SE's inability to protect players from stalking/harassment

[Krotoan]

...Oh wow, someone follows you in a game. Unless they're kill stealing you or trying to talk to you. Why do you care? I must be old or something because I don't see how it affects anyone. They're just another face in the crowd, could be anyone, who cares.

And before you say 'well it's different for girls.' I'm a girl.

So... many.... mean ... comments... I have typed and then deleted.

They're not just being there. They're following you on multiple characters, likely harassing you with tells/trade requests/emotes. Spreading rumors to your FC or LS, possibly NN. There ARE ways to avoid all this but nobody should need to take the full burden of security on themselves. SE should put in SOME concessions so that if you wish to break a contact link with someone you can. Not removing people from a both friend lists when you unfriend them is .. well.. silly. Senn makes a good point that the harassment can follow you outside the game as well, to the forums, discord servers and anything else linked to your character or FC.

[Senn]

So... many.... mean ... comments... I have typed and then deleted.

They're not just being there. They're following you on multiple characters, likely harassing you with tells/trade requests/emotes. Spreading rumors to your FC or LS, possibly NN. There ARE ways to avoid all this but nobody should need to take the full burden of security on themselves. SE should put in SOME concessions so that if you wish to break a contact link with someone you can. Not removing people from a both friend lists when you unfriend them is .. well.. silly. Senn makes a good point that the harassment can follow you outside the game as well, to the forums, discord servers and anything else linked to your character or FC.

Perfectly put. It's not exactly fun when your social life in game is being dragged through the mud because of a vindictive ex for example. Whether people overreact or are oversensitive is irrelevant... There should be privacy options/settings available to people who want them.

[AiUsagi]

...Oh wow, someone follows you in a game. Unless they're kill stealing you or trying to talk to you. Why do you care? I must be old or something because I don't see how it affects anyone. They're just another face in the crowd, could be anyone, who cares.

And before you say 'well it's different for girls.' I'm a girl.

I am 100% certain that my harasser is female.
Not only men are creeps- women can be too. That being said, harassment is harassment. Gender makes no difference & neither does whether that harassment is irl or virtual- it still has an effect on people mentally and emotionally, and it can instill a sense of not being safe. Additionally, situations that begin online have been known to go into real life- which is why cyberstalking is no less important than real life stalking/harrassment and should be taken seriously.
This is a social game and should meet social expectations, good or bad. I don't think that just because FFXIV is a game, doesn't mean that harassment shouldn't be taken seriously. Square Enix wouldn't have attempted to place policies to prevent such occurrences if it wasn't something THEY wanted to take seriously- but new policies aren't going to achieve that for them. Square Enix needs to provide players with more options to protect themselves, rather than leave players to feel helpless. Even giving players more privacy options would likely reduce the need for players to contact GMs at all.

[Rinhi]

at this point I'm convinced nekaru is hamming it up with their recent posts, no one but a troll or someone with a gimmick can make posts like these

[AiUsagi]

There ARE ways to avoid all this but nobody should need to take the full burden of security on themselves. SE should put in SOME concessions so that if you wish to break a contact link with someone you can. Not removing people from a both friend lists when you unfriend them is .. well.. silly. Senn makes a good point that the harassment can follow you outside the game as well, to the forums, discord servers and anything else linked to your character or FC.

It's a shame that online harassment isn't taken more seriously and that these situations often go unchecked until it's too late.

[AiUsagi]

Commenting on this thread until SE stops enabling harassment/stalking.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Commenting on this thread until SE stops enabling harassment/stalking.

If it is truly stalking and getting to the point of real issues, maybe you should seek out the authorities who can put a stop to it, like courts and a restraining order.

SE can't do much outside ban the various accounts, and if this person isn't legally threatened why would they care to stop?

[Araxes]

I never did understand why after you delete people from your friends list, you are still on theirs.

There have been many many cases over the years in wich people asked why this does not get changed and We actually got a respond to this wich was like: "Players might be shocked if they find out you simply removed them." something around those lines but it is of course no real reason. I had more than one Stalker at some point so i switched servers. Then Servervisit came

[Kaoru_Nagisa]

There have been many many cases over the years in wich people asked why this does not get changed and We actually got a respond to this wich was like: "Players might be shocked if they find out you simply removed them." something around those lines but it is of course no real reason. I had more than one Stalker at some point so i switched servers. Then Servervisit came

Yeah, I've said in the past on other threads about it - SE's reasoning for why the FL in this game doesn't work like basically any other MMO out there is incredibly shortsighted and stupid. It goes beyond Japanese politeness culture and into the realm of unbelievably naïve. Stalking happens in Japan just like overseas - sometimes even worse than over here - so it isn't like this is an exclusively Western thing that they don't need to care about or take into account. The current way the FL and Lodestone works makes it horrifically easy for stalkers and harassers to follow their victim wherever they want, always know who they're on, always know any name or server changes.

If it is truly stalking and getting to the point of real issues, maybe you should seek out the authorities who can put a stop to it, like courts and a restraining order.

SE can't do much outside ban the various accounts, and if this person isn't legally threatened why would they care to stop?

True enough, but SE could still do far more to ensure player protection from cases like these. Options to hide your lodestone page, two-way removal from friends and a better blacklist system, etc. The onus shouldn't solely be on a player to take extra measures outside of the game to ensure it stops.

at this point I'm convinced nekaru is hamming it up with their recent posts, no one but a troll or someone with a gimmick can make posts like these

I think we've established she's someone who never grew out of the edgy #notlikeothergirls 13~16 year old mindset.

[AiUsagi]

If it is truly stalking and getting to the point of real issues, maybe you should seek out the authorities who can put a stop to it, like courts and a restraining order.

SE can't do much outside ban the various accounts, and if this person isn't legally threatened why would they care to stop?

I don't want to say much about what I am doing from the irl *legal* perspective, but the fact that I need to even look to irl authorities for help when this could have all been prevented with the right tools ingame, really just speaks for itself about what's wrong with player privacy features in FFXIV. It needs to be fixed.