Valve starts censoring Steam private chat messages mentioning one particular "pirate" site

[xfia]

nah.. I like steam for the most part. never used the private chat though I just think since its a private message it should be that.

there is chat filters in most every game and they are kinda funny.. a literal term gets banned so people use slang and spell stuff wrong.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

nah.. I like steam for the most part. never used the private chat though I just think since its a private message it should be that.

there is chat filters in most every game and they are kinda funny.. a literal term gets banned so people use slang and spell stuff wrong.

Nope, its the same everywhere.

Do you think that because you send a private message to members on TPU or any other forum, send that email to a friend or send a text message that its really 100% private and that only you and the other guy can read it? administrators/support staff (or law enforcement) can access and read whatever you've sent through because its a service or a feature that runs directly through their systems/servers etc etc and im sure there are systems that scans through your messages/emails just to make sure that theres nothing that can be a threat to the rest of the nation, though with so many emails and sms being sent i can see that quite a lot slips through the net. Still doesnt mean that admins cant access your messages should law enforcement request it.

If youre that paranoid then start using satellite encrypted devices and make sure that your friends have one too cuz thats the only real way to bypass being watched unless you unplug from the internet completely cuz microsoft can track you and what youre doing on the PC with their Windows OS.


private messages are 'private' but to a certain extent.

No ICQ or messaging services like Google hangouts, Yahoo messenger, MSN Messenger, Skype, Chatroulette etc etc are ever 100% private and confidential, Im sure that whatever conversations there you have with are recorded and kept on a server for a small amount of time before it gets deleted because of safety reasons.

 

[64K]

I always assume that anything I put on the internet is not private, even email. If I were a site owner I would have some kind of screening going all the time and flag the user that might be doing something illegal like distributing stolen credit card info and then I would delete their PM and perma-ban them.

 

[xfia]

I don't think your wrong but there is also the tor network anyone can use.. there is questions how secure it really is though many rights activists use it successfully for anonymity.
hmm yeah I have played games with people from asia.. cant remember the country but they have told me you cant even use a alias online.
idk I'm not paranoid or even put thought into who can see it when I write a message because I don't do illegal shit.
it runs pretty deep if you want to really get into it.. its not like every message gets viewed but there is data collection centers that label people into groups.
all in all I think valve has every right to hate on illegal torrent sights that take money from them.. just don't really see the point in censoring private messages.

(a little unorganized thoughts but I'm good at that)

I always assume that anything I put on the internet is not private, even email. If I were a site owner I would have some kind of screening going all the time and flag the user that might be doing something illegal like distributing stolen credit card info and then I would delete their PM and perma-ban them.

except there is no way to actually have people monitoring messages across the web like that. fbi cia all them have ways to monitor and have a program flag someone. not sure exactly how it all works but I know in the uk every single thing is instantly copied and scanned when it get to some way point everything on the net has to go through there.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

I don't think your wrong but there is also the tor network anyone can use.. there is questions how secure it really is though many rights activists use it successfully for anonymity.
hmm yeah I have played games with people from asia.. cant remember the country but they have told me you cant even use a alias online.
idk I'm not paranoid or even put thought into who can see it when I write a message because I don't do illegal shit.
it runs pretty deep if you want to really get into it.. its not like every message gets viewed but there is data collection centers that label people into groups.
all in all I think valve has every right to hate on illegal torrent sights that take money from them.. just don't really see the point in censoring private messages.

(a little unorganized thoughts but I'm good at that)

TOR is an entirely different service. you can have TOR running but that still doesnt protect you from having your messages or emails read & it definitely wont help you with steam because thats just not the way it works.

Do you honestly think that because you have TOR running in the background that your private messages cant be read? TOR is a proxy service - you can route your internet through TOR so you can browse the net anonymously but any chat or messaging service that you use, or any service or website that requires login details to get access to - they will be able to track you.

