Terms of Use

What this service is

TraceTheory is a fictional online investigation game. Cases, characters, incidents, evidence, reports, images, transcripts, locations and scenarios are created for entertainment and may be simulated, dramatized, AI-assisted or composited unless explicitly identified otherwise. Case files are not real law-enforcement records or evidence of real events. They are not emergency, investigative, legal, medical or mental-health advice. Never use a fictional file to accuse or contact a real person or authority as though its contents were real. For a real emergency, contact your local emergency services.

Your account

You must be legally able to agree to these terms where you live; if you cannot, use the service only with any permission and supervision required by law. Keep your sign-in details private, give accurate account information, and report suspected unauthorized access through the contact channel once confirmed. You are responsible for activity under your account to the extent permitted by law. Do not share or sell credentials, impersonate another person, or use someone else's account to bypass access restrictions.

Permission to play and ownership

Subject to these terms, you receive a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to access available cases for your own noncommercial entertainment. You do not acquire ownership of the game or its protected writing, artwork, design, transcripts, case files or other assets. Rights not expressly granted remain with their respective owners.

Without authorization, do not copy, rehost, sell, license, publicly post or redistribute case files, solution material, transcripts, images, evidence assets or substantial screenshots. Do not distribute protected answers to spoil the experience for others. The personal-play license does not authorize extracting protected case assets to train, build or benchmark competing case or game datasets, or to commercially distribute such datasets. These restrictions apply only to the extent permitted by applicable intellectual-property and contract law; they do not restrict rights the law preserves.

Do not use bots, scraping or automated data extraction to copy the service; bypass access controls; or reverse engineer the service except to the extent applicable law expressly permits.

Respect people and the service

Do not use TraceTheory for unlawful activity, fraud, impersonation, harassment, doxxing or stalking. Do not contact, threaten or accuse real people, businesses or authorities based solely on fictional game material, or present game content as real evidence. Do not interfere with the service or try to access other players' accounts or data.

If you create notes or send us messages, you keep the rights to your original content and give us permission to store, display and process it as needed to provide, maintain and protect the service. Do not put sensitive details about real people or unlawful or infringing material in notes or messages.

Changes and availability

We may correct errors, update or retire cases, change features, or suspend service for maintenance, security or legal reasons. We cannot guarantee uninterrupted availability or recovery of every saved item. We may suspend or end access for a material breach, misuse, security risk or legal requirement; where practical, we will give notice and an opportunity to address the issue. You may stop using the service at any time. Provisions that reasonably need to continue after access ends will survive.

Links to other sites or sign-in services, if offered, may have their own terms and privacy practices. Review those separately; we do not control their content or availability.

Disclaimers and responsibility

To the maximum extent permitted by law, the service is provided “as is” and “as available,” without a guarantee that it will be uninterrupted, error-free or suitable for a particular purpose. To the maximum extent permitted by law, we are not liable for indirect, incidental, special or consequential losses arising from use of the service. We do not exclude warranties, remedies or liability that applicable law does not allow us to exclude or limit, including liability for fraud or intentional misconduct.

Where legally appropriate, you agree to cover third-party claims and reasonable costs caused by your unlawful conduct, unauthorized distribution of protected material or material breach of these terms, but not claims caused by our own conduct. This does not override mandatory consumer protections.

Disputes and consumer rights

We encourage you to raise concerns with us first, once a working contact channel is confirmed. Nothing here requires arbitration, gives up access to a court with lawful jurisdiction, or limits non-waivable consumer rights.