Privacy Policy
Balanced Play is operated by Critical Labs, Indian Trail, NC, USA. Contact: hello@getbalancedplay.com.
The short version. We collect only what's needed to pool your child's game time and keep the balance: who you are (from your sign-in), the accounts you choose to connect, and how many minutes were played. We never store your passwords, never sell your data, and encrypt every connected-account credential. Delete it all any time.
Who this covers
Balanced Play is a tool for parents. Only a parent or guardian creates an account and operates the service. Children do not create accounts, log in, or interact with us directly.
What we collect
- Your identity — when you sign in with Google, Apple, Microsoft or Amazon, we receive your name, email address, and a stable account identifier from that provider. We never receive or store your password.
- Connected-account access — when you link a platform (Nintendo, Xbox, PlayStation, Steam, Roblox, Google, Amazon), we store the revocable access token that lets us read play time and set that platform's own parental-control limit. These tokens are encrypted at rest with AWS KMS.
- Your child's play data — a first name or nickname you enter, and the number of minutes played per day per platform. We do not collect a child's full name, birthdate, contacts, location, photos, or messages.
- Waitlist email — if you join the waitlist, we keep your email to tell you when we launch.
- Basic technical logs — standard request logs needed to run and secure the service.
How we use it
Only to run the product: total up play time across the devices you've connected, apply your daily budget and bedtime, and set each platform's native limit accordingly. We use your email to send you account and service messages. That's it.
What we do not do
- We do not sell or rent your data to anyone.
- We do not use your family's data for advertising.
- We do not store your platform passwords — only revocable tokens you can disconnect at any time.
Who we share it with
We share data only with the platform services you connect (to read play time and set limits), and with the infrastructure providers that run Balanced Play on our behalf (Amazon Web Services for hosting/storage, and your chosen sign-in provider). We may disclose information if required by law.
Children's privacy (COPPA)
Balanced Play is directed to parents, not children. Any information about a child is provided and controlled by the parent, kept to the minimum needed to enforce a time budget (a first name and minutes played), and never used for any other purpose. A parent can view or delete it at any time by contacting us or deleting the child from their account.
Security & retention
Data is encrypted in transit (TLS) and connected-account tokens are encrypted at rest with AWS KMS. We keep your data only while your account is active. Daily play-time records expire automatically after a few days. Disconnect a platform and its token is deleted; delete your household or account and we remove your data.
Your choices
- Disconnect any platform at any time from your dashboard.
- Request a copy of, or deletion of, your data by emailing hello@getbalancedplay.com.
- Unsubscribe from the waitlist or emails at any time.
Changes
If we change this policy we'll update this page and, for material changes, notify you by email.