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05-22-10, 11:41 AM   #21
Principatus
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I think none of the concerns regarding RealID & anonymity sounds like a problem at all.


RealID, from what I understand, is a fully optional service available to everyone, but cannot be abused in any way without the player in question knowing about it.

First of all, you need to know the Battle.Net username of your RealID friend, which people don't give out to just anyone (if they do, then that's their problem & irrelevant to us).
Secondly, if you use a good password & change it regularly, giving out your Battle.Net username does not at all make it easier for people to crack into your account. Forum accounts are a good example; most people (who just can't be bothered with an extra e-mail for the B.Net service, myself included) use their Battle.Net address as their e-mail address as well. Though my BNet username & e-mail are the same, I do not use the same password on both.
However, it is still stupidly easy to learn Battle.Net usernames simply by hacking into accounts in a forum (this one, for instance) & look at the private details. That, however, doesn't mean they'll get into your BNet account (unless you're stupid & use the same password on that forum as you do for your BNet). And that's been true for me ever since my BNet was created, and my e-mail address is widely known to not only my friends, but everyone who vists the places I usually hang about online.

As long as you know how to browse the Internet, chances are you're more likely to be keylogged than anyone ever guessing your password.


Thirdly, I do believe Blizzard stated that you would be able to choose an "Appearance" (i.e nickname) when setting up your RealID, which must be manually enabled in your Battle.Net.
But don't quote me on that.


But ultimately, only people you trust (real life friends, most likely - or family) should be added to your RealID; anything else would just be silly.

Last edited by Principatus : 05-22-10 at 11:48 AM. Reason: Reworded something for clarification.
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05-25-10, 06:35 AM   #22
Tithulta
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Just have to say I love my fav Mod authors comments here.

I really like the idea of RealID, but I have issue witht he Friend of Friend bit. I have several guild friends I trust fully with my account if needed. Do i know ALL of their friends? No way. Just because I trust my guild friends as much as my real life friends mean in no way that I trust all their friends too. No one should see any of my info unless I myself have approved them as a friend. We've all had friends of friends whom we would rather throw off a cliff, than share a burger with. Sure the friend of friend part would make connecting with other friends easier, but at the loss of information control. As it is I couldnt even RealID family members that play. I "share" my account with a nephew cause my sister's family can't afford 4 accounts. My nephew(10) alone would make me not want any part of RealID. How many other family's have 1 or 2 accounts shared with siblings?


Hope i didnt ramble too much
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05-25-10, 08:17 AM   #23
Beoko
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How dare Blizzard provide a service to stay in touch with friends and family across their games.

As others have said, this service is completely optional. If you actually think that your friends or family are real security threats with only an email address, then by all means do not participate in using it. I don't understand the complaints.
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05-25-10, 10:33 AM   #24
Slakah
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I would just like a steamesque system, not facebook please.
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05-26-10, 02:47 PM   #25
[email protected]
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Originally Posted by Dawn View Post
I liked the idea of being able to communicate "cross game", but the implementation is just poor. I have a simple rule, my RL is private. I leave it behind me, the moment I log in/start a game. The way they implement this feature will make me simply not use it. Besides of my personal opinion, it's also not necessary at all to implement it the way they do. They could EASILY generate some number ID that would keep everything private, but still identifies everyone exactly. I really don't know why they are not doing it like that...
because "Hey its my friend '12345678' doesn't roll of the tongue? an 8-digit id number (to support all the 10 mil+ accounts, possibly even 9 digits as we move to diablo 3 and starcraft 2 being added) doesn't make the Identification of your friends any easier.

Originally Posted by Tithulta View Post
I really like the idea of RealID, but I have issue witht he Friend of Friend bit. I have several guild friends I trust fully with my account if needed. Do i know ALL of their friends? No way. Just because I trust my guild friends as much as my real life friends mean in no way that I trust all their friends too. No one should see any of my info unless I myself have approved them as a friend. We've all had friends of friends whom we would rather throw off a cliff, than share a burger with. Sure the friend of friend part would make connecting with other friends easier, but at the loss of information control. As it is I couldnt even RealID family members that play. I "share" my account with a nephew cause my sister's family can't afford 4 accounts. My nephew(10) alone would make me not want any part of RealID. How many other family's have 1 or 2 accounts shared with siblings?
Note: Account sharing is one of the worst practices for information control and account security. Just an FYI.
That said: Your friends of friends wouldn't know your battle.net address. While I agree that you don't want to share all your information with friends of friends, I can't say the I see any reason why you think the system is telling you anything more then you friend is friend of BLAH, not all your toons, your email, and your home address.
In fact (quote from the Real ID FAQ)
In addition, players who are Real ID friends with that player will be able to see your name in a “friends of friends” list, which allows people to be able to quickly send Real ID friend requests to others they may know.
All they get is a name on a list. And you must agree to someone else adding you, so random people can not just friend you and see what you are doing.

