Privacy Policy

This privacy policy sets out how MapleRoyals uses and protects any information that you provide to us while using our website, forum and game. We aim to protect your privacy to the best of our ability, including updating our security as and when necessary, and any information you provide to us will only be used in accordance with this privacy policy. Please note that if you scam or attempt to scam us via the donation process, this will invalidate your right to the protection of this privacy policy.

We ask you to assist us in keeping your information confidential by not publically posting account details, PayPal transactions, home address or other information which could compromise your account and/or financial security and/or personal safety. Although we delete any publically posted sensitive information as soon as as we see it, we cannot be held responsible for breaches of security and privacy that you have brought upon yourself.


What information we collect from you and who can see it

1) Forum Account Registration

1. Forum Username - this will be displayed along with all your forum messages, so we advise against using your real full name or your ingame account username.
2. Password - we never get to see your actual password as it is stored securely in hash form.
   
3. Email Address - needs to be valid otherwise you cannot verify your account. This is only viewable by members of staff.
   
4. Date of Birth - required to show that you are at least 13 years old. You can control the privacy of this information in your account settings at the top left of the forum.

Any other personal information you might wish to add, such as country flag or gender, is optional.

2) Game Account Registration

1. Account Username - this is only viewable by members of staff unless you wish to see proof of your vote abuse or a screenshot of your ban information. Such information will be sent to you via PM.
2. Password - we never get to see your actual password as it is stored securely in hash form.
   
3. Email Address - needs to be valid in case you lose or need to change your login details. This is only viewable by members of staff.
   
4. Date of Birth - required to show that you are at least 13 years old and to enable you to delete your own characters or buy couple/friendship rings from the Cash Shop. This is only viewable by members of staff.

3) Voting Whitelist Registration

Please note that applying to be put on the Whitelist is optional. You can continue to take turns in voting with other Royallers in your household if you feel uncomfortable about filling this form out. This information will only be viewable by members of staff who have been with us for at least 3 months.

1. Your name - doesn't need to be your full or even your real name, just whatever people know you as.
2. Character name(s).
3. Game account username(s).
4. The names (see point 1) and character names of other Royallers who live with you.
5. (Optional) the names and character names of other Royallers who regularly play at your house.
6. A group photograph of the Royallers in your household, each holding a piece of paper showing their name, character name and the current date.

4) Additional information collected on login or voting

1. Your Internet Protocol (IP) address - viewable by staff only.
   
2. Your Media Access Control (MAC) address - collected on login to the game and viewable by staff only.

5) Paypal Transaction information

• Only viewable by Matt, and, in cases where there is a query, other administrators. Should you scam or attempt to scam us via the donation process, this will invalidate your protection under this privacy policy and we will post an abuse report giving your full personal details, along with a warning to other game sites that you are a scammer and should not be trusted.

6) Cookies

Spoiler: Our Cookie Usage

What Cookies Are
Cookies are small files stored on your computer by your web browser (such as Internet Explorer or Firefox) at the request of a site you're viewing. This allows the site you're viewing to remember things about you, such as your preferences and history or to keep you logged in.

Cookies may be stored on your computer for a short time (such as only while your browser is open) or for an extended period of time, even years. Cookies not set by this site will not be accessible to us.

Our Cookie Usage
This site uses cookies for numerous things, including:

• Registration and maintaining your preferences. This includes ensuring that you can stay logged in and keeping the site in the language or appearance that you requested.
• Analytics. This allows us to determine how people are using the site and improve it.
• Advertising cookies (possibly third-party). If this site displays advertising, cookies may be set by the advertisers to determine who has viewed an ad or similar things. These cookies may be set by third parties, in which case this site has no ability to read or write these cookies. (Only applicable to our facebook page.)
  
• Other third-party cookies for things like Facebook or Twitter sharing. These cookies will generally be set by the third-party independently, so this site will have no ability to access them.

Removing/Disabling Cookies
Managing your cookies and cookie preferences must be done from within your browser's options/preferences. Here is a list of guides on how to do this for popular browser software:

• Internet Explorer
• Firefox
• Chrome
• Safari
• Opera

What we do with the information we collect

The information you provide to MapleRoyals will be used in the following ways:

1. Internal record keeping.
2. Account verification (forum).
3. Assisting you with any account-related issues you might have.
4. Maintaining any preferences you have set.
5. Ensuring that you are able to receive site mailings where necessary.
6. Establishing your eligibility for the Voting Whitelist, if applicable.
7. Detecting certain violations of our game and forum rules.
   
8. Deterring permanently banned players from returning.

We will not sell, distribute or lease your personal information to third parties unless we have your explicit permission or are required by law to do so.

Links to other websites

We do not have control over external websites, therefore we are not responsible for the privacy and protection of your information if you click a link to an external website. Ways you can avoid clicking on unsuitable links include:

• Hover over the link to check the full URL
• Use a Link Scanner
• Carefully check out shortened links
• To safely copy suspicious links, always right click on a the link and copy the link location rather than going to the linked URL.

If we find or are alerted to any malicious links, we will remove them, so please help us by reporting any links that you are genuinely concerned about.