Bonnie Bots, Explained: Team Behind Controversial Second Life Data Tracker Respond to Feedback, Also Notes: We're Hardly the Only Ones Collecting Public Avatar Data

Last night I teleported to a cozy patio with a firepit on a tiny asteroid to talk with the team of Bonnie Bots, the little Second Life user data website causing enormous controversy across the Second Life community. Since the imbroglio flared up, they have updated the site's homepage with this disclosure:

 

Information about Second Life should be freely accessible by all. We intend to make previously obscured information available to all residents, enable open use of the information, and expand available toolsets to further content creation.  All information collected and made available is publicly accessible and is not, and never will be, utilized for any monetary gain. We support individual privacy and will never attempt to obtain information not contained within or relevant to Second Life.

 

"We understand there are people upset about us releasing our data publicly," as team spokesperson Skyler Pancake explains. "However, people need to understand there are individuals and groups collecting this data secretly. Anyone with a little effort can easily collect this information and include it in seemingly harmless objects. The concern shouldn't be over us releasing this information publicly but who else is privately maintaining such databases and not informing anyone."

 

As the team and I chatted on the asteroid, one of the Bonnie Bots itself primly sat in silence. They warned me to take a picture of her quickly, because she was programmed to go back on her rounds across the Second Life grid soon.

 

While the Bonnie Bots team has bore the brunt of this controversy, they wanted to make it clear that they are hardly the only people collecting data on Second Life users -- and how much is already publicly accessible for people to collect off them:

 

 

 

"This is the first time people are realizing how much information can be easily collected on your avatar within Second Life," as Pancake puts it.

 

"The amount of data being collected by complete strangers can be startling when you first learn about it. Although BonnieBots has no interest in data not contained within Second Life and has taken efforts to ensure none of our data is personal identifiable information, the potential for other Second Life services to collect and analyze such information is considerable."

 

"All of this publicly available right?" I ask. "So someone could hire some people in the Philippines to do this manually and get the same data for cheap." 

 

"M-hm."

 

"How do you track Premium accounts? Is it public?"

 

"100%. It's a code feature built in by Linden Lab in part to help land owners set access terms and such."

 

"It’s very useful to see how much revenue Linden Lab is making."

 

Linden Lab has been cagey about how many Premium accounts it has. But if the Second Life community could get a count of them, and track its growth as a revenue stream, they could (for example) use that data to ask for a discount on sim tier and other costs. 

 

"It's definitely one potential use," Pancake agrees. "We were able to figure out very loose estimates of how much Linden Lab is making off Marketplace sales alone." (More on that in another post.)

 

The team has been updating the site to adjust to community demands -- including a feature to enable Second Life merchants to opt of tracking.

 

"But isn’t it a valuable data point for the SL user community?" I point out. (As I've said before, if the American public did not know which people and companies were the most wealthy, there would be general outrage.)

 

Pancake tells me the team agrees the merchant data is indeed valuable:

 

"For the most part Second Life has been considered irrelevant for over a decade now. Revealing how much a designer can make via Second Life will hopefully help inspire other content creators to join.

 

"Additionally, as a person who's done a considerable amount of shopping myself, it's both neat and helpful to see who the top designers actually are. Some of the top stores are ones I've never even heard about and which I've now made some purchases from. If nothing else, it's a free form of advertising for the designers."

 

It will be interesting to see how many designers see it that way too. In the meantime, many merchants are asking the Bonnie Bots team to have their brand name masked:

 

"We've had discussions with various designers, some who've opted out, and are in the process of reworking the Marketplace Listing to address their concerns. We also have some ideas on how we can both improve on the accuracy of the sales data and various ways of making the information more helpful."

 

And so for now the Bonnie Bots will continue wandering the world, collecting data, even if that means occasionally getting booted by a bot tracker. And the Second Life community collectively argues whether knowing this much about their world is a boon or a burden or both.

 

UPDATE, 4;32pm PST: The Bonnie Bots team just added a FAQ here.

