Report • Board Game Arena

Jun 22nd 2020 18:20 • helpfulturn • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This is also a major privacy policy breach as stated here because anyone who is not on boardgamearena can find you: boardgamearena.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=16280

Jun 23rd 2020 16:16 • benny shah • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This needs to be fixed guys!

Jul 12th 2020 9:22 • Chiatina • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Agree, this is important privacy that needs to be protected.

Aug 12th 2020 17:57 • TX-Bluebonnet • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

My family and real-life friends know my BGA name, but I don't want them to know when or what games I'm playing. So I would love to have the option to hide my activity. (as well as my online status)

Aug 29th 2020 20:52 • HollyAGrnwoodtree • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Im all for this. I would like to hide my online status. I dont care about game history. But being able to be online playing and not have unwanted people contacting me would be nice. I come here to destress, and some people still want to bug me.

Sep 8th 2020 2:35 • Hairry • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I come from the opposite side: I don't care if my status is seen, but I don't want to see anyone else's. My game log quickly fills with a ton of records of who just became on- or offline and can't analyze my partner's past moves. Please make it possible to turn off these messages.

Sep 11th 2020 21:59 • RogerBW • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

An additional privacy concern: I have BGA-friends who are members of groups of which I am not a member. If they post to a thread in one of those groups, I can see the whole contents of the thread in my front-page timeline.

Oct 7th 2020 11:43 • sylviel • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Definitely need to put the option to hide your online activity / history.

Oct 9th 2020 6:23 • R o d n e y • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I disagree. I frequently use history to research new games. If I want to learn the best strategies for a game, I go through the history of the top ranked player and replay their old games. I don't know why people want to hide their past games, but if they are worried about privacy, they can create a new and totally anonymous account.

Oct 26th 2020 3:18 • Anya_Bananya • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I would like to avoid one sided friend adds. Friend request option rather than one sided add would be great.

Nov 7th 2020 23:45 • zeinab001 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

i want to see if my friends are online or not i am with two sided friend you cant really be a friend with someone alone s/he needs to be my friend too and i find friend from from game histories to see if we like simillar games or not
if i dont see my friend is online or not how i am going to invite him to a game ? you can hide it from public but i think it should still be visible to friends

Nov 10th 2020 17:14 • postmans • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

On the fence about this one:
- On one end the log of all your games and times tells a lot about when you were online playing games and could put people in a bad spot if people know their name and can see their game times.
- On the other hand I'd like to be able to quickly replay games of my opponents in high-level games. In chess/checkers some of them cheat (which sometimes can be spotted from their play style) and otherwise it's a nice method to capture their skill level. Being able to hide your games makes it impossible for me to filter certain people out (and if I want to play against an engine I go somewhere where I can do that).

As for the friends/online status. I'm completely fine with one-sided friends and them being able to message you can be useful. I understand that it also can be irritating. I'm completely fine with people having me on the list asking me to join a game but not vice versa. If you don't like somebody asking you questions you can politely ask them to stop since you are focusing on a game. If they don't appreciate your request you can always (personal) red thumb them.
I'm not sure if a player you red thumbed can have you in their friends and with that see your status. That is something which I think should not be possible.

Nov 13th 2020 15:35 • Elkio • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

All for hiding online status, the rest doesn't matter that much..
My friends don't always need to see when I am online (ex collegues)
At least make it a switch to let the world see you are online..

Nov 13th 2020 18:33 • Cytotoxic • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Everything has already been said, so my message just confirms that I too want to choose whether I'm visible or not.

Keep up the amazing work, BGA :o)

Nov 20th 2020 13:41 • Phoxtrot • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

My "online friends" count and drop down menu is cluttered with people I don't know because they added me as friend (probably mistaking me for someone). This is annoying because it's makes it harder to see if my real friends are online or not.
Only mutual friends should show up there (always or as an option to activate in the profile).

