An attack upon IRON

[Archon]

Archon, on the other hand, is getting called down to the Principal's Office very soon.

I love it when you talk dirty like that

[Coursca]

I love it when you talk dirty like that

I aim to please.

[PrideAssassin]

I stayed up past my bedtime to wade through this, and found a big pile of Vox Populi garbage, and a whining bugs bunny.

Holy crud, could you people at least try and stay somewhere in the vicinity of the topic?

Hell, I'd have you banned and your nations adminZI'd just for endorsing (or for those who think they're slick, justifying) DDoS attacks against someone's property. Property not being an imaginary game alliance, but rather an actual company, for all you slow folk.

I'm not going to comment on the state of things, since larger fish than me lurk about this pond, and since they have refrained, I will wait until they announce it.

I CAN say that IRON is being specifically targeted in these DDoS attacks, but real world companies are being hurt, and real world people are losing money.

All for a free 'net game.

Pathetic.

I'm new to IRON, and impressed with their operations.

I am even more impressed at the level of redundant systems of communication. Zapping the forum didn't make us lose a step. Maybe some of the lazier members, but we don't need the faint of heart anyway. Good riddance.

Congratulations to the Council for keeping our operation running smoothly.

o/ IRON

-----

Trample the weak. Hurdle the dead.

[Electron Sponge]

I stayed up past my bedtime to wade through this

You probably should have just gone to bed and not posted.

[PrideAssassin]

^ So many TOS violations, just in that post alone. Flame bait. Thread Hijacking. Off topic and disruptive posting. Trolling.

It is my sincerest hope that the sorry little group here are not representative of your alliance.

-----

I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your terror comes.

-Proverbs 1:26

Edited March 12, 2009 by PrideAssassin

[Electron Sponge]

Welcome to Cyber Nations, PrideAssassin. I can see you've gotten the hang of how your side does things pretty quickly for a brand new player. IRON must be pretty lucky to have someone who can assimilate things like that in so quick a time, even down to the o/ hail emoticon. It's almost like you knew about that stuff ahead of time.

Anyway I won't bother you anymore, feel free to continue venting about how awful it is that your alliance's forum wasn't working before you even had a nation.

[WarriorConcept]

Welcome to Cyber Nations, PrideAssassin. I can see you've gotten the hang of how your side does things pretty quickly for a brand new player. IRON must be pretty lucky to have someone who can assimilate things like that in so quick a time, even down to the o/ hail emoticon. It's almost like you knew about that stuff ahead of time.

Anyway I won't bother you anymore, feel free to continue venting about how awful it is that your alliance's forum wasn't working before you even had a nation.

The bilrow is strong in this new young one

[SoxNation]

I see attacks on personal property as much worse than any in game action

yes and no,

Is not your nation in some ways your property, while you have no right to it, how is the game forum, and your actually nation that different?

If you are forced from the game, isn't that the same as having your forum attacked?

Lets say alliance A wanted to knock out Alliance B from the game. They could PZI every member of B, or they could attack Alliance B's game forums. Either way, they are disrupting the persons property in my mind.

Both are bad, both are evil. Both should end.

Good luck Iron glad nothing was lost.

[Frederic Bastiat]

^ So many TOS violations, just in that post alone. Flame bait. Thread Hijacking. Off topic and disruptive posting. Trolling.

It is my sincerest hope that the sorry little group here are not representative of your alliance

-----

I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your terror comes.

-Proverbs 1:26

Your post reeks of irony, and it's not because you're in IRON, either.

OOC: Hail terrible puns.

Edited March 12, 2009 by Frederic Bastiat

[PrideAssassin]

Your post reeks of irony, and it's not because you're in IRON, either.

OOC: Hail terrible puns.

If you can't beat 'em (about the face and neck with a blunt object) join 'em.

-----

You can't see me 'cause your head's up your ***/

And just in case you think you're bad/

I crush the rush/

I rule you, fool/

An immovable stone in your world of weak/

I speak...

Regular People(Conceit) -Pantera

[freakwars]

I was trying to get on the IRON forums to re-join, but they seem to have disappeared.

[Chief Savage Man]

yes and no,

Is not your nation in some ways your property, while you have no right to it, how is the game forum, and your actually nation that different?

If you are forced from the game, isn't that the same as having your forum attacked?

Not even a little bit.

