“On-going harassment” or how Blizzard don’t care about it. Vol 3

Argent Dawn
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Previous thread: https://eu.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/on-going-harassment-or-how-blizzard-dont-care-about-it-vol-2/419077

This time, I’d like to bring in some elaboration, theory and raise a general concern in regards to how Blizzard handles privacy & how it should be handled. I believe that AD forums aren’t the best place to raise this concern in particular. Rather, it should be CS forum or something. But because I’ve previously posted here the previous topic, I’d like to give some consistency. This knowledge may become handy to those who roleplay, after all.

First and foremost. In order to provide some solid evidence & proof, I’ll have to de-anon myself. Or rather, it will become quite obvious once you’ll go through the link provided below. But it is what it is. My right for privacy has been stripped away from me regardless, I lose nothing regardless. Best thing I can say, mistakes were done, lessons learned, so forth.

In previous thread people speculated how does my stalker learn my alts and so forth.
Turns out, things are easier than “installing a virus” on my computer or something alike. Me and a few friends tested a theory based on some screenshots that were received from the others, to whom, said stalker has shared as “evidence” that I’m a bad person. (P.S - he generally does this to off-put other roleplayers from RPing/Talking to me).

[Link removed] - Character added to the database.
This supports a theory that he has developed own addon that has a database structure and either he automatically (which is most likely. I doubt someone would manually add someone with that name anyway) or manually adds targets to this database.

Since Blizzard does NOT turn off API code by default, it allows websites like check-pvp to expose your alts to others. If API is disabled, you can still go to WoW armory page and do a comparison check via pets.

I think that the latter option is exactly what he does. Either manually or, most likely, has integrated it into his addon to do quick requests from the armory to pin point if this character belongs to someone he knows.

Other than that, he uses two other functions & methods:
[Link removed] - using low-level rogue alts to be in stealth and at range, as maximum as /s /e allows you to be in order to read those.
and
[Link removed] - using some parameters to identify when he’s in range or not + using good old fashion /add people to friendlist in order to track their whereabouts & using simple macros of /target to fly around and scan surroundings for the people.

Now, I’ve mentioned that me and my friends tested a theory. It was simple. I HSed to Garrison. One of my friends, on a character that never interacted with any character of mine, separately HSed into Garrison. Their API was disabled too.
A few minutes within Garrison, this dropped by, reported by another friend of mine:
[Link removed]

So what we have in the end are old mechanics that were introduced a long while ago and are easily exploitable to stalk & harass.

  1. Allowance of low-level characters to use public chats.
  2. Usage of /who
  3. Ability to add anyone to a friendlist without their permission needed & track their whereabouts.
  4. Enabled, by default, API code that can be used to expose your alts.
  5. Inability to de-assign pets. Once assigned, you’re stuck with them and this can be exploited against you by “guess&compare”.
  6. Usage of toys upon others (like pumpkins) if they are not in /party /raid /guild

I do not say what must be done about them. There’s more than 1 way about it. But from my personal experience, these are easily exploited to harass & stalk people in-game.

Finally, I’ve been asked by someone to make a compilation of my stalker’s activity on me and as I’ve said, it’ll de-anon me. But to be fair, I no longer care about it. Only reason why I’m using this character to make another post, is because I used the same character on previous post(s). Some form of consistency.

Full evidence compilation

Images evidence: [Link removed]
Video evidence: [Link removed]

Don’t know if the thread gets deleted from this or not, as in-thread itself, names are not mentioned.
But I’d like to highlight that as per Blizzard ToS terms:

Disruption / Harassment: Engage in any conduct intended to disrupt or diminish the game experience for other players, or disrupt operation of Blizzard’s Platform in any way, including:
Disrupting or assisting in the disruption of any computer used to support the Platform or any Game environment. ANY ATTEMPT BY YOU TO DISRUPT THE PLATFORM OR UNDERMINE THE LEGITIMATE OPERATION OF ANY GAME MAY BE A VIOLATION OF CRIMINAL AND CIVIL LAWS.
Harassment, “griefing,” abusive behavior or chat, conduct intended to unreasonably undermine or disrupt the Game experiences of others, deliberate inactivity or disconnecting, and/or any other activity which violates Blizzard’s Codes of Conduct or In-Game Policies.

and Social Contract:
https://imgur.com/a/Cuh81hd

It’s ming-boggling how despite an overwhelming amount of evidence of this violation to the tos/contract for years, it took Blizzard a year to issue a 1-week suspension and another 6 months to issue another 1-week suspension, as all the harassment has resumed after the suspension was lifted.