Dec 1st 2020 9:43 • King of Games • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I know this is a different suggestion, but there are real privacy bugs even with the existing system.

I can find out what language any user is *currently* using (even if their country is private!)
boardgamearena.com/bug?id=27821

Dec 1st 2020 23:35 • Gloriix • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Comencé a jugar una partida y la web se quedó colgada, no podía poner piezas ni mipples y el tiempo del turno se quedço congelado .No quise cerrar la ventana del navergador y esperé mas de una hora a que volviera, recargando constaantemente la página, pero nada ocurrió. Mantuve la partida toda la noche en caso de que volviera a conectarse, pero seguía sin funcionar, así que finalmente se cerró solo.

Dec 9th 2020 20:45 • Azirophos • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Online Status and Mutual Friends I can live with as it is now.

BUT

Having your activity log open for all to view *plus* all the users you friended is absolutely shocking. I only recently found out that it has all these details and that they are open to view for all, with no options to set a more restrictive setting.

This site is wonderful and that is why I went premium, to support you. But this has to change asap.

Dec 10th 2020 16:16 • KongKing123 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Another major privacy issue concerning groups: boardgamearena.com/bug?id=8264

Jan 2nd 2021 14:06 • KongKing123 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

At least this has finally been acknowledged: boardgamearena.com/news?f=10&t=18950

Let's hope the site update will address this!

Feb 17th 2021 1:52 • Lemminkainen • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I disagree with this. There's nothing wrong with knowing what games people play, against whom, and what scores they get. Some people love stats. What exactly are you keeping "private" anyway when this is a public/community website?

Is your user name connected to YOU personally? It isn't. Sure, a few of my friends also use BGA and we play games together from time to time, but globally people have no idea that I am me. Even if they did, what would that prove? That I play games online?

Feb 17th 2021 12:43 • KongKing123 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

@Lemminkainen: good for you, then you will be free to leave your information open for the world to see.

Many others would like more control over their data however, and believe not everyone (even "friends") needs to see every move you make on the site.

Mar 7th 2021 5:40 • SleepiusMaximus • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I would love to be able to hide online status. Sometimes I am on the site just to poke around and look at games to learn, not to play yet, so I don't want to always advertise to friends when I am on.

Mar 10th 2021 8:51 • Deutero • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

please give us the privacy option.

Mar 17th 2021 21:58 • Nunnybunny22 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I agree the fact that it even tells others what we are playing is really off putting to me. plus i dont like my friend calling me and telling me when your boyfriend is done playing "________" want to play this ?

Mar 26th 2021 10:30 • TanyaTT • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I strongly disagree with keeping game history private. On the contrary, I am desperate for BGA to make it possible to link to player's profiles from the lobby so that you can consider their history BEFORE you accept a game!

If a person has played a strategic game 2,000+ times and I've only played it 20 times, this is likely to make the game really unpleasant for me. This cannot be

I don't see these complaints as legitimate privacy complaints; it's games, not personal information.

Mar 30th 2021 19:51 • jeffwolfe • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This should really be three bug reports and not one. Having three different issues, that affect three different parts of the system, in one bug report makes it harder to track and thus harder to address. It also makes it harder to agree with one part of the report and not another.

Hiding online status: should be an option.
Hiding game history: should be an option. It can be handy to see someone's game history, but that should not override a person's choice to not have it visible. If someone chooses to hide their history, that can be taken into account when deciding whether to join a game with them.
Mutual friending: Here I disagree. One-sided friending can be useful. It could be improved. Certain features could only be available to people who have friended in both directions. Also, I don't see any way to tell who has friended me that I haven't friended. They show up on the Activity log but not on the lists. On the list of friends, all I see are people I have friended.

Apr 2nd 2021 17:29 • Gazso • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This bug report relates to legal compliance with respect to BGA's own privacy policy and hence GDPR etc.!

