Verification?

I'm sure you guys have had a lot of threads on this topic.

Unfortunately I've been away from SL for quite some time.

I just heard something somewhere about 'age verification' by some company that SL is working with that sells its info to the highest bidder or something? Dunno, anyhow... I have a couple of simple questions:

Is this verification thing opt-in, or is everyone's info being just handed over?
If I'm paying with a credit card, that pretty much verifies me anyway, right? So I don't have to worry about anything?

I tried searching for info on this topic, and came up with plenty of threads, but some of them mentioned things I'm just not seeing, such as some sort of 'link' on my account page to the verification area or whatnot. I'm mildly lost.

(Also, why aren't URLs showing up as clickable in these forums when surrounded by URL tags?)

Yes, there will be age verification. Yes, it is opt in. No your CC is not good enough, as 13 year olds can get CCs. Your data will not be sold to anyone.

Also, the BBcode has been disabled, that is why nothing works right anymore.

The comapny is a seperate branch of a company that does compile identity information about voters, etc. Supposedly this is working into our favor since that information they already supposedly have is what is used to cross reference you.

(I dont buy it, sounds like circular logic to me)



Opt in, yes. However if you do not opt in you will lose access to content of explicitly sexual or violent nature.

You credit card "age verification" will no longer have any affect once the new system is fully functional. You will have to verify with the new system or be unverified.



You can only verify if you own a sim or an island right now (concererge service level)

Its still in Beta.



Becuase they turned them off "temporarily" during a website upgrade ..

Temporarily on 5-22-07

Ok. So I'm confused again:

This is the article I read: http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2007/09/oped-ll-selling.html

It says the company doing the verification is Aristotle? The company that sold the information of 150,000,000 people without their permission? (http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2003/12/61543 and http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HWW/is_47_3/ai_66932971)

Can you all provide me with links to the guarantees that my information won't be sold?

Also, I own land in a Mature ancient mainland sim (as in, so old it's not even terraform-restricted last I checked. If I don't opt-in, am I going to be unable to visit my own plot of land?

you will still be able to visit your own land. There will be a toggle that makes it so Unverified people can not enter if your content is too Explicit. Any non explicit Mature land is still accessible.

It will be up to you to self label your content. People will be able to report you if they dont agree with your self label. Your neighbors have been engouraged to turn you in.

This all comes from Dan Linden - appherently in Concurance and at the direction of Robin Linden.

Integrity is Supposedly a Division apart from Aristotle, and supposedly wont be selling information , or even keeping it any longer than they have to.

I dont have the link handy but the quote from Robin kind of went like this --- LL wont sign the contract unless provisions to ensure our Residents privacy have been agreed to by Integrity.

So basically its LL saying "Trust us" is the guarantee.

If Integrity has further guarantees I do not know them, some people have verified already though, they might have read the agreement ..

Hey Mol where ya been?

The presence of the " </sarcasm>" tag in your signature causes me to wonder if you really want answers to questions about verification.

Maybe you really want to tell us all about it!

You might find the blog a useful sorce of info in addition to the forums. Given your absence you might not be in the habit of searching the blogs. Here's two links.

http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/08/29/identity-verification-comes-to-second-life/

http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/05/04/age-and-indentity-verification-in-second-life/

Also, about the vBcode, Strife's whipped up a Greasemonky script to deal with it if you use Firefox or Opera. There's a sticky at the top of the Resident Answer forum with the info or take this link: /327/b2/188445/1.html .

I believe there's a Firefox add-on called Hyperlink or some such that will also help with the missing vBcode.

Yes, the 3rd party copany is Aristotle, sometimes going under the name Integrity.

I'd love to see a guarantee that personal data won't be sold on. Unfortunately, I have to see any reason to believe it won't be. Of all the big players in this specific market, LL seems to have partnered with the one with the worst reputation.

Personally, I have zero intention of submitting my personal details to them.

It is so funny how people are so worried about their identity. Little do they know that just using public databases almost anything about anyone can be found out. How do you think that Integrity gets all their data to cross-reference you in the first place?

http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=bpc&group=22001-23000&file=22575-22579

In a nutshell, if you collect personal information from any California resident you must disclose exactly what information is collected and who it is shared with. This information has to be easy to find.

Welcome home, Moleculor!

They get it by claiming they already have it and that you are merely confirming what they already know about you.

I have personally checked on several public databases, and I am not on any of them. I kind of like that.

Honestly, if that is the case, how would they know if the data is correct or not?

But you haven't check them all, now have you. All it will take is for your info in 1 place for the world to know.

So, ignoring the fact that sufficient data is simply not available and not comprehensive in many countries:
- Person A looks up these public databases and gets a set of data for Person B
- Person A feeds that data to Integrity
- Integrity cross-references and verifies to LL that Person B is an adult.
- Duh!

A PR exercise only!
'Nothing to see here that's related to real age verification. Move along please.'


X: I'm going to ask you a question. The answer to the question is 42.
Y: OK
X: What is the secret number?
Y: 42
X: Correct! Excellent!