And yes, I know. Police. I already contacted his police station, it was promptly disregarded to contact my police station first. And while I know that it’s an adequate legal way. I do have a fear that it’ll be laughed off when I come up to them with something like:
“I have a dude in an online-game that monitors my activity and throws pumpkins on me.”
But that’s my personal issue.

Thanks for coming to my Ted-Talk again.

P.s - It’d be great if Blizzard at least would update gameplay mechanics to ensure privacy is actually valued (API code included). Instead of forcing this abstract social contract that doesn’t simply work. Its like safety rules. Everyone read it, no one cares & no one checks.

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I’m really sorry this is still happening to you.

What an absolute nightmare of a creep they are.

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As you’ve said, this is probably better for the customer service forum since usual ways of GMing aren’t gonna cover 5 years of dedicated internet hounding. While I guess there’s something to be said about consistency all that I see happening in the AD forum is this going to 500 posts (but 0 solutions)

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Blizzard should definitely do more to prevent harrassment, there you are right to be concerned. It should be stalkers getting punished, not those whom they are systematically targeting and harrassing. Currently however, /who is broken and has been since Shadowlands.

I personally consider these alt-snooping sites and freedom to add people to your friendslist as a double-edged sword, it can be beneficial as well! As for myself, when I have had a bad RP experience with someone and -know- that interacting with them on any character would result in a headache or subtle forms of bullying, I sometimes add their characters on my friendslist and get to learn their alts to -avoid- them. If I see that they are on a certain zone and I’m trying to decide whether I go to that zone or somewhere else to roleplay, naturally I’d want to avoid meeting a person whom I can’t have relaxing IC and most likely end up feeling **** OOC from anything but minimal interaction with them.

Knowledge is power, when I know that someone is a bad apple, I can give them minimal interaction and still navigate the situation smoothly. But such approach just doesn’t work with decent roleplayers and IC interaction where you want to get more immersed to enjoy it. Otherwise it would be constant hiding behind “prove yourself before I interact with you more” attitude which ultimately doesn’t encourage RP at all, but kills it.

I also have to empathise that it is the nature of internet that everything that we do there tends to become public and we have to be comfortable with some harsh realities of it. It’s not viewing something or gathering info which is bad, because you can use that info both to help yourself or do harm… and this is where the line comes in. If someone uses that info to harrass you, it should be punishable and if Blizzard doesn’t do anything, it is certainly on them as well as on your stalker who clearly isn’t capable of respecting your boundaries or moving on.

I hope that commenting a bit “aside” from the topic doesn’t come off as rude.

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Oh, not at all. These are valid points that you’ve brought up and as you’ve said, options to gather information can either help you or cause harm to others.

I am, of course, pre-biased here, due to the latter circumstances. But even then, people who cross the line, should be dealt with appropriately and without having to wait for months if not years.

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I can’t see your own messages with Blizzard’s CS staff, but one thing I’d mention in every new ticket is the list of previous tickets (with their IDs) you have opened on the same topic and got consequently closed when they answered that they are investigating the matter or gave bogus advice (they can’t disclose actual punishments being distributed).

You’d expect that they go through your entire ticket history but that’s frequently not the case. I had to do my rounds of re-reporting the same issue 5 times, with the last one including me listing all my previous tickets and useless GM responses.

Magically that prompted the next Game Master to escalate the issue I reported to their developer team and magically I had my character fixed and the aforementioned glitch sorted within a week with the GM mediating the progress.

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It’s horrible that this is allowed to continue. Online games and their peculiarities are particularly prone to host deranged individuals and enabling stalking. I can’t imagine how stressful it must be, having endured just a fraction of this kind of nonsense, myself.

By the looks of it, blizzard didn’t consider how these features might be used and don’t consider it enough of a problem to change anything.

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Im so sorry to hear you are still having this going on since last time. Its not okay :frowning:

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You really are living rent free in the persons head.
My absolute condolences.

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I do reference to previous tickets though.
https://imgur.com/a/zCBhsT0

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Yeah, I wouldn’t know that when you snip out this detail. I’m only giving advice based on what I personally experienced when my tickets were handled with room temperature IQ responses.

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Oh, that is understandable. I didn’t want to come off as rude or snorky, but yes. I’ve been referencing to previous tickets almost every time and being even as cocky as to write things like “Confirm that you’ve read previous tickets” so I’d know that CS at least does it. But obviously, no confirmation has taken place.

One of the recent examples was this Pro Tip:

Pro Tip: Do not contact this person in any way. If you don’t react to their actions, this will get boring for this person very quickly. Also use the ignore function whenever you can.

Where it’s clearly not the case anymore and these ‘pro tips’ are pointless. Leaves an impression that they barely read history if not at all.

