Privacy Policy

TL;DR:

What I DON'T do:

  • Collect your Minecraft usernames and/or passwords

  • Distribute malware (or "potentially unwanted programs") with Wurst

  • Sell your data

What I DO:

  • Use Google Analytics to see how many people are using Wurst

  • Sell ads on this website

Google Analytics

I use Google Analytics to see how many people are using Wurst and which versions are the most popular. I use this data to decide when to stop supporting old Minecraft versions. There is no Google Analytics on this website, it's only in the Wurst Client itself.

When you launch Wurst, it only sends a single message to the Google Analytics server saying which Wurst version and Minecraft version was just launched. It doesn't track what you do with Wurst or how long you use it for.

Google Analytics uses a random ID to tell the difference between one computer launching Wurst twice and two computers each launching Wurst once. Wurst generates this ID on its own and changes it every 3 days. This ensures that Google can't do anything sneaky and try use this data for ads.

Unfortunately I can't seem to get the "anonymizeIp" option working with this highly customized Google Analytics setup, so Google does still store your IP address. You are welcome to have a look at the source code to see if you can figure this out. (Of course I am also considering to ditch Google Analytics altogether, but setting up my own analytics server is no small feat.)

You can turn off Google Analytics by going to "Wurst Options" > "Count Users" and setting it to "OFF".

You can view Google's privacy policy here: https://policies.google.com/privacy

Plausible Analytics

I am currently experimenting with using Plausible as a more privacy-friendly alternative to Google Analytics. Plausible is only on this website, not in the Wurst Client itself.

Google AdSense

I use Google AdSense to sell ads on this website. I don't sell data and neither does Google!

Google has their own privacy policy which you can view here: https://policies.google.com/technologies/ads

I have configured Google AdSense so that it won't show any personalized ads to visitors in the EU or California. However, I am still required by Google to show a consent popup that allows users to make their own choice about personalized ads.

I am not sure what happens if you use the consent popup to try and enable personalized ads. I have done everything I can on my end to disable them.

I have also disabled the following Google AdSense options worldwide:

  • "User-based ads" (personalization based on Google Account information)
  • "Additional ad technology vendors" (personalization based on third party ad technology)
  • "First-party cookies" (bypasses privacy tools that block third-party cookies)

Google AdSense uses third-party cookies to keep track of things like how often each ad is seen and how often each ad is clicked on. I have turned off Google's personalization and first-party cookies, as stated above.

Other Stuff

Since I don't have your email address, I can't send you one of those annoying "we have updated our privacy policy" e-mails. Instead, I have a GitHub repository where you can see how this page has changed over time: https://github.com/Wurst-Imperium/WurstClient.net/commits/gh-pages/privacy.md