As title really.

How private is a private message, who else gets to read it?

How long do you keep them on file ?

Do you give up information to any third party ?

If its not private, why is it called a private message ?

Cheers

 

Everything on the net is viewable in some form. So, write knowing that the message will probably have an audience of more than one.

Ive worked in places where whole desks of IT guys were reading through personal emails, looking for gossip :-)

SBK

 

i know a majority of site have admin panels and can upgrade this so that they can read private messages sent between everyone. i believe it is against the law but you have to prove it.

 

Anyone with db access can read it easily enough without any fancy tools.

Bear in mind you are also sending it unencrypted across the Internet so it shouldn't really be called private

 

Judging by the tantrum that SdB threw at me a few years ago when I refused to tell him what was in a few PM's I'd allegedly sent, I'd say that they probably were quite private. At least, they were before the server move and upgrade - maybe things are different now.

 

There is a plug in for VB but I think Stu has already stated that its not installed on this forum

 

Not sure if it is installed at the moment? but i know PM`s have been read in the past, well i was told this by somebody on the inside, so i would assume its true .....

Besides, you could easy just reset the login password and haver the admin login as the user if required ?

 

Not to my knowledge in the 8 or so years I've been a mod...

 

Not available to mods its in the Admin control panel

 

Thanks..

 

They should be under data protection but if they need to be accessed for legal reasons I suppose they can do so.

Yoza at the end of the day things should only be sent that you are not worried about others seeing, if you are use the phone ;-)

 

Just looked at the T's&C's and I reckon they can read whatever they want and by you using the forum you agree to let them do it.

 

As said by others, if you have db access you can read pm's, simply look for the pmtext table, it's all in there (or at least that is where vB 3.8.3 stores them), in clear-text.
Who has access to the db? It could be that even Stu does not have access. It depends how things are setup. I know most hosts won't allow remote access to the db, for obvious reasons, so you'd need either shell access (SSH) to the server and run sql from the command line, or an install of phpmyadmin, again on the server, and you'd need the access codes to get into that.

Apart from the db you can install modifications that allow you to read pm's or simply login as the user, thus enabling you to masquerade as them. That overcomes the whole "reset their password" situation, as you don't need a password perform this login, and the user is unaware their account is being viewed.

To be quite frank, if you think the mods/admins are logging in as you and/or reading your PM's then I think you're a little over confident that they find what you share with others via PM's to be in the slightest interest.

I would say PM's would only be read if there is a complaint, say one user has threatened another by PM or there is pending legal action, the Admin would ideally need to see what has been said by both parties to get to the bottom of things.

If you are worried about PM's being read then use email, unless of course you think the mods/admins are monitoring your emails as well

 

Well I know I can't access other peoples PMs, truthfully nor would I want to.

 

Nah, Jeremy Kyle is our fave'

PS. I never read my own PMs, so why would I want to read anyone elses?

 

I have never assumed that they were private.

Les

 

I know a site owner who did this for a while and it drove him to closing it down in the end as he couldn't beleive what people actually would say behind his back and not to his face ..........WELCOME TO THE INTERNET!

I am sure the current management have absolutly no interest in whats said by PM

 

Send emails instead! Duh lol Message the person once asking for an email address. Unless its to send people abuse, in which case, get a grip

They are called PRIVATE messages as they are not posted on a PUBLIC forum, not because they are super encrypted, spy level secret.

That said, as the owner of a forum for 10 years I have to say I do not condone the reading of peoples messages.

 

Mods DO NOT have access to PMs. Believe me, we woudn't want it either!!

The only way we get to read a PM from another member on here that wasn't sent to us is if it is forwarded to us by someone should, for example, they be on the receiving end of abuse or a libelous comment via the PM system. In these instances we will save the PM (s) (as evidence) untill we are satisfied that the matter is resolved.

This can come in handy when a situation arises where a disgruntled member denies having comitted a transgression from the T&Cs via PM or questions a moderators integrity, for example. Even then, we don't simply disclose the PMs to the community, but will discuss the matter and disclose evidence to other mods so as there is no question of impropiety on the part of a single mod.

Don't worry, your PMs are not being watched.......at least, not by us!

 

Why do the same people assume something untoward is going on....

I just asked a simple question, I am not planning on writing anything in a PM that would be of any worry to me, I just wondered how PRIVATE a PRIVATE message was.



And for the record.....not very PRIVATE by the sounds of it.

 

Practically nothing on the internet is private. Trying encrypting everything with PGP

 

Because they're monitoring your E-mails and PMs!

 

You could drop the "By PM"

 

Most companies are like that - IT people are usually notoriously nos...um...inquisitive and some company police-ies are just stupid.

BTW, IT departments often include girls as well as 'guys' these days. Outrageous, I know, but true.

When I was a ladette working in IT I used to go out of my way to make it difficult for the Hell Desk to spy on me. In one company they installed a snooping system whereby Hell Desk could remotely monitor the screen of any employee, without that employee being aware. Mysteriously, no matter how many times it was installed on my system, it became corrupted within hours. It was never discovered what was causing it. *cough* Not that I had anything to hide. I am an honest employee with a good work ethic; I just resent the implication that if I would not be if I were not spied upon.

In another company I sent a few mails out in encrypted form, only to get a stroppy mail from the Hell Desk Manager to say this was against company policy. I enquired why. I was told I could be sending company secrets out of the building. I pointed out as an IT team member and as someone who took a company laptop out of the building every night, if I wished to steal company "secrets" I had much better ways of doing it. I then switched to sending messages to certain people in a code that didn't flag up on the mail gateway software, but that meant Hell Desk couldn't understand them. This was picked up on within days, and I got another tantrum from Hell Desk Control. My response was to challenge them to prove I was sending anything more than gibberish and to show me where that was against company policy, (which stated that personal e-mails were acceptable to a degree).

I have a real problem with companies spying on me when I've done nothing to warrant it. If they don't trust me, they just shouldn't employ me. It doesn't stop me from doing my job to the best of my ability but it does mean I'll do anything I can to make it difficult for them to spy.

It can be quite entertaining wording emails in such a way that they are innocent but likely to set off the content management flags on the mail system, and seeing just how fast and how often stroppy mails from Hell Desk Control can be prompted.

Childish? Me? Yeah, sometimes.

And to return to topic... PMs could be reasonably private in terms of who on this site can see them, but it's not safe to assume that is the case.

 

The site is owned and by using the site you agree to the rules are set out by the owner.

PMs are generally private and moderators do not have access, but an Admin could quite easily gain access should they want to, as they have access to the service and code.

Even email isn't private as every ISP can access your emails and see your password. Not the customer facing staff but back office support.

 

Emma the rebel! The thing is, you need to remember one thing, the Hell Desk's secret weapon:

 

ITYM stubborn, awkward, bl00dy minded and a pain in t'****.

And ***** to ceiling cat, I am more devious!!

 

All of my PMs in the last day have been read by the moderators

 

Standard forum software, MySql back end, standard schema, easily reverse engineered from a test forum, just need access to the database, hopefully its well protected from SQL injection or any other techniques.

 

Last time I checked (before the site move) there were no mods that permitted easy reading of PMs by anyone. It's a piece of pee to pull the text out of the database directly (if you have access), but to be honest it's all so boring and mundane that no-one ever actually wants to. Much as people might like to think that what they put in a PM is oh so exciting and interesting, the reality is that it's invariably as boring as hell.