Fakenicking

[jerome]

Originally Posted by furball

Perhaps I phrased myself wrongly. I believe that an alliance that stores mobile numbers should not be welcome in PA, because it breaches the trust that PA players place in their galmates. This isn't something that should be banned by the EULA, it's an issue for alliances to reach a consensus on.

as ****ing if ahahahahhahahahahahahahaha

[furball]

Originally Posted by Sjor

i dont say its ok but its legal as you put the mobile number on gal screen

Does FO do it?

[jerome]

they probably do it, i presume the majority of top 5 do

[Mek]

most alliances do log phone numbers afaik

[qebab]

Originally Posted by furball

Does FO do it?

Sjor wouldn't know. He's not a part of FO the coming round, which is the first round FO will do pre-round preparations and intel gathering like this.

And before you ask, neither am I.

[qebab]

Originally Posted by furball

Does FO keep a db of phone numbers?

Of their own members. While I was HC, I didn't see any other phone database.

[Sjor]

furball its just the next step,
u used to to have a second irc client but than ppl figured out that u disconnect at same time as your fake nick. so you get a bouncer.

you used to put up gal pics from your webby, ppl noticed it now you upload it so some anonymus site

ppl used to whois you and find out ya ip adress, or even hack ya pc now you do /mode furbal +x

less and less ppl makes it harder to gather free intel
as said dont like it but its there

[furball]

Originally Posted by qebab

Of their own members. While I was HC, I didn't see any other phone database.

I have no problem with that - it's alliances storing the phone numbers of non-members for intel purposes that I have a major problem with.

Originally Posted by Sjor

furball its just the next step,
u used to to have a second irc client but than ppl figured out that u disconnect at same time as your fake nick. so you get a bouncer.

you used to put up gal pics from your webby, ppl noticed it now you upload it so some anonymus site

ppl used to whois you and find out ya ip adress, or even hack ya pc now you do /mode furbal +x

less and less ppl makes it harder to gather free intel
as said dont like it but its there

There's nothing forcing alliances to keep dbs of phone numbers. It's a moral choice, it's not forced on alliances by the game.

Show me a single PA player that is happy for other alliances (that he's never been a part of) to keep his phone number in a database, and I'll find you a hundred that aren't. That applies to HCs as well - if you wouldn't want someone to store your number, why are you storing other peoples'?

[Wandows]

I'm not sure if storing phone numbers is actually a moral choice. It is one of the few solid identifiers left in the game with everyone trying to hide behind fake nicks and defence channels/bots. If you keep track of phone numbers and nicks belonging to those numbers you have a extra way of gathering solid intel on who is playing a particular planet. I have to admit i don't know much about the intel part of the game, so i have no idea how many other (and perhaps better) methods are being used to get the desired information, but it seems like a reasonably easy/fast method of identifying a planet.

As for me personally, i do not think its bad for ppl to store the numbers for the purpose of identifying a planet (that is ofcourse a risk you take when sharing the info in your gal). The problem i would have with it is ppl abusing those numbers for personal gain (i.e. fake recall sms or such) as to me it would be invading someone's private (real)life, and a game is simply not worth all that to me.

[The Real Arfy]

Back in r11/12/13 or whenever it was, I stored phone numbers in our arbiter. They were only stored as encrypted data though. Able to match identical numbers, unable to store the original number!

How fking hard is it to comprimise ethics and efficiency without needless whingy discussion?

[furball]

Originally Posted by The Real Arfy

Back in r11/12/13 or whenever it was, I stored phone numbers in our arbiter. They were only stored as encrypted data though. Able to match identical numbers, unable to store the original number!

That's a lot more acceptable to me than storing them as the simple phone number.

[Heartless]

Originally Posted by furball

Perhaps I phrased myself wrongly. I believe that an alliance that stores mobile numbers should not be welcome in PA, because it breaches the trust that PA players place in their galmates. This isn't something that should be banned by the EULA, it's an issue for alliances to reach a consensus on.