 

 

 

Comments

[Tankgirl]

55 percent of the top 100 marketplace merchants have opted out. That should tell you something. You are putting a target on the back of small independent artists. Shame on you and Linden Lab for not protecting the hardworking merchants that make them money, it shows clearly how little LL cares about them. Disgusting.

[0xc0ffea]

But what about ..

Who cares what other evil strawmen may or may not be doing in the Philippines. Bonnie and co published.

Public in SL is not public to the world. You need an account to get access to SL. If LL banned Bonnie's bots, it would be game over. If it was public data, that shouldn't stop them.

Thanks to these clowns, it now is public, totally public. Any notion SL users might have had about privacy based on LL's own documentation or options in their profiles to opt in or out of searches are up in smoke, and for some unfathomable reason LL are allowing it to continue .. which counts as sanctioning it, endorsing it even.

Almost 2 decades of reciting the mantra "we don't and won't sell your data" is now meaningless and shatters the trust placed in LL. They might be going to lengths to point out they don't have an agreement with the botters, and will absolutely enforce the letter of one part of their terms, but at this point that hardly matters.

Anyone can now make a data scraping operation and feel safe being as intrusive as they like, because Bonnie made it all ok. This is a spectacular failure to read the room and understand their customer base at the very least.

The obvious question now is where is the line for LL. What else once presumed sacrosanct is actually "public" .. how about local chat, how about who is seen with who, where we as individual avatars spend our days, how much land everyone has, group memberships and so on and on ... because we all know who has this data!

This is a controversy that never dies. Every day, forever, someone in SL will discover information they thought was very private. How many times can LL deflect and sooth the disappointment and disbelief that this is all somehow ok.

Excite used to boast about the "orgasms per hour" statistic. Which was fine .. because they didn't post a public ranking of who was getting the most.

PS .. Where do I send DMCA requests for the images hot linked out of SL from the Linden CDN - that data isn't public domain, even by the labs own T&C.

PPS .. How about a download of the entire dataset .. if this is public after all, why not just go all in, WCGW.

[Aleesha Littlebird]

I don't like them on my land the same as the Brenden ones. It feels likes stalkers cause they come every day. And if I block 12 of then they just send another. Take the block as a sign and leave us alone

[Aleesha again]

And I will definitely opt out as soon as i figure out how

[Tankgirl]

60 percent opted out now, more every hour. And Linden Lab lost their trust. The other 40 probably just don’t know about this yet. Shame on you and Linden Lab.

[0xc0ffea]

I'm actually startin to wonder if the reason the marketplace performs like a pig in mud is because $thoughtful_people are hammering the crap out of it to collect data :/

[aon]

Remove the sales column, restore the redacted names, let us see the popular stores. We know the top 100 make more than 4000 USD a month anyway, so the L$ value there means nothing.

[TessTess]

What honestly is the point of even doing this? People don’t go to this much work without their being some type of incentive they can benefit from. Is there a way to post all the names of bots so we can manually block them? I hate people like this.

[youtube]

why are people so mad at this lol, its just data gathering so players can understand second life better

[Scylla Rhiadra]

It would require a fairly lengthy essay to parse everything that is wrong with what is said here, and I have an RL, so I'm not going to try (at least for now). But let's focus for a moment on the opening sentence of Bonnie Bots' "disclosure."

"Information about Second Life should be freely accessible by all."

The core "information" being gathered by BonnieBots is about avatars: who they are, where they are and when, what attachments they are wearing, and ... maybe other stuff we aren't seeing.

The avatars in Second Life are NOT "NPC"s. They are not (unlike the BonnieBelle bots) "scripted agents": they are real people who have, in many if not most cases, spent years in SL establishing identities, relationships, reputations, communities, and often building businesses. They are not "part" of SL -- they are IN it, and they BUILT it. Emphatically, they are NOT part of the "code base" of this platform: they are real, flesh and blood users who are USING that code.

But "people" are literally what Bonnie Bots is collecting: our data, our identities, our activities. And what this statement essentially says then is that information about everyone in Second Life should be freely accessible to all. In other words, there should be zero expectation of privacy for the real people who engage in real relationships and activities in this virtual environment.

