Looking Back: The Redzone Controversy

 
By Bixyl Shuftan

It was eleven years ago this week, March 1-2, 2011, in which Linden Lab finally acted against the controversial Redzone device. For some weeks, this system had gotten the attention of a number of residents as it was advertised as an alt-detection security system. The idea advertised by creator zFire Xue was that places with this system would be able to ban alts of someone on the Redzone database by looking at their ISP number.

Redzone quickly gained criticism from a vocal group that was probably small at first, but growing. Part of the complaining was he was using an inaccurate way of tracking people as ISP numbers are frequently shared. But more worrisome was concerns that the data could be used to stalk people. Not only did Redzone mean the chance the information could be potentially be used to find someone in Second Life using an alt to avoid harassment, but could be used by a stalker in real life to hunt down someone's home address.

Linden Lab was slow to act against Redzone at first, one New World Notes article quoting Samuel Linden as saying, "We do not consider IP gathering to be an actionable security exploit." So in the absence of action from the Lab, some of the critics formed a group called "Greenzone." They began offering a HUD that would detect the use of Redzone at an area and alert the user.

Eventually, Redzone would get the attention of Second Life media. Not just the Herald which was quicker to pick up on dramatic stories, including an interview with zFire, but New World Notes, the Dwell on It blog, and eventually the Newser with a tounge-in-cheek article by Any1 Gynoid. It would also be the subject of an episode of the Tonight Live SL tv show as two of Greenzone's members were interviewed. And soon zFire claimed his security systems would soon start asking permission before collecting information from anyone. But this was soon followed by tales that not only was this not the case, but he was adding the names of critics to the banned database list. There were also reports of hackers breaking into the Redzone database.

Perhaps part of the reason people were alarmed was the time the Redzone controversy took place. 2010 had been a difficult year for Second Life, with 1/3 of Linden Lab laid off, CEO M Linden resigning and Philip taking the helm as the temporary one until the end of the year, the merger with the Teen Grid and scares about what introducing teens might mean to people whom enjoyed adult activities, the Emerald controversy in which users of a third-party viewer had their computers hacked for the purposes of launching a DDoS attack on a critic followed by the banning of the viewer and a few of the team, and the tales and rumors that Second Life was about to be shut down or bought. It's fair to say the confidence of many residents was still shaky, and Redzone just added to their anxiety, "the Emerald decable all over again." The CEO of the Lab at the time, Rod Humble, had only been in for a couple months, and was likely still getting the hang of things. That may have been part of why the Lab was slow to act.

In any event, on Tuesday March 1, 2011, the Lab removed Redzone from the Marketplace store and "asked for removal by no later than today of all zF Red Zone functionality that discloses any alternate account names." On the JIRA made against Redzone, Soft Linden posted, " I got the go-ahead to give an update on zF Red Zone specifically. Again, thank you for the ARs with specific info about violations. These have been very helpful for letting Lindens know what's going on." Tateru Nino would state on "Dwell on It" that the Lab gave ZFire certain conditions before he could sell Redzone once more. Hamlet Au would state on New World Notes that Soft Linden informed him that the Community Standards page was updated "to more explicitly state that alts are protected from disclosure."

ZFire was not cooperative, replacing inworld vendors that were taken down by Linden Lab. He would respond on the JIRA, saying, "Soft Linden did not say ‘zRZ contains malicious intent.’ It does prove that LL is easily manipulated by a flood of ARs." He would post on a forum elsewhere claiming if he was ever banned, he would start running Redzone outside Second Life and accept Paypal payments. He would also comment the ban was futile as even if he left, someone else would come up with an alt detector.

Finally on Wednesday March 16, 2011, Linden Lab would ban zFire Xue from the Grid. But this would be only the start of his troubles. One claim by a Greenzone member that he was a convicted criminal in real life turned out to be true, by the name of Mike Prime. And not letting his parole officer inspect his computer or informing the officer of the money he made on Second Life were violations of his parole. A warrant was issued for Prime's arrest, and he turned himself in on May 2, initially denying all charges against him to the judge. But he would eventually plead guilty to four counts of parole violations, and be sentenced to four months in prison. For two years after his release, the judge ordered him not to work anywhere near computers. And while he could own a computer, his activity would be closely monitored, and he could not take part in "any online auction site ... or any online virtual environment or online social network," Second Life being specifically mentioned. So while it may have been indirect, zFire Xue/Mike Prime was one of the few people to go to jail because of his activities on Second Life. While he was fined $500, it was "waived due to financial capacity." There was no sign of the money he made off Redzone buyers.