Sharing history should be possible, but only by opt-in!
Maybe even control over who can see the history (no other player, friends, friends and anyone you played with recently, friends and anyone you played with at any time etc.)

Perhaps watching other people's history (except for friends) can be tied for allowing it mutually for people you played with recenty for a few days at least.

Apr 4th 2021 22:20 • igwanna • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Looking for egg :D

Apr 14th 2021 11:30 • rto5987 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Bonjour,

J'imagine que vous avez déjà été confrontés à ce problème mais je préfère être honnête, je n'ai pas envie de passer en revue tous les rapports précédents pour vous signaler un problème.

J'essaye depuis 10 bonnes minutes de jouer à 6 qui prend et les parties proposées sont systématiquement refusées par au moins 1 des joueurs, ce qui fait qu'en plus de ne pas pouvoir jouer, je reçois des messages disant qu'untel quitte la partie (je ne vois pas à quoi ça me sert), le tout avec un son de toc toc à la porte assez insupportable (heureusement qu'on peut couper le son mais écouter de la musique en même temps sur son ordinateur devient difficile).

Une idée de solution ?

Merci d'avance,
Belle journée,

Aurore Marboeuf

Apr 21st 2021 1:04 • helpfulturn • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Also, I just discovered that friends (who I haven't approved to be my friend) can read my notes about other people? I thought that was private??

Apr 22nd 2021 0:48 • KongKing123 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

@rto5987: adding a comment to a random, unrelated bug report is really the worst way of getting it noticed. If you search for "decline", you can find several reports that are much more relevant.
* boardgamearena.com/bug?id=31241
* boardgamearena.com/bug?id=34580
* boardgamearena.com/bug?id=34150

The forum is also an option: boardgamearena.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=9

@helpfulturn: I don't think anyone has the ability to read other people's notes. Where did you encounter this? You can also "unfriend" one-sided friends by red thumbing them (you can remove it afterwards).

Apr 26th 2021 1:00 • 4Apila • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

It would be good that you could hide your previous username too.

Apr 29th 2021 15:45 • doctor vanilla • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Such confidentiality is not needed here. What's wrong with someone looking at your stats and game history? What to hide from then? And the online status is convenient because if the opponent does not make moves in the turn-based game, then you can see if he was online at all

May 1st 2021 16:03 • bluephoenix43 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I know this was mentioned in the News update at the start of the year - has there been any update on it since then? It's by far the highest rated report so clearly a lot of people are after it.

May 1st 2021 17:19 • Gawandur • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Yes... i do want more privacy too. If someone knows your BGA name you are done with privacy....

May 24th 2021 0:01 • procyon11 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Please, we need these privacy improvements.

May 27th 2021 11:07 • ZebraBee • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

NEED THIS ASAP. PLEASE.

May 27th 2021 14:30 • TheyGowByrd • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

The conclusion is - may I say - that it needs finetuning. Of course unvisible to any non-BGA-friend or non mutual friends. But I like and use a lot the option of seeing the online status of MUTUAL friends.

May 28th 2021 4:40 • Jacob Koert • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I think it should be an option. You can change your status yourself, so that certain things of your profile are seen by other users, or not seen. In conclusion, this might be a good idea, just make it so that you can change it yourself.

May 31st 2021 3:09 • shimmeringlight • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

An associated recent thread on this topic is in the forums here:

boardgamearena.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=21265

Jun 1st 2021 12:03 • la_bretonne • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I see some disagree, but we could see the history only to mutual friends, and IF the other decided to share it with his friends.

Jun 7th 2021 9:14 • og_lester • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Short-term solution: only show activity and online status to mutuals.

Long-term solution: better privacy options.

Jun 17th 2021 22:31 • Ax109 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I agree with you in some parts; my previous username gave away lots of personal information, and I don't want anyone to see it. Also, I have some people who have made me my 1-sided friend, and I don't want them to see when and where I am going on BGA.

