Privacy Violation- where to report

I recently went to the sl website to find out how to report a serious privacy violation. And found the email address [email]privacy@lindenlab.com[/email] . This email address is bogus and I was unable to send to this address. I would like to know where I can report this. Here is my letter as follows (violator's name removed)

I have recently become aware of a person named ****** ******* (sl name) who has a device that records and tracks an avatar's IP address, where they live, where they go in second life and regardless of their settings he is able to tell where people are on the grid at any given moment. He has collected a database of this information through an HUD device which he has given to several people. These people in his group are to fly all around second life gathering this data via their "data collection HUD", which is sent to a website outside of second life where users of this HUD can also view this personal information. He has stationed himself in a position where he can gather this data on every new second life user as they enter the grid. As a result of gathering this data he is able to identify users and their alts. He is able to collect patterns of behavior of second life users for commercial purposes and in turn sells this information to outside sources. I was offered one of these collection HUDs and am currently in possession of one of these devices which I do not use for obvious reasons. I believe this is a violation of my personal privacy by a person other than Linden Labs use and second life users privacy policy. I am formally requesting that such data collection of my personal information be stopped immediately by ****** *******.

You can file an abuse report.

That person's name isn't Aristotle Integrity, is it?

No it isn't

I have filed an abuse report as "other" but am not able to include all the information. Also there is no category for this type of violation. Also is says to include dates and times which is impossible due to the nature of this complaint.

Hahaha!

Yeah, he threatens to nuke people if they won't buy his HUD.

When you recieve a email that LL got your AR you should have a email sent to you where you can give further explinations and such.

Personally I would ignore the putz.... he cant harm me or anyone in SL.

Damn Im going to lead-line my bathroom....and my sex bed once its up and running

I hate to say it, but that sort of system is (I'm fairly sure) not against ToS unless it is actually used to harass, and in that case, it would be the harassment which would be illegal rather than the information-gathering.

(Edit: and please do not mistake this for approval on my part, I absolutely do not approve of people building up such databases, but it is now simple enough that I wonder whether it might not simply be better to have one which is entirely publicly accessible, so that it is not just members of some exclusive paid group who have access.)

I believe that using this "system" to report alts is a violation of the privacy rules.... granted I have little sympathy for most alts but there you have the core problem... and I don't know how LL would apply those rules outside of SL

the issue of tracking online status/location... not ToS actionable, nor are name to key databases in general

"a device that records and tracks an avatar's IP address" ???

I doubt it very much

This goes beyond the existing TOS and Community Standards, which do not seem to have anticipated such a development. If this thing works as advertised, it is a direct and fundamental threat to the existence of SL and LL. I would suggest making that point to every available interface where a Resident can communicate to LL, both in-world and out. There are 800 numbers and such. I hope better-versed people than I can educate you about them.

One hopes this is a hoax. If it is not, LL needs to know about it ASAP. If LL does not listen, or does not act, sadly we will all have to look to the next iteration of Web 2.0, for SL will die a sad, litigation-ridden, disgraceful death.

(Personally, my money is on it being a hoax, but that's just me.)

Yeah, from what I understand it is near impossible to get the real IP of a user from a script either on LL server or one of your own.

This is the reason they won't allow textures to be loaded VIA URLs. It would expose users IPs unless they filtered all the traffic through SL servers which would add much more load and data transfer.

-edit-

One thing is, who cares who gets you're IP? You scared they are going to find out your alt is used to visit some hardcore sex shops? If you are this paranoid about people finding your IP, STOP USING THE INTERNET NOW AND UNPLUG YOUR MODEM. Your IP isn't something that really needs to be hidden unless you are breaking the law. (in which case it is easy to proxy) (and note, i'm talkin IP exposure here, not online status tracking which could get annoying but is hardly a big risk)

People who know me here will recall that many months ago I wrote how my then-partner had bugged my entire property and was able to receive my text chat via e-mail. That is how he chased me outta house after he discovered my other relationships. But point I am making is that so many of these "legal" tools/scripts (bugging tools are legal) proliferate and coz so many problems. Seemingly liberal attitude by Lindens to this kind of abuse is most annoying when they get knickers in a twist over sexy conversations being overheard by avatars with cameras. Thread starter's point has my sympathy. It is a pity we have to be quite paranoid to survive in SL.

