Fighting Back: Privacy issues arising from the ban

[oleary]

I think people are missing the point of this thread.

The goal is not necessarily to get a bot account unbanned. The goal is to find out what information they collected which enabled them to filter us out and ban us, and also to find out if in the process they broke any laws in any particular countries.

Why do this? If we find out what was "detected" technically at their end, it could be useful to bot developers in patching it. If they broke some law(s) in the process, the publicity and repercussions of this could prevent them from doing this again in future, and may result in many many accounts being restored or refunded.

Now sure you might ask why we would bother, knowing we did wrong, well aside from that being a matter of opinion and varying depending on use of the bot and how much you think a eula outweighs say a persons disability/missing limbs, but they very well may have committed some serious crime according to some law. You can also debate the ethics of bot detection software and the imposing of such terms of the eula on young people. Consider they allowed botting to become what it is over a long time frame because it suited them financially etc.

I don't know about you but I'd like to be able to continue having fun botting in future, and I'd like not to have my privacy invaded.

 

[Marek1980]

I actually think that Blizzard can scan your PC as long as they have stated this clearly in the terms of use. We have seen this in a few Apple Iphone apps lately. However, I still think it would be interesting to get the data collected by Blizzard, if this is something they store, we are obligated to get insight in due to the privacy laws. so, I would definitely ask to get all data that Blizzard have collected for my accounts.

and please.... do not create now accounts, the only way we can hurt blizzard is to play something else.

 

[oleary]

@Marek1980

You are partially right about them being allowed to scan via the EULA, however many places they sell their games have overriding laws prohibiting a lot of this sort of scanning and limiting very severely what they can scan/collect legally.

 

[iwwt]

The only thing that you could possibly get is to force them to give/erase all informations they have about you.
Pretty useless...

EU love to defend their customers agaisnt big US companies (they for example forced Microsoft to remove internet explorer by default in EU, or Google to give all informations they have about you and to erase them if asked).

But in this case, don't forget we will be presented as cheaters.
Don't expect EU commission to open an investigation...

 

[oleary]

@iwwt

Suppose you put in an information request and they provide the requested information which shows in some way that the data included information they should not have access to in your applicable law. All you need do is spread that information around a few news blogs with some scanned documents and the interwebs will do the rest.

 

[frosticus]

im lazy, can you post the offending sections of the EU terms? ive posted many sections of the US Terms and have informed people of their US situation regarding searches on their computer.

i didnt make anything up. i posted articles referencing judicial decisions and actual laws. examples of other companies that have successfully upheld their searches. and again, posted Blizzards rights you have given them by signing their agreement.

thanks for your post, it looks very professional. i hope it can do something for the cause.

 

[oleary]

It doesn't really matter until we actually get the information from them, until someone actually gets a request answered (which many countries entitle you to, regardless of if they unban the account to avoid it), we won't know what data they collected. If we don't know what they collected, we cant know if they operated legally.

So at this stage one particular set of rules is irrelevant other than the right to obtain information where you are. After that your information could mean that in one or two of the hundreds of countries that have access to their games, blizzard crossed some line. Given the mess of applicable laws in different places I'd guess chances are pretty high, but we can't know until someone gets this information out. So EU/US/AU doesn't matter right now provided you can access the information, as someone in NZ/RU/UK might have been illegally spied on.

 

[iwwt]

Here is the website of the belgian national privacy commission :
Privacy Commission

This is an application of an european directive, so all EU countries must have their own.
The simple fact to store your client's email address in a file without registering to this commission expose you to a (big) fine.

 

[icu]

im lazy, can you post the offending sections of the EU terms? ive posted many sections of the US Terms and have informed people of their US situation regarding searches on their computer.

i didnt make anything up. i posted articles referencing judicial decisions and actual laws. examples of other companies that have successfully upheld their searches. and again, posted Blizzards rights you have given them by signing their agreement.

thanks for your post, it looks very professional. i hope it can do something for the cause.

Hi, the legal framework in the EU is a little complex but I will try to explain it simply...

