Rules, privacy and a guide for parents

What 1GTrack is

1GTrack is a hobby app built by a kid, for kids and their friends. Players rate the video games they play, share their ratings with friends, and chat. It isn't made or run by a company, and it's free, with no ads and nothing to buy.

1GTrack is invite-only: nobody can use it without an invite. The admin can invite people, and players can invite friends they know in real life: by email, or with a one-time invite code that works for 7 days (up to 5 invites a day). The admin can see who invited who, and can turn player invites off.

1GTrack is offered as-is. The people who run it do their best to keep it safe and working, but can't promise it will always be available, error-free or free of inappropriate content from other players.

Player rules

1. Be kind. No bullying, mean comments, threats or hate.
2. Keep private things private. Never share your real full name, address, school, phone number, passwords or photos of yourself, and don't ask other players for theirs.
3. You can share your game usernames with friends, but never your social media, phone, email or address. Your Roblox, Fortnite, Minecraft, Xbox, PlayStation or Switch name is fine, so you can play together. Snapchat, Instagram, TikTok, Discord, WhatsApp and other apps are not.
4. Use a nickname, not your real name.
5. No swearing, adult content or anything you wouldn't show a teacher.
6. Don't pretend to be someone else.
7. Tell a grown-up if anything makes you feel uncomfortable, and tap 🚩 or ⚑ to report it.

If someone breaks the rules, the admin can remove what they posted, reset their nickname, turn off their chat, contact their parent or guardian, or remove them from 1GTrack.

Safety features

• Age check, then parent approval. Every new player first gives their birth year (it can't be changed afterwards). Players under 18 need a parent or guardian to approve and leave contact details before they can make a profile. Players 18 or older agree to the rules themselves. (US law asks for a parent's OK under 13, and some states ask for one up to 16 or 18, so 1GTrack uses the strictest age, 18.)
• Chat is off by default. For players under 18, the admin emails the parent or guardian to check, and turns chat on only after they reply. The admin can turn chat off at any time.
• Private messages only between friends who have both accepted a friend request. Group chats have up to 4 people, and everyone in a group must be friends with everyone else in it. Unfriending someone stops their messages.
• Blocking. Any player can block another. A blocked player can't send friend requests or private messages to the player who blocked them, and that player no longer sees their chat messages or shared games. They aren't told.
• Word filter. Nicknames, shared games and chat messages are checked for swearing, slurs and bullying phrases like "kys", including spaced-out, accented and look-alike letters. No filter catches everything.
• Personal info blocker. Chat messages, group names and shared games can't contain phone numbers, email addresses, links, street addresses, social media handles or phrases like "my school is" or "what's ur snap". They also can't ask for pictures, someone's age or where they live, ask for a video call or to meet up, say "don't tell your parents", ask for passwords or offer gifts like Robux: those are the classic warning signs of grooming (and of stolen game accounts). Chat has a speed limit too (one message a second), and saving games, emoji reactions, friend requests and joining chat rooms have hourly limits, so nobody can flood 1GTrack. A declined friend request can't be sent again for an hour. Game usernames (like a Roblox or Xbox name) are allowed on purpose, because that's how friends play together; social media and messaging apps are not. No filter catches everything, so please still talk about this with your child.
• Reports. Anyone can report a game or message. When a private message is reported, the admin can read that one conversation to understand what happened. The admin can't read private chats that nobody reported.

Privacy: what we store

• Your sign-in account (like your Google email address), to check you're invited. Other players never see it. If you invite a friend by email, their email address is stored too (you and the admin can see it), so they can sign in.
• Your nickname and pixel avatar, which other players see.
• Your games, ratings and notes. You choose who sees each one: only you, your friends, or everyone in 1GTrack.
• Friends, reactions, chat messages and reports.
• Your birth year, and for players under 18, your parent or guardian's name, email and (optionally) phone number, which only the admin can see. The admin also notes whether they've confirmed the approval with your parent.

What the admin can see: parent contact details and birth years, the invite list, and reports. To remove or delete a player, the admin can also see that player's list of games and ratings, including 🔒 "Only me" ones. The admin can't read private or group chats, unless someone in that chat reports a message (then only that conversation).