I didnt want it to be covered and subsequently banned by the EULA, as that would be plain silly. I just wanted to point out that if you give your mobile number to someone without actually agreeing with him that he won't hand it out to someone else, you cannot expect it to stay "private".

A consensus between alliances would be like a joke. There's no way to check if an alliance keeps its word or not, thus someone will break any such agreement again and you gained nothing.

[NitinA]

Now, I'm not going to make a judgement on the actions I've taken, but throughout PA i've done intel work for alliances for several alliances and in several instances. During some rounds, Ive had access to a master list of phone numbers and matching nicknames/alliances. One list I had comprised of aprox. 900 nicks/phone #s. I think it's perfectly acceptable to use this sort of intel for identification of a planets nick to update arbiters with. I, personally, never distributed the list to anyone nor gave out any of the phone #s on that list. The nature of the data is sensitive due to what it can be used for, but if you disreguard the actual data's meaning, and use it as a place identifier to match A to B from an arbiter, then I think it's perfectly acceptable to use lists like that. Abusing it isn't. If you do intel work for an alliance round after round, you can create lists like that which are *private* and only used by you to update round-to-round. Of course, some people I wouldn't trust with having their own personal list because there's some players of the game I know who wouldn't be able to keep their private list (even if they created it by themselves) to themselves. Beyond the possible abuse, I don't see the problem with using the data of phone numbers as a constant intel constant from round to round.

PS I'm aware I'm probably in some intel dumps of nicks and matching phone #s, and I don't care too much about it. It's a risk I assumed by giving out my phone number There are services where you can get a private redirect number from a website virtually for free. I cba.

[Juice]

I don't have a problem with my ally HC's or BC's having my mobile number of other contact details, as this helps with the ally contacting me if needed. The information could be used else but i'm prepared to accept that risk, at the end of the day lot's of people have my mobile number even customers, so letting my ally know it is not a massive issue for me.

[pig]

Pretty much most alliances have a database of mobile numbers, there isn't really a problem with it imo. If people are stupid enough to give there number out to people they have never met (yes myself included) then why should they kick up a fuss when it used for intel purposes?

I have never been a fan of storing numbers, but to compete it was/is needed. Luckily the people with access to the numbers on the whole don't seem like idiots who would use the numbers for anything else other than intel. As soon as the numbers are used for other activities that is when it is wrong.

I have two phones anyway.

[Tietäjä]

Yeah, pretty much seconded to what pig and NitinA mentioned. I've had some level of sight on quite vast IP/Phone number storages, and whilst phone number identifying can be an "easy way" to hand out intel, I personally don't give the number outside buddypack too eagerly, and when I do, I've stopped fake nicking already, so it's really not worth the trouble. Edit. Oh, hell, and, what comes to "want em stored or not", whatever the answer is, someone's going to be doing it wide anyways.


More "malicious" ways exist to collect intel too, really.

Originally Posted by furball

That's a lot more acceptable to me than storing them as the simple phone number.

Isn't this a thin red line? Arfy would have access to a complete list, as he'd obviously be able to decrypt it. Wouldn't it be the same if some person kept a private list of them? What makes the difference between a private list and a list shared among "trustees" what apparently is the trend?

[Wandows]

Originally Posted by Tietäjä

Isn't this a thin red line? Arfy would have access to a complete list, as he'd obviously be able to decrypt it. Wouldn't it be the same if some person kept a private list of them? What makes the difference between a private list and a list shared among "trustees" what apparently is the trend?

although to me the way it is stored doesn't really matter, encrypted data doesnt nessecarily mean you are able to decrypt it aswell. Hashing for example allows you to generate the same encrypted output with the same input without being able to get the original input back from the encrypted output. This can be used for comparing secure information (like passwords or in this case, phone numbers) without storing the data in a readable format (or a format that can be restored in the original text).

[furball]

I assumed it was stored as a hash that would be pretty challenging to crack.