I decided to go to the source and ask CDS' creator, Skills Hak, point blank what CDS does and doesn't. I have never spoken to her before this and she was very pleasant to speak to. She answered my questions without being defensive or vague at all. This, I might add, is a stark contrast the reaction anyone who confronts zFire receives.
Below are the prudent parts of our conversation. (I have her permission to share this, btw. I only edited out the small talk between us that has no bearing on the topic).
[07:13 AM] Skills Hak: Hmm i really should update the CDS FAQ after this Redzone fiasco
[07:13 AM] Skills Hak: Some people seem to think CDS does alt matching and i even read rumors on SLU there had been a database leak and other nonsense
[07:13 AM] Skills Hak: CDS doesn't do the alt dealie at all, it doesn't even log IPs
[07:13 AM] Skills Hak: Oh and for some reason people think CDS vanished months ago, i'm not sure why, sales have been steady and detection rate is still around 80% successfull, there are over 10k flagged copybot users by now
[07:15 AM] Theia Magic: Thank you! One more question? If CDS doesn't log IP's, why does it use media? (I know I'm going to be asked that question)
[07:16 AM] Skills Hak: because it needs the user agent
[07:16 AM] Skills Hak: which is part of the HTTP protocol
[07:16 AM] Theia Magic: Oh ok, that makes sense then.
[07:17 AM] Theia Magic: May I have your permission to share this conversation?
[07:17 AM] Skills Hak: sure go ahead
[07:17 AM] Theia Magic: Thank you very much
[07:18 AM] Skills Hak: redzone is basically based on the cds beta script that was stolen from a friend a year ago
[07:18 AM] Skills Hak: and he turned it into an alt matching stalker tool
[07:18 AM] Theia Magic: I know he's not the original script writer, too. Of course, I can't prove it, but I know what you're saying 100% true.
[07:19 AM] Skills Hak: fun fact: the only time i spoke to zfire was when i had to ask him to remove my keywords from his marketplace listing
[07:19 AM] Skills Hak: he used "skills hak, gemini, cds" etc in a font size 0 text
[07:19 AM] Theia Magic: I'm not surprised. He's as sneaky and underhanded as the day is long.
[07:19 AM] Skills Hak: sneaky bastard
<<snipped the banter>>
[07:22 AM] Skills Hak: alot of people claim it's useless but i wonder where the 10k+ banned people come from
[07:23 AM] Skills Hak: i certainly didn't add them manually like many suspect
[07:23 AM] Theia Magic: Ok, though that is a good point. I heard it was great "back in the day", but since people are now using legit viewers to mask copybotting, how can it catch them?
[07:24 AM] Theia Magic: I too was under the impression it no longer worked because coptybotters got sneakier
[07:24 AM] Skills Hak: well since copybotters are generally not the smartest people in SL, they often get the spoofing wrong
[07:25 AM] Skills Hak: sure there are some clients we can't tell apart from the legit ones
[07:25 AM] Skills Hak: nothing we can do about that
[07:25 AM] Theia Magic: Ohhhh.... so you catch the flaws then? When they try to mask it?
[07:25 AM] Skills Hak: but there is still the large db with flagged avis
[07:26 AM] Skills Hak: and the vast majority still uses older clients
[07:26 AM] Skills Hak: yeah they use versions that don't exist for example
[07:26 AM] Theia Magic: Wow really? They're that stupid? lol
[07:26 AM] Skills Hak: 80% of them are stupid
[07:26 AM] Skills Hak: haha
[07:26 AM] Theia Magic laughs
I then did some further searching, and found this. A person who did some testing on CDS, which supports what Skills told me: Analysis of Gemini Cybernetics CDS
My point to all this? I think everyone has to judge for themselves what is acceptable. I personally don't have an issue with CDS because it makes no attempt to reveal alts and was created as strictly a security device. If someone else decides to disable Media and reject any http requests from CDS that's their choice- which I fully respect. But when someone asks me why I don't exclude CDS locations from lists, the reason is because CDS is different than Quickware Alts or Redzone. People using CDS are doing so to try to protect themselves, in stark contrast to the people using Redzone and Quickware Alts for the single purpose of being a nosey drama whore.
I have major issues with CDS, and I will tell them here as I have many other sites, blogs, and forums.
ReplyDeleteCDS works through the Media, as we all know, by every Copybot user turning off media, it ruins the ability to be detected, we all know this, now Skills Hak's CDS system he claims he doesn't LOG IP Addresses, or any other information about a computer, yet my issue is this.
My information is being sent without my express consent, or knowledge to any region I go to, not only limited to my client name, but IP addresses can also be logged, while Skills Hak has said above that he doesn't it can't be proven that he does, or doesnt, and therefore the collection of any information at all from a HTTP:// request should be asked consent before doing such, and if the user denies then they should be allowed to leave in peace no harm done, but instead it doesn't work that way.
I have used customer clients myself for over a year now, and I will will say that Skills Hak himself shouldn't judge people, or be allowed to sell or market CDS, because he himself was an Emerald Developer, and he worked right along side JCool410's alternate account, and two others including Lonely Bluebird, and this other cant remember the name off the moment, and they all used Malicious codes, and developed viewers for KingG00n, and is the one that made Neil Life, and Onyx, and such, and if that wasn't enough look at the attacks that Emerald did on its residents Skills Hak was there.
My name was add to the CDS Data Base without my consent because of an Emerald Developer, and a Disagreement, and Skills Hak's CDS needs to be gone just as Zfire Xue, and if Skills Hak refuses to remove he needs to be banned along with his simulators, he steals his ideas from cyberpunk games like Neocron anyways.
This doesn't include the numerous friends who are part of many help groups, and help more people daily than Skills Hak does, what we do is all non profit, yet Skills Hak wants to charge $700 L$ a month to content creators for protection that doesnt work, and everyone knows this it should be FREE, with donations.
Honestly even though I hate what Skills Hak has done, I wish he could find a Real Anti Theft solution, and actually be a friend, but after over 1 and a half years of being accused of being a Copybotter by Skills Hak, I dont see how I can ever trust him again, and honestly I never really met him other than a couple of talks once over 2 years ago, but they seemed really cool, and I was actually becomming a Fan of Skills Hak until this crap.