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[Saruhashi]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/tech...oxicity/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f9e2ac59334b

How realistic is this guys story, actually? It just sounds like something from a TV show in that it doesn't really seem to line up with reality but it makes for good drama so whatever.

"After several dozen high-scoring rounds, other gamers started to take notice. He began receiving invites from players asking him to play with them. He accepted one and joined in the group’s online conversation through his headset." OK.

"Then, Haberern said, the tone of the conversation shifted dramatically. The other gamers started asking him whether he had ever testified in court or murdered anyone. “They said they were from Maryland and that they were going to come and kill me,” he said." That just seems so weirdly specific. Why would they be asking that? That's OK though.

The weird stuff is the next bit for me:

"By then it was 3 a.m., and Haberern decided to quit. One of the gamers in the party then sent him a message via Xbox Live. It contained his home address. Next his house phone rang, then his mother’s cellphone. A message appeared on his TV screen from one of the party members — it was asking why he didn’t answer."

OK the message via Xbox Live seems fine but how were they able to snag his home address? The only way i can think is if his user name is his actual name or close enough to his actual name AND his actual name is explicitly tied to his home address elsewhere on the Internet?

Then his house phone rings, then his mother's cellphone? So what's the connection here? How were these folks able to extract from the dudes username, and I guess anything he may have said in the chat, his home address, the landline number and then his mother's mobile while at the same time playing Call of Duty?

This can't be all that common? I mean would the average person be able to do that or would it have to be people with a lot of know how?

Then we've got the "message appeared on his TV Screen". Do they mean his actual TV was hacked or do they just mean it was another xbox live message?

Honestly it sounds fake as fuck but if it isn't then I feel like the article would be a lot better if this was going to point out exactly how this dude was able to be got at in this way. It would be a lot more helpful to people if they understood how this was able to happen.

I am also suspicious of the following: "Following the death threats, Haberern said he did not report anything to police, saying he likes to avoid involving them in his life"

Remember the weird "testified in court or murdered anyone" thing? Seems a bit weird. Plus wouldn't his mother be a bit more insistent that he call the cops. I mean we are literally talking about someone who has managed to get you address, phone number, mother's cellphone and is hacking your TV to put messages on the screen and you're like "probably just a once off event" and moving on. Bullshit.

How does this whole thing work from a purely technical perspective?
You're on Xbox Live playing away, you're so good that other players notice you (of course!).
You join a group. You play for a bit. Then you quit.
Then suddenly they have your address, they are calling your number, they are calling your mother, they are sending messages to your TV.
Is it even possible?

A few other "iffy" things in the article to be honest but this really stood out as something that seems a bit "off" to me.

 

[hariseldon]

OR...you know....maybe they want to clamp down on an environment that is truly toxic and harmful, for the good of everyone in said environment.
As for "standard online trash talk", it's dismissive attitudes like that which mean that the victims of such bullying feel like they have nowhere to turn to because nobody will care.
Bullying and insulting is NEVER acceptable behaviour, and the sooner people get introduced to the idea that they are accountable, the better the world will be.
"But muh free speech" is tired and old. Freedom of expression is fine, up until a point where it is harmful to others, and then there need to be consequences for crossing that line. "Joking" about rape, paedophilia, murder and racism are undeniably far past that line.
As someone who has never been a victim of online abuse, I am fine with the idea of tools to protect those that have.

Lots wrong with your post here. First up, a bit of insulting never hurt anyone and sometimes it's better to let off a bit of steam than let it all boil up. Trash talk is trash talk, it's part of the game, to get into your opponent's head or use any other method to beat him/her. I don't do it myself but I can see why others do it. Doxxing, stalking, those things aren't ok. Calling me a cunt, I'm fine with.

Finally, joking about rape, paedophilia, murder and racism.. I mean you're losing a wealth of good comedy material right there, as well as missing how jokes are part of how society adjusts to and learns from events. Jokes are the least harmful thing, who got hurt by a joke? Seriously. The big problem here is that if you start banning jokes you don't like, someone else will ban jokes they don't like, and their line may be somewhere you don't like. Nothing good comes from that but if totalitarianism is your thing then I'm sure Russia or China will welcome you with open arms.

 

[hariseldon]

You can not protect people from harassment. You can only give them the tools they need to protect themselves, and the best defense against harassment is not being a pussy.

I wouldn't quite put it in those terms, it's a bit close to victim blaming, but my approach to fixing the problem is similar. Back when I was a teacher one kid was getting bullied. A lot. Now we can obviously hit the bullies with all kinds of punishment, and that has an effect on that bully but you know how these things go, that kind of strategy does nothing useful in the longer term - any set of bullies will be replaced by others later. So I sat down with the kid and worked with her on getting her confidence up, on faking confidence so that people wouldn't see her as a victim, but instead as a confident motherfucker they shouldn't mess with. No violence required, just confidence. Doing this made life easier for the staff, but also made her more independent, a stronger person, and eventually faking confidence led to real confidence (which I predicted it would - but I had to sell it as a bully diversion tool to get her to try it) - it fixed the bullying problem too.

