TSR: In Ur Accounts, Deletin Ur Stuffs!

[Fran]

You know what? I'm secretly hoping someday we'll wake up to find Thomass and crew bunked off, having stolen all the money from their subscribers, and selling TSR to Walt.
That way Pescado and company can go in like they did at Insimenator and free the masses of oppressed people clamoring to be free.
Oh, to dream!

[ShanOw]

You know what? I'm secretly hoping someday we'll wake up to find Thomass and crew bunked off, having stolen all the money from their subscribers, and selling TSR to Walt.
That way Pescado and company can go in like they did at Insimenator and free the masses of oppressed people clamoring to be free.
Oh, to dream!

I don't think any bit of that site is worth saving; too much crap has happened there. It would be easier to sit back and let the villagers riot and find there way to new (and hopefully free) sites.

[Moune]

If you don't think TSR was responsible, explain how, exactly, they managed to acquire something that could only have been obtained from a specific hacking? Yes, there are random hackings. Plenty of sites have been randomly hacked by the random riffraff that populates the Internet. When this happens, no one relevant ends up with anything useful. In the past, I have specifically ruled out incidents of hacking as NOT being related to TSR, so I am clearly not out to pin every single hacking on TSR. THIS, however, is CLEARLY a TSR hacking. There is simply no other logical explanation: If an independent hacker did it, then why does TSR have this information? Therefore, it was a TSR hacker.

Pes, I don’t dispute that there is a fair chance TSR was involved in the hacking somehow – if only because past behaviour shows that Thomas & co have very little scruples. But logic doesn’t equal truth. And there are other alternatives to a TSR hacking than just a random hacking.

Another logic explanation could be that – in light of how full of grudges, personal hates and sheer nuttiness the Sims community is – a third party hacked the petition and passed the information on to TSR. To hurt Bluesoup, to hurt the pirates, to help TSR, to just be mean and spiteful, whatever. LyricLee and her crazy minions spring to mind here, as does Chairman Greg and his lot.

And it doesn’t exonerate TSR in any way if they didn’t carry out the hacking. Quite the contrary. It strengthens the case against them. Because they should not have accepted the list. Receiving something that has been obtained illegally is ... illegal. Like buying stolen goods. If there is proof that the petition was hacked, that the information came from the hacking (i.e. the petition was never sent to EA), and that it was at some point in TSR’s possession, then I seriously suggest that somebody involved contact the Swedish police. Because then TSR is legally eligible for prosecution.

*cough~ATWAT~cough*

I honestly don’t think Atwa would be capable of hacking a petition. Judging from her technical skills with MilkShape and SimPE I’d say her only talents lie in manipulation and slander.

¨
I doubt Igne will add anything new to her statement on what Thomas told her.

 

If Inge won’t elaborate on her chat with Thomas, then I’ll take her information with a big grain of salt. I have a lot of respect for what Inge does, but she does at times have a penchant for drama and sometimes a slightly slanted approach to events.

[lorikay]

None of this will ever be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt.  I have no idea who actually hacked the petition.  I just know that it ended up in TSR's hands.  And because of TSR's reputation, they look guilty.  When you continually show bad behavior, circumstantial evidence is all that is needed.  I don't need absolute proof, because it will never come.  I know TSR is guilty just by having the hacked petition in their hands. 

I know nothing will ever come of this, because even the most popular free site, mts, locked a thread to even discuss it.  And then there's Inge who makes a statement that seems to prove coconut's posting, but won't elaborate on it.  Who knows when she talked to Thomas in chat?  Nobody, cause she won't tell.  Nice. 
 

[Pescado]

Pes, I don’t dispute that there is a fair chance TSR was involved in the hacking somehow – if only because past behaviour shows that Thomas & co have very little scruples. But logic doesn’t equal truth. And there are other alternatives to a TSR hacking than just a random hacking.

Another logic explanation could be that – in light of how full of grudges, personal hates and sheer nuttiness the Sims community is – a third party hacked the petition and passed the information on to TSR. To hurt Bluesoup, to hurt the pirates, to help TSR, to just be mean and spiteful, whatever. LyricLee and her crazy minions spring to mind here, as does Chairman Greg and his lot.

