Get Me Off That Key List

Oh thanks Rathe... looks like they're still following!

Lindens could be reading this right now... GETTING MY AV KEY. @_@

If my name being on that list was the reason why after being afk, I returned to a screen filling picture of a near naked man advertising 'chippendale' services at hen nights, then I too want to be taken off the list. I also continually get sent a tp to some club or other but imagine that may be because they are going through the alphabet.

I am most amused by the fact that Ulrika hasn't replied to this thread.

Take me off the list!

Alexa

Nah. Those are good old fashioned spam/griefing campaigns. Just going through a list of people online. No keylists involved.

So here's a free idea to whoever wants it - I have 100 L$ that says that not only has someone here already had this idea, but that they're actively pursuing it...

Some company starts collecting all users' keys. This company then builds a little vendor add-in script that they give away for free. What's more, they offer to pay any vendor who takes it X L$ per sale through the vendor add-in.

The vendor add-in is really quite simple. It just calls home to a web server and lets it know who bought what, where and when. This company then aggregates all this data.

What's in it for them? The information that they collect is extremely useful in the hands of people who know how to use it. It's targeted marketing info. They could sell it to real-life marketers looking for lists of consumers. And if you think that information is not valuable, just ask someone in advertising.

It might sound goofy, but you've seen it before. It's AirMiles. It's the points you collect at your gas station. And grocery store.

There is a slight difference though. In real life, you opt in. You fill out a questionaire indicating who you are, where you live, how many kids you have, what your household income is... In SL, it's so easy to track your movements, such a program could quite happily run without people ever opting in.

Then...

Drop tiny hidden scanners all over SL. Like the land-scanners. Like the key-scanners at hubs. Put them everywhere. Then listen to what people say and send it up to the webserver. Archive it all mapped to their spending habits. Mapped to their movements.

Sell clothing where attachments have these spy-scripts in them. Actively track the wearers movements, conversations, actions... Heck, you could probably pay clothing vendors to build these right into the clothes...


In truth, I'm not pleased with the possibilities here. I'm not smart, and I've figured out a few ways to grossly infringe peoples' rights to privacy. If I had a choice - and based on what I've read of the majority of peoples' opinions here (and Philip's indication that there will be no "federal" government), I don't - I would make the act of handing out my avatar key an interactive thing. "Object X is requesting your key. Do you want to give it?" Maybe even make them a session-based thing.

I don't know what the solution is, but I certainly don't like the possibilies.

JMcH

Parts of this already exist. Colleting sales data and so forth. But it doesnt need a keylist to do it, since any avatar buying something from a vendor has just given his key out. This is what I and others mean when we say the key is a matter of public record: You already give it out just by existing in world.

As for the "spying devices in clothes"... Well, first, you can't script clothes. You can script attachments, but not clothes. But such a device would be a ToS violation of the highest order, and the wrath of the LindenGods would descend with firey vengence on any who did it. This is also, by the way, a good reason not to buy attachments from untrustworthy sources, unless you feel like inspecting every prim of any attachment you buy. I already do this if it's not from a trusted source.

But again, this doesn't need keylists. Because these items already have both the avatar name and key.

Again, to restate what others have said many times, keys let you do exactly three things:

Send an IM to someone

Send an item to someone

Send money to someone.

Thats the only three things that a keylist is useful for.

Exactly my point.

In real life, all your personal data is keyed off of your SSN, right? So isn't SL giving out your avatar key the equivalent of having your SSN broadcast from your person all the time?

I'm not concerned that someone new is collecting avatar keys. I'm concerned that if someone as slow as me has picked up on the possibilities here, what about smart people? What about real life advertising firms for instance?

How long will it be before you walk up to a vendor and have it say, "Hello Jekyll. Based on your previous purchases and purchasing patterns, I have the following suggestions for you..."

That's too much for me.

JMcH

No, not really.

There isn't a real-world analogy to your UUID. It's not your SSN, it's not your bank account number, it's not anything. It's just you. The UUID is simply how scripts see you. Scripts don't see you by name. The closest comparison to UUID is that its a biometric identifier, like a retinal scan or fingerprint. But even that isn't really right. Because those things alone don't mean anything. Your UUID does. It's just your name, basicly, in a different language. Sorta.



Real-life advertising firms are loosely barred from operating with SL by the ToS, last I checked. But since you hopefully aren't giving out your RL information in SL, there shouldn't be any way to connect your avatar with your real-life persona in any event.




