RedZone HUD Forced To Ask to Reveal Alt Accounts
by Alphaville Herald on 25/02/11 at 1:40 pm
by Justine Babii
On July 30 of last year, a user known as Helena asked the SLUniverse forums the following question:
“I would just like to ask who is truly concerned about this product on Xstreet now more than ever. Please Lets not turn this into a big Slandering Debate, or a Flame, or /B/ Comments, but a real topic about who does, or does not like it.”
The ‘product’ she referred to was RedZone, and in both the subject line and her follow-up question, Helena clearly explained that RedZone might be a problem for SL users because it had the potential to reveal people’s alternate or alt accounts.
RedZone Scanner
Helena was way ahead of the SL curve on what a hot button issue this would become, as discussion about RedZone and its new arch nemesis GreenZone has been burning up the Second Life blogs and forums for the past month.
The earliest replies to Helena’s query provide us with a classic snapshot of Second Life Culture, by the way. It took only 13 replies before a completely unrelated Lolcat picture was posted, and two of those replies consisted only of smiley animations. The response that got the most votes of agreement between the original question and the Lolcat was “Don’t Know, Don’t Care”
Eventually the reality of what RedZone could do sunk in, and 131 pages of replies later, Helena’s question seems to be answered- Second Life residents are unhappy with what RedZone has done to the landscape.
RedZone Screen shot
Fast forward to today, Friday, February 25, and you find a different world indeed. Just today, RedZone creator and spokesman zFire Xue has sent out a new version of his zRZ Hud which should assuage the privacy concerns of those made nervous by RedZone owners’ ability to scan avatars and summon a list of that person’s alleged alts. The newest version of the zRZ Hud will ask permission of those people who you seek to scan, just as the various vampire roleplay huds seek consent from those being bitten.
In Xue’s words, the move was made after negotiations with Linden Labs to address resident concerns. The following is quoted from the Mad Scientists, Inc Forums:
Hello RedZone owners.
After talking with Linden Labs over the past month we have reached an agreement.
Effective now and retroactively the RedZone system will request Consent to display alt name information.
LL policy will reflect this change by tomorrow the 25th.
The zRZ HUD will now request consent much like a bloodlines bite.
The zRZ Website now offers a system to send an IM to request consent for a zF RedZone Alt Background check.
The system is already in place, new functions and consent methods will be offered as we discover how best to implement this feature.
Linden Labs has been good enough to suggest many ideas that settled on this one.
Alt names can still be viewed to settle disputes, run security background checks etc. (With Consent)
Please see http://isellsl.ath.cx/checkconsentinfo.php for more.The RedZone system has been, and always will be current with SecondLife(tm) terms of service.
I would like to thank Linden Labs for working with RedZone and providing enough time for RedZone to make these changes.
Best Regards,
zFire XuePS: Everything is still logged as before, everything still works as before.
Only now to view the alts you need consent.
Alts are still banable if they are related to a new user you do not want on your land.
Alts of people you banned are still banned, alts of copybots are still banned, alts of anyone you have banned are still going to be banned, just not named.
For those unfamiliar with this tale, in a nutshell the RedZone system is a security device that land owners can use to scan anyone who wanders into range of the RedZone device. The scanner takes advantage of the fact that Second Life’s streaming media option sends http requests from a user’s IP, and then ties that avatar name to that IP address in a database. Should any future requests from that IP address come from a different avatar, that new avatar is assumed to be an altenate or “alt” account of the original avatar that used that IP address.
RedZone Ad
Land owners with RedZone could then ban all avatars from a certain IP address. Store owners could catch not only the copybot, but the avatar that was simultaneously logged on issuing commands. This is the theory. The practice, as it turns out, was far different and it involves a Hud.
With landowners and shopkeepers buying RedZone and keeping it in place- under the radar and on their land for months before the average user caught on, the database of avatars and alts grew and grew. Then, RedZone released a Hud that would allow owners not only the ability to remotely turn on and off their RedZone device, but also to scan any avatars within 96m of themselves and see if that avatar had any alts in the system.
