Red Shell spyware integrated into Civ 6 code?!

[jomni]

From CA_Grace, 20 minutes ago on reddit:
https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/co...e_explanation/
Red Shell is a program we use to measure the effectiveness of our advertising. It's not spyware.
It's a marketing attribution tool. It helps us determine which of our adverts are most effective. It does this in a similar way to other analytics tools by using cookies to generate a unique token from device information, and comparing that with data taken from our marketing campaigns and game activations. In this way we can see which adverts are more effective. You can find out more about it here: https://redshell.io/home
If you like, you can opt-out of web-based and cookie-based tracking by managing your cookie preferences: https://redshell.io/optout.
Whilst Red Shell is only used to measure the effectiveness of our advertising, we can see that players are clearly concerned about it and it will be difficult for us to entirely reassure every player. So, from the next update we will remove the implementation of Red Shell from those Total War games that use it.
------------------------
I'm sorry, but "a program we use to measure the effectiveness of our advertising... It's a marketing attribution tool. It helps us determine which of our adverts are most effective. It does this in a similar way to other analytics tools by using cookies to generate a unique token from device information, and comparing that with data taken from our marketing campaigns and game activations. In this way we can see which adverts are more effective"  is the very DEFINITION of spyware!!!

What!  Total War has it too!!

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Here's a list of game with Red Shell.  I was just about to pull the trigger on Civ VI: Rise and Fall until I learned about this. 


    Elder Scrolls Online
    Civilization VI
    Any game in the Total War series
    Kerbal Space Program
    Warhammer: Vermintide 2
    Dead by Daylight
    Warhammer 40k Eternal Crusade
    Magic the Gathering Arena
    My Time At Portia
    Battlerite
    AER Memories of Old
    Guardians of Ember
    The Onion Knights
    Realm Grinder
    Heroine
    Anthem Zero
    Krosmaga
    Secret World Legends
    Hunt: Showdown
    Escapists 2

[Gusington]

Steve58 posted the list on the first page - then mirth (I think) discovered on page 3 that it had been removed from Total War games.

[OJsDad]

What does my hardware have to do with their advertising?

They want to be able to identify your machine (and you). That way they know that Steam user "OJsDad" is playing games X,Y,Z on his PC. They can also follow your behavior on other platforms. They know what you're watching on Twitch, Youtube, etc. It's all so they can build a profile of you and then market to you or sell your data.

The problem for them is that I watch very little YouTube.  My son watches quite a bit on my gaming computer.  So the information their getting is not accurate at all.  I don't watch Twitch either.  So their profile for me is going to be totally worthless. 

[RyanE]

Actually, not totally worthless.  The ads shown on Youtube will more match your son than you.  And if he is the main user, that parts kind of a win for them.  But, obviously, that is only a small part of the profile they build.

As has been said already and while I don't think its ethical to "hide" this kind of tracking in games, if you are using an android or iOS phone, there is a lot more being collected on you than this system could ever track.

[Nefaro]

Raising voices might not stop the inevitable march of this kind of spyware, but it might slow it down. 

So yeah, I think there's value to fighting the good fight. 

Look at the loot box thing.  When everyone began to lose their mind over Battlefront II, a lot of the push back from the industry and some media was that this kind of thing was inevitable, and this was basically the service model that we should start expecting.  EA certainly believed that or they wouldn't have been so egregious in the system they put in Battlefront. 

Lo and behold though, push back from Joe and Jane gamer worked.  EA had to backtrack, and as a result right now loot boxes are a pariah word for developers.  We may not have stopped it, but it's absolutely been slowed down.  If people had been quiet about Battlefront 2, just imagine what E3 would look like right now.  If they think they can get away with bad business practices, they WILL try.

So yeah, we should be mad about this, and we should let them know.   This should be making people just as mad as the lootboxpocalypse.

This x2.

Permissiveness just allows bad behavior to get worse.

[Yskonyn]

^ you feminist, you! 

[W8taminute]

Implemented that host file fix thing mirth shared.  Deleted all of my total war games from my hard drive.  Not going to buy anything from CA again. 

Am I over reacting?  Maybe, but guess what?  I don't have to spend my money on a company that's going to pull this sort of nonsense.  It is no wonder why board gaming is on the rise.  It may not be in response to spyware but at least no one can track your movements by chits or otherwise.   :)

[SirAndrewD]

^ you feminist, you! 

