Head up: Listeners and Land Scanners

A couple of people I know discovered a few transparent objects in or near their property...generally small cubes that come up as scripted.

Frequently, these objects are listeners; that is, they transmit open chat to the owner of the item. They are illegal pretty much anywhere and the lindens will handle them immediately, I've seen this numerous times. In fact, many people extend the object to other people's land and ensure enough of the object/root prim is on their land (or a friends) so that the object can not be removed if it is discovered by anybody that doesn't have control of the land. You're basically helpless until a Linden comes and takes it out.

One use that is well known is to scan no-visual chat channels. If you run a game, just imagine how evil this could be. Yes, you can randomize channels and so on, encrypt data, whatever, but that does not remove the fact that it is a really ugly attack.

Land scanners are another matter. People set up devices to scan land for avatar and other kinds of data. This data is frequently sifted through for the benefit of the owner; traffic, objects, you name it. This data could easily allow the owner to make assumptions about popular areas, dwell, and whatnot. Who knows.

If somebody does not have my calling card, for instance, or I have deleted it because of an issue, I don't want that person seeing if I'm online. A land scanner looking for avatars could inform somebody of that. Sort of an early warning system.

I would say the land scanner thing is as invasive as anything else. I do not want people collecting data about traffic, objects, whatever, from my land without my permission. There may be things and objects on my land I hide from general view and I don't want people just being able to scan for them from the borders of my land. I personally don't care, but now that I've identified several of the objects involved in these practices, and their owners, I think it's time to say that this practice should not be considered to have implied consent just because you're not collecting chat.

Are people using this stuff maliciously? I don't know, but from what I know of SL, I'd say that at least a handful of people might be, somehow someway.

If anybody would like a script that scans for different classes of objects and will reveal the name and location of it, even if invis, find me in game and I will give you one. I use them extensively and constantly find little invisible objects on my land with running scripts.

You can also hit CTL ALT T to turn on highlighting. This will reveal invisible objects with a red cloudy shade. It's a good idea to turn off ground rendering in debug so that burying one won't fool you.

Returning objects and no build is a good thing too, but does not defend against things that use the partly-off-land grief or something that is scanning your land from the border.

Heads up.

Why not turn on auto-return?

What was the concensus on these things? Do they create a ton of lag or not? Last I remember, someone was going to test them out.

"Returning objects and no build is a good thing too, but does not defend against things that use the partly-off-land grief or something that is scanning your land from the border."

The Lindens will indeed remove a listener even if it can not be auto returned, and I believe the owner will get a strong warning. Repeated offenses no doubt could lead to suspension.

Tcoz... any chance you can drop me one? I can't get IW just now, but would find this particularly useful.