Privacy Policy

Operator and contact

War Guardian is operated from Maryland, United States. In these policies, "we" and "us" refer to the operator of the War Guardian service. Contact us about privacy at [email protected].

We decide how to process customer accounts, payments, support and platform security information. A community ordinarily decides why its players are monitored and how its own moderation records are used; we process those records on its documented instructions. Where we decide a separate purpose for player information, we take responsibility as controller for that activity. The community's own privacy notice identifies its operator and explains its server rules. Contact us if you need help identifying the community responsible for a record.

Information collected

Account and access information includes Discord identifiers, names and available profile details, community membership and role information, staff permissions, invitations, session records and account activity. Optional player sign-in through Steam provides the Steam account identifier. Discord and Steam authenticate you; we do not receive your password for either platform.

Kill feed data comes from connected game servers and records gameplay events, such as kills, deaths, headshots, weapons, event times and available match context. We use these events and derived statistics for gameplay review. Kill feed records associated with an identifiable player are handled as personal data until anonymized.

Player profile information is obtained from Steam. Available information may include Steam identifiers, profile names and images, profile visibility, public friend lists and platform ban information. This Steam profile information is separate from the kill feed data retained in anonymized cold storage. We also process the roster, visit and match information needed to operate the connected server features.

Moderation information includes bans and their reasons and duration, warnings, kicks, flags, watchlists, staff notes, review decisions, shared-list records, priority access and actions taken by staff or configured rules. Evidence submitted by staff may include screenshots, video, names, chat or voice captured within a recording and information about other people visible in that evidence. Staff must remove unrelated personal information where practicable.

We receive information you send in support and privacy requests. For paid plans, we receive billing contact details, purchase and subscription records, payment status and transaction references. Payment processing is handled by Stripe. Stripe processes payment information under its applicable terms and privacy policy at https://stripe.com/privacy. The exact payment information available to us depends on the Stripe service and payment method used.

Operating the website involves processing network addresses, request times, browser or device information, authentication cookies, error information and security activity. Hosting, proxy, logging and email services may also process these details.

Sources of information

We receive information from you, connected game servers, community operators and authorized staff, Discord, Steam, payment services and service infrastructure. A partner community may supply a shared ban and its supporting evidence. Public Steam information can concern friends who have never used War Guardian. We limit such lookups to the supported review features and available public information; we do not access private friend lists.

Steam profile information

We obtain player profile information through Steam and follow the applicable Steam Web API Terms of Use and Valve's Privacy Policy. We use only information Steam makes available through its permitted interfaces and do not receive or store your Steam password. Steam profile information is not included in our anonymized kill feed cold-storage archive.

Steam Web API Terms of Use: https://steamcommunity.com/dev/apiterms. Valve Privacy Policy: https://store.steampowered.com/privacy_agreement/. This policy describes how War Guardian uses the Steam information it receives.

Legal bases and purposes

We use account and billing information to provide the purchased service, manage access, process payments and communicate about the account. Where you are personally a party to the contract, this processing is necessary for that contract. For staff or contacts acting for an organization, we ordinarily rely on our legitimate interests in administering that organization's service and access. We retain records required by applicable tax, accounting or other law under a legal obligation.

Security monitoring, abuse prevention and handling ordinary support rely on our legitimate interests in keeping the service safe and usable, subject to a balance with affected people's rights. We do not assume that a player's use of a game server creates a contract with War Guardian or supplies consent for every use of their information.

Player history, statistical review and moderation serve the community's interests in operating its servers, investigating misconduct and enforcing fair play. The controller must establish a lawful basis for the particular processing, including any shared bans or public rankings, and assess its necessity and impact. Optional nonessential tracking or marketing requires consent where the applicable law requires it. Refusing such consent does not prevent core access.

Communities can access kill feed records for 180 days from each event, subject to their subscription and authorized access. After 180 days, the records are anonymized and retained in cold storage on a lifetime basis for historical and statistical purposes, with no fixed expiry. Preparing the anonymous archive is carried out under an appropriate lawful basis and, where we act as processor, the community's documented instructions. We do not use a privacy notice or acceptance of service terms as blanket consent to unrelated processing.

Who can receive information

Authorized staff receive records allowed by their community and server permissions. War Guardian personnel may access information when needed for support, administration, security or lawful obligations, subject to confidentiality and limited access. We use suppliers for hosting, storage, communications, payments and enabled integrations. See the Subprocessor and Integration Register for suppliers and processing locations.

Shared bans can disclose a player identifier, reason, dates, delivery history and attached evidence to communities and servers that receive the shared list. This can affect access to multiple servers. Sharing permissions and participation settings determine the recipients. A local ban is not automatically a public statement about a player.

