The government begins plans to monitor World of Warcraft
By Triston McIntyre
If you’re a die-hard World of Warcraft player, you probably aren’t too concerned about having your online identity known by others; how would you feel if you knew that big brother was monitoring your MMO action? The U.S. government is beginning a program that will monitor the most popular online MMOs so as to identify terrorists online.
According to Wired, the new initiative called the Reynard project aims to “automatically detecting suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world,” and from there move to identify those individuals who could be classified as threats.
More information included in the article:
The cultural and behavioral norms of virtual worlds and gaming are generally unstudied. Therefore, Reynard will seek to identify the emerging social, behavioral and cultural norms in virtual worlds and gaming environments. The project would then apply the lessons learned to determine the feasibility of automatically detecting suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world.
If it shows early promise, this small seedling effort may increase its scope to a full project.
Reynard will conduct unclassified research in a public virtual world environment. The research will use publicly available data and will begin with observational studies to establish baseline normative behaviors.
The Reynard project, along with other similar data-mining programs, are being initiated by Congress so as to better evaluate possible terrorist threats.
Really, this isn’t any different than the government monitoring your phone calls, emails or text messages. Does that justify it, though?
Consider this: The new initiative will require funding, which will come from citizens, so whether you like it or not, you will be paying the government to monitor you and your friends on World of Warcraft and other massively popular MMOs.
This is just another way in which our country’s government begins taking more of the freedom that America is known for and giving back additional “protection” against terrorists the government really can’t stop. Happy gaming.
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February 24th, 2008
“Really, this isn’t any different than the government monitoring your phone calls, emails or text messages.”
As in, it is unconstitutional without a warrant?
“Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
February 24th, 2008
Ida:
Exactly. That little document called the Patriot Act really oversteps a lot of the protections of the 4th Amendment, don’t they? I suppose probable cause can be interpreted as the government likes nowadays anyway.
February 24th, 2008
“Those willing to give up a little liberty for a little security deserve neither security nor liberty.”
-Benjamin Franklin
C@RL
February 25th, 2008
In reply to the 4th amendment issue, playing WoW is not your own anything. It’s Activision Blizzard’s.
February 25th, 2008
You guys are nuts! If you read even the few sentences above, they believe (hope) that they can use the virtual world of gaming to analyze and predict social behavior. They are not looking for terrorists online, they are trying to understand patterns of behavior and think that the very controlled world of the mmo may provide an effective model to study human social and anti-social behavior. By the way read the EULA, you have no rights. If you’re afraid, delete your character, close your account and do something that is much more difficult to model (like hang out with real people,) just before you go send me your money and stuff.
February 27th, 2008
Bah it just a way for the feds to play WoW at our expense and a reason to play at work.
June 13th, 2008
No big surprise there, just another way to get something unconstituional done by reasoning it with “terrorism.” They don’t care about finding terrorists, they just want to put fear into you so you’ll go along with their bullshit without protest. The administration is pretty much shitting on the constitution and everyone who fought and died for it. They deserve to be shot.
June 19th, 2008
It’s a ploy to play WoW at work… Not to look for terrorists.