Jun 22nd 2021 12:17 • RockAndSka • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Had the same concerns in 2017 (in french: boardgamearena.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=11943&p=39470#p39470) and only get 2 answers (1 is a troll, the other one say it is hard to find someone BGA profile from its pseudo on search engines...)

Seems that privacy is not a priority.....

Jun 26th 2021 17:43 • Markell • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

What you could do is make friending someone a request to be accepted and reciprocated or denied and not reciprocated.

Jun 29th 2021 17:19 • smugskull • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Happy 1-year anniversary to this bug report! ( I am 7 days late )

Jul 6th 2021 10:17 • fieldsofcarcassonne • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I had a situation where friends could see my posts in a private group that they were not members of, could this also be added to the fix list?

Aug 16th 2021 12:48 • miro134 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I did not start the game because the partners' readiness was suspended when I restarted the game met another player please check it. thank you

Aug 17th 2021 2:46 • mvn • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

please allow to hide game history to friends and everyone.

Aug 26th 2021 14:57 • DracoMagister • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

The most voted request by far and still nothing have been done for more than a year and I don't think this is a very problematic or difficult task. Yeah, probably not trivial but neither that big. Astonishing they have done nothing but a little comment on a post almost 9 months ago.

Sep 7th 2021 15:39 • Oakley4866 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Please consider resolving this. As someone said - you come here to enjoy and de-stress - not to be contacted by people who happen to know or guess your details. Privacy should be respected - a simple check box would allow people to opt in/out of having their online status showing. Also, why should friends (or complete strangers) be able to see my game history?

Sep 20th 2021 11:04 • Gaspodee • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I totally agree with this suggestion. Sometimes, I just want to play without my friends or family, it would be perfect if we could check an "appear as offline" checkbox.

Oct 17th 2021 7:24 • Redundancy • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I am totally against this suggestion, as it will completely ruin the fun, as well as the fairness of the games if implemented.
First, only by analyzing the games he/she has played can we identify whether a high-ranker is getting a high ELO by cheating. Cheating is doomed to happen if cheaters can hide their game information so there is no concern that they will be reported and lose the ELO they have earned by cheating. Thus, cheating behaviours like playing with themselves and bursting ELO will become much more frequent than now. Undoubtedly, supporting this suggestion means supporting CHEATING.
Second, analyzing the games of experts and masters helps the beginners to form a reasonable strategy quickly without having to play a lot of meaningless games with completely wrong strategy. It considerably improves the players’ average level and significantly increases the amount of high-quality games, which is necessary for the healthy development of BGA. Undoubtedly, supporting this suggestion means blocking the way to improve for beginners.
In conclusion, this suggestion is everything but reasonable and I’m happy to see that BGA admins have paid no attention to it, which is the wisest thing they have ever done. Its supporters are either potential cheaters or ones who don’t want BGA to be improved.

Oct 19th 2021 0:14 • shimmeringlight • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

@ Nimda Gnikcuf. You do raise some interesting points, but in my opinion having better privacy far outweighs the potential for cheating or other reasons you mentioned. The way of the world is better privacy, and this website should follow suit. The majority of players seem to agree per this poll:

boardgamearena.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=21265

This suggestion now has more than 800 upvotes. It would be nice to get an update from the admins at some point in the near future on privacy. The last time they seemed to mention it was in their New Year's post in January 2021 where they they were discussing plans for big improvements to the main website and said that said "profile pages are outdated, friend system is vintage, privacy control should be better, etc... We know that."

Nov 23rd 2021 7:18 • augustjologs • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Disagree.

Game history is very useful for reviewing/analyzing how others have played and help players develop better gameplay and strategy. Also useful for people who create statistical info about games. So, game history should not be hidden. Why would anyone want to hide what games they have played?

I've also used game history to check some players suspected of cheating/king-making. And I have seen 1 or 2 guilty of that. So open game history is a cheat-deterent.

Knowing someone online is also useful especially if that player is not making any moves and time is running out - is that player online or offline?

