Privacy in Virtual Worlds - Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada

Second Life - Privacy in Virtual Worlds: This research study was commissioned by the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada as part of their interest in the establishment of real and alternate identities in online environments. http://www.privcom.gc.ca/information/pub/sl_080411_e.asp

CBC News Report on the article: http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2009/03/11/tech-091011-second-life-privacy.html

So people .. well done or a waste of my tax dollars? I have some issues with the study but I'm glad that they are at least apprising themselves of potential privacy and legal implications in emerging technologies. What say you ..??

I haven't read the article but as far as SL is concerned just in principle it seems like a waste of time.

The way SL is setup you have to willingly give up any personal information for someone to get it so any privacy invasions against you are your own fault. Before everyone jumps on me, there are a few exceptions such as streaming media that reveals your IP address but that of course is optional content that you have to use the UI to opt into either each time or permanently via options and again if you are smart even that isn't an issue.

Full disclosure, I'm not a Canadian citizen so it's not my tax dollars being spent but it seems like the only good that could come from this is if it could be used as fodder to prevent ignorant attacks on virtual worlds since defenders can hold up this study and say, "hey they aren't as bad as your saying".

Looks pretty familiar. See the earlier http://www.worldlii.org/int/journals/EPICPrivHR/2006/PHR2006-Second.html for a lot of overlapping content. Compare them, for example, on this bit of misinformation:

1 user groaned.

Looks like they both copy and pasted the marketing spiel.

I have a number of issues with that article written by Janet Lo.



That quote is false. The author seems to be saying that the wide distribution of your credit card information is a requirement to participate in SL. The truth is that only LL and / or Pay-Pal would actually require this information.

After reading further down in the article, I read that Janet Lo now articles for "The Public Interest Advocacy Centre" in Ottawa. I said,"uhhhhuh", and decided to google them to see what they were up to.

These are the same bunch of clowns that masterminded our "National Do Not Call List". This list is perfect for international telemarketers since you can buy it, and simply spam your vics from overseas. Way to go geniuses.

You know....these groups of lawyers who proclaim to be "protecting the public interest" really get on my nerves. This outfit claims to be a charitable organization. Seems the only charity that is given is to themselves...they are currently paying 51K per year if you wish to article for them. Do some BS research and write some BS articles and get paid 51K sounds like a charity that I would like to join myself actually.

They claim to be doing all kinds of good work to protect consumer rights and privacy...but their own privacy policy on their own website clearly needs consideration:


What the hell kind of privacy policy is that? Friggen lawyers, I don't trust any of them. The ONLY public interest they ever protect is their own.

I would encourage people to actually read or at least skim the first link ( yes I know it's really long and I don't think the short cbc article does it justice ). I think with the plethora of media articles that misrepresent or sensationalize aspects of SL, we have a tendency to immediately discount the entirety of reports where we can pick out something that is wrong while some of the pertinent questions get lost in the shuffle. There were some obvious factual mistakes and outdated information in the report, but I think it does raise some interesting questions and potential privacy and legal concerns as virtual worlds become increasingly mainstream on a global scale. Personally, I'm glad governments are attempting to get a better understanding of some the issues and in some ways I think it helps to legitimize places like SL.

I'm quite happy for people to know my credit card is mainly blue.

Note: The above statement might not be true.

They had better not put their PoS adspam anywhere near me, or they can eat my tier.

I didn't just spend a year fighting this stupid blight to have LL go at it themselves.

Idiots.

I'd like to know the Linden responsible so I can address him/her personally, but I have a sneaking suspicion I know who it is, as the fish stinks from the head.

1 user agreed

Oh, assuming this is about the AMPP Media advertising thing, I should have expanded on why I said it was misinformation. It was mentioned in a 2007 blurb in some advertising media blog, and subsequently somebody somewhere "elaborated" to an enormous extent--apparently including even the Linden Lab involvement. Tateru Nino tried to reign in the craziness back then, but somehow it got propagated into that EPIC report, and then to this new Government of Canada thing.