It was open season for alt outing, and the Second Life blogs went crazy.
On February 12, Second Life user Melita Magic posted a message in the Second Life discussion forums with the suggestion that she would like to be banned from all lands and shops that use RedZone, as she doesn’t intend to “spend a dime of my Linden dollar, or a second of my precious time on your shop, sim, land, roleplay zone or wherever you have this thing.” Melita went on to write a creed for the movement:
"I pledge not to use avatar scanners, which collate avatar names with IP and other personal information. I pledge not to support sims or stores that do." (Please consider adding this to your sigline or profile.)
Three hundred and thirty three replies later, the discussion goes on, though much of its energy has dispersed into several other threads about RedZone menace.
Greenzone
Come January, the Second Life community was in arms and ready to do battle. Scripters combined forces to create GreenZone and other tools to detect the RedZone scanner and advise residents to take evasive action. A Jira suggestion that RedZone violated the TOS swelled the ranks of voters and might prove to be the one bug report that finally gets the majority of SL users to understand the Jira system.
2 L$ Green Zone Sign
GreenZone is given away for free. But with this scandal, sadly, have come a number of opportunistic Second Lifers looking to make a dollar or two in the wake of RedZone. One service offers to protect your alts for L$1,200 while another outfit is setting textures you can use to advertise your land as RedZone free for L$2. RedZone itself has been, at least according to some of the blogs, an extremely profitable venture (think $17 US x 20,000+ units sold profitable). The damage it has caused to the trust that users have in their virtual world, however, may prove incalculable.
hide my alt
In the end, it was not the anti-griefer or anti-copybot usage that riled people, as those seem very secondary or tertiary to the issue, but rather the use of the scanner to detect people’s alts that got SL up in arms. The primary issue here is privacy, which, according Dusan Writer’s interview with LL CEO Rod Humble, is also in line with the Labs’current way of thinking;
Said Mr. Humble:
“It’s not unlike the persona I portray on Facebook I suppose. I mean, I’m very deliberate about what I post on Facebook. It’s a persona. I’m not sure it’s a construct, but it’s certainly an aspect of me.
Now, Second Life lets you really extend those dimensions, the ways you can show yourself.
I don’t want to get all geeky about it, but I sort of see this day coming when there’s a formalization of identity that happens. We haven’t had the tools before to formalize our broken up bits of identity.
See, there’s the me who goes to school meetings with my kids and that’s a very well established identity. And there’s the me who plays shooter games online and I don’t want those separate identities to mix up. It’s not appropriate.
We can increasingly go deep on each element of identity and they become more valuable and I can’t help thinking that if we formalize the structures around those identities and have the tools to do that it might actually change us – it might change the person.
The identity system itself influences the person.
From the sounds of it, the new RedZone limits will defang it to the point of the vampire huds. This is a good thing in my estimation, and something that should have been done in July when Helena was bringing this to the attention of the SLUniverse. If a user’s privacy is truly important to the Lab, then this exploit should have been dealt with ages ago, and if that’s not possible with current technological or budgetary limits, then a closer eye needs to be kept on groups and businesses that seek to exploit it.
There have been rampant stories on both sides of this issue, from “RedZone has been pulled from SL, no longer available!” to “The founder of GreenZone has been banned!” Taking RedZone from the superspy level to the vampire script level will be a good start in restoring peace to a troubled SL community.
Mad Scientists Store – Home of RedZone
The biggest problem remaining, aside from the inherent weakness in how SL does streaming media, is that the alt genie was already out of the bottle by the time that LL and the Second Life Community was aware of the problem, and the speculation and finger pointing that resulted from linking IP addresses to avatars could create ripples that will have effect long after RedZone agrees to play nice.
I believe that the security hole that is streaming media access could ultimately prove to be the black swan event that kills off interest in this virtual world once and for all. One bellwether I see here is influential blogger and longtime resident Ann Otoole who concluded her post on the topic by providing links to virtual worlds “where this type behavior is not tolerated.” There are many virtual worlds now, and if Rod Humble wants to keep us as paying customers, we will expect some service.