The 🔎 Discover game catalog: when a player searches for a game or browses the catalog, the words they type (and the category they pick) are sent to free public game databases: Wikipedia and Wikidata (Wikimedia Foundation) and FreeToGame. Nothing else is sent: no name, nickname, email or account. Search words that look like personal info (a phone number or email address) aren't sent at all. The catalog only shows games that Wikidata confirms are video games, and never shows adult games: games with sexual words in their name, description or genre, adult genres, or a sexual content rating are always left out. “Hide 17+ games” is on by default: then it shows only games with a known age rating for kids and teens (ESRB E, E10+ or T, PEGI 3, 7 or 12, without sexual themes), so new games that aren't rated yet are left out too. A player can turn it off on their device, unless the admin keeps it on for everyone. With it off, games rated 17+ (ESRB M, PEGI 16 or 18) can show, but never adults-only (AO) games, and games without an age rating show only if they are well known (Wikipedia has an article about them in several languages), so little-known games from online stores are left out. Game pictures come from Wikimedia, Steam and FreeToGame; like any website, they see your device's internet address, but nothing about who you are. Pictures saved with a game can only be the game's box art on Steam or FreeToGame, and in the 🕹️ Arcade other players only see a game's picture if it has a kids' or teens' age rating (E to T, PEGI 3 to 12); other games show a pixel-art picture instead. The catalog has no links to other websites. Game info is from Wikipedia and Wikidata (free licenses) and FreeToGame; game names and pictures belong to their owners.

On your device only: the time of your last visit (for “Since you were last here” in the 🕹️ Arcade), which chats you've read, and your theme. The 🏆 Hall of Fame, tier list, 🎰 “What should we play?” and badges are worked out on your device from games you can already see; nothing new is stored about you.

We don't sell anything, show ads, or share information with anyone else. The information is stored with Google Firebase, the service 1GTrack is built on. We only use it to run 1GTrack and keep players safe.

Deleting your account: players can delete their own account at any time: tap Edit next to your nickname, then Delete my account. Chat turns off as soon as deleting starts, and if it stops partway (for example, the app was closed), 1GTrack asks the player to finish it the next time they sign in. A parent or guardian can also ask the admin to see or delete a player's information.

Deleting an account removes the player's nickname and avatar, games and ratings, friends and friend requests, the blocks they made, the parent approval and birth year, chat access, the invite (and the invite codes they made, and email invites they sent that weren't used yet), and their chat messages in public rooms. Everything they wrote in private and group chats, and their emoji reactions, is hidden from everyone straight away. What happens next depends on who deletes the account:

• When players delete their own account (the most complete way), their private and group chat messages are deleted too, they leave their group chats, and their emoji reactions are removed from the games they can still see. (Reactions on a game from someone who is no longer their friend can't be reached, so they stay hidden.)
• When the admin deletes a player, the admin can't read private chats, so the player's private and group messages can't all be deleted right away. They stay hidden, and the other players' apps delete the newest ones (the 50 the chat shows) when someone in that chat opens it with chat on, and take the player out of group chats. Older messages further back in a long chat, and their emoji reactions, stay stored but hidden. To have everything deleted, it's best for the player to use Delete my account (a parent can help).

Some things can't be removed by the app: the sign-in itself (like the Google or email sign-in) is removed when a player deletes their own account, but when the admin deletes a player, only the project owner can remove the sign-in (in the Firebase console), which they'll do when asked. Reports a player sent or reports about them keep a copy of what was reported until the admin deletes the player or clears the report. Messages other players wrote to a deleted player stay in those chats, because they belong to the other players.

For parents and guardians

• Please look at 1GTrack together with your child, and talk about the player rules above.
• By approving, you agree that your child can use 1GTrack, and that the admin may contact you about your child's account or behavior.
• Chat stays off until the admin has checked with you. You can ask for it to be turned off, or for the account to be removed, at any time.
• Questions or concerns? Contact the admin (the person who invited your child).