When a community enables public status, leaderboard or career pages, visitors can see the information published through those features, such as player names and game statistics. Public pages may be copied by others. A concealed Steam identifier or an opaque page link does not make a named player's statistics anonymous. Staff notes, private evidence and credentials must not be published through these pages.

Configured Discord feeds may send activity or moderation information to selected channels. Authorized API or AI client integrations can disclose the permitted review data to the client and its selected service providers. The community must control those destinations and give an appropriate notice. We may disclose information when lawfully required or necessary to establish or defend a legal claim. We do not sell player information or provide it for targeted advertising.

Machine learning review and optional AI summaries

We fit local machine learning detection models to recorded gameplay statistics to help staff prioritize manual anti-cheat reviews. This use is limited to WarGuardian's detection service. Model fitting runs within WarGuardian's processing environment. It excludes uploaded evidence, messages, saved AI summaries, Steam profile information and anonymous cold storage.

Optional AI analysis may send the review information needed for a requested summary to a selected provider. This information can be personal data. The relevant provider, processing locations and retention arrangements must be disclosed before that integration is used.

We do not use player data to train or fine-tune LLMs or other general-purpose models. External AI providers may process requested summaries only without training on submitted data. Providers and routes must be configured and contractually permitted to meet this restriction. A community or staff member may not override this requirement with a personal key. If a provider cannot meet it, that route must remain disabled.

Inference can involve temporary processing, safety or abuse logs and provider retention. The restriction on provider training does not require a provider to keep no records at all. Contact us for the retention and processing locations applicable to an enabled route. Generated summaries are saved as player review records. AI findings can be incomplete or wrong and are review aids; they are not proof of cheating or a calibrated cheating probability.

Automated rules and human review

Communities may configure automated messages, warnings, kicks, bans or the delivery of a previously recorded shared ban. These actions depend on the rules and recorded inputs. A resulting ban may also affect public ranking eligibility. AI summaries themselves do not issue bans. For an affected decision, contact the issuing community for its reason, relevant inputs and human review. You may also contact us about inaccurate data or problems with the system.

Where applicable law limits decisions made solely by automated processing that significantly affect a person, the controller must assess the rule, establish any required legal conditions and provide the required safeguards. A community's acceptance of these terms does not waive a player's rights.

Retention and deletion

Communities can access kill feed records for 180 days from each event, subject to their subscription and authorized access. After that window, the records are anonymized and retained in cold storage on a lifetime basis, with no fixed expiry. The archive contains kill feed events and derived statistics in a form that does not identify individual players. Steam profile information is not included. We do not use the archive to train or fit any models.

Ban records and their associated notes, review decisions, evidence and attachments are retained for 180 days from the creation of the ban record, then deleted. This information is not anonymized and is not included in lifetime cold storage. Backup handling and any specific legal hold follow the separate retention policy.

Identifiable information used to operate the service follows the separate Data Retention and Cold Storage Policy, subject to justified case holds and legal requirements. Anonymous archive information cannot be linked back to a player and therefore cannot be retrieved or removed using that player's account identifier. We do not collect additional identity information to reconstruct an anonymous record.

International processing and security

War Guardian's primary service hosting and processing is in the United States. Providers such as Stripe, Steam, Discord and enabled AI services may separately process information in additional countries under their own arrangements. The Subprocessor and Integration Register describes recipient categories. Contact us for the supplier identities and processing locations applicable to your service.

Contact [email protected] for information about the processing locations and any international transfer arrangements applicable to your information. A provider's own contractual arrangements cover its processing and do not automatically cover a separate transfer to War Guardian.

We use access restrictions, credential protection, secure transmission and operational safeguards appropriate to the information and risk. No service can promise absolute security. Report suspected exposure to [email protected] and avoid emailing live passwords, API keys or unnecessary player evidence.

Your privacy rights

Contact [email protected] to request access, correction, deletion, restriction or information about a record, or to object to a use of your information. Depending on the applicable law and processing basis, portability, withdrawal of consent and protections concerning automated decisions may also apply. Our GDPR and Data Rights Policy explains the request process. If we process a community's records on its instructions, we help route the request and assist its response.

These rights have legal conditions. A supported ban or necessary legal record is not automatically erased because it is disputed, but we assess the request and explain any lawful reason for keeping information. You may complain to the relevant privacy regulator without contacting us first. The EDPB lists EEA authorities at https://www.edpb.europa.eu/about-edpb/about-edpb/members_en. The UK regulator is the ICO at https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/.

Children and policy changes

Purchasers and community administrators must be adults with authority to enter the service agreement. Game players whose information appears in server records may be younger. We do not treat the purchaser's age rule as permission to disregard children's information. Contact us if a record concerns a child or unnecessarily includes sensitive personal details. Communities must apply the game's age rules and any applicable child protection requirements.

We publish the effective date and version of this policy and give appropriate notice of material changes. New purposes, new recipients and new optional processing require assessment and any additional notice or consent before implementation.