It would be bad enough if RedZone provided a rock solid list of alts. As it is, however, RedZone provided a list of alts based on IP address, which is not a reliable measure of identity.
This creates a climate of uncertainty and mistrust and fear above and beyond the normal paranoia and hall of mirrors feeling that Second Life and the culture of using alts to stalk people engenders under normal circumstances.
In my case for example, I purchased a RedZone system for the purpose of writing this article and fully expected that my alt, Debbie Delight, would be listed as my doppelganger. I created Debbie as part of an article I was writing for SLNN.com to test the new avatar creation system put forth by OnRez back in the day, and it was no secret that Debbie and I were the same people.
However, RedZone had a different view of me and listed a dozen or so other people as my alts, including the Herald’s Timothy Morpork, and my one actual alt, Debbie Delight was NOT on my list of alts. This quite freaked me out until I realized that our commonality was the vpn proxy server Jaime Wheeler had set up for the bloggers of SexySecond.com, for which we had all written.
If you and another Second Life avatar ever shared a wifi spot, or a workplace, or, on amassive scale- a proxy server, RedZone probably has them as your alts.
Regardless of the accuracy of the data, the Second Life community was becoming torn at the seams by the explosive revelations of the ability to scan people and discover their alts. It was my sad experience to be taunted about my alts in the comment section of this blog by Marx Dudek, or someone claiming to be Marx Dudek.
On Feb 15th, Marx Dudek wrote the following on the Herald comment section, in reply to a story I wrote about child avatars hitting on my friends:
Justine, my alt detector system tells me you do indeed have some friends you should write about.
This was an eye opener to me, because by that point I was already investigating RedZone, but I didn’t think that there would be people this low. I knew by then that my SexySecond coworkers were listed as my alts but I never suspected that anyone would actually think I could be all of those incredibly diverse peoples.
I also knew that just a week of so earlier, Marx had written a blog post in which he had lamented that the creator of RedZone wouldn’t vet the people purchasing it.
Marx said in his post, “There’s no vetting process on the part of the creator to make certain that this is only purchased by upstanding content designers wishing to protect their intellectual property, so that it won’t fall into the hands of those wishing to use it with malicious intent”. It is ironic that he – or someone using his name – did to me just that which he bemoaned.
In any case, effective today, if someone slimy wants to snoop around your avatar, their hud will have to ask your permission. That is, until the next scripter comes along and tracks the IP addresses of request to SL’s streaming media system to make an alt tracking tool. Of course if you wander onto land that has RedZone and you haven’t been properly warned by GreenZone, the landowner can see your alts.
To conclude this, I would like to use the incredibly prescient words of SLUniverse’s Helena, from July of 2010. Her ending question is pretty much what I want to know from Herald readers:
So in general, who doesn’t like this system now, because anyone can find out their alts, anyone feel that this isn’t right, and violates their Second Life rights?
Let me add, what will we do about it going forward?
Huntress Unya
Feb 25th, 2011
The biggest issue is that the changes done to Redzone are purely cosmetic. Yes, the system will now ask if you consent to the harvesting of your IP, but 1. it only asks ONCE per IP, so the person sitting in the Starbucks yesterday may have consented and doomed you to exposure. 2. the collected database remains in zFire’s hands, and although he is not showing the contents to all buyers of Redzone any more, he has promoted his 10 closest fanboys to “administrators” who can freely see (and likely share) the data. So sadly the fight continues…
Marx Dudek
Feb 25th, 2011
Justine, the comment on that article was not from me.
I have made my opinions on RedZone and alt detection more than abundantly clear to those who have followed the thread on SL Universe. If you had read the more than 140 pages of the thread, I believe you would have had at least some suspicion that the person who left that comment wasn’t me.
And so, I’ve discovered this morning that I’ve had my reputation smeared twice – once by an advocate of privacy-invasion who posted falsely under my name, and again this morning by someone whom – given that they were aware of the voluminous thread on the subject on SL Universe, would have at least suspected that someone was engaging in a hatchet job.