And please define "information." Does that include chat, for instance? Is what I say to my best friend or my lover "information"?

ALL information? Is anything out-of-bounds? Because I'm not seeing a list of exclusions. So, not merely whether I'm wearing a "body cum" system (surprisingly popular, apparently), or that I like to hang out in an AFK sex spot, or apparently have a penchant for tentacles? What else about ME should be "freely accessible by all"?

And what does "all" mean? Not just anyone in Second Life, because this is on an open web site, where it lists things that you can't see on the actual SL platform unless you log in. It's all there for ANYONE to find.

I am well aware that the public-facing web site does not provide all of this information -- for now -- but frankly I find this statement terrifyingly dystopian. I find it hard to trust anyone who articulates this kind of philosophy about information and our online lives. Did we build a brave new virtual world, or a new surveillance society, where everyone operates under the watchful, and perhaps predatory eye of literally anyone who chooses to look?

And even if all of this information is not currently publicly available, we know a great deal of it is in the database, which is, at the very least, capturing where you are at given times and days, and what you are wearing there. Can I trust that that data is not being used in less visible ways? And is it secure?

The good people of Bonnie Bots are welcome to their techno-utopian wet dream -- but not with my data.

And as for LL, who is supposed to be operating as a watchdog over my privacy on their platform -- I can't even begin to express my dismay and disappointment about their apparent acquiescence to all of this. I actually don't believe that Bonnie Bots are "evil": I'm sure (maybe) that this is all very well intentioned. But this is the thin edge of the wedge for LL so far as I'm concerned -- because the next "fun" project that emulates this one may well not be.

[Nasty bonniebots need to be trashed]

I am currently looking more into data privacy law when it comes to video games and virtual worlds in general. EU GDPR law is very interesting for game companies such as Linden Lab and potential data farmers about what they can and cannot farm.

What these bonniebots are doing is in clear violation of the GDPR laws and Linden Lab knows it, hence the reason they shut down forums threads about it.

Here is an interesting bit of text from the GDPR:

The GDPR would be okay or not okay with this, depending on a few factors:

If the data is not associated (and can not, technically, ever be associated) with a player/person, then you should be fine as the data then would not be personal data relevant to the rules of the GDPR. Note however, that simply storing an IP address alongside the data would make the association possible and the data could therefore be considered personal data (see next point)

If the data can be associated with a player/person and the collection of the data is not necessary for the proper operation of your game, then you need consent (opt-in) from the player before you can collect it

If the data can be associated with a player/person and the collection of the data is necessary for the proper operation of your game, then you probably do not need consent to collect it

Either way, the collection (including how it is collected, for how long it is stored and why it is collected) needs to be detailed in the ToS or a specific document regarding data privacy.

You can for example collect gaming data, or virtual world data that is anonymous, for example you could collect data about the average amount of Groups a Second Life user has in their profile. That would be anonymous gaming data that cannot be linked to a player account. You could collect data about how many times an average Second Life user logs in to the Second Life grid every month. That would also be anonymous data for which you do not need to ask for consent.

For data related to specific user accounts, or parcels that belong to users or regions that belong to users such as the data that these bonniebots collect you do need specific user permission to collect and publish such data.

Game developers are very much aware of all this and afraid they would violate the GDPR laws.

Linden Lab is also at fault here because they do not tell you what type of data they collect from your avatar in world. For example Linden Lab keeps track how many times you teleport around in world but they do not tell you that they are harvesting this data from your avatar. Linden Lab is at fault here and should specify exactly what type of data they harvest from your avatar.

Linden Lab should also tell you in detail what they do with your data, how they store it and for what period of time they store your data. Linden Lab needs to inform you if they are selling any of your data or are sharing your data with third parties.

These bonniebots certainly have no right to collect data without you opting in so they can harvest your data. They cannot do what they are doing and they certainly WILL NOT KEEP DOING WHAT THEY ARE DOING now.

I expect legal action will be hitting them and I hope they are well funded to pay all their legal bills. Maybe they can go beg with Linden Lab to get money to pay their lawyers.