Cud sumbodi 'splain dis vericashun ting agin plz? (NOT)
Wud abot the chillun? Pleez wunt sumwun tink of the chillun?

Alright, last I'd read in the blog was that the Lindens were backing down somewhat from enforcement of this policy.

Robin Linden said, "I want to reiterate that identity verification is voluntary for both Residents and estate owners." and later ""All content creators and businesses are morally and legally responsible for their activities." http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/08/29/identity-verification-comes-to-second-life/#more-1177

However, if I decide to take other responsible safeguards, perhaps ones more reasonably effective and already supported by the system, then I will injure fewer minors and possible whistleblowers won't have any effective grounds for complaints. I introduced the call for estate owners to boycott this verification, and I later joined a group organized to voice that message louder. Seeing as how the Lindens have passed the burden of verifying maturity to the users and landowners, it won't work if we don't make it possible ourselves.

I don't know how it is where you live, but as far as I have heard from german estate owners, in the german age verification version one option is to give them you passport number.

Since it is forbidden for the german authorities to disclose these numbers even to other governments let alone private businesses they can only check if it is a legit number.

According to the german wikipedia (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ausweisnummer) it is a very unreliable source when it comes to age verification because the algorythms these passport numbers use are publicly known and very easy to reproduce. While it is a crime to use the passport number of another person it is none to fake one

I just wonder, how many people will claim to be german in the future

Robin has a tough job, but statements like this are almost double-speak.

It is starting out "voluntary" in the simplest meaning possible yes. Everyone is free to work with the new system. You are NOT free to work against it though! You cannopt volunteer to ignore it completely. As long as everyone plays by the rules, it will remain at least partially "voluntary".

You can volunteer to NOT register sure, but you cannot volunteer to NOT register and THEN perform or condone adult activity on your land. LL has stated MANY TIMES that if they find enough people not compling with the new rules then it WILL become manditory. You are free to choose only two options: Don't register and avoid adult content in your behavior or land, or you register and you requre eveyone else on your land to be registered.

We really are NOT free to completely ignore the system and go on like we have been. That part of "voluntary" does NOT exist. So claiming that the system is "volunatary" is incorrect. It could be "completely voluntary", but it's not, it's partially voluntary. You can choose how you want to work with the new system, you cannot volunteer to opt out of it completely.

Saying something is "voluntary" when it is in fact tacitly manditory is double-speak!

Heya...

Just for the record, I don't live in the States, but managed to verify using only my driver's license. No passport, no SSN, no nothing, just my driver's license.

I know there's been a lot of talk about, "I'm not doing it 'cuz they're forcing me to give up my SSN/Passport Number/yadda yadda", but that's just not the case. They're not forcing anyone to do anything. These other things are just options.

I know many people don't have driver's licenses. I hear it all the time. I'm sorry to hear that. But I think it's safe to say that the majority, if not the VAST majority, of people DO have one.

And can we stop the "I gave my credit card, that should be enough" stuff? It wasn't LL that said that credit cards aren't good enough, it was one of the card companies (Visa, if I'm not mistaken... but I could be).

It's REALLY not that big of a deal.

Farallon,

That's not quite the case.

It is, in fact, voluntary. You don't HAVE to verify. If you don't, you won't be able to ("legally" access explicit material, but that is not a prerequisite for playing on SL.
You don't have a right to access explicit material.
That's all that you won't be able to do. Everything else in SL is available to you.

So, it ISN'T mandatory. Mandatory would mean that you simply cannot play the game at all if you don't verify. That is quite obviously not the case.

The interesting thing about this -

Either They really arent verifying much of anything - thus the Drivers license is enough. And thus its just a fake verification


Or they already have you on file, and your drivers license is enough. And its a real verification


Of the two neither is good, and in my veiw #2 is far more aggrivating.

I'm thinking no, Colette. I'm not sure what the deal is, but, as I said, I'm not in the States and thus, wouldn't have any info on me (unless you watch X-files. Then, I have a dossier about 6 inches deep! *grin*).

I just wanted to put out there that I had verified and it's really not the big deal folks are making it out to be.

I don't live in the States either and I managed to verify without using my driver's licence, passport or SSN so neener neener




Whereas you're right about Visa, it quite clearly states on the UK passport website that a passport is not an identity document (seriously it states that) and a passport number proves absolutely nothing. A credit card is a hell of a lot more use in verification than the shambolic charade Integrity have produced.

They ask you for information they can verify and then ask you for additional info they can't verify but once you've volunteered it they can then put that information against your existing details. They can then claim to have a super verification system with extra details.

Not sure what the neener neener was for. You made my point.

Not sure how a creditcard - well, a Visa credit card, anyway - can be better than a passport... if anything, it would be equally bad.

Well because I verified with less information than LL have on me. No passport number, no driving licence number, no SSN, nothing that anyone who knew me quite well wouldn't already know.



A passport number (which they can't check anyway) proves nothing at all. A credit card on the other hand can leave an audit trail.

Now if I had to pop down to Brighton and put my passport through a machine reader, then yeah that would be better verification.

You sure assume a lot, don't you?