hat alot of people dont understand is that many privacy laws are an inalienable right which means Eula's don't matter when it comes to most privacy issues they attempt to circumvent if anyone sues a company over some thing they did that's against the law the defense wont even bother showing the eula because its nothing Eula's and tos regarding privacy are nothing
so depending on what sort of data SOE gave away and weather everyone has enough money to sue them what Sony did is highly likely to be totally illegal
As long is its not credit card info and such I could care less.
The problem is that soe has time and time again shown little to no regard for what you care about. They just do what they want, how they want and when they want.
It has gotten to the point where that when it is questioned "would soe possibly do ________" the answer is always yes. There just isn't a situation anymore where it is believable that they will let ethics or concern for their customers best interest stop them from doing anything.
Pleeeeaase, giving away 60TB of personal data is just ridiculous, if this was a phone company they would be shutting their doors right now. SoE somehow gets away with a lot of stuff, but this is so illegal and violates so many privacy laws in so many countries that it's just beyong belief.
Unless they are taking my account information (name, address, phone number, social security number, Credit card number, Mother's maiden name etc) I have no problem with it (thaaaaaaaaankyou).
However, just like facebook or myspace. Anything you say or upload to a public site is public property. There are people whore's faces are on billboards and posters and they never agreed to it, the image was taken off some social networking site.
Sent me an email if you want me to mail you some pizza rolls.
I do not know if people know about this but EULA's are a type of agreement called "Shrinkwrap Agreements". They are basically agreements that you agree to when you use a product or service. Historically, "Shrinkwrap Agreements" generally do not hold up in court because they contain clauses which no normal person would agree to in normal situations (agreement of a shrinkwrap generally does not stand as a normal situation because no formal contract was created between the client and the provider at the point of sale).
MMOs Played: I can no longer list them all in the 500 character limit.
I don't know which is more predictable, the fact that this happened, the fact that most people don't realize this could happen, or the omgsoesuxlol.
MMO games played or tested: EQ, DAoC, Archlord, Auto Assault, CoH, CoV, EQ2, EVE, Guild Wars, Hellgate: London, Linneage II, LOTRO, MxO, Planetside, SWG, Sword of the New World, Tabula Rasa, Vanguard, WWIIOL, WOW, Age of Conan
People who still play SOE games and support how they are corrupting the genre don't care. Smedley could break into their home and rape the family pet and they would defend it.
"Buried among those happy, average players was a small subset of the population—about five percent—who used the game for serious role playing and, according to Williams, "They are psychologically much worse off than the regular players." They belong to marginalized groups, like ethnic and religious minorities and non-heterosexuals, and tended to use the game as a coping mechanism. "
What a bunch of bullshit. So roleplayers are considered psychologically inferior to "normal" players according to these "scientist"?
Good job at furthering the great perception of gaming uninformed ( i.e. idiotic ) people already have, SOE.
Guess SOE better remove all their roleplaying servers for the betterment of mankind before everyone is exposed as the deviants they are.
thread is trdr However, just like facebook or myspace. Anything you say or upload to a public site is public property. There are people whore's faces are on billboards and posters and they never agreed to it, the image was taken off some social networking site.
That's completely not comparable. When you upload something to Myspace/facebook you know that it's viewable to anyone with an account unless you set something to private.
When you send a tell (which is even called "PRIVATE TELL" in EQ) you expect it to stay private no matter what and none of that info should be leaked in any way to third parties.
You don't put your CC card number on your facebook account do you? But it's not uncommon to give your CC card over a tell to your friend or partner for example, or to a GM or to anyone confidential. Is it a good idea? No, but it does happen and that's why this info needs to be protected.
And CC info is just an example, the fact alone that this info is private is enough reason to keep it that way.
that is absolutely disgusting what SOE did. lord only knows what type of data is on those logs that may or may not divulge certain aspects to a players identity and location. if that is the case this is truly a case for a high level lawsuit. this violates so many privacy laws its not even funny. to think i played eq2 off and on since 2004.typical fashion of SOE. fuck them. this reenforces my position on never using this services and games again.
As if they are going to contact people for anything in there also you do realize it didn't even show the characters names...
SOE is a corporation that has as their legal corporate headquarters as the state of California. Thus California has jurisdiction. California has some of the most stringent privacy laws in the U.S. Unless SOE took the step to comb through their logs and made sure that potentially private information was redacted, SOE is in allot of trouble. The EULA does not protect them from divulging potentially private data. That data includes medical information, social security information, and other information that may be protected otherwise. Far be it for me to write the civil complaint but the below EULA except provides no legal protection whatsoever when it comes to divulging private data to third parties.