I am disappointed that you didn’t take a moment to contact me directly inworld – you had my name, after all – to ask me if those words were mine.
The purpose of an journalist is to investigate. Particularly in this environment. Part of investigation is contacting sources.
I’m not upset, I quite rather expected this to happen.
Why don’t you contact me inworld? I’d love to talk with you.
Marx Dudek
Feb 25th, 2011
PS: You got my gender wrong, as well.
Coyote Momiji
Feb 25th, 2011
What brilliant work, Justine. You went ahead and wrote under the assumption that it really was Marx, when simply /asking her/ (yes, her, not him) would have cleared up a lot.
I would hope you’d be big enough to offer a retraction and apology on the front page of the Herald – but I won’t be holding my breath.
Nickola Martynov
Feb 25th, 2011
Thank you for the well-written and informative article on Redzone, Justine.
We are learning to be paranoid about hiding our identity, revealing our identity and having our identity stolen in an environment where all of those things are possible.
Now the question becomes: how do we deal with that?
Pheron Ware
Feb 25th, 2011
Justine, getting your sources wrong is plain bad journalism. At least correct what you write about Marx! Currently this completely devalues an otherwise well-balanced article.
Marx Dudek
Feb 25th, 2011
The article itself is a good introduction into the controversy.
I’m upset that this allegation was made. But this isn’t about me, and I don’t want people beating Justine up over this. I’ve had the opportunity to speak up in my own defense, and I’ve done so.
Ajax Manatiso
Feb 25th, 2011
RedZone just plain doesn’t work and using IP addresses to identify anyone is pointless. ISPs use Port Address Translation (PAT) to group several hundred users into a single IP address but using a connection identifier in the packets to distinguish between users. Websites and LL actually use your network adapters MAC address as this is persistant, doesn’t change when you reboot (or reset your router) as with IP addresses. and is one of a kind. Hackers can still spoof your MAC addresses and make it totally impossible to identify your alts — but IP address is 100 per cent unreliable. RedZone is counting on an old, old, old internet myth to make money. Its hogwash and the panic just plays into their hands regarding their scam product.
Scylla Rhiadra
Feb 25th, 2011
@Ajax
You are certainly correct on two counts: the IP method is not reliable or accurate, and the panic is indeed playing into zFire’s hands, especially as it *seems* to confirm the efficacy of the device. But then, this whole thing has been about marketing to fear and panic from the very beginning. Have you SEEN his promotional video on YouTube? It’s like a scene from Night of the Living Dead: copybotters and griefers are EVERYWHERE!!!!
The problem is that the ineffectiveness of ZedZone means that innocent people ARE getting nailed by it. If the thing actually worked as it was supposed to, targeting only griefers and copybots, we’d be lauding rather than condemning it.
The panic isn’t coming from griefers who are afraid that their days of spamming parcels are over; they already know how to get around the system. It’s coming from the oridinary resident who either has good reasons for not wanting her or his alts outed, or from those who may be *falsely* associated with someone else’s “alts.”
The other issue is, of course, the data scraping going on here. God knows what zFire will do with this apparently immense database that some residents are paying good money to help him compile, but you can bet your boots that it won’t be to OUR benefit . . . and that it will make HIM lots of money, one way or another.
Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia
Feb 25th, 2011
A little history of RedZone:
I took on zFire Xue as my head of security years ago when Whitmyre Island was having some growing pains. Long story short: Sera Korea shut down for a while due to some greifer war and a lot of Koreans wound up in Whitmyre, turning our quiet academic sandbox into a bustling center of activity almost overnight. This was great, we welcomed the refugees with open arms as much as we possibly could, but many Koreans brought their drama with them when they came. We were having problems keeping order in the sandbox for a while until trial and error resulted in what we have today (we’re the most trafficked RL university sandbox for going on 4 years now).
zFire turned out to be the best security person anybody could ask for. He never looses his temper or goes on personal vendettas. He’s a great guy and a brilliant programmer. The attacks in the sandbox kept getting worse as our concurancy grew, though. Something had to be done, and expanding our security team was a difficult task. It’s not easy to find good security people. zFire started experimenting with automating our security and RedZone was the result.
