Privacy Policy

1. Controller

The controller within the meaning of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is: Rene Süß, Barbarossastraße 91, 09112 Chemnitz, Germany. Email: support@gcng.de, phone: +49 151 55386821.

No data protection officer has been appointed.

2. Scope

This policy covers the Skatwerk app and this website at https://gcng.de/skatwerk/. It distinguishes four areas, because different controllers and different legal bases apply to them:

• What Skatwerk stores on your device. The provider runs no server for this and has no access to it.
• What Apple processes through Game Center, the App Store and StoreKit. Apple is the controller for that.
• What is recorded in the server logs when this website is accessed.
• What is processed when you get in touch by email.

3. Principle: no servers of our own, no accounts of our own

Skatwerk has no server, no database and no user account of its own. The app contains no code that transfers data to servers of the provider. The app's only network access goes to Apple services: Game Center for online games, leaderboards and achievements, and StoreKit for the name and price of Skatwerk Pro and for the question whether an entitlement exists. Solo play works entirely without a network connection, and signing in to Game Center happens only when you open the online area.

Three links lead out of the app: the privacy policy and the terms of use on the paywall and in the settings, and the review page in the App Store. They open only when you tap them, and then it is your browser or the App Store that fetches them — the app loads none of it itself. Section 12 applies to visiting the website that way.

4. What Skatwerk stores on your device

Everything Skatwerk stores stays locally on your device:

• The solo game in progress, so that it can be continued after the app is closed.
• The history of finished games — solo and online — with the cards played, the bidding, the declaration, the result and when the game was played; for solo games also the opponent strength you chose, and for online games the mode (casual, ranked or friends), how the game ended, which seat forfeited if any, and whether all devices confirmed the record.
• The settings: opponent strength, hints, the beginner help and which explanations have already appeared, sound and haptics, and who deals next.
• A cached copy of the Skatwerk Pro entitlement, so that the app knows about the purchase without a network connection.
• The state for the review request: when it was last asked, at which number of games, and in which app version.

This data leaves your device in two cases: through a device backup you have set up yourself (section 10) and — if you are signed in to Game Center — as the progress value for achievements, which solo games count towards as well (section 7). The history itself, the individual games, is never transmitted.

5. Solo games, history and statistics

Solo games are computed entirely on the device; the opponents are programs, not people. The history and the statistics derived from it are built solely from the games stored on the device. Nothing is transmitted to the provider, and no user profile is created.

6. Game Center and online games

Skatwerk uses Apple's Game Center for online games. Apple processes your Game Center identity and the connection between the players. What travels over that connection is the moves, each device's view of its own hand, the assignment of seats at the start, the predefined reactions when you pick one, and, once a game ends, the complete record so that all three devices can check it. Apple is the controller for that processing; Apple's own privacy policy applies.

From Apple, Skatwerk itself receives the display names — your own and the other players' — and two facts about your account: whether it is an account for a minor, and whether multiplayer is permitted for it. The app needs both to recognise when online play may not be offered at all. These are shown but neither stored nor logged. The stored history of an online game therefore records only which of the three seats at the table was yours — never the names or identifiers of other players.

Signing in to Game Center is optional. Without it, solo play, history and statistics work in full; only online games, leaderboards and achievements are then unavailable.

7. Leaderboards and achievements

Leaderboards and achievements run through Game Center. Only numbers are submitted — never game records, never names, never anything about other players.

For the leaderboards it is two numbers, and they come only from ranked games that all three devices confirmed: the sum of table points and the number of games won. Casual games, games with friends and solo games do not count towards them.

For the achievements it is one progress value per achievement, as a percentage. Solo games count towards these — a grand won is a grand won, even against the computer. If you would rather not send achievements to Apple, do not sign in to Game Center.

It is Apple, not Skatwerk, that links these values to your Game Center account.

8. Skatwerk Pro and the App Store

Skatwerk Pro is sold as a one-off in-app purchase through the Apple App Store. Apple carries out the purchase, payment, invoicing, family sharing and restoration under its own responsibility; Apple is the controller within the meaning of the GDPR for that. The app asks Apple only whether a valid entitlement exists for the Apple account in use. Name, payment method, Apple ID and billing data are not passed to the app.