In fact, the service is completely opt-in and your are fully able to later opt-out.

I personally believe that if your raiding guild requires that you RealID friend your guild mates, you should find a new guild. It abuses the purpose of the system. Of course, if you are really concerned about privacy, you wouldn't have to have me tell you this. You'd be busy finding/making a non-RealID guild.

As for concerns about real id with shared accounts, account sharing is a technical TOU violation, and therefore not something blizzard needs to support. If you are concerned, make sure those people 'borrowing' your account know not to use it.

P.S.: Anyone who knows my email knows my battle.net address. Im sure all of you concerned about giving out your battle.net id have a hotmail, gmail, yahoo and 3 other email accounts and can keep track of which is an account for what, but the battle.net user name is by no means secure, as posted above. Password security and optionally an authenticator are what are supposed to keep your account safe. Throwing

Last edited by [email protected] : 05-26-10 at 03:07 PM. Reason: added refrences and clarity
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05-26-10, 04:04 PM   #26
cloudwolf
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because "Hey its my friend '12345678' doesn't roll of the tongue? an 8-digit id number (to support all the 10 mil+ accounts, possibly even 9 digits as we move to diablo 3 and starcraft 2 being added) doesn't make the Identification of your friends any easier.
This isn't what he means by a unique identifier number. In steam there is a unique ID number tied to every account this number has no effect on your visible name. What is meant by this is because the realid system is showing your "character" name or real name it doesn't show your email. The only person who knows that info is the person you gave it to to allow them to become a real id friend. So It would tell you friend John Doe is playing Starcraft 2. Even if his unique number is 12345678 this is internal to the system to keep track of each player and in no way a display name.
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05-26-10, 09:24 PM   #27
aceman67
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Considering the recent concessions that Facebook had to make at the behest of both the Canadian and US governments recently, I'm pretty sure that Blizzard will take a lesson or two from FB and give users the option as what information is to be made available.

Don't want people to know your real name? Simple, turn that off.

You're forgetting that Blizzard, unlike some other software developers, actually listen to their consumer base if the same thing is requested enough. Don't believe me? Look at the Death Knight class, we've been nerfed to hell since Wrath launch.

Also, if you're that concerned about your privacy on B.net, Simply don't add anyone to your friends list, become a hermit and don't take advantage of what would be a helpful boon to what is already a thriving online community of players.

Me personally, I hope that blizz will eventually allow us to add people from other realms that we meet using the LFG system and even allow us to queue up for randoms together simply because we know the other person is made of awesome-sauce. There are some players that I had the pleasure of running with on dozens of occasions from lv15-70 while leveling my druid, and I'd love the ability to run heroics with them in Wrath.

Last edited by aceman67 : 05-26-10 at 09:30 PM.
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05-28-10, 04:42 PM   #28
Tithulta
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Originally Posted by [email protected] View Post
As for concerns about real id with shared accounts, account sharing is a technical TOU violation, and therefore not something blizzard needs to support. If you are concerned, make sure those people 'borrowing' your account know not to use it.
Actually they say it's ok for ONE sibling to share an account. When my sister an her kids were living @ my parents that same nephew deleted my bank alt "cuz it was lvl 1". I nearly passed out. GM was nice an restored my bankalt, but did say they'd prefer everyone having their own account so things like that didn't happen.

Yes they didn't ahve to and in a perfect world each and every person who enjoys playing WOW would ahve their very own account. Since this world is far from perfect...


My issue with friends of friends the the amount of info they can see about me without actually being friended by me.

You know what after reading the FAQ yet again, I understood it a bit different this time. I WILL use Real ID at least initially.
I was previously under the impression friends of friends would be able to see first and last name in addition to my battle.net ID. I don't want ANYONE that I don't know and trust fully to know that.