[dicai]

yes and no,

Is not your nation in some ways your property, while you have no right to it, how is the game forum, and your actually nation that different?

If you are forced from the game, isn't that the same as having your forum attacked?

In my humble opinion as quite a newbie in CN, I might say that it isn't the same thing, just because I don't remember any CN guidelines that stops an alliance from attacking other to the point to "get them out of the game". Maybe numbers are a quite different from one alliance to the other, but it's a risk you get if you attack a bigger(in matter of strenght and number of nations) alliance...

I think that there is NO possbile justification for attacking an alliance's forums...

[GTTofAK]

Listen if alliances can use IPs and hostmasks to track down PZI listers, then why--outside of law--can't people DDoS attacks?

You know Shattenmann the more I read these posts I cant help but think that you are just a little too understanding.

[Derantol]

yes and no,

Is not your nation in some ways your property, while you have no right to it, how is the game forum, and your actually nation that different?

If you are forced from the game, isn't that the same as having your forum attacked?

Lets say alliance A wanted to knock out Alliance B from the game. They could PZI every member of B, or they could attack Alliance B's game forums. Either way, they are disrupting the persons property in my mind.

Both are bad, both are evil. Both should end.

Good luck Iron glad nothing was lost.

Technically speaking, no one actually owns their nation. Admin owns the game and everything in it. If he takes this game off the internet, for whatever reason, there's no possible way to get compensation for "loss of property".

Even when you consider your nation a piece of property, the only piece that others cannot eliminate is the shell. The absolute bare minimum of your nation. No matter how much it's attacked, it won't go away as long as the user wants it. Anything above and beyond that bare minimum is fair game for anyone who wants to try and take it - hence alliances, which help defend you against people who may want to take your tech, destroy your infra, and whatever else.

I have never heard of one alliance completely removing another alliance from the game. Never. The most I've ever heard of was the government of an alliance put on PZI. And in most PZI cases, if the leader re-rolls and takes a new direction once they come back, they're taken off the list. Sometimes they don't even need to take a new direction - re-rolling is enough.

That being said, I think there is something to be said for disliking forms of ZI. ZI itself, singular ZI, I believe is fine. PZI, as long as the distinction that a change of character is made, is also fine. That's the interpretation IRON takes, or at least I can point out some precedence for that decision. EZI (in my opinion) crosses the IC/OOC line. IRON does not have an EZI, for anyone who's wondering.

The problem with attacking forums is that it has the potential to cause real damage. You aren't losing money when your nation is destroyed - you aren't losing money when your game forum goes down - but if the server the forum is on has any sort of business normally, every hour it is down, especially during high-traffic times, can cost them money. EZI sucks a lot, but the potential byproducts of a DDoS attack are a lot worse than being excluded from an internet game.

You know Shattenmann the more I read these posts I cant help but think that you are just a little too understanding.

I think it would be best for this thread if we don't bring up points from the beginning of this thread that have already been discussed. I can't stop you, but one continuing conversation seems healthier than constant, fairly unimportant, interruptions.

Edited March 13, 2009 by Derantol

[bros]

Bros is on the case.

Whoever did this did it rather ingeniously. I like their style.

[WarriorConcept]

Bros is on the case.

Whoever did this did it rather ingeniously. I like their style.

bros: masta detective

[Electron Sponge]

Forcing people to destroy their account in order to continue playing the game normally (perma-ZI) is called "griefing" and it's frowned upon by nearly every gaming community in existence except this one. Here it's standard practice. It doesn't equate at all with DDoS attacks as there is no illegal aspect to it, but it is a reprehensible and illegitimate tactic just the same. Even if IRON didn't support such a tactic (which it does), its allied status with multiple alliances who do use the tactic and even stronger tactics (EZI) constitute implicit support of said tactic.

I personally am not shedding a single tear over IRON's misfortune. What's happening is illegal and I don't support it but I also have absolutely no pity for them. You want to act in the arrogant manner that IRON and their Continuum friends have acted, you're going to end up pissing the wrong people off and you're going to get DDoS attacks or worse. Same thing happened to Polar when I was hosting them, most likely due to our membership in WUT and my hubristic actions as leader of the alliance. Of course I managed to fix the situation in an hour or so in each instance, generally. I also learned over time that the most important person in the game was my opponent, as without him or her there would be no game. IRON's actions and this DDoS attack are intrinsically related in my opinion.

