Considering the link to buy Blizzcon tickets sends you to the AXS website, I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that you have absolutely no clue what you’re talking about.
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I can protect myself thank you very much.
I don’t need some sketchy companies looking into my personal information. This is honestly disgusting that they are trying to take advantage of their own customers under the false pretext of security. There are clearly smart and less underhanded ways to go about security for blizzcon than forcing someone to download thiefware on to their phone.
If anything this makes me feel threatened as a customer, and this is really making me consider deleting not just battle.net, but all blizzard/activision games and softer on my computer. At this point I can hardly trust blizzard with a 49 and a half inch poll and I would have only myself to blame if I let blizzard have access to both my personal property and information.
Can’t wait for blizzard to either totally ignore this or say that this is the “industry standard”. Gamers are letting these companies get away with too much…
Technically they’ve been partnered with NetEase since 2009.
Net Ease is Blizzard’s bussiness partner in the People’s Republic of China taking over from The9 in 2009.
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Sharing confidential info with multiple parties.
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Look at me, I’m Blizzard! I repeatedly antagonize my own fans and then implement ever more intrusive security measures justified by my paranoia of their ire!
Honest question here. Can’t you block permissions once the app is installed in the phone? (On Android at least) Settings > Apps > AXS > Permissions > Disable everything.
Can this work?
You might be able to but the key question to ask then is -
If you do this does the app still generate the QR code needed to scan your ticket ?
Someone can very easily prove this by paying for a ticket to a local sporting event (which are relatively cheap) then deny access to everything and see if they can still get into the event even with permissions locked down relatively tight (still needs networking permissions to validate the ticket)
PS Apparently Lineage OS with Privacy Guard installed allows you to see when an app actually uses a particular permission.
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I’m still trying to figure out how intentionally installing an app knowing full well what info it accesses = spyware. It’s like saying if you donate to the Red Cross they are stealing from you. No, you are giving up that money/info willingly.
Luckily this will have zero impact on ticket sales.
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It isn’t the request that is necessarily illegal (although the manner in which this is being done surely skirts a very gray area). It is the possibility of inadvertent or willful disclosure of this information through the use of an unvetted third party who may or may not sell it to someone who may then use that billing information to locate, defraud, or spam the person who, in their quest to obtain entry to an event, was given no safer and more secure means in which to perform said transaction. It is all about the trust relationship. I don’t trust Blizzard Entertainment with much of my personal information let alone some third party to Blizzard Entertainment who has not been vetted properly to my satisfaction and who in the plain language of their terms of service are asking for (and apparently receiving) data of a personal nature from Blizzcon Attendees well and above that which is necessary to prosecute a transaction.
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That particular definition (from WhatIs.com) is 12 years old. It has changed since then.
The current Wiki definition is a little broader:
Spyware is software that aims to gather information about a person or organization, sometimes without their knowledge, that may send such information to another entity without the consumer’s consent, that asserts control over a device without the consumer’s knowledge, or it may send such information to another entity with the consumer’s consent, through cookies.
Under THIS definition AXS App falls well within the definition of Spyware.
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It’s invasive, but everyone agrees to and has a choice of the terms.
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That hardly qualifies as a true downside. Give the wrong people your info and you are potentially: Geo-located, digitally robbed, threatened, accused of everything from petty larceny to murder, targeted for harassment, targeted for being defrauded, family members location at any given moment revealed, digital devices hacked, bricked, zombie-d, adwared, malwared, (yes spammed), shall I continue? It only gets worse from here.
Don’t believe me though. Ask someone this has happened to. Ask Micah Whipple.
BlizzCon 2019: Wyatt Cheng’s Revenge
Do you all not have phones? I bet you do now, motherf-
Crank up the price on the tickets AND sell our customers’ very personal information for even more money! That’ll teach em.
With all those “sometimes” and “mays” just about anything could be considered spyware.
Applying to a job online?
Spyware.
Setting up your BNet account?
Spyware.
That’s the thing though. You don’t know full well what information it accesses. You only know that it may access any of the categories listed in the terms of service.
What it ACTUALLY access you don’t have a clue unless you can decompile the app itself and read the storage and transmission functions in the code.
At the help desk…“Well sir I’d be happy to help you and the first steps we should take are to install the app on your cell phone if you haven’t already, then we can troubleshoot any issues.”
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True but just like with everything else, there are levels. This level of spyware is crazy, don’t you think?