Privacy Policy

The app works with no account

Signing in is entirely optional. Without one, your pet's name, level and settings live only in files on your own computer, in your Windows user folder. An account exists so your pet survives a reinstall or follows you to a second PC, and so you can use the optional community features below.

Even without an account, the app makes a few requests of its own, and none of them identify you:

• Weather — if weather reactions are on, the city you entered is sent to wttr.in to fetch the current conditions. Leave the city blank and none is sent.
• Update check — once a day the app asks GitHub whether a newer version exists. You can switch this off in Settings.
• Calendar — only if you add a calendar link yourself; the app then downloads that link to show meeting reminders.

What we collect if you make one

• Email address and password. We never store your password. It is turned into a scrambled code that can't be reversed. That code is saved instead, so nobody can see your password, including us.
• Display name — optional, shown back to you on the account page.
• Birthday and "how did you hear about us" — optional, asked once after sign-up. Used only to understand who uses Desktop Pet; never sold or shared.
• Your pet's save data — character, level, XP, and the settings listed in the app's own sync allowlist (things like theme, scale, sound preferences). Machine-specific settings (custom sound file paths, whether the app is muted on that PC) are deliberately never synced.
• Sign-in history — timestamp, IP address, and browser/device string for each successful sign-in, kept so you (and an administrator, if something looks wrong) can see where an account has been signed into from.
• Email confirmation — whether and when you confirmed your email address. Confirming is optional.

Profiles, the leaderboard and character packs

These features are optional, and the first two are off until you turn them on.

• Public profile — if you choose a handle and make your profile public, anyone with the link can see your handle, display name, a short bio you write, whether your email is confirmed, and your pet's name, character, level, streak, days together and number of achievements. Your email address, sign-in history and account details are never shown. Switching the profile back to private hides it again straight away.
• Leaderboard — only accounts with a public profile appear. It shows your handle, your pet's name and character, level, streak, days together and achievements.
• Character packs you upload — the pack file, its name and description, and a preview image are stored along with your handle. Every upload is reviewed before anyone else can see it. Once approved, the pack is public: anyone can see it with your handle, download it and like it, and the number of downloads and likes is shown. If you like someone else's pack, that like is recorded against your account.

Don't upload anything you don't have the right to share. We may reject or remove a pack at any time.

What stays on your PC

Some features react to what you're doing. All of them work on your own computer and nothing they see is sent to us or anyone else:

• Typing reactions (off by default) count how many keys you press. They never record which keys, so nothing you type can be reconstructed.
• Clipboard history (off by default) is kept in memory only, is never saved to disk or synced, and skips anything that looks like a password or key.
• App and music awareness notice which kind of app is in front and whether sound is playing, so the pet can react. Nothing is stored or sent.

What we don't collect

No analytics, no telemetry, no advertising identifiers, no tracking pixels, no third-party ad networks. The sign-in token lives in your browser's localStorage, not a cookie — and it exists only so the site can tell you're signed in, nothing more. Because there's no tracking and nothing non-essential in local storage, we don't run a cookie-consent banner: there's nothing to consent to.

Why we collect it

Every field above exists to make the optional account work: authenticating you, syncing your pet, and letting you recover access if you forget your password. None of it is used for advertising, and none of it is sold. We only ask for what the feature in front of you actually needs — the profile questions are the one exception, and they're clearly optional and skippable in spirit even though the form currently requires an answer to move past it.

How long we keep it

For as long as your account exists. Deleting your account — from the account page, with your password — removes your account, your profile and every pet save immediately and permanently. There's no "soft delete" or 30-day grace window: the row is gone.

Character packs are the exception. Other people may already have installed a pack you published, so an approved pack stays available after your account is deleted, still showing the handle it was uploaded under. To have a pack taken down, email us from the address on your account and we'll remove it.

Your rights over your data

• See it — your account page shows everything tied to your account.
• Correct it — display name, profile answers, handle, bio and profile visibility are editable from the account page.
• Delete it — self-service, any time, no need to ask permission.
• Ask a question or raise a concern — email support@desktop-pet.online and we'll respond directly; there's no support team behind it, just the person running the project.

Children

Desktop Pet isn't directed at children under 13, and we don't knowingly collect account data from anyone under that age. The birthday field is not currently used to verify age. If you believe a child has created an account, email us and we'll delete it.

Security

Passwords are hashed with Argon2, never stored or logged in plain text. All traffic runs over HTTPS. Sign-in attempts are rate-limited. No system is perfectly secure, and if that ever changes for us in a way that affects your data, we'll tell you.

Changes to this policy

If this page changes in a way that meaningfully affects what we collect or how we use it, the "Last updated" date at the top will change and, where practical, we'll say so on the site.

Contact

Questions, requests, or concerns: support@desktop-pet.online.