Sometimes you have to take a slightly longer route around a problem to fix it properly, rather than flying at it fists first.

 

[hariseldon]

Don't get me wrong I am a firm supporter of free speech but only with respect to public spaces. I don't like the idea of a govt body telling me what I can and cannot say but in these cases we're are engaging a private platform with it's own pre-defined ToS, so I would welcome govt legislation (if it came to that) limiting speech on these platforms that was designed to protect kids.

The difficulty here is that in a world where people converse more online and less in person or down the local pub, these spaces have become semi-public in use, even if private in technicality. It's an awkward space, especially with multiple cultures converging, and without the traditional moderation that might exist in meatspace (eg you might get a punch in the face). Social media is troublesome because we don't yet have rules or tools for it, and because it slips in between the spaces defined by history, for which we've had time to develop a reasonable set of rules. Hopefully we'll figure it out eventually.

 

[hariseldon]

Blizzard is half way there. All they have to do is enforce "show real name" which is currently a selectable option. Same with Xbox Live. This is not difficult to do at all and I think some sort of regulation is in the future. China is doing it via their "social credit rating" system, which is a more extreme version I think than what western countries would sign up for, but some elements like removing anonymity from the Internet might be a possibility.

Authoritarian right there. Showing your real name btw is a great way to increase the amount of harassment you receive because then people can find you more easily in meatspace, especially if you have an unusual name (I'm so glad my name is very common).

 

[Ogbert]

Don’t talk to strangers over the internet.

Case closed.

 

[DreamsiclesPlz]

Just about every online game has a mute feature.

Just throwing that out there.

 

[wzy]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/tech...oxicity/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f9e2ac59334b

How realistic is this guys story, actually?

It's plausible. Took me less than five minutes to find his username and reddit posts, which immediately led to all the scarier details. Starting with just the gamertag wouldn't have added more than 10 seconds to the search. Remember: it's 99% likely that they found mom, not the gamer. Her house, her phone number. That is often very easy to get, because mom has a Facebook account and can't work the privacy settings. This doesn't require any kind of skillset beyond a few Google searches. It seems spooky because it doesn't occur to most of us to track down and harass the people who call us faggots on the internet, but all of the necessary information for this attack is collected and circulated by social media and other websites. Any bored teenage BPD case could figure it out.

The real story here is that Facebook and other social media platforms are run by criminally irresponsible parasites, but Facebook didn't vote for Trump so we have to settle for another showcase of toxic cringies. As usual, the Era thread tells you everything you need to know about this article:

• Sometimes I feel like taking the anonymity of the Internet would remove these toxic people. They act this way because they feel they are anonymous. Not sure how to accomplish it, but it's worth exploring further.
• The toxicity of gaming culture is a real problem. I think the idea of taking away their anonymity could be the best solution. Bigots are cowards, they would never spew their BS if people knew who they were.
• As long as there is anonymity online and humanity continues to exist you will find toxicity in the industry.

This isn't an accident, it's the whole point. That's the message you're supposed to get from stories like this. If you're a moron, it works like a charm. Anonymity = racism, misogyny, death threats. The useful idiots who write about these issues might actually give a shit, but their real job is to lead people by the nose to the most lucrative opinions on behalf of their employers (advertisers, if you're at WaPo). Power wants the personal information, it's employees want the social justice, so they just tie the two together with the flimsiest bit of sophistry and let public opinion do the rest. More privacy would have solved the issue faster than any "consciousness-raising" slacktivist politics but if you ask mom she'll tell you anonymity is the problem. Funny how that works.

 

[Saruhashi]

It's plausible. Took me less than five minutes to find his username and reddit posts, which immediately led to all the scarier details. Starting with just the gamertag wouldn't have added more than 10 seconds to the search. Remember: it's 99% likely that they found mom, not the gamer. Her house, her phone number. That is often very easy to get, because mom has a Facebook account and can't work the privacy settings. This doesn't require any kind of skillset beyond a few Google searches. It seems spooky because it doesn't occur to most of us to track down and harass the people who call us faggots on the internet, but all of the necessary information for this attack is collected and circulated by social media and other websites. Any bored teenage BPD case could figure it out.

Shit. Yeah, that's worrying.
It's also telling that the article acting so concerned about this thing basically fails to instruct readers on how this could have been easily avoided.

For sure I wouldn't trust anyone on the "other site" for their opinion on this. I don't for one second believe that these people want to get rid of anonymity to stop racism/misogyny.

They want to erase anonymity so they can level up their bullying.
Without realizing it would work both ways and would escalate problems significantly.

 

[Saruhashi]

China is doing it via their "social credit rating" system, which is a more extreme version I think than what western countries would sign up for, but some elements like removing anonymity from the Internet might be a possibility.

Right, but what you have to consider is the potential negatives.

If you strip away anonymity there are good things that would be lost.
The ability for people to become "whistleblowers" that can expose bad corporate or government practices takes a hit.
The freedom to have a difference of opinion and a good old argument with someone without any fear takes a hit.