When we were dating 16 years ago my bisexual wife told me I was the best lesiban she'd ever met.   O:-)

[MikeGER]

there would be a way to fight back

we need a program running in the background that constantly checks for random things (from a long long list) at Google, Amazon, Ebay, look up places and routes at Google maps, visit random Facebook and Twitter pages and starts random YT and Twitch vids,  also it should be able to randomly spoof those system spec and browsers id that are usually grabbed too.

you get the idea  (i let the details and what is possible to the open source genius nerds who would develop the code, of course it has to be open source)
...lets call it an "user activity white noise generator"

so your real activity fade into the background of the noise and the collected info about you will be worthless
when those 'spy software' like RedShell or the algorithms running at the companies end like Goggle recognise that the user has a noise generator up/installed, it will probably exclude him preemptive because it 'pollutes' their general data mine treasure, the statistics 
so even having such a noise program installed may be already enuf to get left alone. 
           

[Bardolph]

Implemented that host file fix thing mirth shared.  Deleted all of my total war games from my hard drive.  Not going to buy anything from CA again. 

Am I over reacting?  Maybe, but guess what?  I don't have to spend my money on a company that's going to pull this sort of nonsense.  It is no wonder why board gaming is on the rise.  It may not be in response to spyware but at least no one can track your movements by chits or otherwise.   :)

Actually CA seems to have removed it pretty quickly in response. I'm ok with that. The Elder Scrolls folks also seem to have responded quickly, and are removing it... "for now" which isn't as reassuring and gives me pause about buying into ESO (was intrigued by the Morrowind expansion have played rather a lot of the original back in the day). Haven't heard anything about the Civ VI folks removing it yet so it will remain uninstalled.

[W8taminute]

Implemented that host file fix thing mirth shared.  Deleted all of my total war games from my hard drive.  Not going to buy anything from CA again. 

Am I over reacting?  Maybe, but guess what?  I don't have to spend my money on a company that's going to pull this sort of nonsense.  It is no wonder why board gaming is on the rise.  It may not be in response to spyware but at least no one can track your movements by chits or otherwise.   :)

Actually CA seems to have removed it pretty quickly in response. I'm ok with that. The Elder Scrolls folks also seem to have responded quickly, and are removing it... "for now" which isn't as reassuring and gives me pause about buying into ESO (was intrigued by the Morrowind expansion have played rather a lot of the original back in the day). Haven't heard anything about the Civ VI folks removing it yet so it will remain uninstalled.

The prompt response by CA and the Elder Scrolls folks clearly indicates that those companies respect their customers enough to cancel their cash grab in the form of spyware. 

The fact that 2K has yet to respond speaks volumes. 

[Nefaro]

^ you feminist, you! 

"I'm a lesbian trapped in a man's body."

[Gusington]

^That's my line! Except it's "13 year old boy's body"

[Pete Dero]

https://www.bluesnews.com/s/191118/games-removing-sdk-amid-spyware-accusations

Games who used Redshell which removed or pledged to remove it (as of 16.06.2018):

        Elder Scrolls Online (Pledged to remove it)
        Conan Exiles (Pledged to remove it)
        Ylands (Removed)
        Holy Potatoes! We're in Space?! (Pledged to remove it)
        All Total War games, (Pledged to remove it)
        Warhammer: Vermintide II, (Pledged to remove it)
        Warhammer: Vermintide I, (might get removed also?)
        My Time At Portia, (Pledged to remove it)
        Dead by Daylight, (Pledged to remove it)
        Battlerite, (Pledged to remove it)
        AER Memories of Old, (Pledged to remove it)
        Magic the Gathering Arena (closed beta & not on Steam), (Pledged to remove it for now)
        Secret World Legends (Pledged to remove remains of it)
        Hunt: Showdown (Pledged to remove it)
        Escapists 2 (Pledged to remove it)
        Omensight (Pledged to remove it)

Games still using Redshell according to community reports (as of 16.06.2018):

        Civilization VI,
        Kerbal Space Program,
        Guardians of Ember,
        The Onion Knights,
        Realm Grinder,
        Heroine Anthem Zero,
        Warhammer 40k Eternal Crusade,
        Krosmaga
        Eternal Card Game
        Sniper Ghost Warrior 3
        Astro Boy: Edge of Time
        Ballistic Overkill
        Cabals: Card Blitz
        CityBattle | Virtual Earth
        Desolate
        Doodle God
        Doodle God Blitz
        Dungeon Rushers
        Labyrinth
        My Free Farm 2
        NosTale
        RockShot
        Shadowverse
        SOS & SOS Classic
        SoulWorker
        Stonies
        Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation
        War Robots
        Survived By
        Injustice 2
        The Wild Eight

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        Raging Justice
        Warriors: Rise to Glory!
        Trailmakers
        Clone Drone in the Danger Zone
        Vaporum
        Robothorium
        League of Pirates
        Doodle God: Genesis Secrets