The point of RedZone is not to detect alts. The point of RedZone is to stop a greifer attack dead in it’s tracks before it disturbs builders who are just trying to peacefully work on projects or chat with some friends. To be honest, I’ve never used the alt function on the RedZone, and I’ve been using it longer than anybody. It’s just a fun gimmick.
As far as the accuracy of the alt detection, zFire has gone to great lengths to avoid false positives, it’s actually pretty rare to get one. It’s more common to get a false negative. It takes more than one scan to connect two accounts like that.
Justine, you should contact zFire about your false positives, tell him about what happened, he’ll fix it.
As far as LL closing this “privacy issue”: You know that web sites do the same thing when you surf the internet, right? You can either connect SL to traditional online content or you can keep your alts secret. You can’t have it both ways. LL making zFire turn off RedZone’s alt detection is just a band-aid until somebody publishes some PHP and LSL code to let people set up their own personal alt tracking systems. This isn’t anything that Modular Systems didn’t do, the only difference is that instead of hoarding the data like Modular Systems did, zFire is giving all of his users access to the data. This makes RedZone’s alt tracking feature much more ethical than Modular Systems alt tracking feature was.
Darien Caldwell
Feb 25th, 2011
“The point of RedZone is not to detect alts.”
Then why make a hud to scan and report alts? ZFire did this himself. You can’t say it’s not the point when thats the primary function of the device (the hud).
The article is still very unclear about what the change means. The way I read it, the HUD now ‘asks’. but the Scanner still shows alts. If that’s true, nothing has been solved at all. *Nobody* should be able to see alts, nobody at all.
Senban Babii
Feb 25th, 2011
@Justine Babii
” It took only 13 replies before a completely unrelated Lolcat picture was posted”
Damn straight :3
“I believe that the security hole that is streaming media access could ultimately prove to be the black swan event that kills off interest in this virtual world once and for all.”
Between JLUgate, the Emerald fiasco and Redzone, my interest in SL was killed off. LL proved that they didn’t give a flying sh*t about resident privacy and security. They don’t deserve our custom or our respect.
And what about the existing database? Is there an option to be retroactively excluded from that list? Is there the opportunity for residents to see what data is being held about them and to be given the opportunity to correct faulty data or request it to be removed? You know, I reckon I already know the answer to these questions?
Oh well, it could have been great, it really could and for a time, it was.
Can someone invite me to the “Dance On The Ashes” party? I don’t think it should be long.
Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia
Feb 25th, 2011
Darien: Pick up the HUD sometime, or check out the feature list, you’ll see that alt tracking is not the primary function of the HUD at all. That HUD has dozens of features that have nothing to do with alts.
The HUD was made to eliminate the need to leave SL to go to a web page to use RedZone to block people in the event of a big greifer attack. The HUD will let you ban and unban people from your land when you are not there, even if the person being banned or unbanned is not there either. It also lets you access the community watch functions and the automatic security settings for your land. All of this also allows you to ban people by IP, which is invaluable to anybody who deals with security on a regular basis. The HUD makes the RedZone functions as easy use as the built-in security features of SL.
Scylla Rhiadra
Feb 25th, 2011
“This isn’t anything that Modular Systems didn’t do, the only difference is that instead of hoarding the data like Modular Systems did, zFire is giving all of his users access to the data. This makes RedZone’s alt tracking feature much more ethical than Modular Systems alt tracking feature was.”
I’m sorry, how is publishing data that can potentially link alts to RL identities by associating avatars via IP addresses “much more ethical” than keeping that information private? The logic here confounds me: the more people who are allowed to violate your privacy, the more “ethical” the person exposing you is?
And how, in particular, is restricting access to those willing to shell out L$3,999 “much more ethical”? I’ve no doubt that this is excellent business sense — but it’s “ethical” to charge for the privilege of accessing someone else’s private information? And how do you reconcile this restriction of information to paying customers, with your suggestion that it is more “ethical” not to “hoard” it?