One blogger expressed concerns that Redzone could be only the start of a serious privacy scandal for Linden Lab. But that would turn out not to be the case. Although the Voodoo security system was sold as a bot-detector a year later, it would get into controversy mainly because it's owner got into a feud with Greenzone, calling it a griefing group and began threatening to add it's members to his security list. Although a recent NFT contest sponsored in part by Linden Lab raised eyebrows as they'd have to reveal real-life informantion, to this day Linden Lab takes pride in safeguarding the privacy of it's users.

Sources: New World Notes, Alphaville Herald, Dwell on It

Bixyl Shuftan
 

Top Stories of The 2010s, Part One

By Bixyl Shuftan

As the decade comes to a close, there's been some looking back at some of the events that have happened. For the people of Second Life, ten years ago there was the creation, the rise, and then the peaking of the popularity of the virtual world. For the 2010's, Second Life hasn't made Big Media very much. But there's been no shortage of events that were for a time were of great interest to many residents. Some made news more than others. So here's some of the decade's top stories.

The Linden Lab 30% Layoff

Just a week after the Second Life Newser got started came our first big story to cover, when on June 10 2010 Linden Lab announced a "Restructuring" in which thirty percent of it's staff lost their jobs. Residents were shocked at the news. Gone were favorites such as Blue and Teagan Linden. One resident reacted by setting up a memorial to those whom lost their jobs. There was an also an "Independence Day" party in their honor as well.

A company giving a third of it's staff the pink slip is usually a sign of deep trouble. So naturally people were worried about what was going to happen next. Rumors were around for months Linden Lab was in talks with Microsoft for a buyout. This was just one of many changes at the Lab in 2010, including the resignation of M Linden as CEO and Philip returning for a short time as intirem CEO. Second Life's future was very much in doubt for the remainder of the year. It wasn't until December with the arrival of a new CEO, Rod Humble/Rodvik Linden, that the fears of Second Life being closed down had largely faded.

Emeraldgate

2010 was when Linden Lab began offering a new viewer for the residents, Viewer 2. It was not popular with established residents, and people looked for alternatives. The Emerald Viewer, offered for free by a group of volunteers known as Modular Systems, or Team Emerald, quickly became the most popular alternative, the first third party viewer to hit it big.

But on August 20, there was a DoS attack on a website of one of their critics. The attack was traced to computers using the Emerald viewer to access Second Life at the time. One of the team stepped down, and the Lab presented them with a list of demands, notably three of the team stepping down. When one refused to, the team split in two. One group led by Jessica Lyon would go on to start Team Phoenix and the Phoenix viewer. The other faded away following Linden Lab blocking the viewer from accessing Second Life, some of their leaders banned by Linden Lab or never seen again.

Emeraldgate is notable as it's the incident that sparked the creation of what now is Team Firestorm, the people behind the Firestorm Viewer that remains the most popular viewer used by residents.

The Teen Grid Merger

Also in August 2011, it was announced at the Second Life Community Convention (or the SL con) that Linden Lab would soon be closing the Teen Grid, and those 16 and 17 of age would be allowed in Second Life. Philip Linden called the grid with it's population of under 18 residents a "mistake," and expressed confidence that Second Life with it's filtering system could handle the influx of 17 and 16 year olds.

But the announcement created a storm of comments by residents whom feared this would soon lead to adult areas being shut down. The Lab tried to assure residents that there would be a smooth transition. And there were efforts by some residents to welcome them in. But others called this an accident waiting to happen, having no confidence in Linden Lab to do the job, "I'm sorry LL shafted you all. ... many of us BEGGED for a PG continent that you and us could have and be safe together. We saw what was coming and wanted to make the grid safe for all. Now it isn't safe for anyone.”

