Trasher Grief

I was in a sandbox tonight and suddenly my avatar became grotesquely distorted. Then a message appeared on the chat line that said something to the effect of "Trasher says do you like your new shape Yipp Oh?"

I figure griefer.

My questions to those who may have more experience are:

Was this done by a script, an object or something to do with avatar creation?

Signing off and on again reverted me to what I was. But... is there another remedy?

I guess I'm hoping to find the cause so that I can find the owner so that I can report abuse.

Any ideas?

A relog is the only fix I know. It's happened to me twice, and I cleared cache on the way back in, just in case, both times.

The first time, it was a gesture somebody gave me called "Superdance". The second time I'd been caged by a griefer. The cage presented a menu when right clicked, with "Be Free!" as an option. It let me go, alright....after making me look like I'd gone through a stamping mill.

Some cretin is selling an object that contains this distortion script on SLExchange. "Great Fun! Try It On Your Friends!" he says. Yeah, right.

I don't know of any way that someone can do this to you remotely.

Thanks Kidd.

First, cretin is an apt description.

Second, I've had other incidents too, including cages and being made invisible. Relogging does work... just a pain to be forced to.

Third... I thought there would be numerous comments on this post. I'm disappointed that there aren't more solutions than damn, I have to log off and start over. Even more, I thought there would be more anti-griefer sentiment. Maybe tips on fighting them. I especially would like to know what quick steps, if any can, be taken to identify the offending trap and/or script so that an abuse report of the owner could be sent.

Anyway, thanks for your interest and reply.

Oh

Apparently Ryozu Yamamoto has created a complete set of animations that undo the effects of those avatar-deforming animations. I've boxed the stuff up and set it up so you can get a copy using the link below, or send me an IM in-world

Deformers usually get applied when you LEFT click on a seemingly innocuous or purposefully mislabled object. Before you fall for this again it's best to check out what you're clicking on first. RIGHT click on the object, choose Edit, More, Contents Tab and see what it says the object contains before left clicking on it. Usually a deformer will have a long list of deformed body parts in the contents. If you find an object containing deformers, Abuse Report it, then do others a favor and cover it up so someone else won't inadvertantly get distorted.

My sims got hit with a spamming animation requester this morning. I assumed it did this, and didn't click any of the options on the menu... What i found most annoying was the blue dialogs steal my chat focus forcing me to pre-type everything in windows notepad and paste it into SL in order to chat because the linden who designed that part of the interface fails at life.

This bears repeating. Don't accept random stuff from strangers.

I never get griefed. Then again I never go to sandboxes...

I never go to sandboxes either but since im a furry im a prime target...

Never accept random objects from strangers who won't explain what it is.
Never accept a teleport from strangers who won't explain what it is.
Never accept a dialog you didn't expect.
NEVER give out debit permissions for ANYTHING that you don't COMPLETELY TRUST.

File an Abuse Report by right clicking the offending object, in the pie menu just click More until you reach Report Abuse. By right clicking the object you've gotten the name of the creator for LL. I've learned to give the date, time, sim name and/or more specific location. Right clicking the object also will set up the Snapshot for the Abuse Report when you first move thru the pie menu. Sometimes you need to take your own Snapshot since it might not show everything you want to be seen. I still think if some numnut gets enough Abuse Reports filed on them for the same activity, they might spend more time being banned from SL than running around in it. And in that case, they might give up and go elsewhere.

The only thing to stop this griefter pack is when LL go after there IP address as well and start to delate there real Ac without any refound too.
I got atk. so many times already.. and when I make my Job and write a AS to LL the handle the Case.. some days later this Residents Name no longer show up under search.. we win and can he happy. or not, becourse the same damm Guy just make a new Ac and the problems start over and over again.

LL like to pushes the Residents number up... soon we get 10.000.000 of them
In the same time the User who are Online past the last 60 Days are droping.. why.?

When I start 7 Months ago, we have a littel bit over 4 Mio Residents and 1.8 Mio online in the past 60 Days. Look for yourself what we got now.

Making the Alt Ac for free and don't chage them 9.90 for it whas a big big misstake... and new Player who are come into this game are getting griefted away, when you like to say it this way. No wonder everything is going down... not only the fun playing this Game.. I mean everything, like Sales, Trust, Honor aso.

Gettig after this poor Guys you have to do it the right way LL.
When my Car is lossing Oel.. the problem will not be fix becourse I stop every 100 Mils and fill it up so that I can go on..

Delate always just the griefter Ac, and give them a free way to make a new one the other Day.. is just what you do right now with your SL "Car"

Bunchoo from Thailand

Considering the standard of PC that is required to run SL, one would think that someone with access to such hardware would be able to dig up US$9 (or even US$1 per month for year 1) somewhere.
Payments with audit trails could also have some impact on reducing the number of minors on the grid.

The problem is that an IP says nothing. If you are with a big ISP there may be many people having the same IP as you do but they have nothing to do with you. Same thing with a shared internet connection like in universities.

So if they start deleting all the accounts with the same IP you risk deleting some innocent (paying) customers with one who made trouble. Not the smartest approach for a company which wants to make money

Ture... but even a multiple IP address can and will lead to the user.... maybe a littel bit hart and to expencive to do so for just a griefter... but if you like.. you can find everyone.

Anyway.. its not such a hart work to find out "who" this guy realy is.. or?

Born today.. but running around with High Scriptet Items.. who this Stuff come from.?
Dit he buy it (don't belive it.. but possible) who upload the L$ for it Paypal, CC, are easy to trak down, and will lead to the real Ac. from this griefter if he use the same one for this Ac.

Dit he get this L$ as Gift from a other resident.. than why.? dit you found his real Ac. already.