Which goes to show, if one has a government contract to plagiarize other reports, it might be a good idea to check a fact here and there.

Yeah, well, fact-checking doesn't seem to be too high on the list, considering the report of 23,000 islands gone in 24 hours.

Just goes to show that you can't believe anything the media says (whether mainstream or not), until you check the facts yourself. That goes to governments and research institutions as well.

Some history recounted by John McPhee about the fact-checking challenges of his 1973 article for _The New Yorker_, "The Curve of Binding Energy" (a 1974 book): http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/02/09/090209fa_fact_mcphee

*For now.*

If LL merges the kid grid with the main grid, expect RL info being required of every av as a result. Including payment info, age verification (handled by some who knows who third party) and the like.

I applaud any check and balance on privacy as new technologies emerge. We lose more privacy daily it seems sometimes and I don't just mean computer games.

Google logs searches, AOL logged personal communications, blabla. Orwell didn't know half of it...

LL already has our RL info, we gave it when we signed up. For a lot of us they have our credit card numbers too. They have so far said that this will suffice for age verification. If you are in this category, you will not be giving anything more. Also some are making it sound like they will put our info in our profiles for all to see. Am I missing something?

Maybe...

Some other registration sites require only an email address.

Some are concerned about the security (or lack of) involved in a third party data collecting firm having all that RL info, the amount of which seems overkill. Abuses of same could be many.

Some do not have more than one way to payment verify so there goes that option for many also.

Many just like the anonymity, end of story, and resent further encroachments into privacy. Of all types. How likely is it to be misused? Well, we've gotten so used to NOT having privacy I doubt we even know. (Why wasn't there a bigger stink when the patriot act came into effect for instance)

If you already have payment info on file, you are already verified, you don't have to do anything else. I agree on giving info to an entity other than LL, I won't either.

As far as those who don't have the resources currently needed to verify, yes something should be done to make accomodate them if possible. But if not, they aren't being kept out of SL totally, just a certain area, which is unfortunate. But in the end SL is a private service, none of us are entitled to have access to it. Hopefully for once LL will listen to it's customers, and come up with a plan that will satisfy the majority.

First of all I applaud how you discuss and even disagree while still remaining civil and 'even' friendly...thanks for that Brenda.

I'm mainly speaking to people's alter egos, literally in this case, alts.

Those are not payment verified usually. And afaik you need more than one type of payment option (CC, paypal etc.) to do so. So even if all the rest didn't bother them, it just might not be possible.

Some people escape into SL in a 'mature' way and that would then be denied them. Whatever their reason for escape, I take it on faith they need to or they would not do so. So, I find it unfortunate that will soon be taken away from many.

Some people resist paypal. For various reasons. I tried using Paypal and for LL purposes they wanted a lot of additional stuff I didn't want to impart.



I agree with both statements, it's just sad all around, IMO. I would really like to know *why* the big change.

Social experiment - to see "what will kids do if given the same opportunities in world as adults"? (Implies ageism i.e. kids have more ideas/energy, *maybe*)

Or, corporate dollars. But how will kids have more money to spend? Are the people who want to burn down mature areas really convincing LL they will spend more than existing players do. I don't understand it.

Once again, I must be missing something. I verified payment with one item, a credit card. I don't need any other method. And according to what I've read, that is enough to satisfy the requirement LL is putting forth to access adult content. Where are they saying multiple sources are needed?

As far as alts go, it was brought up, and one of the lindens addressed it asking for feedback on how to proceed. The simple soulution in my opinion is to verify one main account. All alts are created off that account and are automatically verified.

And you are right in that this is being done for money. SL is a business product whose purpose is to make a profit for LL. Any idealistic dreams about some sort of utopia, or the next internet, or the Metaverse were left behind long ago, I think.

We really are disagreeing very little. I am not fond of this scheme either, i think it is just another step towards the end of Sl as any real creative device. it's just that we are getting there in slightly different ways.