The EULA only explains current law as it is when it comes to being required to hand over private data to government agencies that have obtained that data with the proper subpoena.
12. We cannot ensure that your private communications and other personally identifiable information will not be disclosed to third parties. For example, we may be forced to disclose information to the government or third parties under certain circumstances, or third parties may unlawfully intercept or access transmissions or private communications. Additionally, we can (and you authorize us to) disclose any information about you to private entities, law enforcement or other government officials as we, in our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate to investigate or resolve possible problems or inquiries. You agree that we may communicate with you via telephone, email and any similar technology for any purpose relating to the Game, the Software and any services or software which may in the future be provided by us or on our behalf.
that is absolutely disgusting what SOE did. lord only knows what type of data is on those logs that may or may not divulge certain aspects to a players identity and location. if that is the case this is truly a case for a high level lawsuit. this violates so many privacy laws its not even funny. to think i played eq2 off and on since 2004.typical fashion of SOE. fuck them. this reenforces my position on never using this services and games again.
As if they are going to contact people for anything in there also you do realize it didn't even show the characters names...
They are obviously able to identify people, since they are making assumptions on where they live and what nationality they have.
Obviously a lot of those conversations have names in them too. Don't tell me Sony shifted through 60TB of data and took out all the names. They didn't, they just handed over the raw logs, so they are full of names.
Massively is about 10 hours too late to report this, GG, they should pay me for bringing them news.
Pleeeeaase, giving away 60TB of personal data is just ridiculous, if this was a phone company they would be shutting their doors right now. SoE somehow gets away with a lot of stuff, but this is so illegal and violates so many privacy laws in so many countries that it's just beyong belief.
Privacy laws?
What the fuck are you on?
All the information they've given out is their propery since it's only information that has been taken from their property being EQ2. Pretty sure in that EULA you agree'd to there would be a clause somewhere.
+ 1 everyone that is posting on here saying that soe is stupid does not realize that not even there own character on everquest is theres it was at their rent from soe same goes with other developers like blizzard you do not have the rights to your logs or to sell or do anything withyour character then play it. And as ifthey are going to look at the personal data and track anyone down for anything with this are people mental its 60 TERA BITES there not going to find out whether or not jimmy has smoked pot and trace him down nor will they even if they find harrasment of any sorts which there will be obviously its an mmorpg and in mmos there are trolls.
that is absolutely disgusting what SOE did. lord only knows what type of data is on those logs that may or may not divulge certain aspects to a players identity and location. if that is the case this is truly a case for a high level lawsuit. this violates so many privacy laws its not even funny. to think i played eq2 off and on since 2004.typical fashion of SOE. fuck them. this reenforces my position on never using this services and games again.
As if they are going to contact people for anything in there also you do realize it didn't even show the characters names...
They are obviously able to identify people, since they are making assumptions on where they live and what nationality they have.
Obviously a lot of those conversations have names in them too. Don't tell me Sony shifted through 60TB of data and took out all the names. They didn't, they just handed over the raw logs, so they are full of names.
Massively is about 10 hours too late to report this, GG, they should pay me for bringing them news.
There's only 2 SoE locations for servers afaik. European and US.
So no, they didn't get this with server info, they found out where people live because either SoE told them or they found out through logs of IP addresses or personal info. SoE probably just gave all the account info.
There's only 2 SoE locations for servers afaik. European and US.
So no, they didn't get this with server info, they found out where people live because either SoE told them or they found out through logs of IP adresses or personal info. SoE probably just gave all the account info.
That still wouldn't explain how they are able to make these conclusions:
In that week, his team could detect over 2,000 players that became involved in partner relationships and about 2,500 who took part in trade interactions.
But distance had a much larger effect; players within 10 kilometers of each other were five times more likely to interact.
How do they know where player live exactly? Did they track down IP adresses or did SoE just gave all the account info?
That still wouldn't explain how they are able to make these conclusions:
In that week, his team could detect over 2,000 players that became involved in partner relationships and about 2,500 who took part in trade interactions.
But distance had a much larger effect; players within 10 kilometers of each other were five times more likely to interact.
How do they know where player live exactly? Did they track down IP adresses or did SoE just gave all the account info?
I could only think that when you sign up you address your location but I know and you know that they can't legally give away IP adresse's away thats not theres to give and or their authority. Unless a) The Eula mentions something like this in it which I doubt greatly.. or b) they don't give a fuck and will take the fine
That still wouldn't explain how they are able to make these conclusions:
In that week, his team could detect over 2,000 players that became involved in partner relationships and about 2,500 who took part in trade interactions.
But distance had a much larger effect; players within 10 kilometers of each other were five times more likely to interact.