They might not be able to tell its 'you' you because your IP is being re-routed from somewhere else in the world but any message or chat you have online will be logged because its still going through the providers network.

I dont think TOR has gone as far to make an anonymous or encrypted chat or messaging service just yet so your point is invalid.

except there is no way to actually have people monitoring messages across the web like that. fbi cia all them have ways to monitor and have a program flag someone. not sure exactly how it all works but I know in the uk every single thing is instantly copied and scanned when it get to some way point everything on the net has to go through there.

there are monitoring systems in place that flag a lot of shit, -- how the hell do you think that UK internet ISPs can block torrent sites each and every time you try to access them? There is monitoring in place, it just depends how godlike they have the system turned up and they have torrent sites turned up pretty hardcore. the U.S & China have their own systems in place to monitor and watch what their people are doing on the internets - China is the worst when it comes to internets. and they have blocked access from chat/messaging services because they dont want people outside of china being able to chat or contact the people inside.

China is very much like the 'walled garden' expression when it comes to internet, people at the top get to control what goes in and out.

 

[xfia]

I can agree with you
I got some friends from high school that went into the military and one in the fbi.. not like I'm some source for classified shit or something haha but I get good perspectives and all I can really say is be smart, don't do illegal shit and you can not worry about any of it even in communist countries.
really just the way life has always been..
hell I might say most messages people don't want to be seen is like cheating on a lover or buying pot haha no government agency cares anything about average people.

 

[Vayra86]

If anything this censoring will only raise awareness with the sheep that they are being watched 24/7/365.

I can only say this is positive. People should really start thinking more about their communications, where and what, consequences and transparency. If you openly discuss illegal downloads on a service that makes money off legal downloads, yea, nuff said, you weren't thinking. Regardless of your personal stance on downloading torrents and piracy, it is quite the same as flashing a gun in front of customs even though you come from a country where weapons are legal to have.

Just because internet is a way to communicate without any barriers, doesn't mean it is the best way to communicate about everything. Some people find that out the hard way.

 

[64K]

If anything this censoring will only raise awareness with the sheep that they are being watched 24/7/365.

I can only say this is positive. People should really start thinking more about their communications, where and what, consequences and transparency. If you openly discuss illegal downloads on a service that makes money off legal downloads, yea, nuff said, you weren't thinking. Regardless of your personal stance on downloading torrents and piracy, it is quite the same as flashing a gun in front of customs even though you come from a country where weapons are legal to have.

Just because internet is a way to communicate without any barriers, doesn't mean it is the best way to communicate about everything. Some people find that out the hard way.

Well said. I don't know why anyone would think that Steam wouldn't flag users for discussing Pirate sites when using their service.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

TPU has a similar TOS. Emphasis mine.



http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/help/terms

In short, nothing on forums and such can be considered private since the site operators have unrestricted access to any content you post.

Blah blah blah u missed my point

I don't care I don't use their forums much

I don't care if people can see a post I placed on a public forum that was the point in posting on a public forum

 

[erocker]

Read: http://steamed.kotaku.com/steam-cha...-entirely-arbitrary-1686162264/+nathangrayson

 

[qubit]

Read: http://steamed.kotaku.com/steam-chats-torrent-blocking-is-entirely-arbitrary-1686162264/ nathangrayson

hmmm... it's that arbitrary nature of the blocking which does make me wonder if it's just automated software doing it rather than a concious effort? If so, the behaviour should change in a short time I'd guess.

Whether the link should actually be blocked at all is a grey area, even to me who really doesn't like censorship of any kind, so I'm not commenting on it here, just that one should always be notified it's going to happen and not have the whole message disappear without warning, which is underhand and disrespectful to Steam's users.

 

[TRWOV]

Read: http://steamed.kotaku.com/steam-chats-torrent-blocking-is-entirely-arbitrary-1686162264/ nathangrayson

Maybe they're blocking kickass because of the seized domain? Or maybe we'll see more and more blocked URLs.