As it turned out though, not many of the 16 and 17 year olds would be coming to the Main Grid. When the Teen Grid was turned off on Dec 31, 2010, most apparently went to online games or other Internet activities. Exactly why is speculation, some wondering if the teens just didn't want to hang out with "old people," but preferred a place where they could be with just their peers. Others felt the teens were around, just simply fibbing about their age and always had been.

The Redzone Controversy

One thing many residents fear in Second Life is someone harassing them getting around bans by creating alts to torment them further. So it's no real surprise eventually someone starting offering an "alt detector." As far back as December 2010, news started going around about "Redzone." That the creator developed juvenile products such as a "Toilet HUD" probably helped in the masses not taking the product product seriously at first, especially with stories that the product stunk at delivering what was promised. Privacy activists however were very worried Redzone could potentially be used to trace people to their real-life addresses, leading to doxxing and stalkers taking their harassment to real life.

Eventually, Linden Lab responded, taking down Redzone from Marketplace on March 2, 2011. Redzone's creator, zFire Xue (Michael Prime), remained defiant and was banned a few weeks later. It turned out that zFire was a convicted criminal on parole, and in May he turned himself in when a warrant was issued for his arrest. He would be sentenced to four months in jail, and the judge ordered part of his conditions would be parole were no access to computers or Internet access, Second Life specifically mentioned in the ruling.

For some residents, it was "Emerald all over again" in that a malicious coder had caused so much worry for the residents. Privacy activists such as the Greenzone group remained vigilant for any other alt detector that might cause trouble, getting into a tangle with the Voodoo security system a year later. Fortunately, there wouldn't be another like Redzone.

Second Life Ninth Birthday

2012 was a year Linden Lab put some distance between itself and the residents. There would be no snowball fight between the Lindens and residents. Nor did the "Kiss a Linden" Valentines Day event take place. Later in the summer, it was announced there would be no Second Life Community Convention that year. Residents expressed disappointment at these events being canceled. But then on April 16, 2012, Linden Lab announced they would not be organizing the Second Life Birthday celebration that year. In a statement later on the forums, they stated they were leaving it up to the residents, expecting numerous smaller celebrations.

But instead of following Linden Lab's suggestion, some residents banded together to hold the Second Life Ninth Birthday themselves, with both sponsors and some noted SL personalities behind it. Those taking part had only a short time to get things done, so they hurried things up. It would take place on a twenty sim area, and last from June 18 to June 24. There would be lots to see and do. And the event ended with fireworks at the Cake Stage. While there were a few minor things that went wrong, the SL9B was a definite success.

For five more years, the SLB events continued to be in the hands of a volunteer staff. Although Linden Lab would slowly start to be more involved in the anniversary with "Music Fest" and shopping events, "The Birthday" was still resident-run until the SL15B. In 2019, the Lab finally fully took over, saying over time they had been observing what worked and what didn't. While it meant saying goodbye to some new traditions such as "The Cake," the residents as a whole were glad Linden Lab was taking care of Second Life's anniversary event.

*  *  *  *  *

For part two of the series, Click Here.

Bixyl Shuftan

The Voodoo Curse

A little over a year ago, Second Life was hit by the Redzone controversy. For those not familiar, Redzone was an alt detector that worked by scanning IP adresses, and  banning avatars from a hit list shared through the services' security systems. It raised privacy concerns as in theory a stalker could track someone this way. Plus it didn't really work as IP adresses can change, and the wrong person could and was mistaken for the target and blacklisted. In response came "Greenzone," which detected which areas were covered by Redzone. Eventually, Linden Lab reacted against Redzone. Redzone's creator zFire threatened to retaliate, and was soon banned from Second Life.

zFire once boasted if Redzone was ever banned, another alt detector would replace it. And in an interview with Paisley Beebe in March 2011, one of Team Greenzone mentioned there were a few systems that claimed to do what Redzone did. So even though Redzone was gone, would something else take its place?

Recently Treminari Huet, a Second Life blogger and one of the first to warn about Redzone, came to me about another alt detector: Voodoo.

Voodoo's "anti-bot" system advertises itself as "most effective at deterring … people using … (alts) to cheat games, grievers, and avatars known to cause problems," saying this was a way to deter cheaters at contests and games whom would otherwise enter multiple times in contests, and thus get the alts' owner a bigger share of the money.