How do they know where player live exactly? Did they track down IP adresses or did SoE just gave all the account info?
I could only think that when you sign up you address your location but I know and you know that they can't legally give away IP adresse's away thats not theres to give and or their authority. Unless a) The Eula mentions something like this in it which I doubt greatly.. or b) they don't give a fuck and will take the fine
10 kilometers = 6.21371192 miles
If they can get that close in proximity to your location, they are getting more than just chat logs and ingame actions.
Perhaps someone with a bit more knowledge than myself can answer this:
In order for you to interact with the game, the client has to continually connect and transfer data to and/or from your client to the server. It seems to me that somewhere in there, your IP address would eventually show in the transaction at some point, wouldn't it?
actually if you read well both the ToS and the Privacy statement you will notice the following
in the privacy statement they say that they can't and will not give any personal information to any third party unless you give them permission.
in the ToS it states that by accepting this ToS you agree to allow them to give ALL the personal information to third parties.
honestly, its bad business, and sadly enough most, of not all subscription based games have this. basically if we want to play ANY MMORPGs we would have to give our personnal data, and deal with the barrage of shit those third parties do with our info.
not all is bad though, like this research, nonetheless i would like to be asked (or at least told) before this transaction is made.
IMHO, the EULA/Tos/PA is unfair to the consumer. all they have to write is that they can change any part of this at any time and we are completely screwed. they change they EULA saying that they will give out all the credit card informaton to x third party (and due ot legalities they send you an email stating so. 1 hour later they do the transaction. 1 hour and 10 minutes later you log in to your email account and see that, you run to your account to cancel... but alas its to late, besides they have your data in their database.
actually if you read well both the ToS and the Privacy statement you will notice the following in the privacy statement they say that they can't and will not give any personal information to any third party unless you give them permission. in the ToS it states that by accepting this ToS you agree to allow them to give ALL the personal information to third parties. honestly, its bad business, and sadly enough most, of not all subscription based games have this. basically if we want to play ANY MMORPGs we would have to give our personnal data, and deal with the barrage of shit those third parties do with our info. not all is bad though, like this research, nonetheless i would like to be asked (or at least told) before this transaction is made.
IMHO, the EULA/Tos/PA is unfair to the consumer. all they have to write is that they can change any part of this at any time and we are completely screwed. they change they EULA saying that they will give out all the credit card informaton to x third party (and due ot legalities they send you an email stating so. 1 hour later they do the transaction. 1 hour and 10 minutes later you log in to your email account and see that, you run to your account to cancel... but alas its to late, besides they have your data in their database. (yeah this last part is me rambling on)
Which is exactly why California has such stringent laws in place for the consumer, and why SOEs' EULA/ToS wouldn't stand 5 minutes in a lawsuit in a case such as this.
And for these scientist to pronounce players as "psychologically inferior" and all that bullshit, that to me seems to indicate a medical basis for the research. And I sure don't recall giving SoE permission to use me, or my data, as a medical lab rat. And the laws regarding medical authorization are much more stringent than consumer protection laws.
Comments
hat alot of people dont understand is that many privacy laws are an inalienable right which means Eula's don't matter when it comes to most privacy issues they attempt to circumvent if anyone sues a company over some thing they did that's against the law the defense wont even bother showing the eula because its nothing Eula's and tos regarding privacy are nothing
so depending on what sort of data SOE gave away and weather everyone has enough money to sue them what Sony did is highly likely to be totally illegal
The problem is that soe has time and time again shown little to no regard for what you care about. They just do what they want, how they want and when they want.
It has gotten to the point where that when it is questioned "would soe possibly do ________" the answer is always yes. There just isn't a situation anymore where it is believable that they will let ethics or concern for their customers best interest stop them from doing anything.
The question is how can they be trusted.
Pleeeeaase, giving away 60TB of personal data is just ridiculous, if this was a phone company they would be shutting their doors right now. SoE somehow gets away with a lot of stuff, but this is so illegal and violates so many privacy laws in so many countries that it's just beyong belief.
Unless they are taking my account information (name, address, phone number, social security number, Credit card number, Mother's maiden name etc) I have no problem with it (thaaaaaaaaankyou).
thread is trdr
However, just like facebook or myspace. Anything you say or upload to a public site is public property. There are people whore's faces are on billboards and posters and they never agreed to it, the image was taken off some social networking site.
Sent me an email if you want me to mail you some pizza rolls.
Just read the EULA... SOE can do anything and you can't... It's even specifically mentioned that SOE is allowed to share your date with a 3rd party.
Way to go SOE!
