Privacy

CrumbJar Polls is part of CrumbJar. This page explains what CrumbJar Polls itself stores and why. The CrumbJar privacy policy covers the rest: who runs the site and is responsible for your data, the legal reasons we rely on, which providers handle data for us and where, your rights, and how to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office. Where the two pages overlap, this one has the detail for CrumbJar Polls.

CrumbJar is run by [operator name not set], [operator address not set], who is the data controller for the information described here.

You do not need an account to ask a question, vote, view a result or comment. CrumbJar Polls is built so that taking part needs as little information about you as possible.

What we store when you have no account

• A private browser identifier. A random value in a signed cookie that scripts on the page cannot read. It is what stops the same browser voting twice on one question. It is pseudonymous: it holds no name, email or other personal detail, and it is not shared with anyone.
• A per-question participant key. Made by a keyed hash of your browser identifier and the question’s id. Because the question id is part of it, the key is different for every question, so the database cannot be used to follow one person from one question to another.
• A hashed IP address and browser type. Stored as keyed hashes, never in the clear. IPv6 addresses are cut to their /64 prefix first. They are used only to spot automated abuse. An IP address is never used on its own to identify a voter, because shared networks are normal.
• A display name, if you type one. Shown next to what you post, and kept in a cookie so you do not have to retype it.
• Country, where our hosting provider supplies it. Country only, never a precise location. Country breakdowns are hidden below five responses.

What we store when you have an account

• Your username, display name, optional bio, email address and, if you set one, a password stored only as a bcrypt hash.
• If you sign in with Google, Facebook or X: that provider’s id for your account, and the email address it gives us if no other account already uses it.
• If you are signed in to your CrumbJar games account, we make a CrumbJar Polls account from it the first time you visit: a private code for the games account and its username (if our name check accepts it; otherwise a name like player_1a2b3c). We do not receive your email address, your password or your age band from it.
• The questions, answers and comments you make, and the people and questions you follow.
• Your notifications and any achievements you earn.
• Your sign-in session, which is the same one the rest of CrumbJar uses, as the CrumbJar privacy policy describes.
• Sign-in links and password reset links are sent to your email address through our email delivery provider.

What we do not store

• Raw IP addresses.
• Precise location.
• Any link between your identity and how you voted that a question’s creator can see.

Who can see how you voted

Nobody. A question’s creator sees totals, and where they have made named group links they see totals per group, never who voted for what. Group breakdowns are withheld until a group has at least five responses, so that a small group chat cannot be used to work out one person’s answer.

Advertising

There are no adverts at the moment, so nothing sets an advertising cookie. If adverts are switched on, this page changes with them, and Google's advertising cookies stay off until you agree in the cookie message.

Cookies

CrumbJar Polls sets a small number of first-party cookies, all needed for the site to work or asked for by you. Every one is listed on the CrumbJar Polls cookies page.

How long we keep it

Raw analytics events are deleted after 90 days (only daily totals are kept), sign-in records and sign-in or reset links 7 days after they expire, and saved result history after 400 days. A scheduled clean-up does this once it is switched on at launch; until then it runs only when started by hand. The hashed IP addresses kept with votes, comments, guest identities, reports and the audit log are kept as long as the record they belong to. Questions and comments stay until they are deleted or removed, and account details until you delete your account.

The CrumbJar privacy policy lists these periods beside those of every other part of CrumbJar.

Deleting your account

You can delete your account from Settings. That deletes your email address, password, sign-ins, linked Google, Facebook or X sign-in, follows, followed questions, notifications, achievements and unused email links, and clears your username, display name and bio. Your name is replaced with “Deleted account” in other people’s notifications.

Your questions, comments and answers stay up so other people’s conversations and results do not develop holes, but they are no longer linked to you or to your browser. Reports you made and moderation records are kept for safety, without your account attached. If you want content removed as well, use the CrumbJar contact form.

Children

You must be 13 or over to make your own CrumbJar account, and you do not need an account to play. The one exception is Puzzles, where a parent or guardian can set up an account for their child, including a child under 13, from the parent's own account; it has no email address and the parent manages it. An account for anyone aged 13 to 17 is an under-18 account. Anything marked 18+ is shown only to someone signed in with an adult (18 or over) games account.

Automatic safety check

When it is switched on, the words you write for other people to see (questions, answers, comments and names) are sent to OpenAI or Anthropic, whichever we use, to check them for hate, threats and other harm before they are shown. Only the words are sent: not your name, your account or any identifier. They are not used to train those companies’ models.

Your rights and who to contact

Your rights, and how to use them, are set out in the CrumbJar privacy policy. For a privacy or data request about CrumbJar Polls, use the CrumbJar contact form.