I could do that now, if I wanted to. But this is unavoidable. Totaly, 100% unavoidable. Because even if you somehow managed to get keys obscured (which would break every vendor everywhere, because it needs your key to refund excess money, deliver the product you bought, etc... Along with breaking about 75% of other scripted items that need your key to animate you, or send messages to you, or anything else), you can't obfuscate your name. And it's more clunky, but still do-able, to make the sort of system you envision here work by names. It's just, as I said, more clunky.

To answer your question, though, it will be a while. Not until a true real-time SL<>RL data transfer method is implimented will this happen, because scripts dont have enough memory to store much data like this... It has to be stored on external servers and looked up, with can take quite a while with as fickle as e-mail is.

That's too much for me.

Maybe I just missed it, but it does not look like Ulirka put her own key on that list.

Real-life advertising firms are loosely barred from operating with SL by the ToS, last I checked. But since you hopefully aren't giving out your RL information in SL, there shouldn't be any way to connect your avatar with your real-life persona in any event.


This is simply not true.

There are now thousands and thousands of compiled aliases that a marketing firm could take, look up, and more than likely discover the real life people behind. This would be highly desirable since it would guarantee these people are "online" types, and gamers. Target marketing. Out of 30k keys, if I get 100 names, that's not bad. But I'd be willing to be I'd get more like 2k or more RL names and addresses. That is entirely unacceptable. LL should protect their users from this sort of harassment.

This would not be as expendiently and readily available if lists of this nature did not exist. It doesn't matter if you can do it somewhere else, it doesn't matter if it would otherwise be easy. Stating that there is absolutely no malicious use that could come out of such a compiled list is just deliberately misleading.

Without this list, they would have to do it another way, and then we could go after them.

The info in SL should remain within SL unless the owner gives consent. That is the right and considerate thing to do. Anything else basically says, to hell with what you think. I have my reasons for publishing info that is specific to the avatar you pay for, whether or not you want me to do it. "Public" when used in the context of SL, doesn't mean "public" the way Times Square is. It doesn't mean you are now free to do whatever you want with the info, anywhere you want. Or rather, that's how I see it, and it would be interesting to hear how LL defines the in-game info that is entirely owned by LL and only available to people that slap down a CC card and subscribe. That does not sound so "public" to me.

Why can't the creator put up a list that says, "feel free to enter YOUR key and name. Please do not enter anybody elses, though please let everybody know about the service."

I'll tell you why. Because it wouldn't succeed. Because not enough people care to have this info published. That is exactly why lists of this nature are compiled the way they are, subversively.

There is another thread about this (the one published in the hotline) where post after post says, get me off that list. I am clearly not alone in this.

This is indicative of the degrading sense of privacy the world has. Somebody says, "info is public" and again, SL is NOT a public environment, it is a private and closed one (you can not join unless you subscribe, and that requires a CC card), so for some reason, now people think that they can simply do whatever they want with this info regardless of what the people it actually refers to think or wish. Just because you can't be hauled to jail for it doesn't mean you should do it or that it's right.

What about all the people who want nothing to do with it? Ignore them? Tell them, as so many have here, to get over it, welcome to the millennium? THIS is what many here advocate?

And I still put out the point, which was not fully represented in the hotline thread, that the creator of this list is openly stating that the point of her service is to decrypt a portion of the software and publish the info within it. IT SAYS SO RIGHT ON THE SITE, these are not my words. I don't care if decrypting actually just means parsing (which it does not). It is more than likely an unintended use of the software and thus more than likely in violation of the license, 4/4.1, re: "unintended use". I simply can not believe an intended use of that portion of the software is to enable submission to any non LL website that wants to use if for the purposes of building extensive lists that more than likely will be used to push services onto people that want nothing to do with them.

It will only take one person, in all of SL, to receive a message saying, "Hi! I'm such and such friendly happy service, ready to serve you with updates on SL products! If you don't want to receive such messages in the future, please visit such and such and select opt out, thank you!!", and then SL saying there's nothing wrong with that, to open the gateway to spam. That will finish off SL as far as I'm concerned and I, and the people who I have talked into playing, will wrap up our land, quit, and write up how SL has just turned into another vehicle for spammers to harass the populace.

Of course it's not true. People never think about things like that. But they should be. Thats the point. Privacy begins at home.



Nobody tried to suggest you were alone. If you pay attention, you will note that I have in the past asked for my name to be removed from such lists.

HOWEVER

There exists a wide gap between what I would like and what I have a right to. So, basicly, yes. I'm saying "Welcome to the new millennium, get over it." Except that is not new. Lists like this have exited for longer than I've been alive. Companies sell customer lists constantly.