Dit he get his Items he use from a other resident as drop Inventory, or setup to buy for 0 L$..? if yes.. than why.. dit you find the real Ac on this way.

I mean a transaction history is easy to read.. not to much work to bring someone down, who bring so much trobble into SL and force other normal player to leaf this Game.

Sure.. will be a littel bit of work to handle cases like this... but right now LL got a never ending story of delating ac, and go after the next one over and over again.

Other Games protect them for hackers... I thing LL should be able to find a way and protect them self for this griefters... not a 100% protection.. this is impossible.. but 90% + I expect from a Company like this.

Make a Griefter already clear that LL will go after him, trying to find his real Ac. and will delate them as well without refound for L$ or Inventory maybe can be a start to reduse this Nr. of Guys who create one in the first place.

Bunchoo

They don't have to delete accounts. They shouldn't. The account is not necessarily tied to an IP.
They just have to redirect traffic from certain IPs to a place where the person using the IP is informed that
- the particular IP is a source of continuing abuse of SL
- LL has reported this in detail to the ISP owning the IP
- the abuse from the IP continued
- if the user has an issue with this, they should either take it up with their ISP or change ISP.

The notice should direct the user to a web page that makes it clear that the blocking of the IP is the fault of
1) the abusers
2) the ISPs for failing to act against abuse of the Net by their own users

Thanks to all for the great information. Maybe this thread will be helpful to some other unfortunate person who is made to panic and feel embarrassed and hurt (and later on really pissed) when he or she is suddenly terrorized by a CG. CG? My new term. It stands for Cretin Griefer. Next, an apology to my relative, Day Oh. I was in-world when you sent me the deformer-undo package. By that time I was so paranoid that I was afraid to accept it (I finally did a half hour later), and I was afraid to open it until I finally saw your forum post. (Paranoia will destroya) Thanks Day!

For the past couple of days I've been rolling this subject around in my mind, learning and trying to come up with an approach. (Obviously being deformed has scarred me for life. LOL!) At first I thought, ban all deforming scripts and cages! But now I feel that should not happen and that such scripts have some merit, albeit small merit. Want to play a joke on a friend? Deform him/her. Better still, want to attack an obnoxious griefer? Definitely deform him/her! That's different from terrorizing the innocent. Next, I agree that accepting things from strangers should be done cautiously. But I also know that some traps can be sprung by colliding with an object. I've learned that going to 'View' and selecting 'Beacons Always On' can help detect scripted objects. But I've made objects that are .01x.01x.01 and transparent so that they are not easily detectable. (How about a script that will detect tiny and/or invisible prims so they can be checked for dangerous content?) Finally in this vein, I'm not sure if a griefer can give an object that activates a script upon rezzing, without it being touched. And I'm not sure if a griefer can attach a trap onto or into my avatar. (It seems I've experienced at least one incident immediately upon being bumped.)

So let me capsulize everyone's comments to maybe help the next victim feel less shocked. I've also added some keywords to the end so that the subject will found more easily upon searching the forum. I originally complained of being 'distorted' and, as several have stated, the more common term is 'deformed'. Noob's might not know that.

Conclusions

DEFENSE:

*Be careful who you accept things from

*Be careful when using sandboxes and public build areas.

*Right click FIRST. And inspect.

*Don't panic if hit! It can be undone. You can log off, then on again. (But it may be wise not to come back to your last location as the object may be there.

*Don't panic #2. Try to note your co-ordinates and potential culprit's names so that you can return to a nearby safe spot and seek out the offending object.

*I especially like Pierce Kronos' suggestion to cover up the offending object by building a box on it. This may protect the next person. Maybe we can come up with an international warning sign or police line, do not cross tape.


OFFENSE:

*File an Abuse Report! Objects like cages and deformers that disrupt another's peace should, IMO, be considered griefing if left behind on public land. It's no accident.


LINDEN LABS

*I found the discussion and suggestions that Linden Labs shout track griefers by IP address spirited and interesting. Along that line, I'm thinking that since it's easy to get a new account, this tactic may be useful.

*I would support a move to keep the teen grid 100% free. (I remember when I had no money.) I would give three months free on the adult grid and thereafter charge a minimum annual $9.95 fee. This way, LL could associate banned griefers with a credit card # or PayPal account.

*I'd like to see access to a ban list by names and incidents, but only for incidents of 2 or more.

Thanks again for all the ideas. Sorry if I've been a little hyper about this (ya think?!) but terrorism and thoughtlessness and harassment at another's expense make me mad.

Yipp Oh

Keywords: deform deformer deformed distort distortion distorted trash trasher trashed cage caged grief griefer spam spammer trap relog

An animation that can't be stopped is a bug, so the correct solution to this is for LL to handle these oddball animations and have stop all animations do just that.

As for the griefing, this is usually done by throwing a large transparent prim set with a sit target right in front of an avatar's face so that he's very likely to click on it by mistake. When you sit on an object, animation priviledges are automatically granted as a special case so that chairs can make you sit. So you can also abuse this by doing any animation, including the bugged 'deformer' ones. An option to double check before performing left click operations in world (buy, sit, touch, but specifically sit) would allow an avatar to protect themselves against these.

Note also that once you give an object animation permission it can keep it. So if somebody hugs you or you sit on a chair, a malicious user could hang onto those permissions and later use them to grief you at will.

Basically, the workaround (similar to allowing control scripts in no script for AO's, or allowing you to push yourself into others causing them to go flying in no-push, and various other special cases) open things up for easy abuse.

Most people aren't aware that sitting on a chair could orbit them (potentially damaging their scripts), or have their avatar distorted requiring relog, A setting for sit targets with a warning by default would certainly be due diligence.