Blizzard has done something and Neogaf has gone bonkers

[jenova_9]

Oh mew why would they do that?
Blizzard secretly watermarking World of Warcraft screenshots with user data - NeoGAF


Activision Blizzard Secretly Watermarking World of Warcraft Users - Slashdot

[Firewind]

Seems about right given how incompetent Blizzard are at handling online security.

[Taskmage]

Why is this a big deal?

Super descriptive thread title, btw.

[jenova_9]

Well people's private information are in jeopardy, mew. That could be a security measure to trace hackers, but Blizzard could use it for just about anything even share personal info and no one would know.

[Taskmage]

It says the information encoded is the user's ID, which may be their email address, the IP of the server they're on, and a time stamp.

WoW server IPs aren't exactly private information. Anyone can find those out easily. Seems like the worst case scenario there is someone could tell your shaman is "Killabad on Lightbringer" or whatever an actual WoW server name is.

As for the email address there are way easier methods of collecting emails to spam than finding WoW screenshots and decrypting the watermark. Account security-wise, the password and authenticator are the hard part, not the user ID.

Blizzard could use it for just about anything even share personal info and no one would know.

Maybe they "could" but there's no evidence they ever had or ever would. According to your link, it's just been these three pieces of info since 2008. If there was more, like password, authenticator key, session ID, client IP address, I could see that being a big deal, but there isn't, so who cares?

[Firewind]

Pretty much what TM said. Blizzard are incompetent at this sort of thing but it's not *that* bad in the big picture.

[Aksannyi]

Doesn't stop people from blowing it all out of proportion, though.

I really don't care if people know who my toons are, you can look them up in the Armory too, and it's not that big of a deal. Now if it said my first and last name I might get a little bit ornery about it, but even that isn't uncommon or difficult data, and it isn't like there's not a bazillion more people with my exact same name anyway.

Boils down to a big fat "meh."

[Etra]

I'm enraged because they watermarked my photos and I want pure, unwatery, jagged, cartoony graphics in my screenshot. I don't need them compromised by a watermark!

[jenova_9]

oh well thanks for the informative outlook on this subject, mew. I guess WoW is safe, maybe.

[DakAttack]

oh well thanks for the informative outlook on this subject, mew. I guess WoW is safe, maybe.

It's as safe as the precautions you take. There are certain things that are out of yours hands, but that comes with the territory and that boils down to "don't like it then don't play".

[Taskmage]

Nice try on a real news story though, in all seriousness.

[Balfree]

the User ID is internal to WoW databases and there's nothing anyone but Blizzard can do with it

good try

[Aeni]

oh well thanks for the informative outlook on this subject, mew. I guess WoW is safe, maybe.

I think you'd be worse off having your PSN account compromised and people finding out what games you own and play and being ridiculed for it at your work place.

...

In other words, it's not an issue.