I also re-ask a question others have asked in this forum: Before starting this tirade, did you first go to Ulrika and ask to have your key removed? Did you wait for a response? What was the response? How long did you wait?

It does not decrypt any portion of the software. It runs a simple substitution cypher over a plain text file that the program creates on your hard drive. No part of the "source code or client program" is being decrypted, which is what the ToS forbids.

You constantly skirt the topic of intended use.

Nowhere, anywhere, does it say that users may use any portion of the software to build lists, or that users may extract information from any portion of the software an publish in on the global internet, or a magazine, or a newspaper, or anywhere else. Unless otherwise stated, you may not do it.

And this person is indeed doing it. This person is taking a portion of a commericial software package and (not my words, stop trying to make it seem like I invented the word "decrypt" advertising a service to decrypt it. Or run a cypher over it. Or whatever. To manipulate it, interpret it, parse it, it doesn't matter. It is not her software, nowhere does it say this is the intent of the software.

If I was the creator of the software, I would have to say umm...I never said you could do that. Anywhere. What makes you think you can?

The only answer could be, "well, it's not hard to do, and I want to. Even if people don't want me to."

And FYI, from the dictionary...

"encrypted data is referred to as cipher text."

And here's what you said...

"It runs a simple substitution cypher over a plain text file".

Sounds like decryption to me, even if, I'll grant, it is used in the broadest sense. The creator of that site used the word decrypt because the creator apparently understood this. Just because it's not hard, or MD5/RSA/Whatever encoded, doesn't mean it isn't encrypted, though I grant, it isn't very strong.

I feel much more strongly about this than my individual key. In RL I aggressively fight any such effort. I hate it, it's wrong, it's bottomfeeding, and if more people came out strongly against the practice as opposed to just protecting their sole interest, maybe it would not be so prominent. But I will settle for an absolute guarantee that at no time, anywhere, will my name appear on such a list unless I say ok. And because I know that's not going to happen, just looking out for this one incident would be shortsighted. Just as in RL, I would end up in an endless cycle of having to call people, or email people, or visit links, or whatever, to get myself removed. Please allow up to a week.

Oh, and yes, it is a standard tactic to actually not remove the user but to simply use the visit as a way to validate the initial spam contact info. All they do is move you onto another list.

Actually, I adressed it once already. Go back and re-read.



This is too slipery of a slope to stand on legaly, Tcoz. Nowhere does it SAY you may do a great many things done in SL. Nowhere does it say Chromal can compile his simstats lists, for example. That doesn't mean LL hasn't permitted it to happen.



I never once tried to make it sound like you invented the word decrypt. I don't know where you get that idea.

What I'm saying is that the site is not violating section 4.1 of the ToS where it states you may not decrypt/decipher/etc the source code or client software, as name.cache is not a part of the actual software.



You, however, are not the creator of the software, thankfully.

By the way, getting into "skirting"... Again, did you ask Ulrika to remove your name/key? Did you wait for a response? How long did you wait? What was the response?

Yes, you addressed it once. And your point was extremely weak.

The broadest definition of this activity is decryption. It is, whether or not you agree. An alg has been specifically created to extract and reformat that information into a usable list. The creator itself (not being insulting just no idea if the person is actually female) states it is a decryption service.

The license states unintended use. You are taking the position that anything that is not explicitly forbidden is allowed? That would be ridiculously open to interpretation...so, ok that's not allowed...but what if I did such and such, then it wouldn't really be the same thing....no, not that either...ok but what if I did such and such then, how about that...no, not that either...

If I don't say you can, you can't. You have to ask. And I find it very, very hard to believe that LL would say, "sure go ahead, you may use any portion of our software to build lists, whether or not the private resident (and we are all private residents) wishes to be included, and publish them on any third party medium, anywhere, for any reason.

If LL permits it, and I receive the spam, then LL is culpable. If LL forbids it, and I receive the spam, the list creator is culpable.

The intended use of a .cache file is the following:

"Cache files are used to store information on a temporary basis for quick access. The physical location of this can be either on a hard drive or in RAM memory.

The idea behind it is to store information the computer is probably going to need in a location that's quick and easy to access. Since it can get to needed information quicker, the computer runs faster."

NOT to build third party lists.

And thank god you are not the creator as well, or we'd all undoubtedly be receiving spam and nobody could do a damn thing about it. Well, other than throwing away the software, and informing anybody that is considering using it what will happen if they do (you will immediately become part of a series of third party lists, with the consent of the creator, which may very well make your RL info available unless you have taken measures to prevent it, and maybe even if you do).

