Is this against TOS?

hi I'm new to second life and have a question. I was in a club dancing and asked the hostess of the club a question about someone who contacted me in IM, after getting her reply to my question she informed me that she could see my IP address and other alts, as well as other information connected to that IP address, which btw is our family account. Is this against TOS? As a precaution I removed my personal billing information as well as all new friends on my list, calling cards and groups. That was very scary for me -am I being paranoid?

if this person had admin rights on the music stream server then, perhaps she could see the IP addresses of the people connected to it but the rest sounds like a bunch of BS to intimidate a newcomer.

I would just not go to that place again and carry on. Only LL can connect any account to any associated alts.

Not sure if it's a ToS violation but it's pretty psycho...

When you play audio/video streams in SL, you connect directly from your PC to the stream server. If the owner has access to the stream software, they may be able to tell your IP address (since you connect directly to it).

I'd not go back to such a place. I'd also be tempted to Abuse Report them for being so creepy.

If you really new, just don't go back. If you're an alt and are concerned about people finding out who your other accounts are, don't play music/video in SL or click on objects that take you to web sites.


The alt comment was probably the "owner" thinking same IP = same RL person. Can be true but doesn't have to be.

edit: also, are you sure that you talked to the real owner, Aleaah?

She can't tell if any alts are connected to your account. Even if she sees your IP address from the music stream, I don't know haow close that pinpoints your location, but in any case. Disclosing personal infoemation without your permission is against the TOS, so if any idiot tries to pull that again on you , just tell them you'll AR them for disclosure. let then blink first. Why someone who is running a business would want to intimidate a customer is beyond me, but every day SL become a little bit more beyond me anyway.

thank you Kathy and it worked in reference to her "scare tactics" I deleted all the clubs they are connected with - however, I am still a little scared to go back in to second life - I think I will take a little break *lol* thanks again you helped alot.

No, she is the partner of the DJ, they go from club to club I was in several of their groups, he DJ's there only, its one of three that I know they stream for.

Should I just let it go? or contact the owners? I'm only one person that won't be going back there. However, I have teleported other friends in it seems to help them somehow maybe with tips? I don't know too confused.

Also, is my billing information secured on the website? They can't see it right?

Then tell the club owner, and if you like. File a harassment AR against her as well. Don't worry about them being able to see your billing info either.

Agreed

welcome to second life

don`t worry about the bullies, idiots, flametards or just fruitcakes, there are more (doubt you could count them on 700,000,000,000 fingers (inside joke, nm))

just shrug it off and tell the owner, i`m still waiting for the person who claimed that to show up at my doorstep, never heard back, gasbags

from expirience, if some one bullies/griefs, return the favor or mute them and leave
once you get the hang of it, there are funny ways to have some *really* good fun OF the person griefing you (just don`t be shy, it`s really worth the 10 minutes to make your day and ruine theirs )

Aleaah, I shared a similar experience at a club here in SL when I first 'rezzed' inworld. I didn't know all of the advice you've been given in this forum, all of which is very smart. Please don't be intimidated by a few jerks that want to play private detective, and ruin your SL experience...and paranoia? It's not you that's paranoid, it's obviously that hostess that tried to run that game on you.

Hope to see you inworld!!!

IPs are not secret on the internet. It's provided to every website you visit. It's essential because it's the address that the website sends pages to, and it's the same with music streams. So don't give that a second thought. It's like posting a request to a company, asking them to send you something - you need to include your own address so they can send it to you. Your own address is the equivalent of your IP address.

Your billing info is safe. Your IP address is *your* internet address and not the address where your billing info is.

There are a few dangers to letting someone know your IP address, but these are mostly marginal. To be specific:

1. Your IP address often allows to ascertain your geographical location down to a few kilometres -- more precise in highly populated areas, very imprecise in sparsely populated. The reliability of this information is rather low in some areas and for some ISPs, and it does little to harm your privacy unless you wish to lie about your location.
2. Knowing your IP address allows someone to launch a denial of service attack against you in hopes of denying you net access altogether, by sending you large amounts of bogus data. This is a costly means of annoying someone, though, requires high technical aptitude, and is not particularly effective.
3. If two resident accounts have the same IP address they connect from, they are sure to either belong to the same person, or to multiple people in the same household -- while it is technologically possible that this would not be certainly true in some conditions, most of these are completely unsuitable to connect to SL. Since the residents being alts is usually more likely than multiple residents in a household, this is what everyone normally assumes. If you wish to keep separate identities for your alts, someone knowing the IP address for both can disclose it against your wishes.
4. If you are using the same connection to access web pages controlled by the same person who knows your IP address from inworld, they may be able to identify whatever you say there with your resident account, which might also be against your wishes.

