HardHat stores the account you create (player name and a securely hashed password), your customization choices (character, colors, profile photo, bio), who you follow and who follows you, your chat messages (including reactions) and a log of your calls (who called, when, and for how long), your coin balance and a record of the coin packs you buy, game results, the dare-proof photos/videos, the photos/videos you choose to send to friends or post to your Reel, and when you were last active in the app (used for the “Active now” indicator your friends see). If you choose to be findable by your phone number, we keep a one-way code made from it — never the number itself (see Contacts and your phone number). If you report something or send feedback, we keep that report; if your account is reported or moderated, we keep a record of what was reported and what our team did about it.
Everything you share is used only to run the game: showing your profile to friends, delivering messages, running matches, and showing proofs and Reel posts to the people they’re for. A post marked Friends is seen by your friends (a proof also by the crew from that match). A post marked Everyone is public: any HardHat player can see it, comment on it, and follow you. You choose per post, and a private account (Settings → Privacy) keeps everything friends-only. We do not sell your data, use third-party analytics, or share your information with third parties — except the payment providers above (only what a purchase needs) and, on iPhone, Google’s ad service as described under Ads.
You can report any message, photo, video, proof, story, or player, and block anyone. We review reports within 24 hours and remove content and accounts that break our Community Guidelines. So that reported content can’t vanish before it’s reviewed, we keep a copy of a reported message, comment or profile with the report, and a reported photo or video is kept (hidden from everyone once it would normally expire) until a moderator has looked at it — at most 30 days, unless the law requires us to keep it longer. Only HardHat’s own team can use our moderation tools: they can see your account details, the content that was reported (with a few messages around a reported message, for context) and your purchase records, and every action they take is logged. Our team can also send you a message that appears in the app, for example a reply to your feedback.
Coin packs bought in the iOS app are paid through Apple: Apple handles the payment and sends us a signed record of the purchase (the pack, the price, the date and a transaction number) so we can add the coins to your account. Coin packs bought on the web store are paid through Stripe: Stripe collects and processes your payment details under its own privacy policy, and we send Stripe only your player name so the payment lands on the right account. We never see or store your card number. We keep a record of each purchase (pack, amount, date, store and transaction number) for refunds and support.
When you send a gift or a tip we keep a record of it (who sent what to whom, and when) for support, limits and fraud checks — the last few thousand across HardHat. Gifts show up as a card in your chat with that friend; a tip shows up in the creator’s activity with your name. In the casino (18+) we keep your chip balance, your last 30 bets (game, bet, result) and the seeds that made them, so results can be checked; your friends who play see your chip count on their casino board, and nobody else does.
When you go live (18+), the video, sound and, if you turn it on, your camera are sent to our server, turned into a live stream, and shown to the friends, followers and other adults who open it. Nothing is recorded: each second of video is deleted from our server a few seconds after it goes out, and a preview picture is kept only while you're live. Chat messages and donations in a stream are kept in memory while it's live; donations are also logged like tips. If someone reports a stream or a chat line, we keep the report with the stream's title and that message so a moderator can review it. We keep a short record of your past streams (when, how long, how many watched) for the dashboard.
HardHat shows a few ads, always marked Sponsored: a full-screen story between your friends’ Stories every few stories, and a card in the Reel every few posts. Never in a game, a chat or a call, and none in a new account’s first days. Which ad you see depends only on where it shows (Stories or the Reel) and your age band (13–17 or 18+) — never on your messages, contacts, location or what you do in HardHat. Tap ••• on any ad to see why it’s shown, hide it or report it. For our own ads we count, per ad, how often it was shown, tapped, hidden or reported; advertisers only ever see those totals, never who you are.
In the iPhone app, when none of our own ads fits, Google AdMob may fill a Stories slot, and you can choose to watch a short Google video for coins. Google’s software then receives information from your device (such as its IP address, device and app details and how you interact with the ad) under Google’s advertising policies. Ads from Google in HardHat are never personalised, HardHat never asks to track you across apps, and accounts under 18 are flagged to Google as under the age of consent. For a coin video, Google tells our server the video was watched (with your player name and a one-time code we created) so the coins land on the right account.