Where personal data is processed by the provider in connection with a purchase — for example when you get in touch about a purchase, or through billing documents provided by Apple, in so far as these relate to an identifiable person — the legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR, and otherwise Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (legitimate interest in proper accounting). Retention obligations under commercial and tax law remain unaffected.

9. Review request

After several finished games, Skatwerk may ask for a review through the mechanism iOS provides for this. Whether that dialogue actually appears is decided by the operating system; the app is not told whether a review was written. All that is stored for this, locally, is when it was last asked, at which number of games, and in which app version. Apple is the controller for a review once it is given.

10. Device backup and iCloud

Skatwerk does not exclude its data from the device backup. If iCloud Backup is switched on in the system settings, the locally stored app data can be part of that backup — as with other apps. This is deliberate: Skatwerk synchronises nothing to a cloud of its own, which makes the device backup the only protection against losing your games altogether. Whether iCloud Backup is used is your choice in the iOS settings; Apple is the controller for the processing in iCloud.

11. No advertising, no tracking, no analytics of our own

Skatwerk contains no third-party advertising, tracking, analytics or crash-reporting libraries and builds no user profile. No tracking permission prompt is shown, because no tracking takes place.

Apple receives crash and usage statistics only if you have allowed that in the iOS settings under "Privacy & Security → Analytics". That data reaches the provider anonymised and aggregated.

12. This website and its server logs

This website is static. It sets no cookies, uses no analytics tools and no tracking, and loads no fonts, scripts or other resources from third-party servers.

When it is accessed, however, technically necessary access data is processed. This includes in particular the IP address, the time of access, the page requested and technical information about the browser or device used. The IP address is stored in full; it is neither truncated nor anonymised. The processing serves the secure and reliable provision of the website, error analysis, and the detection and prevention of misuse and attacks. The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR.

Access logs are deleted regularly and are generally kept for no more than about 35 days. Technical error logs may be kept longer for error analysis and to secure operation, but for no more than about eleven weeks. Where security-relevant events are processed separately, the shorter retention periods laid down for them technically apply.

No processor is engaged for the operation of this website. No personal data is transferred to third countries for the operation of the website.

13. Getting in touch by email

If you get in touch by email, the details you send — in particular your email address and the content of your message — are processed in order to deal with your enquiry. Hosting or email service providers engaged for the technical provision and delivery of email may act as processors.

The legal basis is Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR in so far as the communication serves the performance or initiation of a contractual relationship, and otherwise Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR (legitimate interest in dealing with general enquiries).

14. Retention and erasure

The data stored in the app stays on your device until you delete it. A game in progress can be discarded in the app; the history and all other app data are removed by deleting the app. The provider has no access to this data and can therefore neither disclose nor erase it.

The periods given in section 12 apply to this website's server logs. Messages from an enquiry are deleted once the enquiry has been dealt with, unless statutory retention obligations or other legitimate grounds prevent this. Apple's own periods apply to data Apple processes.

15. Your rights

Where personal data is processed, you have — subject to the statutory conditions — in particular the right to information, rectification, erasure and restriction of processing, and where applicable the right to data portability and to object. Consent you have given may be withdrawn at any time with effect for the future.

These rights can be asserted against the provider for the data the provider actually processes: this website's server logs and the content of an enquiry.

Because Skatwerk operates no accounts and no servers of its own, the provider holds no personal play or usage data that could be assigned to an account or erased from a server of its own. You remove locally stored app data yourself, as described in section 14.

For data Apple processes through Game Center, the App Store or StoreKit, the corresponding rights exist against Apple, in so far as Apple is the controller for it.

For questions about data protection, please write to support@gcng.de.

16. Right to lodge a complaint

You have the right to lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority. The authority responsible for the controller is in particular the Sächsische Datenschutz- und Transparenzbeauftragte, Maternistraße 17, 01067 Dresden, Germany.

17. Changes to this policy

If the way the app or this website works changes, this policy will be adjusted. The version published here at the time is the one that applies.

18. Version

7 September 2026. The German version is the authoritative one; this translation is provided for convenience and does not differ from it in substance.