This proposal demonstrates a fundamentally flawed understanding of how hacking works, and to the eye of someone technically minded, like myself, amounts to a tinfoil-hat grade conspiracy theory with zero plausibility. Hacking something requires one of two things: Either leverage, or an exploit. To hack a site using leverage is relatively simple, requiring little in the way of technical ability in its most simple form, such as this. To hack a site with an exploit is also simple...if you're dealing with a public, script-kiddy grade exploit. However, a known public exploit always comes with a swath of destruction: Because it's a public exploit, every 12 year old kid is out there blowing away unsecured sites using it, and you are not alone. If PetitionLand had been hacked with a public exploit that anyone could use, there would be a giant swath of destruction rained across many of the petitions on the site. We know this did not happen, so this can be ruled out. For the site to have been hacked by someone using an ORIGINAL exploit for a singular purpose, on the other hand, requires SIGNIFICANT technical skills to even ATTEMPT. Such skills really don't exist in this community, certainly not at TSR: All TSR-related hackings to date have been simple leveraged hacks.

In short, what you are proposing is completely inconsistent with anything we've seen in this community, ever.

I honestly don’t think Atwa would be capable of hacking a petition. Judging from her technical skills with MilkShape and SimPE I’d say her only talents lie in manipulation and slander.

Yeah, but here's the thing: Hacking a petition, with likely low security, run by the Soup, who is not exactly security-concious, using the leverage that TSR itself can provide, is easy. At some point, the Soup has probably been identified on TSR. It is trivial to fish her password out of the DB: We know TSR has done this many times. Given that it is a crappy e-petition and not something of personal relevance, it is likely the Soup used the same shitty password as she would for any other disposable application. I know I do this: Only stuff I actually CARE about gets a good password. Everything else gets the same generic shit password, because I just really don't care if someone steals a disposable forum account I never intend to post with.

In short, this form of hacking is easy, trivial, and well in line with TSR's known capabilities.

So now, we have two scenarios: One posits the existence of a highly skilled hacker able to selectively penetrate a target's security on demand. This is something which is extremely rare to nonexistent. Hackers simply do not operate this way anymore, that age passed two decades ago: Modern systems, even bad ones, simply cannot be hacked easily by simple operations, unless you are using a stock exploit, in which case you are not alone in this. If you are using a stock exploit, so is every other kiddy. If you are finding a new exploit, you need to have technical chops that make you pretty much a singular figure in this community. If you are finding a new exploit to a foreign site on DEMAND, you are some kind of deity-figure in hackerdom. The other scenario is far more basic and matches historical precedent: They leveraged personal information they already had to penetrate a low-security authentication mechanism, just all the other times.

Summary: "A Wizard Did It" vs. "TSR Strikes Again". Which scenario is plausible, and which scenario amounts to tinfoil hat conspiracy?

[justso]

If the cap fits wear it.  TSR are knee deep in this and they can't deny it. No matter how they got their grubby little hands on the list, they have the list, they will use it to their own advantage.  It doesn't matter how someone believes they got the list, they again have been found to be sharing private information of over 600 people.  I believe that now this is out there, if you support TSR in any way you are responsible for anything that happens to any of those people on the list, if you are supporting TSR you are enabling their behavior,  you are condoning and justifying their behavior, you are funding them, allowing their activities to persist.

[dietofworms]

It's time for Bluesoup and Inge to come clean about what they know.  Otherwise, this is going to be another time that TSR gets off the hook. Why is it that people who could shed light on what TSR is doing clam up at the most important times--like after dropping hints that that there's direct evidence that TSR was involved.

[rum nate]

Inge has added to her statement about Thomas

Yes, the situation arose from the fact that there was technical collaboration on the creation of modding tools, which has already been discussed, and I spent quite a bit of time in a chat room that included such people as Delphy, HP, Tiger (of the hood editor) Johan, Pommes, Murano and Thomas of TSR among others.  Johan, who is Thomas's twin brother is a really nice guy.  I am sure if he was in charge, TSR would have a very different face.

