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

This is a sister thread from Argent Dawn Forums. I’m only sharing it here in a hope that the issue of stalking & how the game mechanics allow/applause for such people to exploit it in order to stalk, harass and bring general level of toxicity to the game environment, will raise general concern. This is an issue that’s been lasting for years and Blizzard doesn’t do much about it. I have friends, guilds, communities I’m in and have been a part of for years and I am not willing to give up, make new accounts or “log out”. It’s a hill I’ll be standing on.


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).

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.

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.
But he hops on low level alt to spam messages in trade or general chat.

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


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.

3 Likes

No one should suffer harassment in game and there are ways to report players, starting with the ignore feature and the final step is reporting them to Blizzard as a last resort. If this person persists after punishment you will have to keep reporting them.

Your pixel data is not private data. The things about in game characters are not personal or private, however as you point out there there are ways of opting out of the various sites and API sharing. Blizzard is obliged to keep your personal data private, so things like your real name, address, payment details etc.

You can’t name and shame on the forums and your images name your stalker and their personal information. The only people you need to submit evidence to are Blizzard. I understand you feel frustrated and that not enough is being done.

I’m am presuming you two shared personal data with each other in order for you to be in contact over email etc. My advice would be to cut them off every time they try to get in touch. Hit that Ignore/Block every time, don’t sit and read what they have to say. Don’t respond. Let Blizzard deal with it. Ignore should work account wide, if they are circumventing that then report them. If they are in touch over other mediums, block and report on those too.

4 Likes

Alright, that’s enough. I support people who are victims of harassment and I believe it has to stop, but now you’re flipping the script and setting him up for harassment.

Stop.

1 Like

I wanted to make one thread in general discussion but it got auto hidden as system thought its a spam. So i made another one but with different context and wording.

Didnt expect this one to ‘resurface’ and cant delete it either as i have no permission.

Unless its only to remove content of the message itself i guess.

Interesting. Well, I’d recommend you edit the original post to only contain links to images that DO NOT contain the name of your stalker.

But I do agree Blizzard should take care of this. It’s a pretty clear case.

You can edit your original post with the pencil marker, then remove the url to the images giving away all that personal data of your stalker. :wink:

You should see a menu like this at the bottom of your post:-