Ow yes GDPR is 2000 USD per violation per user account. Google for example had to pay 50 million in damages to the EU for violating the data privacy act.

I hope you are rich bonniebots cuz you will need it. I suspect your farming days will be over sooner than later.

Also the entire garbage story of "We just happen to be a team of 5 people who know how to program and we are so bored we just decided we want to make Second Life better because we love Second Life so much and for that reason we are now scraping the grid every single day 24/7 with our bot army harvesting anything we can on anyone we detect".

I am very much aware you are doing this to make money, not hard with a database that holds 67 million user accounts of gamers.

IF ALTBERG WOULD BE STILL ALIVE HE WOULD NEVER ALLOW THIS DO YOU HEAR THAT LINDEN LAB.

IT IS TIME YOU GET A DECENT CEO AGAIN LINDEN LAB

IT IS ALSO SAD TO SEE HOW YOU ACT ON THE SECOND LIFE FORUMS WHICH YOU ARE MANAGING LIKE THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF CHINA.

[faith Jolifaunt]

I am one of the merchants in which the Bonnie Bots gather information and post information. These people running this "cult" as they call it have no idea the amount of time and enery we pour into our work. As a previous poster stated, they have put a target on our backs. These people in the cult have no idea of the ramifications of what they're doing.

I worked in SEO and marketing for years. I completely understand data mining and the trends it can set. This group is amatuers who think what they're doing is "cool". They could post completely false information for all we know and set the market trending in a totally different direction. They should not have the power to do this. Who's to say this isn't merchant's buddy who has mediocre sales paying them to drive up their business. The group is doing this for the good of SL residents? I call BULL. They're doing it for the good of themselves.

They even say themselves it's a form of advertising for the designer. How do we know they're not being bought off? Because they say they're not? And we're supposed to trust these jokes of residents because they say so? Wait, wait, wait....you're telling me you make no profit from this, and I'm supposed to trust you? Because you were SO UPFRONT about this shady datamining you were doing? Because you offer us the option to opt-out AFTER the fact?

I don't trust these people as far as I can pick them up and throw them. This has illegal shadiness written all over it.

I have been a strong supporter of SL and LL for years. The way they have handled this situation sickens me. It has opened my eyes to how little they care about creators. I am a premium plus member, but I'm not seeing me renewing any subscription after this.

Thanks for not thinking this through, Bonnie Bots. And by the way, I kept my word and personally messaged everyone on the merchants list to let them know their sales info was on display for the public to see. So, you're welcome :)

[Scylla Rhiadra]

@Faith -- thanks for this. It's good to see the creative community responding as assertively as it is.

According to Bonnie Bots' *own* FAQ, "Due to limitations we are unable to guarantee the accuracy of the Marketplace information. Our best estimate is that we are under-reporting by 25-35%."

25-35% is hardly a marginal error. This is crappy, inaccurate data, and it's utterly unverifiable. It needs to go.

[faith Jolifaunt]

By the way, Hamlet. You state on your Twitter feed that Bonnie Bots are a non-profit group. How do you know this? Because they said so? Exactly what proof do you have that this is a non-profit group? Please, do a story showing your proof that these people aren't making money from this. No? You can't? Because you do not know what's going on. They could very well be paid outside of SL via many monetary platforms. Please stop portraying them as helpless non-profit agents when you have zero proof.

[Grace]

How exactly does BonnieBots get the MP statistics on merchant sales?
I can understand how they collect data on number of visitors to a sim, or even what attachments they are wearing, by having bots in the sim. But MP is not 'in-world' so I can't visualise how a bot that is in-world gathers that data.

If that MP sales data down to merchant level is available somehow in a public or semi-public way, then isn't the crux of the issue the fact that LL is making it available, and not about BonnieBots showing it on their site?

[Scylla Rhiadra]

@Grace -- The MP home page features a "What Customers Are Buying Now" panel near the bottom that includes a feed of recent purchases from the MP. Bonnie Bots appears to be forcing a refresh of the page, and scooping the items as they appear there. It's a clumsy hack and, as their own FAQ notes, probably at least 25-35% inaccurate.