At the beginning, before the chatroom really got off the ground, MSN details were exchanged between myself and the TSR people.  Thomas would occasionally PM me via that, and pass on technical stuff to and from his programmers.  Sometimes he would fish for gossip, and I made it clear I wasn't going to act as any sort of double agent.  One day, in fact the last time I ever had communication with him, he asked whether as a person who seemed fairly neutral between the paysites and the rest of the community what I thought about the feuds between them, and TSR's position in the community   I told him that since he was asking my opinion I felt that TSR's reputation was reasonably good in the days they had all items in rotation and maybe he could go back to something like that.   I also told him I thought it was quite wrong of the owners to have shared customers' personal data with people other than admins (ie creators etc), and that this was a huge part of the loss of TSR's reputation.   He responded that he felt it was entirely justified to have shared this information with creators whose work was being stolen.   The conversation ended soon after that and we haven't spoken directly since.

[kenmtl]

So there you have it.

However here's the issue.
SteveB

We would like to assure all member of TSR that this list of usernames has not come from TSR.

This list is clearly not a list of TSR users

Some comments posted by users on that site who are listed, state that they never gave TSR that info, or that the username is actually used on another Sims site and not on TSR

A bunch of private information from another site containing information about people who are not even members of TSR somehow got into the hands of someone associated with TSR and and was apparently freely distributed on their site. So if they are truly innocent of any nefarious behaviour why didn't they just fess up and say " Yes this happened, yes this is serious and yes we are taking the appropriate actions to rectify it" ? That would seem reasonable to me. Instead they get all defensive and start making threats which is usually not what innocent people do. Yanno if you want people to trust you at least give the appearance of being responsible.

[dietofworms]

Igne has added to her statement about Thomas

Yes, the situation arose from the fact that there was technical collaboration on the creation of modding tools, which has already been discussed, and I spent quite a bit of time in a chat room that included such people as Delphy, HP, Tiger (of the hood editor) Johan, Pommes, Murano and Thomas of TSR among others.  Johan, who is Thomas's twin brother is a really nice guy.  I am sure if he was in charge, TSR would have a very different face.

At the beginning, before the chatroom really got off the ground, MSN details were exchanged between myself and the TSR people.  Thomas would occasionally PM me via that, and pass on technical stuff to and from his programmers.  Sometimes he would fish for gossip, and I made it clear I wasn't going to act as any sort of double agent.  One day, in fact the last time I ever had communication with him, he asked whether as a person who seemed fairly neutral between the paysites and the rest of the community what I thought about the feuds between them, and TSR's position in the community   I told him that since he was asking my opinion I felt that TSR's reputation was reasonably good in the days they had all items in rotation and maybe he could go back to something like that.   I also told him I thought it was quite wrong of the owners to have shared customers' personal data with people other than admins (ie creators etc), and that this was a huge part of the loss of TSR's reputation.   He responded that he felt it was entirely justified to have shared this information with creators whose work was being stolen.   The conversation ended soon after that and we haven't spoken directly since.

Um, doesn't TSR  consider themselves--and not the creators--to be owners of the work once it's posted on the site?  In that case, since it's no longer theirs, why should the creators have any business knowing who's "stealing" it?

[Moune]

This proposal demonstrates ...
[snip]

tinfoil hat conspiracy?

Understood. Either you would have to be extremely skilled in the hacking business or you would have had to know Bluesoup’s password to the petition. And since Atwa apparently has TSR database access, it could be her or someone else from TSR – provided that Bluesoup used her TSR password for the petition. I’ll buy that explanation.

(Never said I knew a lot about hacking, by the way. I don’t – just like a lot of other people following this, I’m sure).

Would you mind explaining how you find out that your petition has been hacked. I mean, if the hacker just logged in with Bluesoup’s password, how did she ever find out something was wrong?

As for Inge, she’s evidently talking about past incidents and whatever Thomas said to her doesn’t have anything to do with this incident. It would still be interesting to find out how much Thomas knew about the list – if only to determine if it’s only Atwa ending up in the slammer for this, or if Thomas is going with her.

