Terms of Service for the 333networks Master Server

[Feralidragon]

For some reason I find it amusing for people to be worried about privacy terms from the master server when they use the Internet constantly while not giving it a second thought.
Here's a tip from someone who actually works in the area: nothing of what you do is "private".

The max that there could be, and is what all sites do nowadays: establish a "privacy policy". A privacy policy doesn't generally define what kind of info they get from you, instead they define what they do with it. Most sites commonly establish that they will save your data for internal purposes (preferences, stats, etc) but they won't ever hand it to 3rd parties.
Therefore probably something similar could be added to those terms.

Just my 2 cents for what it is worth

[{S.o.W}DeathMask]

For some reason I find it amusing for people to be worried about privacy terms from the master server when they use the Internet constantly while not giving it a second thought.
Here's a tip from someone who actually works in the area: nothing of what you do is "private".

Damn right. Totally Agree.
Let's just give a quck example: Facebook.

On facebook, everyone (almost) give their personal info about themselves and make them public, and the administration is paid to store those information and I never heard about a use complaining for that.
Now that Darkelarious spends some time into making a Master Server for the Community, everyone talks about privacy. Sounds quite hypocritical from you. No flaming nor offence intended, but that's what I've seen.

I'd also add, If it was I running a Master Server, I wouldn't even take care about users' information. And I know Darkelarious pretty well enough to think (no, to be sure about it) he'd treat those information sent like every other Master Server does (if not even better) and wouldn't use them for his own purposes. He's not that kind of guy.

And to ditto Feralidragon too, "Just my 2 cents for what it is worth".

[TheDane]

The max that there could be, and is what all sites do nowadays: establish a "privacy policy". A privacy policy doesn't generally define what kind of info they get from you, instead they define what they do with it. Most sites commonly establish that they will save your data for internal purposes (preferences, stats, etc) but they won't ever hand it to 3rd parties.
Therefore probably something similar could be added to those terms.

I start to believe you guys can't read, because this is what I have been trying to say all along. SOME SORT OF PRIVACY POLICY.

You guys make it look like I question Darkelarious and his project, while I'm not. Darkelarious started this topic himself and asked the community for help - I tried to help, I don't help by lining up behind the other nodders, I help by looking at things that hadn't been addressed before. There are rumours about robots going out etc, rumours I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH, but if he states that no IP's are tracked, then he also states that he doesn't send out any potentional robots as he would not know where to send them? This was my idea to help him burrie that without mentioning them - this to avoid further rumours to arise from it - Again I fail *sigh*

But you know what, I will stop. I won't be using Darkelarious master server since Epic is back in the game. Therefore I will no longer try to bring my input to this service as it seems that I am the only one who tries to deal with "the worst case scenario". And to those of you who compares this project towards Epics or the far out Facebook - IMO it's not compareable - and I'm not on Facebook anymore for the same privacy issues I address here. Just because some company runs a website with bad ethics and gets away with it doesn't mean that Darkelarious has to lower his project to their level. There are great difference between good ethics and the law.

[Darkelarious]

I start to believe you guys can't read, because this is what I have been trying to say all along. SOME SORT OF PRIVACY POLICY.

Added to list; privacy policy. Note: use post http://www.ut99.org/viewtopic.php?f=12& ... =15#p63567 for reference/example.

That wasn't so hard, was it?

On said post, I have another remark, though.

So in short you wont give the client any guarantees that you wont be collecting any information from them. Thats ok, it's your project and you can do whatever you like as long as you stay within the frames of the EULA I guess. I can just say that my personal opinion is that I will not dare to open a datalink to a private PC running a master server if I cannot get a written guarantee about privacy.

What you are talking about here, has nothing to do with what you asked earlier; you asked for a datastream going up/down between master and client. That information is clearly described in said sources, what you ask about here, is "What is your policy on logging and storing IPs from both clients and web visitors?" -- that is a completely different story.

But to give you a head start:

website
Keeps an httpd access log with the standard format; time and ip, which page was visited, referred, browser. This is the same information your own forum registers.
My website engine stores the time, link, processing time -- no ip; logs it for performance checks to find which pages are loading (too) slow.

master server
Logs time, ip, port, game, secure/validate challenge and whether it succeeded. They are logged for the following reasoning:
ip/port to see whether somebody abuses the master server by spamming requests faster than normal (already in my previous ToS post)
secure/validate -- only while debugging, to see whether all clients successfully validate, or in case of Deus Ex, that the game systematically fails validation.

In the end, the master server will only log the number of clients for any game, for fancy (public) visitor stats. Small note: logging IPs is different from tracking -- I don't do anything with the IPs themselves, only with the amount of different IPs.

As stated before, added to the list, with your post as example.

[papercoffee]

I start to believe you guys can't read, because this is what I have been trying to say all along. SOME SORT OF PRIVACY POLICY.

And I start to believe you can't remember your own post correct. Because that's not what I did read here.

• So in short you wont give the client any guarantees that you wont be collecting any information from them. Thats ok, it's your project and you can do whatever you like as long as you stay within the frames of the EULA I guess. I can just say that my personal opinion is that I will not dare to open a datalink to a private PC running a master server if I cannot get a written guarantee about privacy.

And my question is also not answered...

Where is the warranty about privacy from Epic?
Epic's Masterserver is also private and not government-run.