*account canceled*
I do not know if people know about this but EULA's are a type of agreement called "Shrinkwrap Agreements". They are basically agreements that you agree to when you use a product or service. Historically, "Shrinkwrap Agreements" generally do not hold up in court because they contain clauses which no normal person would agree to in normal situations (agreement of a shrinkwrap generally does not stand as a normal situation because no formal contract was created between the client and the provider at the point of sale).
MMOs Played: I can no longer list them all in the 500 character limit.
I don't know which is more predictable, the fact that this happened, the fact that most people don't realize this could happen, or the omgsoesuxlol.
MMO games played or tested: EQ, DAoC, Archlord, Auto Assault, CoH, CoV, EQ2, EVE, Guild Wars, Hellgate: London, Linneage II, LOTRO, MxO, Planetside, SWG, Sword of the New World, Tabula Rasa, Vanguard, WWIIOL, WOW, Age of Conan
they give away chat logs and action performed in the game. not account info
People who still play SOE games and support how they are corrupting the genre don't care. Smedley could break into their home and rape the family pet and they would defend it.
digg.com/gaming_news/Science_gleans_60TB_of_behavior_data_from_Everquest_2_logs
Digg it.
"Buried among those happy, average players was a small subset of the population—about five percent—who used the game for serious role playing and, according to Williams, "They are psychologically much worse off than the regular players." They belong to marginalized groups, like ethnic and religious minorities and non-heterosexuals, and tended to use the game as a coping mechanism. "
What a bunch of bullshit. So roleplayers are considered psychologically inferior to "normal" players according to these "scientist"?
Good job at furthering the great perception of gaming uninformed ( i.e. idiotic ) people already have, SOE.
Guess SOE better remove all their roleplaying servers for the betterment of mankind before everyone is exposed as the deviants they are.
That's completely not comparable. When you upload something to Myspace/facebook you know that it's viewable to anyone with an account unless you set something to private.
When you send a tell (which is even called "PRIVATE TELL" in EQ) you expect it to stay private no matter what and none of that info should be leaked in any way to third parties.
You don't put your CC card number on your facebook account do you? But it's not uncommon to give your CC card over a tell to your friend or partner for example, or to a GM or to anyone confidential. Is it a good idea? No, but it does happen and that's why this info needs to be protected.
And CC info is just an example, the fact alone that this info is private is enough reason to keep it that way.
As if they are going to contact people for anything in there also you do realize it didn't even show the characters names...
SOE is a corporation that has as their legal corporate headquarters as the state of California. Thus California has jurisdiction. California has some of the most stringent privacy laws in the U.S. Unless SOE took the step to comb through their logs and made sure that potentially private information was redacted, SOE is in allot of trouble. The EULA does not protect them from divulging potentially private data. That data includes medical information, social security information, and other information that may be protected otherwise. Far be it for me to write the civil complaint but the below EULA except provides no legal protection whatsoever when it comes to divulging private data to third parties.
The EULA only explains current law as it is when it comes to being required to hand over private data to government agencies that have obtained that data with the proper subpoena.
12. We cannot ensure that your private communications and other personally identifiable information will not be disclosed to third parties. For example, we may be forced to disclose information to the government or third parties under certain circumstances, or third parties may unlawfully intercept or access transmissions or private communications. Additionally, we can (and you authorize us to) disclose any information about you to private entities, law enforcement or other government officials as we, in our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate to investigate or resolve possible problems or inquiries. You agree that we may communicate with you via telephone, email and any similar technology for any purpose relating to the Game, the Software and any services or software which may in the future be provided by us or on our behalf.
I smell a class action.
As if they are going to contact people for anything in there also you do realize it didn't even show the characters names...
They are obviously able to identify people, since they are making assumptions on where they live and what nationality they have.
Obviously a lot of those conversations have names in them too. Don't tell me Sony shifted through 60TB of data and took out all the names. They didn't, they just handed over the raw logs, so they are full of names.
Massively is about 10 hours too late to report this, GG, they should pay me for bringing them news.
Pleeeeaase, giving away 60TB of personal data is just ridiculous, if this was a phone company they would be shutting their doors right now. SoE somehow gets away with a lot of stuff, but this is so illegal and violates so many privacy laws in so many countries that it's just beyong belief.
Privacy laws?
What the fuck are you on?
All the information they've given out is their propery since it's only information that has been taken from their property being EQ2. Pretty sure in that EULA you agree'd to there would be a clause somewhere.