There is no current mechanism to get someone's IP address from within SL, presuming that they are not viewing video/audio feeds for a parcel (it would be quite possible to set the feeds to a URL which gathered IPs as they are streamed directly as far as I'm aware), they don't look at your web profile or visit any URLs you specify via llLoadURL, etc. Fairly exclusive criteria.

In any case, one's IP address is certainly not any sort of secret magic code. The consequences of having someone know your IP address really boil down to "oh you can tell who my ISP is and maybe identify if I look at something again and haven't gotten another one".

If indeed such a device can collect another residents IP address, then that falls squarely under a "disclosure" violation. The IP address really has no meaning in SL, but CAN allow immature individuals an avenue to harass others outside of SL (by hacking, DDoS, ping of death, OS Exploit, etc..). I'm pretty sure that collecting and sharing alt identities (by comparing the IP addresses of accounts recorded in this manner) is a "disclosure" issue as well. It's "disclosure" because it's RL identifying info, not freely offered by the victim, and collected secretly without notice. Yes, dynamic IP's do change, but tell the RIAA there's no money in backtracing an IP through the internet provider
The gathering of info about locations inworld, and trends relating to that is perfectly ok... just like Google does when you use their site.

Well, but that's less sympathetic. I mean I don't advocate spying on other people, including loved ones, but if you are cheating and get caught from spying, it doesn't seem to me a very sympathetic case for complaining about the spying.

I'm fairly sure it doesn't go beyond any ToS.

Some bits of it (IP addresses, "we can find you anywhere on the grid" are hoaxes, but a lot of it is quite achievable with a sufficiently board community of people with scanning scripts and a reasonable database.

Is it even possible to get an avatar's IP address with a script?
(I thought not because external http requests go through the sim.)

Presumably this system (in theory) determines alts by catching multiple avatar sharing the same IP address. That's a fallible process because plenty of SL users share the same geographical address and therefore IP address.

Isn't it only possible for a script to determine the next sim to which an avatar just teleported due to some glitch in the system? If said avatar teleported to another sim immediately afterwards, wouldn't the script have no way of detecting where they went this time?

Regarding this assertion:



Could somebody more tech savvie than I please explain (or theorize) on how this would be achieved. Being able to intercept any amount of data from _every_ _single_ _user_ logging into the system seems like a _very_ serious security concern for Linden Lab. This is perhaps the most suspect piece of information, leading me to believe most of the alleged specs of this system are based on rumour or misselling.

What is the name of this HUD? Where can I buy one?

I'm not interested in tracking other users. I'd just like to see if this HUD lives up to its rumoured specs. (I suspect not, and I wonder whether the HUD itself contains a script which tracks the wearer. The more people wear it, the more successful a tracking device it becomes. That's a pure stab in the dark, but it's an interesting concept.)

Finally, if this product is legit, and its usage becomes widespread, I suspect its future would be short-lived. Remember what happened to Godmode last year folks?

Oh OK, while I was typing my post, y'all answered half my questions.

how do you even know YOU are being tracked?

No.

It can't be.

I have seen numerous items for sale which claim that they can do this sort of thing - previously it used to be slave collars, with "masters" intimidating and lying to the unwary - and it has always been rubbish. I do know the odd one or two things regarding how these systems could possibly work. It's all an enormous con-job.

Yes, it is possible if you are running a stream of your own using shoutcast and comparing a visitor log with the shoutcast admin log. But it's not guaranteed to work 100% if people are not connecting to the stream, and if there is no traffic. I often have music off, so this generally would not work against me.

As for the name to key service, your name and your avatar key are public information. There is no privacy violation in getting your avatar key.

The ONLY IP Exposure comes from using the Video & Audio streams.

BUT, it would be hard to put this information together with the users AV unless they are tracking small parcels to see if AV enters at 1:10:10 and a new users enters the stream at 1:10:05-1:10:15, it is save to assume it may be that user.

Now that would be VERY limited on active parcels and you would need to track bother Enter & Exit times to properly associate the two.

Actually, now that I think of it, with an external Database it would be simple to track an Avatar and associate it to an IP on LANDS THAT YOU OWN. But, this is limited in only knowing when the user entered the land and exited. It also assumes video or audio is set to stream automatically.

Perhaps the 'behavioural info' relates to the excessive length of time between visits to the bathroom by sl inhabitants...then sold on to some unscrupulous laxative salesman who tries to alleviate the problem