In the early days of the products life cycle there was a big bot problem in Second Life around the TMY sploders which were originally designed to attract traffic to locations and provide small amounts of money to residents. Scripted bots would fill regions and take the money.
Voodoo's systems have changed that. Since the beginning we have been exploring new ways of detection and ways to reduce false positives and we have increased support resources. Our purpose is to enforce fair play and make gaming a better experience for everyone.

While discussing Voodoo, Treminari sent me a couple links to stories by Forceme Silverspar and   Examiner writer Douglas Green, both written in Summer 2011. Green's issue with Voodoo was it's role as a 'Sploder security system, as any form of gambling in Second Life was technically illegal. Forceme Silverspar decided to take a closer look at Voodoo to check the worries of some in Greenzone if this was indeed a second "Redzone." She checked the system and noted that the Voodoo Sploder gave those nearby a warning that those wishing to be verified to play would have their IP address revealed to Voodoo. While she felt Voodoo could have been more clear about it, she concluded this was a fair warning. Plus she found "no evidence whatsoever of any sharing of … alt data outside of 'Voodoo.' " Of the ban list, Forceme stated, "this should not be called 'Anti-bot' but rather 'Anti-anyone we Voodoo people don't like." Of the question whether or not Voodoo was using the same media loophole as Redzone, she concluded probably not.

In the end, Forceme concluded Voodoo was most likely no big deal, except being a poor product for the purchaser, "the whole Anti-bot device is a joke, don't bother …. and to those who have had their name put in because Voodoo doesn't like them, and that means they are banned from using the sploders and going on land that runs the Anti-bot device, yeah, whatever."

In her first article about Voodoo, Treminari noted that the Greenzone HUD reacts to a Voodoo sploder "like it would any Redzone-like system." But only the wearer of the HUD gets the alert. She tried testing Voodoo for a "media exploit." Going about the few locations she could find that used Voodoo sploders, "I did find attempts in media to send to a specific IP and port number … " but, " … I was unable to rule out what I did see recurring as the possibility of other products that set media URLs, such as a harmless shoutcast DJ board." She concluded her tests were inconclusive.

Treminari was ready to just leave Voodoo alone, then came another development. Talking to her, she described Voodoo's owner Monkey Wonder as entering the Greenzone chat and stirring up arguments, "just because the group has a few anal members, its like anything else. You kick the hornets nest, most of them are going to sting you. He kicked the hornets nest ,making it regular business to enter the group and troll its members and pick fights with them." Monkey did have a right to defend his product, but Treminari felt he was going too far, ".... he did have a right to complain, until he started threatening the groups members and businesses that participate as a whole."

The threat was in a notecard Monkey Wonder passed around to various members of the Greenzone group.


Dear Greenzone griefing group member,

Following mass defamation, griefing, propoganda, scamming and false abuse reports initiated by members of Greenzone griefing group recently on a scale never before seen in SL, Voodoo has taken the decision to protect our customers and other residents of Second Life from your activities.

Greenzone once had a legitimate purpose in Second Life, protecting the privacy of residents from systems such as Red Zone.
Red Zone is long gone, and Greenzone now operates more like the Anonymous hacking collective. The moderators have lost control, and the group is now a leaderless organisation that anyone with a grudge can join to attack others in the name of Greenzone.

Voodoo produces an extremely popular free Sploder tracking HUD which is owned by thousands and used everyday by many people, we have a user base of over 40,000 avatars. The next version of these HUDs, to be released imminently, will announce any nearby Greenzone griefers in local chat by name, along with any land owned by these griefers and any objects created by them. We believe your creations and land are not safe as you are a member of a group well known for griefing.

We do however understand that there is a minority of legitimate business owners currently in the griefing group, who joined long before Greenzone was hijacked by trouble makers. Due to this, we are allowing 12 hours for you to leave the group and avoid any damage to your business.

Voodoo has been at the forefront of SL security for many years and we take it and peoples privacy very seriously.

We do not wish to become ememies of any group, but we simply cannot tolerate people who choose to attack or scam others.

Thank you for your understanding and please make the right decision.