Nov 23rd 2021 22:06 • shimmeringlight • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

@ augustjologs. You also raise some interesting points. Regardless, I think the majority of users should be catered to on BGA, and the majority of users seem to want more privacy per this poll:

boardgamearena.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=21265

As a compromise, perhaps consideration could be given to only allow unranked (training mode) games to be hidden. This would for the most part keep a cheat-deterrent in place, as most people cheating would probably be doing it to increase their rank. And I expect anyone gathering stats or researching good strategies would want to look mainly at ranked games.

That said, I'm still in favor of being able to hide all your games. Having good privacy options are the key to any good website these days.

Dec 7th 2021 7:12 • frankenStain • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

i do agree to make some information invisible to "people" not registered on the site (hopefully a google bot would be somewhat avoidable by that) - but STRONGLY DISAGREE, to give the option to make information hideable for other players... because of the reasons @augustjologs listed
@shimmeringlight
also some poll with a vague question, with under 50 participants, where you cant give votes anymore - is barely relevant, even less so since this questions affects all players on bga!

Dec 7th 2021 23:42 • shimmeringlight • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

@ frankenStain. Agreed that the poll numbers are low, but this combined with the 870 upvotes for this privacy improvement suggestion gives it some value. It is too bad they don't allow for downvotes of a suggestion. Maybe that's another feature they could add at some point.

I see the BGA admins already implemented part of this increased privacy suggestion, by disallowing one sided friends. So that's good, at least in my opinion. We'll see if they go any further to increase privacy. I hope they do.

Dec 22nd 2021 3:35 • wunderlagerlover • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Please take our privacy seriously and allow us to hide online status or game history. Why is this not resolved yet? It dates from 1,5year ago...
I agree, game histeory is a very intresting feature, but to most players privacy is way more important than detailed game stats of an opponent.
About the argument of cheating: good point, but a bot could easily identify that as well, and bga could make a 'report suspicion of cheating' button so bga could have a close look at certain stats of a reported player and respect privacy of its members at the same time.

Jan 1st 2022 17:09 • Wreckage • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I disagree with having hidden history. The reasons augustjologs listed are important. Also, if you run an event with a lot of players playing at different tables, it's good to be able to gather everyone's scores by checking their history.

We have had hanabi events with special rules like no red or yellow clues are allowed. Being able to replay a game is important to see if someone accidentally made a mistake.

I'm not sure why you need your game history hidden.

Jan 6th 2022 11:39 • xtyner • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I want to agree on the previous post of Wreckage and want to bring some more points why an open game-history is important:

- When only friend can see what games one person played, there will be people using that out. One example could be to create a false account, playing houndrets of games against that false account and always quit. Easy points and not only cheating themselves but everyone who plays honestly. Such a thing will be recognized if everyone can see the game-history.

- There exist groups talking about strategy of the game (I am member of at least two). In these groups we share games in which all players played pretty well, such that everyone can analyze that. In other games as well, sometimes I learn how good-ranked players play their games, to improve my own game. I do not want to miss on that option.

- In tournament and Arena-games it is important to know if opponents play another game. Especially in the end of the season, Arena-rankings can change a lot in the last minutes even when it is not visible if people just play this game.

So having a visible game-history in my eyes in mandatory fór the game-experience of fairness and playingstrength.

Jan 22nd 2022 12:56 • MrBeardy • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I agree with privacy side of things i guess but there is a time when looking at someone's game history helps: when you think players are in cahoots with each other and playing in an odd way that seems like they're teaming up. Eg in 6-nimmt you get some players who take weird moves that a normal player wouldn't do to help one person win. I've spotted a few player names who nearly always play together and do weird things in games. Suspicious?! I guess this could be dealt with by BGA just auto-warning players of such trends similar to the "same ISP" warning while still giving the option to make history private.