Good luck finding a solution to this bros. Drop me a line if you need a hand. Good luck finding your soul, IRON. I can't help you with that at all.

[bros]

Forcing people to destroy their account in order to continue playing the game normally (perma-ZI) is called "griefing" and it's frowned upon by nearly every gaming community in existence except this one. Here it's standard practice. It doesn't equate at all with DDoS attacks as there is no illegal aspect to it, but it is a reprehensible and illegitimate tactic just the same. Even if IRON didn't support such a tactic (which it does), its allied status with multiple alliances who do use the tactic and even stronger tactics (EZI) constitute implicit support of said tactic.

I personally am not shedding a single tear over IRON's misfortune. What's happening is illegal and I don't support it but I also have absolutely no pity for them. You want to act in the arrogant manner that IRON and their Continuum friends have acted, you're going to end up pissing the wrong people off and you're going to get DDoS attacks or worse. Same thing happened to Polar when I was hosting them, most likely due to our membership in WUT and my hubristic actions as leader of the alliance. Of course I managed to fix the situation in an hour or so in each instance, generally. I also learned over time that the most important person in the game was my opponent, as without him or her there would be no game. IRON's actions and this DDoS attack are intrinsically related in my opinion.

Good luck finding a solution to this bros. Drop me a line if you need a hand. Good luck finding your soul, IRON. I can't help you with that at all.

I'll tell you how I temporarily resolved it later.

Edited March 13, 2009 by bros2

[shahenshah]

Forcing people to destroy their account in order to continue playing the game normally (perma-ZI) is called "griefing" and it's frowned upon by nearly every gaming community in existence except this one. Here it's standard practice. It doesn't equate at all with DDoS attacks as there is no illegal aspect to it, but it is a reprehensible and illegitimate tactic just the same. Even if IRON didn't support such a tactic (which it does), its allied status with multiple alliances who do use the tactic and even stronger tactics (EZI) constitute implicit support of said tactic.

In such way, one can form an endless list of implicit support of many things and turn that around on anyone.

-

So far none of us have seen any piece of evidence between someone on some EZI list and DDoS attacks on IRON.

There has been an attempt to link these two events..and somehow form a cause-and-effect relation to create a rationalization..perhaps implicitly ...but..where is the evidence to back this up in this scenario?

Edited March 13, 2009 by shahenshah

[Electron Sponge]

In such way, one can form an endless list of implicit support of many things and turn that around on anyone.

-

So far none of us have seen any piece of evidence between someone on some EZI list and DDoS attacks on IRON. The attempt to link these two events and somehow squeeze morality out of this OOC attack so far is not backed by any evidence but pure speculation and propaganda to rationalize the OOC attack by some posters.

Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. Simple as that.

We haven't seen any evidence at all of who is perpetrating these attacks and we likely never will. That's a shame. It is obviously game-related and since IRON is a griefer alliance it stands to reason that someone is fed up with it and is taking action. It's not like Mushroom Kingdom or Seaworthy Liberian Cardboard Boxes are getting hammered with DDoS attacks. They aren't part of the power structure that is causing so much consternation and has run hundreds of people out of the game or into hiding. IRON pissed the wrong people off with something they have done ingame and now they paid the price for it with their forum.

If you want hard evidence, get the relevant legal authorities involved. Something tells me they won't bother investigating but they'd have the power to subpoena records from ISP's the botnetted computers are on and the hosts of the proxy servers used to perform these attacks.

If this incident should teach anyone anything, it is to keep your OS entirely updated so you can't be used as a drone in a botnet. Oh, and to treat people you meet online decently because you never know who will be able to ruin your day.

[jerdge]

Everybody should bookmark this thread as a good example of how this game can be ruined by OOC Bombs^[1].

When one will then feel tempted to try use the OOC bomb s/he can just come back here, read a few random posts and be once again free from the temptation.

[1] OOC bomb: when the accusation of having engaged in OOC attacks isn't brought to the Mods or to other RL controllers - or anyway dealt with off-game - but it's "used" in game (in a miserable attempt to get the upper hand).

____________________

:nuke: Help Defuse the OOC Bomb ! :nuke:

[shahenshah]

Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. Simple as that.

Yes, like I said, can go around in anyway, depending upon a point of view and not as a matter of fact.