[ShaiHulud]

I do know that after GS shutdown all new UT installs will require manual update to use the new Epic master and alternatives.

If this is the case, we're back to square one in my respects as far as I'm concerned. I'm struggling to understand, though - isn't the master server address (current) the same as the default EPIC MS UnrealTournament.ini entry?

[noccer]

If this is the case, we're back to square one in my respects as far as I'm concerned. I'm struggling to understand, though - isn't the master server address (current) the same as the default EPIC MS UnrealTournament.ini entry?

UT comes out with unreal.epicgames.com as default. If ut was allowed to update the master, you got utmaster.epicgames.com. fortunately it doesn't matter which adress you use, both will work. And yeah, the current adress is "the old" one

[Dr.Flay]

Thanks for putting me right.
I assumed they were ignoring the original but I did remind Shambler and Smirftsch that UT has it in the defaults and the utmaster.epicgames came later.

A quick couple of tests show they have not re-enabled it for Unreal this time, and it only works in UT
Ah well better than nothing, but a real shame (wonder if it is tracking, and I wonder where they could possibly get a multi-master?).

333networks does not need much data (a reason it is fast), and can't get anything different than Epic and GS get, and can't go looking around your computers.
It only needs enough to run an efficient system. If it starts harvesting loads of long-term data on random players, that will require a heap more database programming that Darkelarious would have to do.
This would slow everything down, and serves no purpose unless you offer a system like GameTracker, or wish to sell the info, or sell product to the player.
Player info relating to cheats or banned players is better dealt with by server admin and anti-cheat mods. They will already be retaining more personally identifiable info than 333networks does.

Ask what Epic have done with all the data tracked by utmaster.epicgames.com as it always listened, but never talked.

[Darkelarious]

Another entry to be added:

When a threat to 333networks or its master server is detected, we reserve the right to defend ourselves by firewalling the offending IP/IP range until we deem such threat to be gone.

Threats include, but are not limited to: flooding the master with fake servers (e.g. only sending scripted heartbeats) or abnormally high (to do: define abnormal) rate of heartbeats, flooding with an abnormally high amount of downlink requests or any other type of flooding with the intent to damage 333networks.

Defenses will mostly be automated, so it can always happen that you end up in a blocked IP range -- in that case, email 333networks and we'll get it sorted out.

[Darkelarious]

I promised to come back to this thread when I had more information. Necro-bump!

Below, you will find a draft for the disclaimer, terms of use and privacy policy for 333networks.
http://dev.333networks.com/disclaimer

Please read it carefully and provide feedback if/where necessary.

[Chamberly]

Funny readme... good job xD

[EvilGrins]

Gluten free my sweet patootie! I found somebody's toe in there...

[sektor2111]

I'm thinking at some IpToCountry service (if exist enough resources) for a simple reason, if game-server has ignited a connection on Internet, another query to the same location is probably faster than initializing another one for any other need. Probably response is faster if "path" has been already "cached" right ? Also I might think at another UT services provided in purpose to prevent lags (AntiCheat info, Cheaters lists, MapInfo for common quality stuff).

[Darkelarious]

I'm thinking at some IpToCountry service (if exist enough resources) for a simple reason, if game-server has ignited a connection on Internet, another query to the same location is probably faster than initializing another one for any other need. Probably response is faster if "path" has been already "cached" right ? Also I might think at another UT services provided in purpose to prevent lags (AntiCheat info, Cheaters lists, MapInfo for common quality stuff).

I must confess that I do not really understand this comment in context with the Terms of Service for 333networks. I'm guessing that you are asking/stating whether it possible to use the IpToCountry connection for querying and displaying information as well? If so, that would not work (unless IpToCountry is going to be rewritten) because they both use very different connection types. Queries use UDP in the context of the most direct connection possible. IpToCountry uses a http connection over TCP/IP, which by default comes with a lot of other "junk" on the connection. If anything, we should rewrite the IpToCountry library to also host/service the UdpUplink function, but that introduces a lot of other unnecessary traffic too (for example, when there are 5 players, they all require one IpToCountry request, but you do not need to send 5 separate 333networks masterserver uplinks). If I understand your question correctly.

When I have ferbotz playing on the server, they make the server display like 3[3]/10. so 3 for 3 players, the [3] for 3 ferbotz, /10 for 10 slot. It doesn't always show up like that because not many people play with ferbotz - majority of the time of the server using players and not much ferbotz games. Is this indication OK?

With respect to rule #13 of the House Rules, above is an (edited) part of a PM that I received. I deem it necessary to answer this in public:

If <ingame> there are actual bots, then it's fine by me. I don't really know how 333networks (or the ubrowser) handle the 3 [3] notation, or whether they just state it as 6 players. Either way, as long as there are 6 playing entities in the server (for example 0 players and 6 bots), it means that when you join a server, there are still others playing. The "fake player" thing, which is considered the problem, has 6 players shown, but when you walk in there, there is nobody to be found, bot or not. That is the specific case that we want to get rid of.

Also,

Gluten free my sweet patootie! I found somebody's toe in there...

I guess you did not see the e-mail address to send legal notices/takedown notices to?

[papercoffee]

Gluten free my sweet patootie! I found somebody's toe in there...

I guess you did not see the e-mail address to send legal notices/takedown notices to?

It's not vegan ...I don't use services which are not vegan.