When someone sends a Spotify link in a chat, our server asks Spotify for its public title and cover so it shows as a card (Spotify sees our server, not you). Joining a Spotify Jam opens Spotify, which handles it under its own privacy policy. If you link your Spotify account (a small beta), the sign-in token stays on your phone; HardHat only reads what’s playing and sends play / pause / skip when you tap them.
If you sign up with a friend’s invite link (or name the friend who invited you), we record who invited you so they get credit, and we keep the network (IP) address you signed up from — only to stop invite bonuses from being farmed with fake accounts.
Being findable by your number is off until you turn it on. Settings → Privacy → “Let people who have my number find me” asks for your phone number. Your phone puts it in standard international format and sends it to us over an encrypted connection, and our server immediately turns it into a one-way code (an HMAC-SHA256 made with a secret key that only our server holds). We keep only that code with your account — never your number or any part of it — and the key is never included in our backups. We don’t send you a text to check the number yet, so we can’t confirm it’s yours, and someone else could type your number: if a player pretends to be you, report them. Turning the setting off, or deleting your account, deletes the code at once. If you’re under 18, only other players under 18 who have your number in their contacts can find you this way; adults never see you there, and you never see adults. Accounts that haven’t told us their birthday can’t use either side of this.
Finding friends from your contacts only happens when you ask, each time. When you tap “Find friends from contacts”, HardHat first shows what will happen; then the iPhone app asks iOS for access to your contacts (or, in a browser that supports it, you pick which contacts to share). Only phone numbers are read — no names, email addresses, photos or anything else — and they’re sent to us over an encrypted connection, at most 2,000 at a time. Our server turns each number into the same kind of one-way code, compares it with the players who turned on being findable, and sends back only the matches: each player’s name, character and photo, how many friends you share and whether you already follow each other — never a phone number, and never which of your contacts matched. We don’t store your contacts, the numbers you sent, or the codes of numbers that matched nobody — not on our servers and not on your phone — and we never contact the people in your contacts or tell anyone you looked. To stop the feature being used to look up numbers in bulk, each account can check a limited number of different numbers a day; to count them we keep short tags in our server’s memory only, made with a key that’s replaced every day and never written to disk. You can take back HardHat’s access to your contacts at any time in your iPhone’s Settings → HardHat → Contacts.
HardHat asks for camera and microphone access the first time you open its camera or start a call, and photo library access when you pick a photo, video or screenshot. While the camera screen is open the camera and microphone are live so you can take a photo or hold to film; they turn off as soon as you leave it. Nothing is recorded or uploaded unless you take a shot and choose to send or post it, and nothing is captured in the background.
Calls connect your phone directly to your friends’ phones. The audio and video are encrypted end to end by the connection itself and never pass through or get stored on our servers; when a direct connection isn’t possible they’re passed through a relay that can’t see or hear them. Our server only rings people and connects the phones, and the call card in your chat records who called, when, and how long it lasted. Your camera and microphone are live only while you’re on a call, and calls are never recorded.
Each recipient can open a photo or video you send them at most twice, and they’re deleted from our servers 24 hours after they’re sent. A dare proof you send privately can be opened 3 times by the friend who set the dare, and is deleted within 24 hours. Reel posts, Daily Dares and proofs you post as a Story are on the Reel for 24 hours, then stay on your profile — visible to the people who can see your profile — until you take them down (we keep your 300 most recent; up to 3 pinned posts stay at the top). Reported photos and videos are the exception — see Safety. You can take down anything you posted at any time. Chat messages are retained so your conversations persist. Anyone can take a screenshot of what you send, so only send what you’re comfortable sharing.
You can remove your profile photo, edit your bio, unsend your messages, replace your pitches, change your password (Settings → Change password), and sign out at any time. You can hide your activity status in Settings → Privacy, and turn off being findable by your phone number there too (that deletes the code made from it). You can delete your account and all associated data at any time in Settings → Delete account — it takes effect immediately. You can also email us to ask for a copy of your data.
HardHat is intended for users 13 and older.
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