Really, with a sense of “ethics” like yours, your talents are wasted here: you should be working for Facebook.
Scylla Rhiadra
Feb 25th, 2011
@Bubblesort
“Pick up the HUD sometime, or check out the feature list, you’ll see that alt tracking is not the primary function of the HUD at all.”
Given that this has been one of the main bones of contention about Redzone, why hasn’t this option simply been removed then? After all, it’s not its “primary function”?
Could it be that, “primary function” or not, alt detection is one of the main selling points of the system?
Emperor Norton hears a who?
Feb 25th, 2011
Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia @ “All of this also allows you to ban people by IP, which is invaluable to anybody who deals with security on a regular basis. ”
Nice hand wave. You can do a hell of a lot more with an IP address than just ban someone from your second life sanbox.
meg
Feb 25th, 2011
you tell me your alts, i tell you mine, else f off
Ciaran Laval
Feb 25th, 2011
You really should withdraw your comment about Marx Dudek.
@Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia the comments on the Redzone forum from Zfire suggest he’s far from a nice guy, throwing out ideas on how to get around the issues, including suggesting that if people don’t respond within sixty seconds it will be assumed they’ve consented, those are not the actions of a nice person.
Scylla Rhiadra
Feb 25th, 2011
@Ciaran
Actually, my favourite suggestion being mooted by zFire there is publishing the names of “alts” . . . with the first letter removed.
Can someone remind me again that alt disclosure is not one of the most important functions of this device?
hobo kelly
Feb 25th, 2011
I hope most people here turned their Streaming Media garbage off years ago. If you want to listen to dorky parcel sounds then you pay the price by giving up your RL information.
Really, do you all need LL to tell you these things? Don’t you realize how servers log your IP addresses? And media servers are not under LL control, they are under the parcel owners control. That should be obvious to anyone that has ever set up parcel sound.
so maybe redZone is just thinning the herd in a somewhat darwinistic fashion
Lordy
Feb 25th, 2011
This device is being used at that skin fair that is going on now. So if you went, you are now logged into that database.
Yep
Feb 25th, 2011
I have read that viewers like phoenix and Cool viewer are putting some type of url block that lets a person decide if they wish to allow the media to go through or block it. If half of SL is using phoenix by now, that is half of SL that will be blocking redzone.
Bambam
Feb 25th, 2011
I can see the upside of the scanner for some but yet there is a dark side that many are not aware of. I have seen more then a handful of people leave SL never to log in again under any of there ALTs or main. People that spent wads of L$ in SL all gone. I really wonder if the economic benefits out weigh the negatives on this.
Keep in mind redZone with all its good intentions has given us a tool to grief with that has been well exploited. Most don’t realize what can be done with your IP address or the ability to harass unsuspecting people because of it. But I guess it is no less then the info you give to Facebook or the apps used to track you on it.
Judge Dread
Feb 25th, 2011
“It was my sad experience to be taunted about my alts in the comment section of this blog by Marx Dudek, or someone claiming to be Marx Dudek.”
“It is ironic that he – or someone using his name – did to me just that which he bemoaned.”
Personally, I would find it hard to believe that someone would bother to impersonate Marx Dudek, so I’ll calling shenanigans on his bawwwwww.
But as for the journalism part, I’d say she covered it in the above quotes, and as one of the points of this whole RedZone thing is that now online identities are even more blurred, it fits together nicely imho.
I say it’s well done Justine.
Dave Bell
Feb 25th, 2011
The way LL are stuffing their website with FACEBOOK “like” buttons, they don’t care about what happens to IP addresses. And now they want us to read profile though the web, while using the viewer.
It’s simple enough, and an inescapable part of using internet protocols. When there’s a graphic on a web page, a request has to be sent to the server storing that graphic. That request sends your IP address, and a chunk of data about what you’re doing–the “HTTP-referer”. Maybe your viewer cache is some protection, but those FACEBOOK buttons are loaded by a script.