 

[erocker]

hmmm... it's that arbitrary nature of the blocking which does make me wonder if it's just automated software doing it rather than a concious effort? If so, the behaviour should change in a short time I'd guess.

Whether the link should actually be blocked at all is a grey area, even to me who really doesn't like censorship of any kind, so I'm not commenting on it here, just that one should always be notified it's going to happen and not have the whole message disappear without warning, which is underhand and disrespectful to Steam's users.

Well.. of course they aren't manually reading and censoring private messages as they happen. Seems some links are caught up in their spam filter. On the other side of the coin, perhaps some Steam users need to respect Valve as a company and the services they provide.. or just find a different service to share their torrent links.

If I'm a private business owner, should I allow some guy standing on a box and yelling "whatever" on my property? Nope.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

If I'm a private business owner, should I allow some guy standing on a box and yelling "whatever" on my property? Nope.

But what if......


But what if he was declaring that it was his united states of whatever?

Spoiler

 

[erocker]

But what if......


But what if he was declaring that it was his united states of whatever?

Spoiler

He would be trespassing on my land. I would call the police and have him removed.

 

[manofthem]

No, it works. What are you talking about?

Steam blocks it so that the recipient doesn't receive it.

The pic below is a sample of that, taken from the link @erocker posted.

 

[OneMoar]

ill just leave this here
https://github.com/OrfeasZ/SteamLinkFilterDisabler

 

[MxPhenom 216]

ill just leave this here
https://github.com/OrfeasZ/SteamLinkFilterDisabler

Some Malware?

 

[BiggieShady]

Some Malware?

Well, I went quickly through the source code and all it does it finds running steam.exe and its friendsui.dll module, then it patches/rewrite a part of memory loaded by friendsui module. The rewritten memory is not enough for any malicious actions (changes the link filter setting) however this code will be picked up by antivirus heuristics.

 

[OneMoar]

notice the commit date of the code ...
this is nothing new gg qubit late to the party as usual
valve doesn't actually care about piracy,this is about ass-covering
steamworks is the very reason we have most `cracked` games its trivial to circumvent and valve knows it and chooses todo nothing. they know that 'pirates' are potential customers,and any attempt to pile on more DRM would be a waste of time

 

[qubit]

notice the commit date of the code ...
this is nothing new gg qubit late to the party as usual
valve doesn't actually care about piracy,this is about ass-covering
steamworks is the very reason we have most `cracked` games its trivial to circumvent and valve knows it and chooses todo nothing. they know that 'pirates' are potential customers,and any attempt to pile on more DRM would be a waste of time

Dear oh dear, here we go again. I'm not "late to the party" like you love to tell me (wrongly) all the time.

1 The article came out on the 14th and I posted about it on the 15th. There's no "lateness" here. If the news site reported something "late" that's not my concern.

2 Remember I'm making a forum post here not a news article, which you seem to think it is and that's a big difference. What you don't appear to realize, is that I could therefore make such a forum post years later if I wanted to talk about it so "lateness" doesn't apply.

Do you finally understand?

 

[Jadawin]

Steam has every right to censor any service they provide.

Nope. They provide services for different countries and some countries still have very tough privacy protection laws. Just because you are using the chat doesn't mean Steam is allowed to listen in and delete messages.

 

[rtwjunkie]

I don't think you can get much more into the realm of privacy rights than in the U.S., and even there, if you are using someone else's service, in other words, their property, AND if by using their service you are consenting to their TOS, then you have no expectation of privacy.

 

[REAYTH]

Really who cares. Its not a big deal.

Also yes they have the right to do anything they want with their intellectual property. Don't like it? Uninstall it and stop wasting peoples bandwidth.

 

[catnipkiller]

I cant send any links over steam even if its just google or a steam links. I have steam guard on and i can see links others send me they just cant see what im sending them.