Privacy Policy

This is everything that may exist associated with you, and why:

• Username — identifies your account and is the only thing shown publicly.
• Password — always stored as a hash, never in plain text.
• Recovery email — optional: only if you choose to add one so you can recover your account.
• Comments and ratings — the content you publish voluntarily.
• Technical session data — IP address and browser, for security (see sessions.txt).
• Local preferences — theme and language, which never leave your browser.

We do not ask for your real name, your age, your phone number or any payment details. We use no analytics or advertising tracking tools.

You need an account to comment. Registration only asks for a username and a password: no email address is required to create an account, and usernames shaped like an email are not accepted. Only your @username appears in comments.

Passwords are stored hashed with bcrypt, never in plain text. Not even the site's staff can read them: the database holds only their fingerprint, which allows a password to be checked but not reconstructed. Passwords must be at least 8 characters long.

In some cases an administrator may issue a temporary password to restore access to a locked account. It expires after 24 hours, is shown only once, is also stored hashed, and forces you to choose a new password on sign-in.

You may add a recovery email to your account. It is entirely optional and serves a single purpose: letting you regain access if you forget your password.

When you request a password reset, we send a 6-digit code to that address. It expires in 15 minutes, allows at most 5 attempts and can be used only once. The code is stored hashed, never in plain text, and your password does not change until the code is verified. We never send passwords by email, nor will we ever ask for yours that way.

Your email is never shown publicly: it does not appear in comments or on your profile. Where it must be displayed for your own orientation, it is masked (for example j***z@gmail.com). We do not use it for newsletters, marketing or any message beyond your account's operation and security.

If someone tries to recover an account with no email configured, an internal alert is sent to the administration with the request's IP and browser so that account-hijacking attempts can be spotted. That alert does not by itself authorise any change.

You can add, change or remove your account's email at any time from your account area.

Your session is kept with an HttpOnly cookie marked SameSite=Strict, which the page's JavaScript cannot read. It lasts exactly one hour: after that it expires and you have to sign in again.

You can keep several accounts signed in in the same browser (up to 5) and switch between them. Each one leaves its own session cookie, also HttpOnly; the index of open accounts contains only usernames and is likewise unreadable by scripts.

So that unauthorised access can be detected and cut off, every sign-in is recorded in our database with: a fingerprint of the token (not the token itself), your IP address, your browser (user-agent string) and the expiry date. That record lets you or the administration close a specific session, and makes every other session revoke instantly when the password changes.

This information is strictly internal and for security only: it is never shown on the public site and is not linked to your comments.

To keep the platform secure, fast and stable we use Supabase as our database and backend, and Vercel as our hosting provider. Both may log technical connection data for security, maintenance and attack-prevention purposes, under their own policies.

Requests to our sensitive routes (sign-in, registration, comments, ratings and password recovery) pass through a rate limiter that uses your IP address as a temporary identifier to stop brute-force attempts and abusive automation. That counter lives in memory, is ephemeral, is never written to any database and disappears when the server restarts.

Apart from that ephemeral counter, your IP is indeed stored in the cases described in sessions.txt and on password-recovery requests, for security reasons.

The only cookies Luxine writes are the session cookies described in sessions.txt. We use no advertising, analytics or cross-site tracking cookies, which is why we show no consent banner: there is nothing to consent to.

Everything else is kept in your own browser via localStorage and sessionStorage, and is never sent to our servers:

• theme — whether you prefer the light or dark theme.
• lang-pref — the language you chose, so we do not ask again.
• luxine_anon_id — anonymous rating identifier (see ratings.txt).
• lang-prompt-skipped — remembers, for the current tab only, that you dismissed the language notice.
• The last tab you had open in the footer and in the news filters.

You can erase all of the above at any time by clearing the site's data in your browser. We do not share this information with any external corporation, including Mob Entertainment, Euphoric Brothers or Silvercity Sharks.

Every article can be rated with a like or a dislike without an account. So that the same browser cannot vote twice, a random identifier is generated and stored on your device under the key luxine_anon_id and sent along with the vote. It is not derived from your IP address or your account, it cannot be used to work out who you are, and if you clear your browser storage it is lost and a new one is generated.

If your browser does not send that identifier (for instance with storage blocked), the system falls back to your IP address so as not to lose protection against repeat votes. That is the only case in which a vote is tied to an IP.

Tallies are kept in Supabase associated with the article, not with a person.

To operate, the site relies on these providers, which may process data on our behalf:

• Supabase — database: accounts, comments, ratings, sessions and recovery emails.
• Vercel — hosting and delivery of the site; technical connection logs.
• Gmail / Google SMTP and, as a fallback, Resend — delivery of recovery codes and security notices.

Some of these providers are established outside the European Economic Area, so certain data may be processed on servers in other countries under the safeguards each provider states in its own terms. They receive only what is strictly necessary to provide their service and we do not authorise them to use that data for other purposes.

Each piece of data lives as long as it needs to and no longer:

• Account, username and password — as long as the account exists.
• Recovery email — until you delete it or the account is removed.
• Recovery codes — 15 minutes; after that they are useless.
• Temporary passwords — 24 hours at most.
• Recorded sessions — valid for one hour; the record is kept so access can be audited and is purged periodically.
• Rate-limiter counters — minutes, and in memory only.
• Comments — until you delete them or moderation removes them.

Luxine is available in Spanish, English, Portuguese and Italian. The first time you visit, we may suggest a language by comparing the one your browser announces with that of the page you are viewing. That check happens entirely on your device: we do not send your language settings to any server and the suggestion is discarded as soon as you close it.

Some articles embed YouTube videos and Steam store widgets, and images hosted on external services such as the Garten of Banban wiki, Reddit or Steam's servers are displayed. When those elements load, those providers receive your IP address and may apply their own cookies and policies, over which Luxine has no control. If you want to avoid this, review your browser settings or consult each provider's privacy policy.

Luxine is not aimed at children under 14 and we do not ask anyone's age, so we cannot verify it. If you are younger than that, please do not create an account or post comments.

If you are a parent or guardian and believe a child in your care has created an account, write to contactoluxine@gmail.com and we will delete it along with anything it has posted.

Regarding your data, you may at any time exercise:

• Access — find out what we hold associated with your account.
• Rectification — correct your username or recovery email from your account area.
• Erasure — delete your comments from the article itself, or request that the whole account be removed.
• Objection and restriction — ask us to stop processing some specific piece of data.
• Withdrawing your email — leave the account with no recovery email, accepting that you will then be unable to recover it yourself.

For anything you cannot do yourself on the site, write to contactoluxine@gmail.com from the account's recovery email, if you have one configured. We reply within a reasonable time; as a fan project, it is not instant.

You can also wipe all local data at any time by clearing the site's data in your browser.

This policy is updated whenever the site gains features that affect data. The date shown under the title indicates the latest revision, and significant changes are announced on the front page.

Continuing to use Luxine after an update means accepting the version in force. If a change were to significantly broaden the data we collect, we would say so prominently before applying it.

The Spanish version of this document is the reference one: in case of discrepancy, it prevails.