Privacy Policy

Welcome to FavoritePicker.com ("we", "our", "us"). We are committed to protecting your privacy and ensuring you have a safe, transparent, and enjoyable experience while ranking your favorite Pokémon. This Privacy Policy explains our practices regarding data collection, client-side local storage, analytics, and your rights under global privacy laws including the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA/CPRA), and the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA).

1. Information We Do NOT Collect

FavoritePicker.com was built from the ground up as a frictionless, anonymous web utility. When using our interactive pickers, random generators, or Pokédex features:

• No Registration Required: You never need to create an account, provide a username, password, or profile information.
• No Contact Details: We do not ask for or collect your email address, phone number, or postal address.
• No Financial Information: All tools on FavoritePicker are 100% free to use. We do not process credit cards, billing addresses, or payment details.
• No Device Sensors: We never request access to your device camera, microphone, contacts, or precise GPS location.

2. How We Save Your Rankings: Client-Side Local Storage

To let you pause a tournament, close your browser tab, and resume your rankings at any time without losing your progress, FavoritePicker uses standard browser HTML5 Local Storage (`localStorage`).

• Stored on Your Device Only: Your match choices, Elo rating calculations, and active tier lists remain strictly inside your browser's private storage sandbox on your phone, tablet, or computer.
• Never Sent to Our Servers: Your individual matchup selections are calculated via client-side JavaScript. They are not transmitted across the network to our database.
• How to Reset or Clear Your Data: You have complete control over your data. You can erase all saved rankings at any moment by clicking the "Reset Picker" button within the app, or by clearing your browser's site data/cookies in your browser settings.

3. Analytics & Operational Server Logs

To ensure high performance, monitor site uptime, and diagnose server errors, we collect minimal, non-personally identifiable diagnostic information:

• Anonymized Web Analytics: We may use privacy-conscious analytics tools (such as Google Analytics 4 with IP anonymization enabled) to aggregate broad traffic metrics, including total page views, average session length, referring websites, and general browser/device types (e.g., Chrome on Android, Safari on iOS). These metrics cannot identify you as an individual.
• Standard Server Access Logs: Like virtually all websites, our web server temporarily logs basic connection metadata (such as obfuscated IP address, timestamp, request URL, and user-agent) solely to detect automated DDoS attacks, block malicious scrapers, and guarantee reliable server response times.

4. Cookies and Tracking Technologies

Cookies are small text files placed on your device to ensure proper technical operation. FavoritePicker uses cookies only for essential functionality and basic aggregated performance metrics:

• Strictly Necessary Technical Cookies: Used to maintain server security sessions, rate-limiting, and basic interface state.
• No Third-Party Advertising Trackers: We do not employ third-party ad networks, behavioral retargeting cookies, or cross-site tracking pixels (such as Meta Pixel or TikTok Tracker).
• Browser Cookie Control: You can choose to disable or block cookies at any time via your browser settings (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge). Note that core picker functionality relies on Local Storage rather than cookies.

5. Children's Privacy (COPPA Compliance)

The Pokémon universe is beloved by fans of all ages, including young children. We treat children's safety and privacy with utmost seriousness:

• FavoritePicker.com complies fully with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and international child data protection standards.
• We do not require registration, do not collect personal names, email addresses, or phone numbers, and do not provide public user profile directories.
• If a parent or guardian believes their child has somehow provided personal information to us, please contact us immediately, and we will promptly delete any associated records from our server logs.

6. Third-Party APIs, Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) & Links

To provide high-definition Pokémon artwork, lightning-fast image loading, and responsive typography, FavoritePicker relies on reputable infrastructure providers:

• PokéAPI: Pokémon statistical information, names, generation classifications, and base attributes are sourced through the open-source community at PokéAPI.co.
• Asset CDNs: High-resolution sprites and optimized WebP artwork are cached and distributed via global Content Delivery Networks (e.g. Cloudflare, wsrv.nl, GitHub Raw) to maximize page load speeds worldwide.
• External Links: Our website may contain links to external sites (e.g., official Pokémon websites, community wikis, or open-source resources). We do not control and are not responsible for the privacy practices of external websites.

7. Your Legal Rights (GDPR & CCPA/CPRA)

Depending on your jurisdiction, you possess specific legal rights regarding your data:

• European Union / United Kingdom (GDPR): You have the right to request access to, rectification of, or erasure of any server log records pertaining to your IP address, or to lodge a complaint with your local data protection supervisory authority.
• California Residents (CCPA / CPRA): You have the right to know what categories of data are collected and to request deletion. We do not sell, rent, or share personal information with data brokers or commercial advertisers.
• Right to Erasure: Because your tier lists and rankings live exclusively in your browser's Local Storage, you can exercise complete erasure at any time simply by clearing your browser cache.

8. Security Measures

We deploy modern digital security measures to safeguard user connections, including:

• Full HTTPS SSL/TLS 256-bit encryption across every page, subfolder, and asset.
• Modern HTTP security response headers (including X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff, X-Frame-Options: SAMEORIGIN, and Referrer-Policy: strict-origin-when-cross-origin).
• Continuous server patch management and automated firewall threat mitigation.

9. Policy Updates & Contact Information

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect site enhancements, new Pokémon generation features, or legislative changes. When updates occur, the "Last Updated" date at the top of this page will be revised accordingly.

If you have any questions, inquiries, or privacy-related requests, please contact our team via our Contact Us page or by emailing us directly at privacy@favoritepicker.com.