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Do you know what is Blizzard doing on your PC?
LHOO
Member Posts: 103
It may make some privacy-allergy gamers crazy: Blizzard is scanning your browsing history and cookies. The linked screenshot provides proof that WoW developer Blizzard is actively scanning players' browsing history and cookies. Early speculation is that this is a countermeasure against cheaters, but players are arguing that Blizzard has no right to access this highly private data.
Comments
----ITS A TRAP!!!----
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Do I ever sleep?
linking surfing profiles to names ...
Pi*1337/100 = 42
I must be missing something here. They've had the crap that scans your computer from day one. It's been argued about since day one. It must have some semblance of legality since they've had it from day one. It's one of the reasons (outside of the game sucking) that I and others don't play it. Yes, it is in the ToS/EULA. So it is agreed to when you log in. Personally, I feel it's BS and shouldn't be allowed. But apparently it is, so just move on or accept it.
Don't see what is wrong with scanning your computer for cheats, isn't that what punkbuster and Valve's system also do?
But lets say they do ? What are they doing with this information. They arent selling the info to spammers along with your email address. This I know for a fact because I have a seperate email I used just for WoW.
So the real problem here is invasion of privacy right ?
Have you all seen the recent Bush measures put into place all in the name of protecting us against terrorism ? When in fact it gives the president dictatorial like powers. I'd be concerned more about what your government is doing while smiling at you than what Blizzard may or may not be doing.
I actively want my games scanned for cheats. in games where Punkbuster is optional, I always turn it on.
I would be more annoyed if Blizzard didn't do this.
"Lick My Weapons"
The privacy policy states that Blizzard does not use this information in any way to get personal information about its' patrons. Blizzard is trying to make their game a fair and fun environment for people to advance in a fair manner without worrying about mischevious players who would like to cheat and thus advancing in an unfair way. In an online world where rules may be bended with little recourse or action it is mandated that Blizzard take action in preventing their players from cheating. I am personally glad to see Blizzard made the effort to create a system to thwart cheating players.
Men never thought possible to explore worlds in the comfort of their homes, creating worlds to feed the curiosity and imagination of people creates comfort in the mind that can lead to success in other areas.
I don't believe that for a second. If they have access to that information then chances are they are selling it but being better about it then most. Scanning for cheats is one thing but that's Blizzards own fautl for designing the game and the communication between client and server the way they did. They should be fixing things at the source.
Not playing WoW anymore but had I been I feel I would have stopped playing about this. It may have been there since day one but doesn't seem it got a lot of attention. Maybe I just missed the whole thing. I really dislike that companies sneak this shit into their policies they make you agree with before playing. That thing should be on the back of the box with all of the important aspects highlighted so you can make an informed decision before you purchase the game.
There is a huge difference between scanning your system for cheats and spying on your web browsing activity. It certainly appears that Blizzard is engaged in the latter.
Not playing WoW anymore but had I been I feel I would have stopped playing about this. It may have been there since day one but doesn't seem it got a lot of attention. Maybe I just missed the whole thing. I really dislike that companies sneak this shit into their policies they make you agree with before playing. That thing should be on the back of the box with all of the important aspects highlighted so you can make an informed decision before you purchase the game.
Sadly selling and buying accounts, gold, and items for real cash is an intangible product which causes problems for the economy. There really is not a way to fix this at its source and Blizzard has implented a system that is intended to help fair players. Blizzard makes many millions of dollars each month doing what they do best, producing content for World of Warcraft, why would they enter the business of acquiring information and selling it to third parties while risking many legal issues and losing patronage?
Men never thought possible to explore worlds in the comfort of their homes, creating worlds to feed the curiosity and imagination of people creates comfort in the mind that can lead to success in other areas.
Warden's activities are very highly exaggerated.
Warden
recurses through all of your open windows, and takes each and every
string that is in the window. This means it reads text like:
- the window title
- all of your open tabs in firefox
- the content of those tabs
- information in any textboxes (message posting, username, passwords)
- what track you are listening to in winamp, windows media player, etc.
Invasion of privacy? It would be, except it's not. Why?
Warden
does not actually "read", "understand" or report the text to anyone,
anywhere. It is not transmitted to Blizzard. They will never see it.
What Warden does is compares each string to a table of "hashes". Let's make an example.