The European Parliament and the Council of Ministers share the power to adopt European laws, often acting on suggestions from the European Commission. These laws can take a number of forms, of which the two most common are regulations and directives.

In our case EU Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC is the most relevant.

Directives are binding on each member state as to the result to be achieved. In other words, the objectives of the directive must be achieved within a specified time scale (typically two years) but exactly how they are achieved is left to national authorises in each state. This is why it is important to look up your own country's data protection law.

To find out more about your particular country's law look it up here.

Personal data should not be processed at all, except when certain conditions are met. These conditions fall into three categories: transparency, legitimate purpose, and proportionality. In particular:

• The data subject has the right to be informed when their personal data is being processed, and
• The data collector must provide a name and address, the purpose of processing, the recipients of the data and all other information required to ensure the processing is fair.

Judging by how Blizzard are going about things and unsubstantiated information that has been PM'd to me, I think they have something to hide.

 

[gamerhead]

Do you guys think that blizzard will willingly hand out information that incriminates themselves. Let's be realistic here. Anything they give out, if at all will not be what you want.

 

[iwwt]

@gamerhead

yes and no.
Of course they won't send data that incimate themselves, so most likely we won't get everything they have in their database.
But it's a fact these data must include if you are flagged for botting, eventually date/time of detection.

 

[brainsick1987]

Hi there!

Following a review of your case, we can confirm that the evidence presented was correct and that the subsequent action taken was appropriate. Our decision in this matter stands and will not be overturned. Penalties are applied against accounts, not specific players - thus it doesn't matter who committed the offence.

For privacy and security reasons, it is our policy never to reveal details regarding account investigations beyond those which are provided in the original notice mail.

If you wish to review our current Rules and Policies, they can be found at: [url=http://battle.net/support/games/wow/conduct-penalties]World of Warcraft - Battle.net Support[/url]

This account action has already been thoroughly reviewed and will not be investigated again. Further tickets concerning this issue may be closed without a response.

For sensitivity and security reasons, we do not provide evidence of investigations to our customers. However, I can assure you that we have investigated and re-reviewed the evidence presented in this case. This is also done by multiple agents to ensure fairness and in this case the evidence was correct.
This action has been taken in accordance with our Terms of Use and our In-game Policies ([url]http://battle.net/support/article/100644[/url]), which all players acknowledge and agree to prior to playing World of Warcraft. These policies and conditions allow us to maintain a fun and safe game environment for all of our players.

Our Battle.net Terms of Use can be found at [url=http://blizzard.com/company/about/termsofuse.html]Blizzard Entertainment: Battle.net Terms of Use[/url]. Further information on the different levels of account penalty we can apply is available at
[url]https://battle.net/support/article/200475[/url].

We now consider this matter closed and would not look to enter into further discussion on the subject.

thats what i got when asked for evidence ..

 

[gamerhead]

@gamerhead

yes and no.
Of course they won't send data that incimate themselves, so most likely we won't get everything they have in their database.
But it's a fact these data must include if you are flagged for botting, eventually date/time of detection.

And that is the information that they will say is secret and needs to be keep that way as it has to do with there method of detecting botters. The most that will ever be sucked out of blizzard without a major lawsuit is the same standard bs we always get.

 

[icu]

Hi there!

Following a review of your case, we can confirm that the evidence presented was correct and that the subsequent action taken was appropriate. Our decision in this matter stands and will not be overturned. Penalties are applied against accounts, not specific players - thus it doesn't matter who committed the offence.

For privacy and security reasons, it is our policy never to reveal details regarding account investigations beyond those which are provided in the original notice mail.

If you wish to review our current Rules and Policies, they can be found at: [url=http://battle.net/support/games/wow/conduct-penalties]World of Warcraft - Battle.net Support[/url]

This account action has already been thoroughly reviewed and will not be investigated again. Further tickets concerning this issue may be closed without a response.