If you’re using the latest iterations of Viewer 2, every time you look at a profile, you tell Marc Zuckerberg, and anyone he cares to sell the data to, that you’re currently active in SL. And maybe more. It depends what the code Linden Lab use is doing, and, just as with Emerald, there’s no real way of knowing that the Open Source codebase contains all the secrets.
I’m uncomfortable about this. It doesn’t feel good when a company you’re dealing with is giving you reasons for paranoia.
hobo kelly
Feb 26th, 2011
LL has been doing everything it can to cut down on IP (internet protocol) traffic to all of its users. So forcing you to view their webserver to get someones profile means that data does not have to come from their asset server. Playing around with how much stuff rezzes in your viewer for you to see, how fast scenery will move, how successful sim crossings will be, the list goes on and on. Its been happening for over 2 years now. Suck more and more power out of each and every sim, cut down every way possible the data flow out of the asset servers, load more and more junk into your computer that is running the client, its all making for a worse and worse SL experience. Its especially bad at peak times when sim crossings become a 50/50 chance (or less) and everything runs so slow that many scripts start to malfunction. Did the population of SL triple lately? no. Has LL been on a rampage to DOWNSIZE SL lately? yes.
get out while the getting is good, thats what I tell myself
JB
Feb 26th, 2011
@Scylla
The other issue is, of course, the data scraping going on here. God knows what zFire will do with this apparently immense database that some residents are paying good money to help him compile, but you can bet your boots that it won’t be to OUR benefit . . . and that it will make HIM lots of money, one way or another.
——
zFire has intentions to continue this whether it is banned from SL, or not. He posted this earlier today in the RZ forums…He has since deleted this portion of his reponse. The original is visible in a screenshot over on SLU, pg 145.
If RedZone is banned, I will be forced to privatize the RedZone service with a service that operated outside of Secondlife, and therefore unrestricted by the above secondlife policy. Without that secondlife policy alt information will be shared with everyone. LSL scripts would be provided free of charge for people to copy paste into their own prims, and RedZone devices would continue to remain in SecondLife. Such a website would accept paypal instead of linden dollars for membership. I don’t want that, nor do you. I prefer to operate with Linden Labs, not against them. I like Linden Labs, they are my friends and I try to improve Secondlife by improving security.
Yep
Feb 26th, 2011
lol I saw Tiger on another forum. Go getem Tiger
Back to the topic
My worry about alts being matched is not my main concern with redzone, it is the way he gets his information.
So today mr redzone is harvesting alts and peoples RL locations by sending urls or cookies through the SL viewer onto your computer. What happens when his next cookie has keyloggers or other malware designed to crack your computer? LL should learn from this exploit and fix it like you would any other problems with security.
hobo kelly
Feb 26th, 2011
I think there may be a threat beyond streaming media giving you away, and that would be “html on a prim”. When you encounter a prim in SL that has “html on a prim” on it displaying some image that comes from someones private web server. I do not know if they get the SL IP address when you encounter it and force a serve of its contents, or if you get the SL avatar’s IP address. I bet its the SL avatar IP that you get on your server logs when someone encounters your “html on a prim”. so that may be another way they get you. or something..
MystreLoverly Wrigglesworth
Feb 26th, 2011
I have to admit, as soon as I heard that the skin fair had a redzone scanner on sit, I did not go. I’ve been avoiding several places I used to frequent often due to redzone being on those sims, and even told my current landlord that if that system became active I was leaving and not recommending their services to anyone. As someone who’s already had to deal with stalkers in SL under previous incarnations I find this tool to be nothing but a stalkers wet dream.
And for those who think that redzone is a good thing, I’m guessing that your the type of person who thinks that someone comming into your own RL home at any time to inspect anything and everything you own as well as possibley mounting camera’s to watch your every move is a good thing as well.
I enjoy my privacy and this tool has gone far beyond what was (I’m assuming) was a noble intention… and zFire’s noted and posted responses are showing that he no longer really cares about anyone but himself and his ego.