FAQ states : "Your Battle.net account name (your email address) is not displayed to other players through the Real ID friends list."

Still will have to see how it turns out, but I'm not worried about ppl knowing my name is David Rogers. There are so freaking many of us they'd have a crap shoot getting the right one. I've even had a warrant out for my arrest for truancy, 2 years after I'd graduated high school. Wrong SS, but same name.
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05-28-10, 05:15 PM   #29
Psychophan7
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Originally Posted by Slakah View Post
I would just like a steamesque system, not facebook please.
I find this funny because Facebook has better privacy controls than Real ID. It might have better privacy controls than Steam, too.
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05-28-10, 06:01 PM   #30
Dawn
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Originally Posted by cloudwolf View Post
This isn't what he means by a unique identifier number. In steam there is a unique ID number tied to every account this number has no effect on your visible name. What is meant by this is because the realid system is showing your "character" name or real name it doesn't show your email. The only person who knows that info is the person you gave it to to allow them to become a real id friend. So It would tell you friend John Doe is playing Starcraft 2. Even if his unique number is 12345678 this is internal to the system to keep track of each player and in no way a display name.
This.


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05-29-10, 06:39 AM   #31
Slakah
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Originally Posted by Psychophan7 View Post
I find this funny because Facebook has better privacy controls than Real ID. It might have better privacy controls than Steam, too.
Yeah it does the whole point is that steamcommunity has very little information that it needs privacy controls for.

http://steamcommunity.com/id/circusact/ theres my steam id page, theres not much to keep private, very little personal information apart from home town and the games I own/play a lot.

When I said I would prefer a steam system I was referring to the fact that Steam doesn't allow you to store much detailed information and keeps mainly to gaming information. Instead of venturing into the RL social networking sphere of which facebook already handles amicably.

All I want to be able to do is be allowed to join games that my battle.net mates are playing.

Last edited by Slakah : 05-29-10 at 06:55 AM.
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05-29-10, 11:47 AM   #32
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Originally Posted by Tithulta View Post
Actually they say it's ok for ONE sibling to share an account. When my sister an her kids were living @ my parents that same nephew deleted my bank alt "cuz it was lvl 1". I nearly passed out. GM was nice an restored my bankalt, but did say they'd prefer everyone having their own account so things like that didn't happen.
I'm sorry but the Terms of Use disagrees with you.

Basically it considers you and one minor child you are a parent or guardian with the same "legal entity".

This is the legal entity that the EULA and TOU is a legal contract for between them and Blizzard.
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05-29-10, 11:52 AM   #33
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Originally Posted by cloudwolf View Post
This isn't what he means by a unique identifier number. In steam there is a unique ID number tied to every account this number has no effect on your visible name. What is meant by this is because the realid system is showing your "character" name or real name it doesn't show your email. The only person who knows that info is the person you gave it to to allow them to become a real id friend. So It would tell you friend John Doe is playing Starcraft 2. Even if his unique number is 12345678 this is internal to the system to keep track of each player and in no way a display name.
There is actually an internal battle.net account number now.

When you log on the current 3.3.5 PTR , when the default folders are created then a numbered folder appears in your WTF/Account folder.

IMHO All they would need to do is implement a way of using that number to friend someone using the Real ID system. Maybe even an alias to put it on your computer to denote who that person is.
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tuba_man on Apple test labs : "I imagine a brushed-aluminum room with a floor made of keyboards, each one plugged into a different test box somewhere. Someone is tasked with tossing a box full of cats (all wearing turtlenecks) into this room. If none of the systems catch fire within 30 minutes, testing is complete. Someone else must remove the cats. All have iPods." (http://community.livejournal.com/tec...t/2018070.html)
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05-29-10, 01:28 PM   #34
orionshock
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wow... while i can understand the varying points of view. There is no real need to be anonymous to your own friends from IRL.

I do agree with the view about hiding the real name to use a screen name for people you don't know IRL.
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05-29-10, 01:45 PM   #35
Dawn
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My friendlist contains almost 98% of people I do not know in RL. And I bet that at least 70% of the people on all friendlists out there are people, not known in RL. Privacy is something that is worth being kept private.

