Privacy

Who is responsible

The maker of sf-browser.com, a private person in the Netherlands, is responsible for this site under the GDPR. For anything about your data, whether a question, a request or a complaint, write to contact@specialforce.info.

When you visit

The site counts visits without cookies and without following you. When a page opens, your browser tells the site which page it is, its language, the site you came from (only its name, such as discord.com), a ?ref= tag if the link had one, your time zone, and later how many seconds the page was on screen. Clicks on links to other sites are counted too, with where they went.

Your address (IP) is used for a moment and never written down: it is looked up in a country list kept on our own server (so only the country, such as PH, is kept), and mixed with your browser type and a random code that changes every day into a short code. That code tells us one visitor is one visitor within a day; the random code is thrown away after a day, after which nobody, including us, can tie the code back to you or to your other visits. From your browser we keep only the kind of device, browser and system (for example Phone, Chrome, Android).

Why: to know which parts of the site are used and where players come from, so the site gets better (legitimate interest, Art. 6(1)(f) GDPR). These numbers are not tied to a person. They are removed after 25 months.

To stop the site being flooded, the number of requests per address is counted in memory for at most a minute. Our server does not keep access logs.

When you log in with Discord

Logging in is optional. If you do, Discord gives us your Discord user id, username, display name and profile picture; we never see your email address or password. We keep those, when you first and last logged in, how often, your role on the site, the characters you save, and the items and weapons you mark as favourites. A visit made while logged in is linked to your account.

Why: to give you an account and keep what you save (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR). When someone makes an account, the site posts their Discord name and picture in the private Discord channel of the people who run it, so they know who joined (legitimate interest).

You keep your account until you delete it. The button is on your profile page; it removes your account, saved characters and favourites right away. Visits stay counted, but no longer point to you.

When you send in a callout, lineup or strategy

Logged-in players can send in a callout (a name for a place on a map) a lineup (where to stand and aim for a smoke, flash or grenade), with an optional note and a link to a clip, or a strategy (who goes where and throws what, drawn on the map). We keep what you sent, the map, your Discord user id and name, and when it was sent and decided. It is posted in a private channel of the Discord server of the people who run the site, with your Discord name and id, so they can approve, edit or reject it. Once approved it shows on the map page with your Discord name.

Why: you ask us to publish it (Art. 6(1)(b) GDPR). It stays until you delete your account, which removes everything you sent in from the site, or until you ask us to remove it (also from Discord).

When you write to us

Mail to contact@specialforce.info is received and sent through Resend (servers in the EU, Ireland). We keep your address, name, the subject and the text of the conversation, so we can answer and see what was said before. The people who run the site read and answer it on this site and in a private channel of their Discord server, so Discord also holds a copy. A conversation is deleted two years after its last message, or earlier if you ask.

If you apply to help as a moderator with the button on our Discord server, what you fill in is posted in a private staff channel on that server and is not kept on this site. Ask us and we delete it.

Cookies and storage in your browser

No tracking or advertising cookies. Only these, all needed for what you ask the site to do:

sf_session: keeps you logged in, for 30 days or until you log out. sf_oauth: used for ten minutes while you log in, to check the answer from Discord is really for you. lang: remembers the language you picked. sf_nc: only if you ask not to be counted (the site admins get it automatically). sf_did: a random number for this browser, set the first time you play; with your account we keep only a scrambled (hashed) form of it and of your network (the first part of your IP address), for 90 days, so that accounts on the same device or network earn no EXP from each other (nobody can farm by playing himself). Neither can be turned back into your address. If you report a player, or the game server finds numbers in a match that no player makes (aim, reaction time, shots at someone you could not see), we keep who it was about, the reason, the room and those numbers (and for a report who sent it and your note) for 12 months, for the site admins to look at; nothing is decided by it on its own. In your browser’s storage, sf_loadouts keeps characters you made before logging in; it never leaves your device unless you log in. sf_server remembers which server you play on, sf_settings your game preferences (the Preferences window: mouse sensitivity, lightmap, your walkout, the picture you chose for your sleeve emblem and the like; logged in, they are also kept on your account so they follow you, and shown on your page unless you switch that off), sf_currency the currency prices are shown in, sf_keys whether you folded away the controls on the map, sf_prefs_sec and sf_prefs_nav which part of the Preferences window you had open and whether its sections show their names, sf_tour whether you did the tour of the map page, sf_map the map you last had open, sf_lobby who stands in your lobby and what he wears, sf_trailer which side’s map trailer you last watched, sf_play_rules, sf_play_against and sf_bot_level what you last chose in Play, sf_room_map the map you last made a room on, sf_notice_seen the newest news item you have seen, sf_browser_note that you saw the tip about which browser plays best, sf_throws4 the aim worked out for each lineup you opened on the map (so the throw is not worked out again), sf_drill_best your best time in each practice range drill, sf_missions your best time on each mission (logged in, it is also kept on your account and shown with your name on the missions leaderboards to other logged-in players; each finished run is kept 8 weeks for the week’s board; deleting your account removes them), sf_range_map the map you last practised on, sf_range_test the speed you picked for the practice range’s shooting test and your best score on each (logged in, also kept on your account; deleting your account removes it), and in the browser’s cache (sf-avatars) the pictures of your soldiers in their poses, drawn on your device; apart from sf_settings and sf_missions when you are logged in, none of them leaves your device.