I remind you that you published on this forum that by using that list, this was possible. And then the blame was on me for not being more careful with what identity I picked.

I asked Reit and never heard back from her.
\

That would be your opinion. But don't say I'm skirting it.



Your point?



More fun than the inverse "Anything not explicity allowed is forbidden", which forbids almost everything.



See above.



Merwan: That's discouraging. Perhaps Ulrika has been busy though... I don't recall even seeing her post here in the last few days.

Ah, there we go.

But that is how it works. If it doesn't say you can do it, you can't, not without explicit permission. By default, everything is forbidden. There is a ton of language in every TOS/EULA that makes that clear. That is why EULAs and such tend to be very specific about what you can do, and very general about what you can't do.

The anecdote I have seen applied to this is the following:

Little Johny sitting at a desk, crayon and paper. You only want him to draw on the paper. What do you tell him?

Don't draw on the desk. Don't draw on the floor. How about the bottom of the desk? No. How about the wall? No.

But if you say...you may only draw on the sheet of paper that is on your desk in front of you. Everything else is unintended. Now every other question is answered by default.

If you weren't told you can do it, the assumption is you can't. You can't rob supermarkets just because you were only told you can't rob banks. And you can be told to stop doing anything, at any time, whether or not it is in the terms.

Just imagine the scene in the court: why did you do it. Nobody said I couldn't. But, nobody said you could. Where did you get the idea you could? Nowhere really. That's just how I saw it.

Is there any language, anywhere, that even by the furthest stretch of the imagination, gives you the idea that you may use this software in this manner?

No. None. Anywhere. Here's the TOS. In fact, it is clear about unintended use.

Where does it say, by even the most galactically broad view, that this is intended, in any way?

It doesn't.

Well then. You shouldn't have done it. Your personal addendums to the TOS are not valid.

And the award for "Missing the forest for the trees" goes to Tcoz.

You are right. Legally, your interperetation is accurate.

This is not how these work in reality. Because as you said, everything is forbidden. What it boils down to, in reality, is exactly what I'm saying: Everything is allowed until it is specificly forbidden.

This is the exact same reason that all ToS's included a line to the effect of "And we may terminate your service at any time for any reason". Because they are wrote in such a way as to be interperetable as needed. The ball is in LL's court now, not yours, Tcoz. If they don't choose to make an issue out of this, it is 'allowed', no matter how much you might wish it to be otherwise.

And, by the way, robbing a store is explicity fobidden.

And what the HELL is this about? I've told you a half-dozen times that I am NOT the one doing this. Bloody STOP refering to 'me' as if I did this, now.

I made no addendums to the ToS either, don't accuse me of something I didn't do.

As has been pointed out myriad times in your various threads all talking about the same issue, this is a strawman argument as there is no spam, nor has there been. If, at such a time there is spamming, then this might be valid, until then it is just hand-waving.

Furthermore, if you wish to "broadly define" the application of a 2000 year old dirt-simple substitution cipher where the ciphertext is readily available and the plaintext is returned by many LSL functions as "decryption", that is your prerogative; by similar rhetoric, I define the "decyption" as actually being "rollerblading" for a sufficently broad definition of "rollerblading".

As has also been pointed out, we don't need no steenkin' decryption, it is just far less grid intensive than the alternatives.

Ah I see. So being legally correct per the definition of a contract that you agree to every time you start SL has nothing to do with RL. I'm sure LL is happy to know that this is how people view their TOS.

Well, I just don't know what to say to that. But man I'd love to debate it in front of a judge some day. I have a feeling it would be a short one. If what you say is true, there would be virtually no point to contracts, since they would not be useful in defining what can and can not be done.

Interesting now that you concede, at least, that the ball is in LL's court regarding the interpretation of intended use, and not that I'm simply out and out wrong.

Cat gut nailed to a stick and plucked is still considered a string instrument. Just because we now have nickel plated strings and onboard electronics doesn't change that, and doesn't mean that rollerblades are now string instruments. Your rollerblading comparison is specious to say the least.

There has been no spam YET because the list just got started. You don't wait for something to go wrong before you try to make sure it never will. The idea is to prevent it. Not react to it after the fact.

I'm sure LL will clarify the issue along those lines, and define what is, and what is not, acceptable use of their software regarding building such lists, and the actual use of the list itself. As of now, many of you seem to think, "they can do whatever the hell they want, as long as I don't get any spam".