[Alazarin Mobius]

Bonniebots, the new Ginko Financial. Wait until it all blows up when the EU taps them for GDPR violations. No wonder LL keeping quiet over this, they could be on the hook for major fines and compensation to all SL account holders.

[Mondy]

I personally don't have a problem with a lot of public data. Google, Facebook, Microsoft have mine but at least they all have tools, even if convoluted to lock down and limit WHO gets to see that data. I can limit, choose, opt in/out to family, friends, the general public or just their own organisations for telemetry purposes.
I agree with others here, there's a problem for Merchants and that for them it should be opt in, not opt out.
The main problem I have, which was pointed out to me by someone on Twitter, is that Bonniebots do post Profile information that isn't publicly shown inworld.
They show a users Premium account status. While that might not seem a huge deal, that info is not shown in the inworld profile. So regardless of whether or not it can be "scraped" by standard scripting tools, they ARE giving out information that isn't normally available, contradicting (or so it seems to me) what they said in their interview.
Another thing they do is link to any other profile that mentions a users name and display all of that info, not just the one searched for.

[Khaotickupkake Resident]

I have opted out, days ago and am still in their system.I feel like I can not go anywhere without being followed. I don't like it. It's not just my land, but it's every place I go. It's a simple invasion.

[Not buying from Backbone Again Either]

Tell me the system isn't already being abused. Looks like BackBone magically put their entire store on sale as soon as they heard about this. Look at the on sale tab. This many price drops are not coincidental. They have obviously driven up their prices significantly and cut them to be listed all over that sales page: https://gyazo.com/210367a84a07e65dc8973b800d4ffa7e . They are abusing this marvelous system you all created. SMH And what does that say about Backbone? How disgusting they'd take part in this. Maybe they're in on it?

[Adeon Writer]

Second Life is convinced to consume itself until there is nothing left. Innovations like this will be cast aside.

Nothing about this is surprising. It's repeated over the entire history of the platform.

[Dave]

Get your bots off my land - no I will not *give* you more info on me in the hopes you keep your word about opting me out, without any information on what that even means. Keep your bots off my land. I am in discussion with LL regarding closing my six premium accounts and leaving SL (I am a medium sized MP and inworld seller) if something isn't done about this.

You are not welcome on my land or to my data.

No-one wants you to do this - stop pretending you are doing it for the good ofSL or its residents. You are not wanted by anyone who knows what you are doing.

[Adeon Writer]

Second Life is convinced to consume itself until there is nothing left. Innovations like this will be cast aside.

Nothing about this is surprising. It's repeated over the entire history of the platform.

[Nodoka Hanamura]

Wagner, and especially the Lindens - this shit ain't it.

[jbsl]

My biggest issue isn't that they collect or display the data - it is more HOW they collect the data, and the titles that they use.

If their goal is to show the top stores - they could do that without showing L$, if they wanted to show L$, they could do that without showing store names.

Bonnie Bots should let people know -exactly- how they are collecting data, meaning exposing a repo that people can examine, understand, and provide feedback.

As a SE with focus in data visualization, Bonnie Bots hasn't done anything wrong, but they have been criminally negligent with their current work.

[0xc0ffea]

It just keeps coming ...

The merchant list appears to be fully populated again - seems they are now omitting the names of everyone who opted out, so now a whole new list of merchants who thought they were too small fry to be exposed are now exposed and the cycle repeats.

Backbone figured out how to easily game the On Sale! page and flooded it in the most shameless way possible, they are now the top visible earner.

A FAQ page was added.

What data are they collecting? - ALL OF IT.

How Secure is the data? "No data is ever 100% secure." .. ooof.

They also explain what opting out means - it means they don't publicly show your data on the avatar or merchant page. They are still collecting your data.

[kthxbai]

How can we continue to trust the Lab? They talked about caring about our privacy for decades and now are shutting down conversations in the forms when people try to have an open conversation about Bonniebots. We are expected to just keep paying to be spied on and have our data harvested by a 3rd party? How many people are going to continue to put up with this massive privacy issue and pay for land and premium accounts?