Mar 13th 2022 3:52 • Corrancesixsix6 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Hiding online status would be awesome. Sometimes I want to play with strangers while I listen to music/podcast. I don't like that my friends know I'm online and avoiding them.

Mar 16th 2022 19:27 • LadySan • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

The relevance is, this report was opened in 2020 and it still hasn't been reviewed?! Being able to "hide" our online status sure would be nice. Turning off who is online and offline would be nice too. How does a report get analyzed by the developers? Does it need a certain amount of reports?

Apr 10th 2022 2:06 • DiscipleofMeep • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Should this not be three separate suggestions? Or, 3 other reports so that people can vote on their individual choice...I don't see the need to hide my game history, I couldn't care less what people think of mine. However I 100% agree with a hide offline/last seen status (I don't need my son pointing out I was on BGA at 3am) and also the friends list could have more of a - dare I say it - Facebook privacy setup.

Jun 5th 2022 20:08 • Hulb • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

The way I see it, for the online status part of this, is there are two types. The worded type that pops up in the sidebar to say so 'n' so is online and the green dot in a game table.

I'm focusing on the green dot, as I don't think this should be private, as, in turn based games, if I come on and take my turn (especially in two player) seeing that green dot may make me just hang around a few to see if they take their turn soon after and we end up having a bit of a back and forth. Without the dot, you'd just assume it's going to be some time before they take their turn and log out. It's not a definitive thing or anything, but it's just instinctual, if that makes sense?

Jun 16th 2022 23:35 • DiscipleofMeep • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Can't believe this is STILL not even noticed by devs. The use of online status when in a game is irrelevant to the broader issue, because they could make it so that online/last seen status is visible to players you're in-game with. Seriously. What's the issue here, why are they ignoring it.

Jun 18th 2022 2:02 • ToughCookie • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

The longer I'm on BGA, the more friends I develop. There are times in which I would like my privacy while playing a game with new friends or to not be disturbed in general. It's irritating to be disturbed with several messages while I'm trying to have a quiet game to myself.

Jun 20th 2022 11:17 • Vésuvier • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I like the idea of hiding the online status, but I think it is important to be able to see other players history and replay every games. I've been able to confirm cheating (team playing) several times, I have found out a player was using more than 30 accounts playing together thanks to this functionality. (reported and found guilty by moderators)

Jul 7th 2022 9:04 • takeyourchits • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This is a privacy issue plain and simple. Needs to be fixed and I'm surprised as everyone else that it hasn't been addressed.

Jul 7th 2022 18:50 • stamo • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Commenting to keep towards the top - wild it hasn't been "analyzed" yet.

I'd vote a big yes for providing options to hide history / online availability (perhaps as a member benefit? or an additional level?) and balanced with administrator/moderator access to history as needed. Not sure why the good old world wide web needs access to entire game history ...

Jul 15th 2022 9:36 • Tokoloshe79 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

When is this going to be addressed?

The constant messages and interruptions are by FAR the most annoying thing on BGA

X is online
Y is offline
Y is online
X is online
Y is offline
Z is online...

... MAKE IT STOP, PLEASE!

Jul 15th 2022 23:00 • Cosmic_Corvus • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

If you can see someone's friend list and game history you can give a proper red thumb to people who are kingmaking, otherwise, you might not be able to report them. However, I do agree that being able to hide online status can be quite useful.

Jul 25th 2022 11:46 • Anantara • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This is by far the highest voted issue, is over 2 years old now, and is still hasn't been "analyzed by the developers yet".

BGA, what's going on here, how are you managing your issues board, are the BGA team just ignoring the community feedback when it comes to user privacy?

Jul 26th 2022 6:01 • skoki • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Not to mention they reveal your location to other players by displaying on the online friends list, players who are near you and online. No matter that you don't even know you, they can see you online and check your profile...