Keep up the good work Justine
SecondLife erupts in outright war « ladysakai
Feb 26th, 2011
[...] The Alphaville Herald [...]
lolol
Feb 27th, 2011
To funny!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqW0A0PLhQ0
Yep
Feb 27th, 2011
lol where is Glenn Beck with
“you know who else liked redzone”
Obvious Schism
Feb 27th, 2011
Auf Wiedersehen RedZone
Gundel Gaukelei
Feb 27th, 2011
There is another CDS, exploiting the same information leak? Oh really?
General Drama
Feb 28th, 2011
Yep,
It goes without saying that Hitler would love RedZone. It’s tautological. It’s better than phrenology at exposing enemies of the state, as well as turning innocent people into convenient faux enemies of the state when true enemies are not available to flog.
It’s a new rule of the internet: There are always griefers griefing something. If there arent, they will be invented, to perpetuate one’s sense of victimhood and entitlement.
Jingerlee
Feb 28th, 2011
This was the only line of defence we have ever had in secondlife, if you have never operated a club, with 30 x-disgruntled staff you probably have no need for such a device…but for 3 yrs I have battled 100′s of alts from most of x staffers..only to wreak havok on my business and take my customers elsewhere, You can not report them on a guess…after fighting the fight for 3 yrs I finally gave up..closed my business down..no win situation..no help from anywhere to solve the problem…bots everywhere too!
The best solution would be for linden lab to stop all alt accounts period, except for one additional one for emergencies then it should be posted clearly in the name tag or the profile who the main alt account is..as it is anyone can make as many alts as they desire and return time after time. Took me 2 yrs to find redzone..sad i didnt find it sooner…and to me yes now it is rendered useless..I dont need it to secure my place..but while your at it you need to remove all the avatar online stautus gadgets too..as they detect you are online without your consent and all the spy devices and gadgets that has and is being sold in secondlife, clocks, bug scripts etc..oh and dont forget the cam on the camera that lets people peep in on you. or under your dress…without your consent….and dont forget the radar…it tracks you without your consent….there is no good reason for having a bunch of alt accounts…most are used as griefers and to trick and deceive…so why should they have privacy rights? Thats giving the criminals the ok to keep harrassing as it always has been..sighs..this is getting as bad as real life
Popular SL News During February 2011 « Daniel Voyager's Blog
Feb 28th, 2011
[...] RedZone HUD Forced To Ask to Reveal Alt Accounts > 24th [...]
Ava
Feb 28th, 2011
Content notwithstanding, “Eventually the reality of what RedZone could do sunk in…”
The word is “sank.” It is the past tense of sink. “Sunk” is past participle.
Who the hell is the editor around here? Helen Keller?
Kelsey Grammer's Grammar
Mar 1st, 2011
Ava- Actually both are correct. You’re right that sank is usually more correct, but when you strip the modifying clause “of what RedZone could do” out and are left with:
“The reality sunk in”
You see she’s actually chosen the better form of the verb.
http://books.google.com/books?id=2yJusP0vrdgC&lpg=PA851&ots=nYyXqhDZU4&dq=merriam%20webster%20usage%20dictionary%20sink&pg=PA851#v=onepage&q=merriam%20webster%20usage%20dictionary%20sink&f=false
Both “sank” and “sunk” are correct for the past tense of “sink.” The two are listed without comment in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.) and Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th ed.), which means they’re considered standard English.
http://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2010/01/honey-i-sunk-the-boat.html
Tessa Zalivstok
Apr 27th, 2011
This isn’t a minor matter. A stalker RedZoned me early this year and published my alts. Not a biggie. But during the same week all my emails and all the bank accounts of my (RL) family members were attacked. Draw your own conclusions.
The question of privacy, always an issue on SL, has become explosive. Once you could untick all your contacts and enjoy a few moments’ privacy. Now since Emerald and Phoenix even that respite is no longer available. As a lawyer it seems to me that this is skating on very thin ice as far as several countries’ privacy laws are concerned. Personally I can’t hack it and have taken my business elsewhere.