Monkey Wonder
Owner of Voodoo SL

At this point, the nature of the debate changed. Treminari in her article called Monkey Wonder's statement, " 'leave your discussion group or I will do something very bad to you,' obviously meant to coerce people into leaving, which is the very definition of blackmail: 'to force or coerce into a particular action.'" In my conversations with her, "He sent the threat to the whole group, and said he would be setting up his HUD to slander any members present. I take threats directed at me wether it be directly at me or what I have membership in very seriously." She felt concerning his actions, Linden Labs had only one realistic option, "he crossed a line you don't cross, so I will be seeking at the very least his removal from the Grid."

Joining the group to get more information, the reaction of the group was disbelief, and anger, an Anguissette Resident stating, "Leave the group or they'll blackban my products? My products are widely sold. That will anger a lot of product owners. In all my travels through SL, I have only encountered two Voodoo products. One was at the Voodoo creators shop, and slandered me in local chat as a copybot, which of course I am not. The other was in a very unsuccessful and empty club, and wasn't working, according to the error messages it flooded local chat with. I have never griefed anyone. Any claims I have ever made about voodoo were based solely on fact and what Monkey himself told me. That is not griefing. I will not stand by and let him label me as a griefer. I will not let him threaten me and my business.  I will not bow down to threats of blackmail. I will not be slandered and abused. Monkey must abide by not only the TOS, but also the laws of the countries he trades in, both his own and that of his customers. I hope he is reading what we are writing here today. I will be ARing this notecard, on the many infractions of TOS. … I can't believe he's asserting that someone's land might not be safe if they purchase something from my shop. That just makes my blood boil. I make cards and funny signs. Is a greeting card that sends you a hug a weapon of mass destruction now? … I won't be leaving the group. Report that to your leader, Monkey boys. And every time I or something I created or own gets blacklisted, I will file an AR."

After I asked for information, I was IMed by one member of the group. He claimed that a number of "Greenzone proponents" were former members of Woodbury, an infamous group that Linden Labs has banned from the Grid. He cautioned me to watch out for anti-JLU (Justice League Unlimited) propaganda, but I noticed none that night, or as of the writing of this article or any night I observed Greenzone chatter.

One Greenzone member, Unya Tigerfish, sent out a notecard that appeared in a group notice not long after Treminari first contacted me on the matter.


Dear members of the GZ group!

Recently I have revisited the Voodoo products, and to my positive surprise I noticed that Monkey Wonder has in fact adapted many privacy features and thereby relieved a lot of the concerns regarding privacy that were the reasons for this group to fight against the products.

Therefor, I personally contacted Monkey Wonder and we agreed that I should give him a list of the remaining few items that we think were still in violation of privacy. Were those addressed, we would be happy to clear Voodoo products from our "Bad" list. Our talk ended cordially in a truce.

HOWEVER!

Only a week after this talk, before I was finished compiling this list, members of the Greenzone group are receiving a blackmail: "leave GZ group within 12 hours or you, your items, and your creations will be blacklisted"

I personally feel betrayed!  We as the GZ group have pride!

And we will not bow to blackmail!

The GZ group is no griefer group! Therefor, I would like to suggest that everyone of you who is subject to the blackmail of Monkey Wonder, AR him, and whoever is subject to his announced griefing in local chat, AR the person owning the offending device.

Monkey Wonder, consider our talks cancelled. You have shown that you are no man of honour, but instead a blackmailing criminal.

For GZ,

Unya Tigerfish


Heading to Voodoo's office in Voodoo City, Morenci (213, 207, 22), I came across a couple of Monkey's staff. When I asked one about Greenzone, he didn't seem to know what was going on, "green zone, are they making trouble again?" " 'Again?' You have some trouble with them before?" "lol nothing much. … guess if you want info like that, you'll have to talk to the boss." And he told me they would get in touch with Monkey Wonder. A couple days later when I appeared in the office again, he was there.

I asked about trouble between he and Greenzone, and he answered, "Yes it started a long time ago when they misunderstood how our products work and blacklisted us and our customers with their hud. the gz hud says 'Spyware detected' when it sees anything created by me." Telling him of their wondering of a possible similarity to Redzone, "voodoos main thing is the sploder game. we are very strict about cheating. we ban a lot of avatars who try to cheat, so we have enemies. when someone wants to get at us, they join greenzone. so gz is fed false info from these people. without investigation, we were blacklisted by them. if everyone is guilty until proven innocent, why are we targeted? … for months members of the group have lied repeatedly to try to damage us .. they send notecards to our customers saying our products are illegal, they visit my shop. so we decided to implement a similar blacklist."