+ 1 everyone that is posting on here saying that soe is stupid does not realize that not even there own character on everquest is theres it was at their rent from soe same goes with other developers like blizzard you do not have the rights to your logs or to sell or do anything withyour character then play it. And as ifthey are going to look at the personal data and track anyone down for anything with this are people mental its 60 TERA BITES there not going to find out whether or not jimmy has smoked pot and trace him down nor will they even if they find harrasment of any sorts which there will be obviously its an mmorpg and in mmos there are trolls.
As if they are going to contact people for anything in there also you do realize it didn't even show the characters names...
They are obviously able to identify people, since they are making assumptions on where they live and what nationality they have.
Obviously a lot of those conversations have names in them too. Don't tell me Sony shifted through 60TB of data and took out all the names. They didn't, they just handed over the raw logs, so they are full of names.
Massively is about 10 hours too late to report this, GG, they should pay me for bringing them news.
Did you ever consider the location of the server?
There's only 2 SoE locations for servers afaik. European and US.
So no, they didn't get this with server info, they found out where people live because either SoE told them or they found out through logs of IP addresses or personal info. SoE probably just gave all the account info.
There's only 2 SoE locations for servers afaik. European and US.
So no, they didn't get this with server info, they found out where people live because either SoE told them or they found out through logs of IP adresses or personal info. SoE probably just gave all the account info.
I'm quite certain they did not give away any IPs cause that would result in a fine and when I say server location you don't really understand I mean like this http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/runescape/images/7/70/Serverlist.PNG
That still wouldn't explain how they are able to make these conclusions:
In that week, his team could detect over 2,000 players that became involved in partner relationships and about 2,500 who took part in trade interactions.
But distance had a much larger effect; players within 10 kilometers of each other were five times more likely to interact.
How do they know where player live exactly? Did they track down IP adresses or did SoE just gave all the account info?
That still wouldn't explain how they are able to make these conclusions:
In that week, his team could detect over 2,000 players that became involved in partner relationships and about 2,500 who took part in trade interactions.
But distance had a much larger effect; players within 10 kilometers of each other were five times more likely to interact.
How do they know where player live exactly? Did they track down IP adresses or did SoE just gave all the account info?
I could only think that when you sign up you address your location but I know and you know that they can't legally give away IP adresse's away thats not theres to give and or their authority. Unless a) The Eula mentions something like this in it which I doubt greatly.. or b) they don't give a fuck and will take the fine
That still wouldn't explain how they are able to make these conclusions:
In that week, his team could detect over 2,000 players that became involved in partner relationships and about 2,500 who took part in trade interactions.
But distance had a much larger effect; players within 10 kilometers of each other were five times more likely to interact.
How do they know where player live exactly? Did they track down IP adresses or did SoE just gave all the account info?
I could only think that when you sign up you address your location but I know and you know that they can't legally give away IP adresse's away thats not theres to give and or their authority. Unless a) The Eula mentions something like this in it which I doubt greatly.. or b) they don't give a fuck and will take the fine
10 kilometers = 6.21371192 miles
If they can get that close in proximity to your location, they are getting more than just chat logs and ingame actions.
Perhaps someone with a bit more knowledge than myself can answer this:
In order for you to interact with the game, the client has to continually connect and transfer data to and/or from your client to the server. It seems to me that somewhere in there, your IP address would eventually show in the transaction at some point, wouldn't it?
actually if you read well both the ToS and the Privacy statement you will notice the following
in the privacy statement they say that they can't and will not give any personal information to any third party unless you give them permission.
in the ToS it states that by accepting this ToS you agree to allow them to give ALL the personal information to third parties.
honestly, its bad business, and sadly enough most, of not all subscription based games have this. basically if we want to play ANY MMORPGs we would have to give our personnal data, and deal with the barrage of shit those third parties do with our info.
not all is bad though, like this research, nonetheless i would like to be asked (or at least told) before this transaction is made.
IMHO, the EULA/Tos/PA is unfair to the consumer. all they have to write is that they can change any part of this at any time and we are completely screwed. they change they EULA saying that they will give out all the credit card informaton to x third party (and due ot legalities they send you an email stating so. 1 hour later they do the transaction. 1 hour and 10 minutes later you log in to your email account and see that, you run to your account to cancel... but alas its to late, besides they have your data in their database.
(yeah this last part is me rambling on)
Which is exactly why California has such stringent laws in place for the consumer, and why SOEs' EULA/ToS wouldn't stand 5 minutes in a lawsuit in a case such as this.
And for these scientist to pronounce players as "psychologically inferior" and all that bullshit, that to me seems to indicate a medical basis for the research. And I sure don't recall giving SoE permission to use me, or my data, as a medical lab rat. And the laws regarding medical authorization are much more stringent than consumer protection laws.
strange none of the usual soe defenders arent piling in on this thread....