Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how Brandon Gamez, doing business as GamezServers ("GamezServers", "we", "us"), collects, uses and shares personal information when you use gamezservers.com, our control panel and our game servers (the "Service"). It is part of our Terms of Service.

The short version: we collect what we need to run your servers, bill you and keep the Service safe. Card details go straight to Stripe and never touch our servers. Our own analytics run on our own servers and use no cookies. We also use Google Analytics to understand how the site is used and to measure which of our Google ads bring people to us. Optional tracking follows your choice in our cookie notice, which you can change any time with Cookie settings at the bottom of every page. We do not sell your personal information for money.

Information we collect

Information you give us

Account: your email address, and your name and profile picture if you sign in with Google. Passwords are stored only as a salted hash that cannot be turned back into your password.
Orders and servers: the servers you buy, their names, descriptions and settings, who is in each Server Share (payers' emails, shown to the owner partly hidden), promo codes used, and your consent records at checkout (the version of these terms, the exact renewal terms you agreed to, and when).
Payments: Stripe collects your card or wallet details directly. We receive your Stripe customer ID, the email and billing country on the payment, payment status, invoices and refunds. We never see or store your full card number.
Support: what you send us by email, and our replies.
Affiliates: if you join the affiliate program, your promo code and commission records. Payout details (identity, bank account and tax forms such as a W-9 or W-8BEN) are collected and held by Stripe when you set up payouts. We keep only your Stripe account id, whether payouts are ready, and the tax information Stripe shares with us where the law requires it.

Information collected automatically

Analytics: pages you visit, the site you came from, buttons and steps like starting checkout, your browser, device type, approximate location from your IP address, and your IP address itself. We also record how pages are used (session replays) to fix problems and improve the site, with everything you type hidden. If you are signed in, we link these events to your account, including your email and first name. We run this analytics software ourselves (OpenPanel, hosted on our own servers), and it does not use cookies. It runs only when your cookie choice allows optional tracking (see Cookies and local storage).
Security and server logs: IP addresses, times and actions for sign ins, API requests and control panel use, used to run the Service and stop abuse.
Server usage: your server's memory, processor and network use, whether it is online, and when players are active, used to show stats, sleep idle servers and plan capacity.

Information inside your game servers

Your servers hold worlds, files and logs, which may include information about your players, such as their usernames, chat messages and IP addresses. See Your game server's players.

How we use information

To provide the Service: create and run servers, show your dashboard and console, manage Server Shares and send you the emails the Service needs, such as receipts, "your server is live", price change notices and password resets.
To take payments, give refunds, pay affiliates and keep the tax and accounting records the law requires.
To keep the Service secure and fair: detect fraud, abuse, attacks and misuse of discounts, refunds and promo codes, and enforce our Terms. This can include automated checks. If a decision about you is made this way, you can ask a person to review it.
To understand how people use the site and improve it, for example which steps of checkout confuse people.
To answer your questions and give support.
To comply with the law and respond to lawful requests.

If we ever send marketing emails, every one will have an unsubscribe link, and unsubscribing will not stop emails about your servers and payments.

If you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, our legal bases are: performing our contract with you (running your servers and billing), our legitimate interests (security, fraud prevention, improving the Service and analytics), legal obligations (tax and accounting), and your consent where we ask for it.

We do not sell your personal information for money. The Google cookies described in Cookies and local storage can count as "sharing" for targeted advertising under some US state laws, and you can opt out of them at any time. Otherwise we share personal information only as follows:

Service providers who work for us under contract and may use it only to provide their service to us: Stripe (payments), our email delivery provider, Google (only if you use Google sign in), and the hosting and data center companies that run our website and game servers in the United States.
People you share a server with: a server owner sees who is in their Server Share, with emails partly hidden, and friends see the owner's first name on their share link. Anyone you invite to a server can see its address and status.
Affiliates see how many servers were bought with their code and what they earned, but not who bought them.
Google, through the Google tag (Google Analytics, linked to our Google Ads account), when your cookie choice allows it (see below).
Legal and safety: when we believe in good faith it is required by law, a court order or a valid legal request, or needed to protect the rights, property or safety of our users, the public or us, including reporting child sexual abuse material.
Business changes: if GamezServers becomes a company, merges or is sold, information may move to the new owner, who must keep protecting it as this policy says.
With your permission in any other case.

