Those of you who were registered in Second Life prior to 2007 may remember a feature where anyone on your Friends List could map you without your consent. It was later resolved by allowing you to toggle mapping capabilities for those on your Friends List to include only specific people. However, according to a recent post your privacy may not be as private as you assume.

Before we get into the detail, let's be clear about a couple of things. First, this does appear to be a problem which could be exploited by someone with malicious intent. However, that said, there is little evidence that anyone is being tracked without their consent, so this whole thing might be purely theoretical at this point. Nonetheless, if you are concerned about the potential for abuse, and you want your private activities to remain private, this might be something of which you should be aware.

According to Dusan Writer:

The “mapping” function lets you ALLOW others to know where you are on the Grid - to map you. The decision to let someone map you is often used with extreme caution. This is a world after all - a world where you can go anywhere, be with anyone, do anything.

...

Well, suspicious spouses don’t need to go to the expense of a detective: just run and grab a copy of Second Inventory and you can map anyone on the Grid at any time.

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[E]mbedded in the application’s communication tools is “user location” data. You can see the region and exact coordinates of any user who speaks in a group chat, or with whom you open (but do not necessarily use) an IM.

Second Inventory takes advantage of an Improved Instant Message function built into Second Life. This message function communicates the region ID and location of users, and is equally applicable to objects.

Interesting. So according to this your precise movements on grid can be tracked by someone without your consent. In the comments section of this article, the author responds to a couple of challenges to his assertion:

you do NOT need to say something to someone in IM to get their sim location. It appears that location (coordinate) data is passed as well, although this was not directly tested. So, the idea that you need to message people in order to get their location is erroneous - all you have to do is open the IM and not say anything.

So, Dale and Thraxis - your “work-arounds” don’t work. Because someone just needs to open an IM window to find out where you are. Similarly, muting someone does not prevent them from doing this.

Dusan brings up a scary possibility. Someone can track you precisely, via an open IM window and Second Inventory, and you will have no knowledge of this occurring. If he is correct, and I have to assume he is, then such activity could be happening, although it sounds like it takes a bit of technical acumen at present to pull this off. That said though, it isn't a stretch to imagine someone marketing these capabilities in the form of tools or services, which makes SL not quite as anonymous as you might have thought it was.

Have you personally had any experiences with someone tracking you without your permission? Let us know.

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