Text, hash: (note the text is not actually stored, only the hash and an ID)
WoW bot 1, fedcba0987654321 (ID#1)
WoW bot 2, 0192837465fadcbe (ID#2)
So Warden is going through your open windows, this is what it sees:
Microsoft Internet Explorer, 1234567890abcdef
Winamp, 9ab4c6534c57ba23
1. Warden goes through it's list and compares 1234567890abcdef to each hash in the list.
2. It doesn't match, the text is discarded.
3. Warden goes through it's list and compares 9ab4c6534c57ba23 to each hash in the list.
4. It doesn't match, the text is discarded.
Let's
say you have the program "WoW bot 1" open. Warden will take the window
title and hash it to fedcba0987654321. It will run through it's list
and recognise that it matches ID #1. It will report to Blizzard that a
positive match was found, and that it matched ID #1. The GMs will now
test your account using various methods to determine if you are running
a bot. If it's determined that you are (and they aren't usually wrong,
but check out the Cedega scandal) you will be banned.
So as you can see, Blizzard actually DOESN'T invade your privacy.
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Why are you reading this? This is crap compared to what's above.
Every game has a similar function. How do you think GM's catch cheaters? Blizzard is doing nothing different than every other game developer.
Make a difference!
I don't believe that for a second. If they have access to that information then chances are they are selling it but being better about it then most. Scanning for cheats is one thing but that's Blizzards own fautl for designing the game and the communication between client and server the way they did. They should be fixing things at the source.
Not playing WoW anymore but had I been I feel I would have stopped playing about this. It may have been there since day one but doesn't seem it got a lot of attention. Maybe I just missed the whole thing. I really dislike that companies sneak this shit into their policies they make you agree with before playing. That thing should be on the back of the box with all of the important aspects highlighted so you can make an informed decision before you purchase the game.
You need to download a program to monitor all connections being made to your PC. You'd be surprised how many times a day your pc is being scanned by various organizations such as the CIA, FBI, MPAA and hackers. Blizzards just trying to stop cheaters. These other organizations are trying to find things they can either arrest you for, sue you over or take advantage of for profit.
Here's a scarey scenario:
Earlier this year a Federal law was passed in the United States that states having child porn whether knowingly or unknowingly on your pc is illegal. This means you don't have to actively go to a child porn website or download child porn to break the law. Intent is no longer a determining factor. So say someone doesn't like you. They happen to know your IP. They happen to know how to connect to your pc. They happen to have some child porn. Poof they put it in a nice hidden folder that you'll never see. 2 days later you have an FBI agent kicking your door in to arrest you and sieze your computer which just happens to have 2000 pics of little girls doing rude things to little boys just like their super secret informant had told them. In this day and age you don't even need an enemy. People could be doing it just for kicks.
Every time i see someone get arrested for kiddie porn these days i cringe and really wonder if they were set up. The scariest thing of all is that there is absolutely no way to completely lock down your pc and stay on the net. So we're all open to this sort of attack. Now is what Blizzard is doing really all that bad in the grand scheme of things?
Make a difference!
Every game has a similar function. How do you think GM's catch cheaters? Blizzard is doing nothing different than every other game developer.
Care to name a few games that have a similar function. Making blanket statements is one thing, proving it is another.
I don't really care about WoW, but I still don't see why they need to scan a persons web browser.
I don't know much about how this works, but how difficult is to to say, retrieve someone bank details if they are using an online banking service. Isn't this something thats probably goign to be a potential liability at some point.
If you got porn inside your WoW directory it can find out. Only stuff inside WoW it sees. You afraid of warden be not.
edit: Oh who use internet explorer anyways
EQ, EQ2, SWG, EVE, SoR, Guild Wars... Every major game has anti cheat code that has similar abilities.
The minute you turn on your modem you are open to all that from much more devious people. Blizzard already has a credit card number if they wanted they could charge you for 5 years LOL. You're living with rose colored glasses if you think any part of your pc is secure the minute that modem is turned on. I don't care what kind of firewall you have. Even IP blockers can be beat rather simply.
Make a difference!
Third party software such as Punkbuster is completely different than what is being discussed here. Punkbuster exists solely to rid games of cheaters and they work with developers to provide a solution. When publishers start scanning things like history and cookies there are several issues. If you think blizzard is using what they find to get rid of cheaters and botters exclusively then you are wearing rose colored glasses. Yes it has been done to some extent before but that doesn't change what it is.
The marketing dept. has their hands on that information regardless of what blizzard or anyone else says. To deny that simple truth is ignorant and that is only the beginning.
http://codmw3.me
Im visiting a lot of Cheat Sites to know with what kind of Tricks the Criminals are working and not fall into their Traps.
Never Had any Problems with WoW GM´s.
Even the chess software i use Blitzen from chessclub.com has the ability to see every folder and file on your pc to prevent cheating.
Make a difference!