I don't want to opt out of a public internet service that is not in any way supported by SL. I just never want to opt in, ever. I don't even want to be part of an opt out list (just another list that can be moved to another service, which is exactly what such bottomfeeders do).

And jsut because somebody is figuratively waving their hands doesn't mean that person doesn't have a point, or maybe is even right. Saying that this is all I'm doing is just misdirection.

My gosh. I can't believe I read the whole stupid thread. I guess I'll weigh in now.

Since the major argument pushed by Tcoz right now is the "unintended use" clause, it's best to slice the foundatinos out from under it first. Look, everything we do in SL is "unintended use", because we're being creative. LL gave us a very open-ended system, and they probably didn't intend, for example, sit-target teleportation. They're not going to sit here and list out every single "intended use". That'd kind of ruin the whole point of an open-ended world.

Anyway, this whole thing is a big mess. Tcoz, you're foaming at the mouth. Let me lay it out on the line for you, nice and simple. Your key is like your name. You can't have your name hidden or removed from all records, because it's just a statistic -- an attribute of your existence. So is your key.

You don't own your key. I don't know how many times I have to tell people this before they understand. It's not yours. It could loosely be considered the property of LL, but I kind of disagree even with that. It's just information. It's like your height, the color of your shoes... it's just a fact. Nothing more. Sure, maybe in the US you can have your phone number removed from a list ... oh wait, no, you can't. You can have your phone number put onto a do not call list. This is a specific list of people who won't be "spammed". You can't tell them not to have your name in a compilation.

You're getting your panties in a big knot over this. You're acting like a big child, making a flamewar out of a minor issue. You believe you've been Wronged here (although this hasn't been proven since you have not yet been spammed), and you're going to do everything in your power to make the other person suffer. You've made all sorts of less-than-veiled threats, and even threatening illegal activity is a crime. Stuffing 1 million keys into that form for the purpose of taking the site down is a crime, whether or not the site is designed to handle key data being sent to it. Servers on the internet are designed to handle pings being sent to them and reply back, but if you stuff a few billion down their pipes, it'll pretty well lock them up hard, and that's illegal.

My point is that you're being a real jerk here. You're screaming your fool head off. Nothing is going to get done this way. It might be better to peacefully talk to LL about this, push the issue into the public eye for rational discussion. Start a petition, although LL is in no way required to actually obey it. Instead of doing something constructive, you've come in here screaming your head off from day one, and it's not even clear whether you've reasonably and directly asked Ulrika to take your name off the list. There are now instructions on how to do this on the site. I suggest you follow them and stop making so much noise.

You're angering a lot of people, and being purposefully inflammatory and argumentative. This is not a matter of "not ignoring a criminal", this is you trying to be as loud and annoying as you possibly can about this issue. It's become a matter of pride for you. This thread is beyond the point where anything useful can come out of it. If you really want this situation to change, you're going to need to be peaceful and diplomatic, because your current tactic only drives people away from your point of view.

I guess what I'm saying here is that you're assuming some Wrong has been committed, and whether it is wrong is a matter of Universal Truth. You've concluded long ago that no opinion but yours is right, and your "debate" in this thread is mere acting because you feel that no opinion but your own can possibly be held by any reasonable person. That's not the case. There are people on both sides of this issue, and you're completely failing to accept that this situation requires careful, reasoned debate, not brow-beating with continued shakey reasoning. Stop what you're doing in this thread and start being diplomatic and even-headed, before you alienate anyone else that might otherwise have been with your cause.

YOU do not own my key either. LL owns it.

And no, there are a great many things specified in the TOS that are permitted. Your "everything we do is not permitted" notion couldn't be more wrong. Why don't you try reading the document.

SL is NOT a public environment. It is a private one. The info should remain within it unless the users say, "ok remove my info from this environ and put it onto the web".

Interestingly, this is pretty much exactly true. For example, you know those "You waive the right to sue in the event we screw soemthing up" clauses? Yeah. They don't work very well.



Never said you were wrong, at least not about the issue itself. I said you don't have a case. That's a different issue. I DID say you were wrong to behaive the way you did, and I stand by that.



The hell is this? What rollerblading comparison?

Oh, I see. You were responding to someone else without switiching topics. Got it.



THIS list just got started. This TYPE of list has been around for ages. Ages. Probably before the email functions got added, but I know several started up right after, as they simplified the process.



Yeah, pretty much. Because there isn't much else that can be done with those keys, FUD aside. And when LL clarifies the issue, fine. But the havn't yet, and these lists have been around for a coons age, so to speak. A year or so, some of them.