Final Fantasy XIV fans began freaking out earlier this month after the discovery of a mod tool that could be abused to track down players and stalk them in-game, no matter where they were in the popular MMORPG. The game’s director has now responded to the controversy and promised the team is looking into solutions, although many players aren’t impressed by the developers’ suggestions so far.
The mod in question is called “Playerscope” and it was created last year and shared on Github. But it didn’t hit most players’ radars until earlier this month after posts about it started blowing up on the FFXIV subreddit. Making matters worse, the vulnerability making the mod possible appeared to be introduced by Square Enix itself in an earlier update, intended to improve blacklisting features to prevent exactly the kind of stalking players are now afraid of.
“We have confirmed that there exist third-party tools that are being used to check FFXIV character information that is not displayed during normal game play,” director Naoki Yoshida wrote on the game’s Lodestone forum. “The tool is being used to display a segment of an FFXIV character’s internal account ID, which is then used in an attempt to further correlate information on other characters on the same FFXIV service account.”
He laid out two possible avenues for fixing the problem:
The Development and Operations teams are aware of the situation and the concerns being raised by the community and are discussing the following options:
- Requesting that the tool in question be removed and deleted.
- Pursuing legal action.
Fans posting in other threads on the official forum weren’t impressed. “The response is a joke and I expected more regarding this issue,” one wrote. “While I agree that the creator should face legal action it is also of importance to actually fix the actual issue which allows the functionality of such stalking mechanisms. It’s just insane...”
IGN reports that Github has already removed the Playerscope mod from its repository for violating its terms of service, but there are worries the tool has already been backed up in other places for those willing to search it out. Threats of potential legal action also leave open the possibility of someone else making and sharing a similar mod that goes under the radar while still potentially endangering players’ privacy.
Yoshida did try to reassure fans that no personal data like payment information and home addresses are viewable using these tools, but it’s still unclear why team isn’t exploring an update to FFXIV’s account system as one possible solution to the larger stalking problem. “We strive to offer and maintain a safe environment for our players, which is why we ask everyone to refrain from using third-party tools,” the director wrote. “We also ask that players do not share information about third-party tools such as details about their installation methods, or take any other actions to assist in their dissemination.”
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