For sensitivity and security reasons, we do not provide evidence of investigations to our customers. However, I can assure you that we have investigated and re-reviewed the evidence presented in this case. This is also done by multiple agents to ensure fairness and in this case the evidence was correct.
This action has been taken in accordance with our Terms of Use and our In-game Policies ([url=http://battle.net/support/article/100644]Rules Regarding In-Game and Forum Conduct - Battle.net Support[/url]), which all players acknowledge and agree to prior to playing World of Warcraft. These policies and conditions allow us to maintain a fun and safe game environment for all of our players.

Our Battle.net Terms of Use can be found at [url=http://blizzard.com/company/about/termsofuse.html]Blizzard Entertainment: Battle.net Terms of Use[/url]. Further information on the different levels of account penalty we can apply is available at
[url]https://battle.net/support/article/200475[/url].

We now consider this matter closed and would not look to enter into further discussion on the subject.

thats what i got when asked for evidence ..

You were lucky to get a response which looks to be clearly automated.

If you live in the EU this response isn't in accordance to your rights and I would encourage you to make a request using the letter template in my earlier post.

 

[iwwt]

Penalties are applied against accounts, not specific players - thus it doesn't matter who committed the offence.

Interesting.

 

[tia1979]

As another thread stated. When you give them consent to scan, the laws are not valid.

Thats not true. EULA or TOS are not above the law, it will kick in once blizzard breaks one of the paragraphs in the data protection law no matter if you accepted it or not. Mostly because the EULA and TOS of blizzard works on a general basis, which is never a good thing as it all needs to be documented.

 

[gamerhead]

Thats not true. EULA or TOS are not above the law, it will kick in once blizzard breaks one of the paragraphs in the data protection law no matter if you accepted it or not. Mostly because the EULA and TOS of blizzard works on a general basis, which is never a good thing as it all needs to be documented.

It's against the law for a police officer to search you home without a warrant unless you give them permission.

 

[tia1979]

It's against the law for a police officer to search you home without a warrant unless you give them permission.

Still, you can limit the warrant. We don't know what blizzard might be doing on our computer, im just saying.

 

[gamerhead]

CONSENT TO MONITOR.
WHEN RUNNING, A GAME MAY MONITOR YOUR COMPUTER'S RANDOM ACCESS MEMORY (RAM) FOR UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAMS RUNNING CONCURRENTLY WITH THE GAME. AN "UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM" AS USED HEREIN SHALL BE DEFINED AS ANY THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE PROHIBITED BY SECTION 1(C)(ii) ABOVE. IN THE EVENT THAT THE GAME DETECTS AN UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM, (a) THE GAME MAY COMMUNICATE INFORMATION BACK TO BLIZZARD, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION YOUR ACCOUNT NAME, DETAILS ABOUT THE UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM DETECTED, AND THE TIME AND DATE; AND/OR (b) BLIZZARD MAY EXERCISE ANY OR ALL OF ITS RIGHTS UNDER THIS AGREEMENT, WITH OR WITHOUT PRIOR NOTICE TO THE USER. Additionally, certain Games include a tool that will allow your computer system to forward information to Blizzard in the event that the Game crashes, including system and driver data, and consent to Blizzard being able to receive this data.

this is paragraph 4 from the bnet elua, the underlined part is just vague enough to let blizz get away with scanning your pc. this will be there defense if challenged. keep in mind that this is from the US battlenet page.



and the eu bnet elua is the same minus the very last statement about game crashes. also states: This Agreement shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of France.

 

[OhaiDur]

I love the guys like Webhond ect in here, You are truly disgusting human beings, Your advice is basicly "Bend over and take it as soon as someone with more money than you fucks you over" You guys must be proper little bitches irl, Also this isnt the USA we are talking about here in the EU mainly, in the EU,UK ect We dont need money to go too court, We just need too point out some unethical practices and the authorities would take over and launch investigations and anything less than full cooperation would end up some hefty fines for Blizzard in the EU, So please stop commenting on this thread when you view the world through your Ally McBeal , Boston legal tinted glasses. If you have nothing constructive too say on the matter just take worthless opinion elsewhere