Your game server's players

For information your players generate on your server, you decide what is collected and why, and we act only as your service provider, hosting it and processing it on your behalf. You are responsible for telling your players what your server collects, handling their requests and following the laws and game rules that apply to you. If a player of a customer's server contacts us, we will pass their request to the server owner where we can.

We access server content only to host, back up, support and secure it, and to comply with the law. We do not use it to train artificial intelligence models.

Cookies and local storage

The first time you visit, a small notice asks for your cookie choice. You can change it any time with Cookie settings at the bottom of every page.

Always on (needed for the Service to work):

One cookie that keeps you signed in.
For your current visit only, the promo code from a creator's link you opened, so it can be filled in at checkout.
Small settings in your browser's local storage, such as whether a panel card is open and the cookie choice you made.
Stripe sets its own cookies on its checkout page, and Google sets its own if you use Google sign in. Their policies apply.

Optional (only with your choice allowing them):

Analytics and session replays with our own OpenPanel, described above.
First visit note: your browser's local storage keeps the site and page you first arrived from, sent with your sign up so we know how you found us.
Creator links for 30 days: if you open a creator's link, your browser remembers their code for 30 days, so they get credit if you buy later.
Google Analytics and Google Ads: the Google tag sets Google Analytics cookies to count visits, the pages viewed, how people move through the site and whether they bought, so we can improve it. Because it is linked to our Google Ads account, it also measures which ads led to a visit or a purchase and may let us show our ads to people who visited before. Google processes this data under Google's privacy policy. You can turn off personalised ads at adssettings.google.com and block Google Analytics in any browser with Google's opt out add on.

How the choice works: in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom and Switzerland, optional tracking stays off until you choose Accept. Elsewhere it is on unless you choose Opt out, which is how you opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information and of targeted advertising. If your browser sends a Global Privacy Control signal, we treat it as that opt out automatically. Choosing necessary cookies only, or opting out, never changes the price you pay or what the Service does.

How long we keep information

Account information: for as long as your account exists. Ask us to delete it at any time.
Game server files, worlds and backups: deleted about 14 days after a server shuts down or pauses at the end of its paid time, or sooner when you delete a server or get a refund.
Payment, invoice, tax and affiliate records: up to 7 years, because tax and accounting laws require it.
Checkout consent records: at least 3 years after your subscription ends, because automatic renewal laws require it.
Analytics events: up to 24 months, then deleted or kept only in aggregate form that no longer identifies you.
Security and server logs: usually no more than 90 days, longer if needed to investigate abuse or a security issue.
Support emails: up to 3 years.

We may keep information longer if the law requires it or to resolve disputes and enforce our Terms.

How we protect information

We use HTTPS encryption, salted password hashing, signed session cookies, access limited to the people who need it, and payment handling by Stripe, a PCI certified processor. No system is perfectly secure. If a breach affects your personal information, we will tell you and the authorities as the law requires.

Your choices and rights

Depending on where you live, you may have the right to:

know what personal information we have about you and get a copy of it,
correct it,
delete it,
receive it in a portable format,
object to or restrict how we use it, or withdraw consent,
opt out of the sale or sharing of personal information, or its use for targeted advertising or profiling (use Cookie settings or Global Privacy Control, or email us), and
appeal if we deny your request.

To use any of these rights, email support@gamezservers.com from your account email. We will verify your identity before acting and reply within the time the law requires, usually 30 to 45 days. An authorized agent may make a request for you with proof of permission. We will not treat you differently for using your rights. If we deny your request, you can appeal by replying to our answer, and if you are unhappy with the result you can contact your state attorney general or, in Europe and the UK, your data protection authority.

Some information we must keep even if you ask us to delete it, such as payment and tax records.

To change your name or email, or close your account, email us. Cancel your servers first so you are not charged again.

Children

The Service is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them. People under 18 need a parent or guardian to agree to our Terms. We do not ask for dates of birth, and we do not show advertising on our site. If we learn that we collected personal information from a child under 13 without a parent's consent, we will delete it. Parents who believe this happened can email us.

Players on a customer's game server do not have an account with us. Their data is the server owner's responsibility, as described above.

International users

We are based in the United States, and our website and servers are in the United States. If you use the Service from another country, your information is transferred to and processed in the United States, where privacy laws may differ from yours.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy. We change the "Last updated" date at the top, and if a change is material we tell you by email or in your dashboard before it takes effect.

Contact

Brandon Gamez, doing business as GamezServers, Michigan, United States. Email support@gamezservers.com for any privacy question or request.