Her name is INGE, by the way. Not Igne.

[Sigmund]

I also told him I thought it was quite wrong of the owners to have shared customers' personal data with people other than admins (ie creators etc), and that this was a huge part of the loss of TSR's reputation.   He responded that he felt it was entirely justified to have shared this information with creators whose work was being stolen.  

Thomas referring to their work as being "stolen" seems like a very odd way to put it. If anything, situations like the Shakeshaft Debacle would fall under the category of stealing, and I didn't see anybody offering up her personal info then (nor should they have). Moreover, I fail to see how knowing the credit card number of someone you think is filesharing your creations is helpful at all. It strikes me as being more of a revenge-type situation, which is pretty problematic when you share the wrong person's info. You can't exactly take that back.

[Missbonbon]

I am also rather curious as to how someone knew that the petition was hacked. Let's just say they did use her password, how would one find this out? And where is Blue? She's the one that posted that the petition was hacked so surely she would know better than anyone if it truly was, and if the list was sent to EA. I would HAVE to think that SOMEONE in the community knows how to get a hold of her other than sims boards.

Also with Inge, I'm glad that for once she came clean about some things. But now I am worried. By what she said, if she's not shit stirring () then that means that Thomas has been trying to wiggle his way into the community via those programmers. Why has none of those programmers come forward with that? Simple conversations are none to dangerous, but if he's trying to get some "juicy gossip" and the way he's doing it or the topics he's speaking of with other people just seems like he's trying to get the big names to praise TSR. Why are they not coming forward? The way I see it, Thomas isn't trying to get Inge's views since shes "paysite nuetral." He's just trying to get her to jump the bandwagon. Not to mention it's very clear that he is admitting, plain as day that they did share information, and that he has no problem with it.

[Pescado]

Would you mind explaining how you find out that your petition has been hacked. I mean, if the hacker just logged in with Bluesoup’s password, how did she ever find out something was wrong?

In a word? Ordinarily, you don't. While some sites will do things like listing the last IP to use your account, experimental studies have found that people tend to ignore this information: Researchers recoded the site to intentionally spit out falsified IPs even though no security breach had actually occurred. Out of about a few thousand users, only a few, less than a handful, of people, noticed that anything was odd, and blamed it on a system glitch rather than suspecting malicious activity. So if someone wanted to purely compromise data confidentiality, they could do so without anyone noticing at all. However, the petition was apparently also vandalized, and therefore, the intrusion was detected because the attacker had damaged the functioning of the petition, rendering it inoperable, either intentionally, or as a side effect of being incompetent.

As for asking the Soup to tell us more about it, I doubt that is going to happen because the Soup has, well, souped again, disappearing into the ether some two months ago.

[Missbonbon]

Would you mind explaining how you find out that your petition has been hacked. I mean, if the hacker just logged in with Bluesoup’s password, how did she ever find out something was wrong?

In a word? Ordinarily, you don't. While some sites will do things like listing the last IP to use your account, experimental studies have found that people tend to ignore this information: Researchers recoded the site to intentionally spit out falsified IPs even though no security breach had actually occurred. Out of about a few thousand users, only a few, less than a handful, of people, noticed that anything was odd, and blamed it on a system glitch rather than suspecting malicious activity. So if someone wanted to purely compromise data confidentiality, they could do so without anyone noticing at all. However, the petition was apparently also vandalized, and therefore, the intrusion was detected because the attacker had damaged the functioning of the petition, rendering it inoperable, either intentionally, or as a side effect of being incompetent.

As for asking the Soup to tell us more about it, I doubt that is going to happen because the Soup has, well, souped again, disappearing into the ether some two months ago.

Bah humbug! Doe is it mean that I've been spending to much time reading PMBD that when I read that last bit about Blue, all I could think of was "What a fat head." 

I am rather curious, because if the petition was rendered inoperable, wouldn't the epetitions or whatever it was, know? Did Blue contact them when this happened? Because I see a huge issue there if they were contacted and just shrugged it off.