Plus you have the possibility of false accusations leading to crazy amounts of dogpiling etc.

If what you propose comes to pass then what would stop me from going over to ResetEra tonight and using my wife's account to say "I am just a woman of color trying to play video games and I was harassed by this awful gamer called lefty1117".

Since we've stripped away anonymity I've just given those people your full name and address and since we are believing women it's going to be on you to reason with them. So, good luck.

I'm just going to say that the ways that people abuse anonymity online would be easily outstripped by the ways that people would abuse a complete lack of anonymity.

You've seen how some of these people handle simple differences of opinion right?
Now, imagine you say you hated The Last Jedi and they have access to your full name, address, place of work etc. No fucking thanks.
"Rey is a Mary Sue". Congratulations, your employers HR department just got a deluge of emails about their "sexist" employee.

All because little Jimmy on Xbox Live is too fucking dumb to mute and/or block.

 

[lefty1117]

Right, but what you have to consider is the potential negatives.

If you strip away anonymity there are good things that would be lost.
The ability for people to become "whistleblowers" that can expose bad corporate or government practices takes a hit.
The freedom to have a difference of opinion and a good old argument with someone without any fear takes a hit.

Plus you have the possibility of false accusations leading to crazy amounts of dogpiling etc.

If what you propose comes to pass then what would stop me from going over to ResetEra tonight and using my wife's account to say "I am just a woman of color trying to play video games and I was harassed by this awful gamer called lefty1117".

Since we've stripped away anonymity I've just given those people your full name and address and since we are believing women it's going to be on you to reason with them. So, good luck.

I'm just going to say that the ways that people abuse anonymity online would be easily outstripped by the ways that people would abuse a complete lack of anonymity.

You've seen how some of these people handle simple differences of opinion right?
Now, imagine you say you hated The Last Jedi and they have access to your full name, address, place of work etc. No fucking thanks.
"Rey is a Mary Sue". Congratulations, your employers HR department just got a deluge of emails about their "sexist" employee.

All because little Jimmy on Xbox Live is too fucking dumb to mute and/or block.

Great points. I am playing devil's advocate here so doesn't mean I fully endorse the idea. But look at it another way - these kind of personal attacks, swatting etc etc already happen. People aren't TRULY anonymous on the Internet even now, it's just a matter of the lengths people are willing to go to find out who you are. So a line of thinking might be, instead of chasing and trying to close down all the myriad of ways that people can find out who you are, why not level the playing field and make EVERYONE known. This might act as a deterrent for the COD guy who wants to harass you, if it's simple for him to be found out and harassed in turn. And now that harassment is on his public record. I think this is what China is after, but it's so easy to see how it could be abused by the government.

I don't know what the right answer is. It's a society-level question: do we want people to be safe from harassment on the internet, and if so what lengths should we go to ensure it? Same sort of question like we ask in the US - do we want people to be safe from random shootings and if so what lengths should we go to ensure it?

 

[oagboghi2]

Easier access to healthcare and therapy could be a solution but sadly America is very against social services and very for corporations.

What incredibly stupid logic is this?

"I'm a call of duty troll, but I wouldn't be this way if the taxpayers gave me free therapy sessions. Poor me"

 

[ShdwDrake]

I thought threats like that are illegal, no need to use the flawed "but private company" argument (yes, they are private companies, but they command platforms of planetary scale, hence said companies cannot be allowed to do whatever they feel like)

They are illegal.

What incredibly stupid logic is this?

"I'm a call of duty troll, but I wouldn't be this way if the taxpayers gave me free therapy sessions. Poor me"

You know what your right. The sharp increase in suicides in America is from white males anyway I should just let their toxicity kill them off. I shouldn't care I'm not white.

 

[DeepEnigma]

Ffs all platforms and even social media have block, mute and ignore features, if someone is being a wanker to you, just use the tools the platform as provided to cut all communication/interaction with said wanker. End of story

People crying on the Internet because some random avatar on a screen typed out some words, some people need to grow up big time imo.

 

[Sqorin Hammerfarf]

 

[Eiknarf]

Riiiiiiight.



It's a little weird that you'll type out 'cracker' and 'faggot,' but 'nigger' gets 'the nword.'

Thats the problem with being politically correct. PC assholes say they promote equality, but they actually promote their own systems of bigotry. Slang words written or said against certain perceived social and ethnic groups are considered greater crimes than those delivered against other groups.

So when it comes to the word “Nigger” the PC folks consider that word so offensive that they can’t even quote it. They try to delete the word out of existence by replacing it with the phrase “N-Word”, but they don’t apply that logic to derogatory words aimed at other groups. They don’t say “G-Word” for “Gook”. They don’t say “H-Word”, “TH-Word”, “W-Word”, “C-Word”, “S-Word” and “JB-Word” for “Honky, Towel-Head, Wog, Cracker, Spic, Jungle Bunny” etc.

So the PC assholes have developed their own unofficial hierarchy regarding who is allowed to be insulted and by which specific slang words and phrases. This is in itself a form of bigotry in that they believe some people are less deserving of protection from insult than others.