elsewhere, our legitimate interest in understanding and improving the site (Art. 6(1)(f)), which you can switch off at any time.
The first time you visit, a small “Privacy choices” box explains this. If your device is set to a European time zone (EU/EEA, UK, Switzerland and neighbouring countries), nothing is stored and nothing is measured unless you click Accept. Elsewhere, measurement runs unless you click Opt out. If your browser sends a Global Privacy Control or Do Not Track signal, we treat it as an opt-out. You can change your mind at any time:
Opting out stops the script on this site, removes its storage from your browser, and deletes the visitor record linked to your random ID from our server. Your choice is saved in the hub_consent cookie for 12 months; if you clear your cookies we will ask again. You can also block or delete cookies and site storage in your browser settings and the site will still work.
| Name | Type | Purpose | How long | Category |
|---|---|---|---|---|
hub_consent | Cookie | Remembers your privacy choice (analytics on or off) | 12 months | Strictly necessary |
_hub_nb | Session storage | Notes that the privacy box has already been shown in this tab (outside Europe only) | Until you close the tab | Strictly necessary |
_hub_s, _hub_n, _hub_lp | Session storage | Random tab-session ID, page count and previous page, to link the pages of one visit | Until you close the tab | Analytics |
_hub_v | Local storage | Random visitor ID, date of first and last visit, number of visits, to tell new visitors from returning ones | 12 months | Analytics |
ironfrontier_name | Local storage | Your commander name | Until you clear it | Functional |
ironfrontier_highscores | Local storage | Your own high scores on this device | Until you clear them | Functional |
| Forge API key | Local storage | Your Gemini API key, only if you tick “remember” | Until you clear it | Functional |
We do not use advertising cookies, tracking pixels or cross-site trackers.
Like almost every website, our web server writes a line for each request it handles: your IP address, the date and time, the page or file requested, the result, the referring page and your browser’s User-Agent. We use these logs to keep the game running and secure: fixing errors, spotting attacks and abusive bots, and counting traffic. The log files roll over by size and are overwritten automatically, usually within a few days. Our traffic dashboard keeps only counts made from them. For daily unique-visitor counts it combines the IP address and browser with a random value that changes every day and is thrown away after three days, so the count cannot be traced back to you.
Legal basis: legitimate interests in security and in running the service (Art. 6(1)(f)).
We do not sell personal information, and we do not share it for advertising. We share it only with:
| Who | What for | What they receive | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hetzner Online GmbH | Server hosting (data centre in Helsinki, Finland) | Everything stored on our servers | Finland (EU) |
| Google LLC (Google Fonts) | Web fonts loaded by your browser when a page opens | Your IP address, browser details and the page that requested the font | US |
| Google LLC (STUN server) | Helps players’ browsers find each other for multiplayer | Your IP address | US |
| Google LLC (Gemini API) | Forge tool, only if you use your own key | Your prompts, sent directly from your browser | US |
| Other players | Multiplayer | Your commander name and, because the connection is direct, your IP address | - |
We may also disclose information if the law requires it, to protect someone’s safety, or to defend legal claims. If the business is ever sold or reorganised, the buyer would take over this information under the same promises.
Our servers are rented from Hetzner Online GmbH and located in Helsinki, Finland, in the EU. We are based in Michigan, in the United States. Some of the providers above are based in the United States. Where the GDPR applies, transfers to the US rely on the EU–US Data Privacy Framework for providers certified under it, and otherwise on the European Commission’s Standard Contractual Clauses in the provider’s data-processing terms.
Wherever you live, you can ask us to show you the personal data we hold about you, give you a copy (including in a machine-readable format), correct it, delete it, or stop using it for a particular purpose.
EU/EEA, UK and Switzerland: under the GDPR (and the UK GDPR and Swiss law) you have the rights of access, rectification, erasure, restriction, data portability and objection, including the right to object at any time to processing based on our legitimate interests and to any direct marketing. Where we rely on your consent you can withdraw it at any time; that does not affect what we did before. You can also complain to your data protection authority (list of EU authorities; in the UK, the ICO; in Switzerland, the FDPIC), though we would appreciate the chance to put things right first.
United States: residents of states with privacy laws (such as California, Colorado, Connecticut, Virginia and others) have similar rights to know, delete and correct their information and to opt out of its sale or use for targeted advertising. We do not sell or share personal information in that sense, and we honour Global Privacy Control signals.
We do not make decisions about you based solely on automated processing that have legal or similarly significant effects.
To use any of these rights, contact us at arthur@gourmetgleaner.com. We reply within one month. For complex requests we may take up to two more months and will tell you if so. We may need to confirm that a request really comes from you. Using your rights will never count against you.
Iron Frontier is a general-audience game and is not directed to children under 13. It asks for no real name, email or account. If you think a child has given us personal data, for example a real name on the leaderboard, contact us and we will remove it.
Every page is served over HTTPS. Admin tools are password-protected, passwords are stored only as salted hashes, and card numbers never reach our servers (Stripe handles them). No system is perfectly secure; if a breach affects your data we will tell you and the authorities where the law requires.
We will post any changes here with a new effective date. If a change is significant we will also say so on the site.