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Even when you do (as I have multiple times in the past), they tend to ignore it from my experience. For what reason, I do not know.

All the same, I am really sad to hear this still hasn’t been resolved. How can Blizzard preach of inclusivity when they let things like these slide for so long?

At the same time, I also see a lot has changed about the way you speak about this and look at it. You go out of your way to try and explain the situation as objectively as possible whilst also reminding that this is just your PoV and reminding us that you have bias. You have also built your post and case on very much evidence and structured coherently.

Correct me if I am wrong but I feel like this fight has steeled you in some way. I do not know if that is how you feel or look at it, that is just my observation.

All the same I hope you get the justice that you deserve. Nobody deserves what you have had to go through.

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I’ve spoken with as many as people as they have reached out to me.
From the “Don’t give up” and “I’m sorry that this happens to you” whispers up to more lengthy debates & topics as well as attempts to play an arm-chair detective and even go as far as to report the person or find other ways to try and help me.

This has overall helped me to gain more confidence and strength. I do try to stay objective and neutral and this is still my PoV / story / experience that I share.

The whole ‘compilation’ list was suggested to me by someone, who has seen a similar approach done by someone else. So I took their post and used it as an example to sit down and structure it in a cohesive, easy-to-follow sort of a read.

Previously, whilst I tried to stay neutral, my post(s) were written in one go and re-reading them now, there are a few inconsistencies that may be hard to follow by others. Hence why I picked a more slow but better worded way & provide evidence as much as possible to emphasize on the scale / severity of this case as well as to elaborate & explain some moments.

A few emotional outbursts that I had and allowed myself to slip in public against the stalker, were recorded by the stalker and now he just sends these links to people I RP / play with, with intention to stop them from interacting with me. I was asked about it and had to explain what actually happened and how. So it felt right to explain this in the post as well.

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I am so sorry you’re going through this. I have been stalked on this game and it is an awful experience that can bleed into real life.

The stuff about databases and addons to aid in stalking is actually scary. Blizzard’s lack of care about that sort of thing is also frightening.

Though the ‘Pro Tip’ is very condescending, I do really recommend never replying to an email, message or whisper. A complete block might hopefully lead to them eventually giving up.

I wish Blizz would do more about this sort of thing and you have my sympathies. :frowning:

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Admittedly, cursing and demanding answers from Blizzard Support has never-ever worked to anyone’s favour. I understand the frustration you have to go through, as I had to report a stalker for a year, but it simply does not help you whenever you try to approach with the issue to Blizzard in such manner.

Perhaps consider writing tickets in a more “pleading” way, less so “when will you fix your game”.

Hope the issue gets resolved and you get some peace.

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Yeah, that is a fair point.
But I’ve been trying to stay cordial and polite for so many times and every time, I’m just brushed off. Eventually, some anger begins to rise up. It doesn’t justify or make my situation any better, I agree. It’s just. It is what it is. In my recent replies, I was cordial.

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Your emotional outbursts are understandable. You come to roleplay to have fun and have positive experiences within your boundaries of which is fun and comfortable for you as a player.

But then someone systematically provokes you, rubs you off or acts disrespectfully, it wears out a person’s decency. People who say “just log off”/“leave”/“ignore it” are superficially giving a good advice, but in long run, constant escaping and walling up doesn’t work - you can’t just have fun if you need to be guard up/stressed all the time.

I have experienced some systematic but subtle bullying on AD myself and usually it has been done by subtly putting me down, using jabs and threats disguised as jokes or otherwise disrespectful behavior just to get a reaction out of me - or excluding me from RP groups if I’m not appealing to egos of socially influential roleplayers (but still being reasonable). And when I notice that “stop it”/“I don’t like the way you are treating me”/“I don’t like where this is going, can we talk about this?” isn’t going to work but I also want to stand my ground and enjoy the game I’m paying for, naturally I’d explode at the person. But these reactions have then been used to influence people to think negatively of me or shame me, so that they wouldn’t RP with me. Without going further on this and dragging attention away from the OP’s issue, this is a thing on AD and awareness should be spread so that at least decent people would see both sides of the coin rather than believing an abusive person’s version blindly.

Don’t let your stalker win.

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It’s awful that you’re going through this, and it’s honestly good that you’re not letting this person have their way. The amount of harassment that should be allowed in WoW is zero. Hopefully the GMs will realize what you’ve been through and ban this person.

It’s easy for me to say, I never had to deal with your problem, but I would echo the idea that patience and perseverance are a better way to report someone rather than insulting the person who will have to look into the issue.

GMs may have had a difficult day too. For all that we know, they may not even have the authority to permanently ban this player.

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