Names

[o_mikequist]

okay, last time i typed this, the power went out about 4 paragraphs in.

A vast group of us have had the oppurtunity to be the victim of tfc identity theft. It happened to me a month ago. A guy stole my name and went around letting random people in the clan and made me look like an ass. Then just last week I was on a concmap server when one guy concs the other in an effort to do it. (omgsh.!!!!)..... -.- anyways, following that was a nice flame war between the two with the usual "your a kid," "get outside you loser. theres a whole world out there" (that remark really pisses me off.) "you have no friends". the guy then thought it would be a good idea to get him back by taking his name and going to random servers and making his look like an ass so hell be banned everywhere. then yesterday, a clanmate had his name stolen. some people were telliing him what a dick he had been and how he was a racist. he knew right away what had happened. later that day he encountered him. the guy changed his name to my clanmates old hostmask. that is really messed up. so my clan mate did some research. this guy has stolen like 50 names on the cats. and has a few steam ids.

now im not a coder. or someone with an amazing amount of ingenuity. those coupled together, i could not produce a solution to this, and if i could, i would have put this in suggestions. But this is an amassed group of the smartest people tfc has to offer. so i ask you. how do you solve this problem?

[o_sidius]

Just keep away from people like them and stick to servers which people will know it it u. Thats what i would do anyway :shock:

[o_mikequist]

o i do stick to my own clans servers. where it is the biggest risk becuase they can do it there where things you say matter. the point of this post is for FF. a system of somewhat to eliminate or discourage it. but i cant think of any. lets think OUT OF THE BOX guys.

[Jiggles]

Out of the BOX, but inside the RECTANGLE!

[o_]l[-rare]

well.. you can make a suggestion about having a list of banned ips that gets updated everyweek. Admins just download this list and put it in their server to enforce the banned ips.

ofcourse this would give the ff team more responsibilites... maybe a different team altogether and a diff. site. dedicater to this. They would be the one who would review demos / ss of hackers and lamers to be banned.

releasing the lists weekly/every month. or making it included into ff installations, so eveytime we patch or use an autoupdate feature we get the new lists of banned ips.

[o_mikequist]

But then any lame admin can add any name he wants to the list.

[o_]l[-rare]

that is why there would be a team that reviews the proofs...
you would have to need some kind of proof to ban someone.

[o_]l[-rare]

getting into the list should prove that the llamma be 100% proven guilt beyond a reasonable doubt

[o_mr.saturn]

Maybe a thread with a list of banned names and the reasoins they where banned would be effective. There are some real shit heads out there that I would not want playing on any server. Of course, this may also do FAR more harm then good because people could post false charges aginst an ID because of a personal fight or something, thus making the list useless.

As for the tag theft, if I can rember right, "Admin Mod" had some kind of option build into it where you could not use a clan tag without a password. I cant rember how it worked, but its in the documentation somewhere...

[o_mikequist]

things dont work like that. examples of controversial bans are everywhere. and it just takes some asshole who has a bit of power to say "well if you think that, you might as well not play ff".

[o_d3pth charge]

I think the best idea would be to have a forum for cheaters/hackers/llamas where we can all post their userids and stuff if they are banned from our servers. This way admins can add them to their banlist, if they so choose. Obviously some 13 year old kid might post some other 8th grader he doesn't like's userid up, but this community is clued-in enough to know who to trust and who not to trust. If "15n1p3dj00" with 1 post in the forums makes his first post as saying "OMG fagg3t b01 was hax0rzing my server lol ban him!!eleven!one1" then you probably would be safe ignoring it. ;)

[o_binarylife]

This is actualy a lot simpler than it seems. The ban by IP is a good idea, that goes to the player, not their name and it doesn't matter if they've stolen someone's name or identity.

As far as ban lists go, keep them, but alow for challenges. If some lame admin sticks your name on a ban list you can have the ability to challenge. Then the admin's gotta show the log of his reason or some sort of proof other than word of mouth (so a clan can't just agree to say the same thing and add you) if he does.. you stay banned, if he can't you go free.

[o_cruor]

Why ban by name or ip when you can ban by steamID :twisted:

[o_silver]

people have multiple of those but eventually they run out, adminmod had a plugin called userid with collected all names every used by a steam_id on your server and the admin would just type admin_who and the current user name and it would show all his names he's used on your server.

also as a note on the massive updated ban list, thats been done already but i forget the name of it. it was a meta plugin i believe

[o_mikequist]

forget it. and there are people high up in tf community who would ban too for reasons unworthy.

[o_crazy carl]

There could be a feature:

If you know someone is cool, you can save their steam id and they'll be hilighted in the scoreboard, so you always know if it's really him (just be careful to protect your steam id).

Similarly, if you know someone is a dick, you can save their steam id in a different list, and they'll show up in red or something, so you know what to expect.

[o_sobe green]

To put it simple, don't give out your Steam password/CD key to anyone. Make your password something that you yourself even need to write down in order to memorize. Nothing like "hamburger1" or the like. You'll always have morons in servers, but when it comes to losing CD keys and Steam accounts, it is usually your fault.

[o_binarylife]

I still say keep the list and include the ability to challenge.
You find yourself on a list and don't think you did anything wrong? Then send and e-mail to the list's host site (hopefully controlled by a third party) telling them you disagree. If a challenge is made it's up to the admin to justify his ban.

[o_vanquish]

but then what happens to the guy who doesn't know about the list, doesn't realize he's been banned, and has no idea he can challenge...

[o_mikequist]

sobe, im talking about names, not steam IDs. and its not as simple a fix as highlighting names.

[o_deathzone]

...A guy stole my name and went around letting random people in the clan and made me look like an ass...
ONO! Its the attack of the Name-Snatchers all over again!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v602/DeathZone/leehotel20000.jpg