Anything else at all that can be done with knowing IP addresses requires cooperation of a third party, your internet service provider, which is, in most localities, bound by law not to cooperate unless subpoenaed. You basically can't find out anything else at all about a person from their IP address until you start a court case, or unless they disclosed sufficient other information, like a real name.

Knowing the town you live in is not much of a privacy loss, denial of service attacks are illegal, and disclosing your personal information, which, I believe, includes ownership of alternative accounts, (or does it? Will check later.) is an offence against TOS, that can be ARed.

Nevertheless, knowing your IP address is not, by itself, against TOS. But being so blatant about it is just not nice and grounds for telling them off.

There are laws against hackers! Sometimes the more information out there can be either good or bad. Some will see it as an opportunity to investigate more and in turn gives others ideas of what and how to do it. But we are all at risk when we go on the Internet.

Correction, there are laws about malicious activity done through computers, which is commonly termed 'hacking'. A 'hacker' is just someone knowledgeable enough to perform such an activity, doesn't mean they do that, and doesn't mean that the activity is inherently malicious. But if you discriminate against people with in-depth technical knowledge as such, you're just one step away from burning books.

Ah correction: The laws in the USA and Russia perhaps are different!

Not those. There is no law against being called a 'hacker' anywhere, and before the press had a field day with the word some twenty years ago, being a 'hacker' was a badge of honour. But there are laws about misusing knowledge to cause harm, and they're largely identical in both countries.

Ok - splitting a few hairs here...

A hacker is one who hacks, and not one who has the ability to hack.

There are laws against hacking, and I don't believe it has to be malicious or harmful hacking - just hacking into systems is enough to break the law, as far as I know.

First I would contact the owners and let them know.. This is not only a violation of the TOS but VERY bad business for the club.

Second turn off your music, only turn it on when you want to hear it. Most DJ's do NOT snoop the IP's of those connected to their streams. This one sounds like a powertripper that likes to scare newbies. But this way you can have an idea who is suppling the stream before you connect to it.

If you visit a club and they are DJing there, don't turn on your stream and tp out right away.. BTW if they had done this to me I would turn the tables on them. I would create several alts and everytime they DJ, I would show up and complain to the owner that they are know to snoop the IP address of the clubs clients. Soon their DJ business would dry up.

Third, unless you have a very unusual internet connection your IP address is not static. That is it will change everytime your reconnect. If you are using a DSL or Cable modem and you ever worry about someone having your IP address, just close any internet applications and turn off the power to the modem. Wait a few minutes then power it back up.. You will almost always get a different IP address that way.

I would have also told the DJ what his partner had said.. He may be quite unaware that his partner is playing this little game.

Oh and yes your billing information is quite safe. Well as safe as anywhere else anyway.

Good to know. My modem usually gest shut down several time a day, when I go out, or go to bed I shut down my computer anyway, and If I am home but not using the computer, I'll leave it on but shut down the internet connection.

To my knowledge there is no way to associated an IP address connected to a music stream with an SL account. Am I wrong? How would you know that a certain IP is associated to a certain avatar?

WELLL...... maybe but mostly no. most ISP lease the ip adress for a set time ussualy 30 days and most times when you reboot the modem the system just gives you the old ip number back agian.

to work all the time would have to involve somebody else asking for a new address during the time you wear rebooting every time. so it only works maybe a quarter of the time

it is very possable if your n a set schedule, logging in about the same time every month that the system gives out your new ip. you can happens alot have the same ipadress for 2-3 months in a row

what i'm trying to say is rebooting a high speed line hopping to get a new ipa only really works if you do it during a very busy time when eighter new accounts are logging on, or others are rebooting

otherwise your chances of having the same ip are about 3-1

well if there are 5 people there and you watched when somebody new connectd by prosses of elemination you could figure it out

Aleaah, this is indeed creepy and worth keeping in the back of your head but I wouldn't worry too much about it. SL has sooooo many people from all over the world in it and your IP address really isn't _that_ interesting that it's pretty unlikely that this will go anywhere. I'd shrug it off and go back to having fun.

The DJ is likely to have control over the stream so she might be able to get at your IP.

Absolutely tell the owner of the place what happened and then drop it. It will go over best if you put it as a "hi.. I don't know you and you don't know me but this is what I saw happen.. just fyi." If you push it or demand they do something about it, you're more likely to be ignored. I suggest this because I own a club and it's what would work best with me.

Yes, this has nothing to do with your billing info. Your IP address won't get them anything at all from www.secondlife.com.

Your ISP probably uses something called DHCP to assign IP addresses. If you're really worried about this stuff, you can usually tell your router to get you a new IP. Look around in your techodocs for "release" and "renew" buttons. You may lose your connection for a minute or 3 but you'll get a new IP address.

For an object that sends you to a web page, something that does a blue permissions pop-up, you can probably automate the connection between IP and user name. For just picking it off a stream server, it's a bit more tricky, especially if there's a bunch of people listening to the stream already.