Other parties

The site runs on our own server at Hetzner in Germany. The 3D files come from Cloudflare R2 (assets.specialforce.info), so Cloudflare sees your address when your browser fetches them, as with any website. Profile pictures are loaded from Discord. When you log in you use Discord’s own page, under Discord’s privacy policy. Mail to us goes through Resend and our Discord (see above). Fonts are served from this site itself; nothing is loaded from Google. The country list (by DB-IP) is a file on our server: your address is not sent to anyone to look it up. Lineup videos are on YouTube, Vimeo or TikTok: their pictures are fetched by our server, and the video player itself (YouTube’s privacy-enhanced youtube-nocookie.com, Vimeo with do-not-track, or TikTok) only loads when you point at a lineup, pick it or press play, under that site’s own privacy policy. The Discord card in the lobby shows how many people are online: our server asks Discord, your browser does not.

We do not sell or give your data to anyone else.

Your page (/u/your-name/) is public: your Discord name and picture (or the name you chose to go by), and whatever you add there yourself: a line about you, your in-game names, your socials, the soldiers you pick to show (if you have saved only one, that one, until you take him off) (then one of them, with your name, can also stand in the map trailers, and when you are logged in your own lobby character stands there too, only for you), and the lineups and callouts of yours we approved. Search engines are asked not to list it. You change or empty it on your profile; deleting your account takes it away.

Friends: when you add a player as a friend, we keep who asked whom, whether it was accepted, and when. The other player gets a message from our bot in Discord. Either of you can end it at any time; deleting your account removes it. Your friends see whether you are on the site now or when you last were (the time of your last visit while logged in, kept on your account).

Messages: when you write to another player we keep the text, who wrote it to whom, when, and whether it was read, for one year; then it is deleted, and deleting your account deletes your messages. Only the two of you can read them, shown as plain text. You can block a player: then neither of you can write to the other. Messages are checked for slurs and limited in how fast they can be sent. News from us to everyone (Notifications) is kept 90 days. Asking for a server in your region: we keep which region you asked for, with your account, to count the asks per region; the counts and your name go to our team's Discord; deleting your account deletes it.

Clans: when you make or join a clan we keep its name and tag, who leads it, who is in it, was invited (and by whom) or asked to join, whether it is recruiting, and when. The clan has a public page with its members and the soldier each has equipped (the one marked as your favourite). An invited player, and a leader someone asks to join, gets a message from our bot in Discord. You can leave at any time; deleting your account removes you from it.

Matches: when a match you played ends, the game server sends us its result (your kills, deaths and points, whether you won and stayed to the end, the soldier you played and what he wore). From that we keep what you earned per match (EXP, SP, the mode and map, when, and in a one against one mode who the opponent was, so playing the same person over and over earns less) and add it to your rank, your soldier's level and your clan's points. We also keep whether you left a match before its end (by leaving, or not coming back within 90 seconds): the share of your matches you left is shown at your seat in a room, as in the original game. Deleting your account removes it

Your picture: if you upload one, we keep a small copy we make of it ourselves (160 × 160 pixels, nothing else from the file) with your account, show it to other players, and delete it when you remove it or delete your account. Six uploads an hour at most; a site admin can take a picture down.

Likes: when you like a lineup or strategy we keep that you did, on which one, and when. Others see only how many likes it has. You can take a like back; deleting your account removes them.

Alpha Founder: if you log in while the site is in alpha, we note the day you first did, so the Alpha Founder pack on your player card (a title, frame, background and badge) stays yours after the alpha. Deleting your account removes it.

Player card ribbons and medals: we work out which ones you have earned from what we already keep (your match results, levels, rank and the Alpha Founder day); nothing new is collected for them. The ones you pick to show are kept with your preferences and shown on your player card to other players, in the lobby, on your page and in matches.

Leaderboards on Ranks & Rewards: from what we already keep (your EXP and rank, your soldiers' EXP, your mission times and your clan), the boards show your page name, clan tag, rank and the board's number (EXP, best soldier level or mission medals) to other logged-in players; logged out, only places and numbers are shown, without names. Nothing new is collected for them, and they go with your account.

Your rights

You can ask to see, correct or delete what we have about you, object to how we use it, or ask for a copy, by writing to contact@specialforce.info. You can delete your account yourself on your profile page. Visit counts cannot be traced to you, so we cannot find or remove them per person. If you think we handle your data wrongly, you can complain to the Dutch data protection authority (Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens) or the one in your own country. If an admin bans an account (for cheating or abuse), its Discord id, the date, the reason and when the ban ends are kept, also after the account is deleted, so the ban holds. Every action of an admin on an account (a ban, a correction of EXP or SP, logging it out everywhere) is written in a staff log with who did it, when, the values before and after and the reason; it is kept two years, also after the account is deleted, so staff decisions can be checked. Staff may write short notes about an account for other staff; they are never shown to players and are deleted with the account.

Logging in requires a Discord account, and Discord is for people of 13 and older.