We haven't seen any evidence at all of who is perpetrating these attacks and we likely never will. That's a shame. It is obviously game-related and since IRON is a griefer alliance it stands to reason that someone is fed up with it and is taking action.

You are assuming that something grave has been done in IC which has led to this OOC action, at the same time, you clarify in the previous sentence that you simply have no idea what that IC action actually is.

So you are basically counting on the rationality of the people behind this attack to justify your statement..that probably they would resort to this only under great injustice..mind you..these are the people who are carrying out criminal activities over an 'internet game'...did they explore all possible avenues of IC retaliation? there are several means don't you think.

Again, you and I simply have no evidence of what is the justification for this DDoS and since we do not know who are possible attackers, we don't know their age or how they may think..? We simply do not know, we can only 'assume' and 'speculate' as to what 'might' be the reasons..and these assumptions and speculations are going to be obviously different for different people. Also these assumptions and speculations are based on 'zero evidence'. We can always list these as possibilities...but some people here seem to talk in 'matter of fact' tone when all they said is based on 'nothing'.

I am also very much thankful of your offer of help and yes, a good reminder from Uncle Sponge:

If this incident should teach anyone anything, it is to keep your OS entirely updated so you can't be used as a drone in a botnet. Oh, and to treat people you meet online decently because you never know who will be able to ruin your day.

Edited March 13, 2009 by shahenshah

[arentak]

In a game where

A. The Message Boards you visit in Real Life will be used to justify attacks against your CN Nation and Alliance;

B. Your Alliance Message Board may be subjected to a "Viceroy" by someone in the game who defeats you in war;

C. Regular groups of people join the game all at once from a foreign message board not related to CN and form alliances;

D. Real Life Human Beings are ordered to be ZI'ed if they play the game, no matter their nation name, based in their IP address;

E. Alliances require Real Email Addresses and track your IP, and provide it to their "Allies" if needed,

there is no (insert bad word here, I prefer the F-Bomb myself) OOC line.

The forum attacks, regardless of this wasteful conversation about IC/OOC, are criminal. However, any hacker knows this action will get no one in trouble, as there is a certain amount of monetary damage you have to do to get in serious trouble. Furthermore, any decent hacker would have gone through one or more proxies, making it almost impossible to track down, unless you're prepared to issue multiple subpoeneas.

So, I'm not happy that some CN players are willing to break U.S. law (which may or may not apply where they live) to settle scores in the game, but don't give me that (insert bad word here, I prefer the F-Bomb myself) line about an OOC line being crossed. It happens every day in CN, and people are only "Aghast" when the losers do it, when winners do it, its called "winning"

Edited March 13, 2009 by arentak

[Electron Sponge]

You are assuming that something grave has been done in IC which has led to this OOC action, at the same time, you clarify in the previous sentence that you simply have no idea what that IC action actually is.

So you are basically counting on the rationality of the people behind this attack to justify your statement..that probably they would resort to this only under great injustice..mind you..these are the people who are carrying out criminal activities over an 'internet game'...did they explore all possible avenues of IC retaliation? there are several means don't you think.

If it had nothing to do with the game the attacks would likely not have followed your forum to its new home. If it has to do with the game, that tells me that IRON did something to motivate someone to attack them in such a manner. Like I said before, you don't see SLCB or MK getting DDoS attacks. Only the large, powerful, and hegemonic alliances have it happen to them. You know, the ones who tend to piss people off by doing stuff in the game without any available retaliation. And no, for most people there is no possible retaliation. They get crushed and are told to go create a new account, that their role in CN as they know it is over, and if they are lucky they won't get rolled on the next go round as long as they keep their mouth shut. Very few people have the resources and connections I do to be able to strike at the hegemony the way I do. And even then, I can only do so much. I'm not going to ZI anyone or seriously hurt an alliance by myself, and by all accounts I am one of the more talented people who's ever logged in here (as well as the most handsome).

Again, you and I simply have no evidence of what is the justification for this DDoS and since we do not know who are possible attackers, we don't know their age or how they may think..? We simply do not know, we can only 'assume' and 'speculate' as to what 'might' be the reasons..and these assumptions and speculations are going to be obviously different for different people. Also these assumptions and speculations are based on 'zero evidence'. We can always list these as possibilities...but some people here seem to talk in 'matter of fact' tone when all they said is based on 'nothing'.

Deduction, shashashashamantan, deduction.

Also, arentak - well said.