Of the charges of him sending a notecard to various Greenzone members, Monkey Wonder admitted it, "yes i sent a warning to green zone members explaining what we intended to do. The nc said we would implement the system in 12 hours but it was more like 48. we will be targeting other griefer groups also, to warn our customers and members." "So 48 hours for 'legitimate business owners' to leave, or else?" "voodoo is a security business. 12 hours until we blacklist members of this group because the group is well known for causing grief to other residents." I responded that I hadn't heard of any problems with Greenzone since the Redzone controversy. "Maybe you should talk to the JLU," Monkey responded.

When asked about Unya Tigerfish and if they talked, "yes she is a moderator at green zone, we spoke and talked about changes that could be made to our systems. … She made some vague claim she was going to talk to others and get a list of changes, then nothing happened ... the problem is, there are a lot of people in the group now who are not interested in privacy, they just want to try and damage us in revenge for being banned. you turned my warning on me and said it was a threat, but greenzone have already carried out their action before any warning and now we are blackmailed to make changes or stay on their blacklist. we didn't get a warning."

Monkey Wonder claimed, "6 people have come to me so far and asked to stay in the group and not be blacklisted by us 'because they are in the group to monitor their activities and prevent attacks by them.' it is a griefer group." "So you're not banning everyone in the group?" "i'm not banning anyone unless they grief, but everyone in the group is blacklisted and announced by our tracker HUD."

Monkey Wonder concluded his side of the matter, "voodoo is a gaming and security business, we are not out to invade anyones privacy and really we don't care who anyone is .. we are just concerned with keep the integrity of our games through fair play. i am not a criminal as unya thinks. i am a programmer who makes SL gaming systems for a hobby. … it is not a scam operation. it is a fun thing for people and we have built a big community. The group is about 3000 strong, and we have a userbase of 40,000 … people who have ever played our games, or been customers. the key problem is the group is full of people with the only agenda of revenge."

The meeting seemed to end on a cordial note. But later, Treminari contacted me again and pointed out Voodoo had put me and her on his blacklist. Later on in one of the rare moments I made a comment in the Greenzone chat, when I told someone Treminari had blogged about the controversy and I would be writing an article, a "Killer Sugarplum" responded, "amazing, Bixyl, you represent yourself as a reporter when you had your mind made up before you ever talked to both sides, your reputation isn't worth crap." Treminari had told me she suspected Killer was one of Monkey Wonder's alt accounts.

Chatting with Treminari, she felt what Monkey Wonder did deserved more than just a boot from the Grid, "If Linden Lab don't ban him, I will be getting in contact with the FBI regarding this. I contacted the FBI regarding zFire. The appropriate action for dealing with him is exactly the same." She felt Monkey Wonder deserved "criminal prosecution" for his threats, "He's running a gambling operation on a California based service and threatened an entire group. And (he) was knowledgable he was threatening innocent people too, even says so in the notecard with the statement about innocent business owners. Even if it's a baseless threat, its still a threat nonetheless. And also it reflects on his lack of ethic in his business practice that he would even consider doing such a thing: integrating a slander tool with his HUD. So it really goes to show his SL bot protect ban list ain't to be trusted."

Legal issues aside, Monkey Wonder and Voodoo may soon have a problem on their hands. Keeping an eye on the Greenzone chatter, there were numerous residents stating they were filing ARs against Monkey Wonder. One of the group posted what Voodoo was saying about her:   GRIEFER WARNING: This land is owned by (name of resident), who is blacklisted by Voodoo for being a member of Greenzone Griefer Group. The parcel is not safe. If as many people are sending ARs as I noticed, let alone when I wasn't online, the sheer number is almost certainly going to be at least looked into by Linden Lab. What they'll do about Voodoo and it's owner, that's yet to be seen.

Voodoo is not looking like another "Redzone," but it's owner's actions have created a controversy that will take Linden Lab to resolve.


Sources: Treminari's Secondlife Blog, Forceme Silverspar's Adventures in Second Life, The Examiner, Voodoo

Bixyl Shuftan