[Nadeja]

Honestly, they do interesting things, but there are issues too.
The top merchant list is quite a free advertisement, for those who didn't opt-out; on the other hand it promotes those who are successful already, making it harder for new merchants to emerge.
Still, it was pretty interesting to see which merchants/items people spend the most money on. Although BonnieBots miss a consistent fraction of the sales, statistically they have a quite large sample, as they capture most of it.
Also it's understandable that some merchant isn't ok to make so public their estimated revenue, although it's calculated from publicly available data.

[Tankgirl]

80 of the 100 in that top MP list opted out, but Bonniebots simply took them off and found 70 new victims to invade the privacy off. Who all have to know and opt out know. Thanks a lot Bonniebots and Linden Lab.

[thelabcaresnothingaboutprivacy]

Tell us you don't care about user privacy without saying you don't care about user privacy.

[Nadeja]

Another issue is data control.

The whole log of your activities, the locations where you go and when, where you hang out etc, I don't think isn't exactly public info.

Unlike someone diving into conspiracy theories already, Linden Lab doesn't need bots to know what you do. I think to remember that employees can even look at your inventory (e.g. when you need support). Linden Lab already knows all the places you go and when; a few people even received a rez-day recap mail showing how many regions they visited in the previous year.
However, if private data leaks, a company is legally responsible of that.

What about BonnieBots? It's interesting to find out which place is a bot parking-lot or has actual traffic, but how do you do that? If you look only at the amount of avatars in a parcel and how it changes, that's not very reliable; if you look at which avatars didn't move, you need a database with their UUIDs and timestamps. And BonnieBots even scan avatars for attachments.
Therefore, depending on the way they store the data, they might have a database of UUIDs associated to attachments and locations, timestamps and more.
This data has been collected from Second Life and stored on their third party website. A website you never signed up and the only control you have is an opt-out option.
Public data or not, it's not only about the search engine and your profile presented as current info - that if you edit it in SL, you hope BonnieBots will synchronize it, eventually, because neither you or LL has control over it - but also the full database that the BonnieBots team has access to.
If their data leaks, who is the responsible, since their website entirely lacks of any privacy policy and its owners are anonymous?

So I think some concern here is legit.
It's not relevant if somebody don't care, other people do.
There are other data hoarders in SL, but that argument sounds a bit like whataboutism: two wrongs don't make one right. Also publishing what you discovered about other people isn't necessarily morally better than scanning avatars for yourself just to know which bodies are still popular and to make outfits for those. It could actually be worse. e.g. here you have a public service, that it's like a big sign amid the square, showing your profits to everyone. And you didn't choose nor gave consent to show it.
Suspicions are fueled by (perceived) shady behaviors and lack of transparency. I don't mean that's the case, though, but it's not so surprising that there are people doubting of this bot-team's good faith. However, before jumping to conclusions I would give the benefit of the doubt.
Perhaps (hypothesis) BonnieBots started as just a personal pet-project and they genuinely thought they were doing something useful for SL - indeed at one point they even asked for feedback and suggestions - nice and interesting ideas. But it looks like, at best, they weren't ready for public adoption. If you offer this kind of tools and public service, then there are responsibilities you have to take into account. Particularly if you state that you want to make the "obscured information" (that may be obscured for good reasons) "freely accessible by all".

[0xc0ffea]

Riddle me this ...

Is it hypocritical to scrape everyone else's data and publish it on the open internet .. but opt out your own profile.

[faith Jolifaunt]

Welp, guess I'll be message all of the new top businesses today to let them know their sales data is public. I don't mind. I have middle child syndrome and believe everything should be fair. It's on Bonnie Bots :D

[Redacted]

Backbone posted that they were intentionally moved their Valentines flash sale to confuse the bots. It's just proving that the information could be manipulated and that the bots are not useful data, but simply a privacy invasion. Saying you aren't buying anything from them also proves YOU can be manipulated by the creation of this data. I don't particularly love Backbone's stuff. It's expensive and I can get nice things for less with lower prims, but you're villainizing them for their actions AGAINST the bonniebots site. Getting angry over the content there exactly what bonniebots is instigating. Don't be a sheep. Backbone is showing their backbone to troll them, and you're showing that you are a knee jerking reactionary.