People are giving up their right for privacy way to fast these days and in turn get hacked - not only a game account, but even bank accounts - stalked, whatever ... you don't want that.
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05-30-10, 09:14 AM   #36
Tithulta
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Originally Posted by Dawn View Post
My friendlist contains almost 98% of people I do not know in RL. And I bet that at least 70% of the people on all friendlists out there are people, not known in RL. Privacy is something that is worth being kept private.

People are giving up their right for privacy way to fast these days and in turn get hacked - not only a game account, but even bank accounts - stalked, whatever ... you don't want that.
I agree 100%
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05-30-10, 12:09 PM   #37
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Either way all this is going to reach a head come the 8th of June.

If you log into battle.net today you will notice that up the top is something about a new updated battle.net agreement.

http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/company...ofuse-new.html

In there is a paragraph on how the "Real Life Friends" works. It stresses what they can see and can not see and makes deliberate use of the phrase "Real Life Friend". As in if they are not your RL friend don't use the feature.

It makes it clear that if you don't wish to agree to the agreement that you can stop using the Battle.net service. Which is used to connect to World of Warcraft. That you agree to this TOU and World of Warcraft's TOU & EULA. That if "If any part of this Agreement is determined to be invalid or unenforceable, then that portion shall be severed, and the remainder of the Agreement shall be given full force and effect.".

So I hate to be that guy running around with a slippery slope argument decrying about how this is going to result in canceled accounts , the invetiable result of pretty much every change Blizzard has made since the pre-alpha days but ....

If they don't update this terms of use to accommodate people's privacy concerns IMHO they will either see a ton of cancelled accounts ... or a feature that never gets used by anyone as everyone refuses to use it until their privacy concerns are addressed....
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tuba_man on Apple test labs : "I imagine a brushed-aluminum room with a floor made of keyboards, each one plugged into a different test box somewhere. Someone is tasked with tossing a box full of cats (all wearing turtlenecks) into this room. If none of the systems catch fire within 30 minutes, testing is complete. Someone else must remove the cats. All have iPods." (http://community.livejournal.com/tec...t/2018070.html)
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05-30-10, 12:43 PM   #38
Dawn
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What concerns me the most is that people tend to simply agree to blizzard terms, without reading them... A wall of text isn't fun when you want to play, asap.
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Rock: "We're sub-standard DPS. Nerf Paper, Scissors are fine."
Paper: "OMG, WTF, Scissors!"
Scissors: "Rock is OP and Paper are QQers. We need PvP buffs."

"neeh the game wont be remembered as the game who made blizz the most money, it will be remembered as the game who had the most QQ'ers that just couldnt quit the game for some reason..."

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05-30-10, 01:36 PM   #39
Bluspacecow
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Originally Posted by Dawn View Post
What concerns me the most is that people tend to simply agree to blizzard terms, without reading them... A wall of text isn't fun when you want to play, asap.
Quoted For MF' Truth , excuse the masked profanity.

It is my personal opinion that 70-80 % of the US World of Warcraft base are not fully aware of exactly what implications the Terms of Use and the End User License has on them and their consumer rights.

I will freely admit that I only just started examining it in detail just before the first Lawbringer articles on wow.com (the site formerly known as wow insider).

The funny thing is you can't play without agreeing to both documents. Both documents are legally binding and state that if you don't agree with whats in them then your recourse is to cancel your account and wipe the game client off your computer.

By scrolling to the end of both documents and clicking agree you are signing to see this is legally binding by me and by continuing to play after signing both documents indications your reconfirmation that you agree with the terms of that agreement.

PS Satrina ? You out there babe ? if you are reading this , this would be a nice thread for you to weigh in on. I don't wanna PM you

or um ... the other addon authors whose day job is being a lawyer >_> <_<
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tuba_man on Apple test labs : "I imagine a brushed-aluminum room with a floor made of keyboards, each one plugged into a different test box somewhere. Someone is tasked with tossing a box full of cats (all wearing turtlenecks) into this room. If none of the systems catch fire within 30 minutes, testing is complete. Someone else must remove the cats. All have iPods." (http://community.livejournal.com/tec...t/2018070.html)
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05-31-10, 07:36 PM   #40
Beoko
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I really think most of you are making too big of a deal out of this. I find it incredibly useful, and I will use it. If you don't find it useful or don't like it, for whatever reason, then don't use it.

Suggesting that people will cancel their accounts over this or that you're giving up any privacy by using it is ridiculous.
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