If bonniebots wants to know what I'm wearing: Nothing at all. Make some male bots. I have a use for them. I'll put them to work in my digital brothel. They can collect all the data...

[Not Redacted]

I banned all the Bonnie's from my land and then saw "NotAnotherBonnieBotMakeItStop" on my land. Just a heads up. Banning these bots is propbably pointless. They'll just make more.

@Redacted: Don't be fooled. Backbone is seriously using this platform to boost their sales. They're main interest is their pixel wallet. Backbone should be ashamed.

[Redacted]

@Not Redacted

What are you wearing right now?

[Redacted]

@xc0ffea: BonnieBelle86 Resident profile isn't opted out.

[Not Redacted]

@Redacted Nothing at all bc I don't want the Bonnie's to post it on their site ;) rawr

[Roxy Couturier]

A simple solution would be for LL to show the'bot' designation just like premium status is. Then allow land owners the option to ban bots. That would shut down all the inworld scaping fairly quickly.

[Redacted]

Skyler Pancake's profile isn't opted out either

[Adeon]

Only one parcel in a region needs to be public access in order to gather all data for that region.

[Arwyn Quandry]

"Backbone should be ashamed!"

Oh no, a creator is utilizing a tool to get sales and doing well! The *horror*! How dare they enjoy being at the top of a list that you personally disagree with!

You don't like creators finding new ways to market themselves? Or you just don't like them doing well? Or maybe you think everyone who disagrees with you must be an inherently bad person because bots bad grrr? Get over yourself.

[Sandra]

"This is the first time people are realizing how much information can be easily collected on your avatar within Second Life,"

AND THEN BONNIEBOTS MAKES IT ALL AVAILABLE OUTSIDE OF SL!!!
https://www.bonniebots.com/avatar-search

EVEN IF YOU CHOSE IN YOUR PRIVACY SETTINGS TO KEEP YOUR PROFILE VISIBLE INWORLD, NOT IN RL, THEY JUST PUBLISH IT ON YOUR BEHALF!!
BUT LINDENLAB WILL ONLY REDIRECT YOU TO A LAWYER IN YOUR COUNTRY TO SOLVE THIS PRIVACY ISSUE...SHAME SHAME SHAME!

SHAME ON BONNIEBOTS SHAME ON LL.
ITS SICKENING HOW MANY BOTS ON DAILY BASIS LAND ON SIMS, YES BONNIEBOTS NOT THE ONLY ONE, THERES TONS OF GROUPS THAT HAVE EACH A TON OF RIDICULOUS ROAMING BOTS, AND THEY ALL INVADE SKYBOXES AND SIMS, I HAD OVER 50 BOTS LANDING ON ONE DAY, THIS NEEDS TO STOP!

[Rahbit]

why did we have to find out about this by constantly being chased down by these bots and fighting to find out why they were and what they were doing? I wasn't informed of any of this, there was no information in their profiles explaining themselves and when I confronted them they closed their bots profiles from the public and refused to give any answers. I had no idea this website or "business" existed before asking for months everywhere I went trying to figure out who was stalking me everywhere I go and why. bonniebots were not open about this before they got called out, if they had been, maybe people wouldn't be so pissed. but no, they chose to hide it, blocking people from seeing that other people were calling them out. I blocked bonniebots everytime I seen them land on or near me and they would send another one after that everytime. is it possible to opt out of being stalked? if so, how do we do it?

[FYI]

I just spoke with LL and they responded that merchants can request their sales not be posted on the What Customers Are Buying Now to prevent these pesky bots from acquiring your sales info. Send those tickets in folks!

[faith]

I made an in-world group for this if anyone wants to join to have open discussions without LL shutting down threads XD secondlife:///app/group/88b10d74-7c1b-f7a1-2af8-0372e31f4cf5/about

[Nunya Bizzness]

Maybe if LL is made to hear that people will start dropping their sims, and sales plummet will they take this seriously.

[Marissa]

This is going to end up like Red Zone all over again. Looks like we have a nouveau Mr. Prime trying to tell us what is acceptable.

[Arwyn Quandry]

Small update for those still reading this thread: The BB site's marketplace data structure has completely changed since yesterday. They're now listing earning brackets and how many creators (but not which ones) are in it, and the overall ranking of the creators who haven't opted out. No more individual earnings per store. So you can see there's ten creators making around L$550,000 but not who they are. Hopefully this calms some folks down.

[faith Jolifaunt]

Since the update to the Top Merchants page, I have now chosen to opt in. I appreciate them listening to our concerns and implementing the change.

[Cathartes Aura]

BonnieBots are boring.

If they want to datamine the residents of SL, at least they could be a little more creative with their BotStyle. I want to see LurkerBot, PervBot, GothBot, SteamPunkBot, KardasianBot, SteroidGuyBot, MyPillowGuyBot, BarbieandKenBots, FurryBots, VampireBots, MarilynMonroeBots, LucyLiuBots, JoeBidenDonaldTrumpBots(LMAO), and the ultimate Bot of All...

The BuzzardBot!

Licks my Pointy Road Kill Encrusted Beak at the thought of a BuzzardBot Dataminer... ;)

[legalbeagle]

Why didnt bonniebots just ask and not blanket assume everybody accepted it. Under many countries laws privacy data violations as this is illegal.

YOu overstepped the mark by showing information on membership levels. That is violation of privacy adn data laws. it is information not made public to accessible to the general public.

I hope your pockets are deep, countries with clear cut laws on this will react. LL just screwed up too.

Next time just ask you might find people more friendly than hitting the sue button for this violation.

Personal data breaches can include:

access by an unauthorised third party;
deliberate or accidental action (or inaction) by a controller or processor;
sending personal data to an incorrect recipient;
computing devices containing personal data being lost or stolen;
alteration of personal data without permission; and
loss of availability of personal data.

A personal data breach can be broadly defined as a security incident that has affected the confidentiality, integrity or availability of personal data. In short, there will be a personal data breach whenever any personal data is accidentally lost, destroyed, corrupted or disclosed; if someone accesses the data or passes it on without proper authorisation; or if the data is made unavailable and this unavailability has a significant negative effect on individuals.

Memebership levels are private non disclosed data held in trust by LL and not disclosed openly to the public. You have committed theft of private customer data on personal private database.

You have disclosed personal private account information that is not public accessable to read and made it a breach by disclosure and breached the rights and freedoms of those individuals whom were not asked or agreed to have any of their information or private memebership level disclosed on an unregulated website

You also failed to give a public "opt- out" register or notify all sl inhabitants of your bonniebots activity, what you were harvesting or informing all inworld that your spyware collected activity would be publically displayed for all to access and cause direct harm by or from as a result of your data misue. This information including personal in some individual cases to private sites, information and held and displayed without proper sanctions or protections.

Bonniebots have just advertised they have stolen, leaked information to all, sl related or not, without permission, licensed to or respecting an inviduals right to privacy. That is the law very clear cut on the subject. That law is one can of worms you have walked into.

[Tantrica Banana]

Privacy is a fundamental human right. It is one point that sets us apart from animals. That we have autonomy about our privacy.
Giving it away simply so is not ok.
That "others" collect the same data secretly is not ok.
That Bonniebot collects and publishes is not ok.

[Sandra]

Finally!!!! Bonniebots have REMOVED the avatar search!!!! and splitted the merchants top list differently, however they should not mention brandnames at all to my opinion, they promote the ones that are already big and snow under the starters, why not show ALL merchants instead of a (almost looks like) sponsored top-list? anyway, thank you for removing the avatar profiles! Keeping daily eye on it to make sure they will not just get back to it soon again.

[Virtual Visitor]

Last night I was threatened by a bonniebot. This is not harmless "info gathering"

[Woner]

Lil new tool to get rid of them
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Land-Security-No-Bots-Ban-Bots/24673231