Aug 6th 2022 19:13 • fufumdr • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This ticket is a mess.
-I 100% agree with the (now implemented) mutual friends thing
-but 100% disagree with hiding people's history (and wonder in which case hiding it could be acceptable/legit)
-The gamelog spammed with XXX connected/disconnected is a serious issue too, but it doesn't belong here, and having an offline status isn't the way to fix it.
DND or "ignore" status (with the possibility to simply prevent beeing messaged or invited) could be useful, but I don't miss them as much as the possiblity to block spam requests like global chat or "Hey, you, come join a game you didn't ask for !", which IMO should have been removed or restricted to least played games a loooong time ago.
-The "online near you" is another dubious thing, indeed, and doesn't bring anything useful anyway. But once again, such things deserves their specific ticket.

Please, @BGA staff, consider answering something in this ticket someday (this even could be "split it to several, specific issues", since mess can't be worked on :p)

I'm sure they read it and its updates now and then, but discussions going in all directions at once can't be very fruitful

Aug 7th 2022 18:40 • niefus • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Please allow users to opt out of having their activity feeds be public.
If a player is suspected of cheating, there should be a reporting mechanism and BGA admins should can review those reports and review the players' activity history. It should not be an expectation that. non-admin players need access everyone's activity history to investigate cheating.

Sep 5th 2022 10:14 • CarrisBCN • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

It soo simple and quick put a option for hide history in preferences....

Sep 9th 2022 12:37 • robbaap • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I disagree also, the game history is a great tool to analyse your games. But I accidentally pushed on the 'like this report 'button.

Sep 12th 2022 22:53 • PhotoJoe • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This should be an ***option*** for those of us with privacy concerns.

Sep 17th 2022 16:52 • RaxoGG99 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Yeah Jack

Oct 7th 2022 7:18 • LoriDean • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Summary of issues brought up in this ticket:

1. Provide an option to hide online presence.
2. Provide an option to hide game history.
3. Provide an option to turn off messages when others go online/go offline (interferes with the game log).
4. Provide an option to hide my friends list (and when I became friends with someone).

My thoughts on these issues:
1. I want to be able to hide my online presence. This is a fundamental privacy issue.
2. I am okay with others being able to see my game history. I like being able to see what other friends are playing so I might invite them to play a game we mutually enjoy. I'd prefer only friends see my game history.
3. By far the most annoying feature is having my game log spammed with who is coming online/going offline. I would rate this at the highest possible priority.
4. I don't have strong feelings either way about who sees my friends list but think having the option would be beneficial to some.

Hopefully I captured all the issues brought up.

Nov 22nd 2022 18:41 • XomiMag • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I would like to bump these requests, especially the ones about the options to hide online status and game history (or exact game times) from public and friends, by choice.

Nov 23rd 2022 8:10 • coeurdespoir • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Regardless of who would or would not *need* privacy settings they should be an option. Every other social website has privacy options- why shouldnt we?

Nov 26th 2022 15:35 • Ulfibulfi • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This issue is up since 22. Jun 2020 and is now supported by 1282 players!
For nearly two and a half years nothing has been fixed on this case. Why is BGA acting this way? As a paying member I'm really concerned about the future development of this platform. It seems to me that the concerns are not taken seriously enough. Please fix this as soon as possible if you want to keep people playing here, since at this point it is not a privacy safe environment.

Dec 8th 2022 17:25 • Willy_Wonka007 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I can't see why it's still in 'awaiting', clearly it's the top 1 request from the members.

Dec 18th 2022 23:09 • summer_wind • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Adding a comment just to keep this going. I cant believe it still hasnt happened.

Dec 19th 2022 21:34 • MeowMF • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Toujours aucune façon de garder notre statut en ligne privé?

Jan 14th 2023 18:36 • Wickedestjr • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

One of my favorite things about BGA is being able to watch games that other players have played, even players that I am not friends with. It's a great tool for learning how to play certain games better. I see zero benefit to removing this feature.

Jan 14th 2023 22:57 • SAMUEL8 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

blocked me

Jan 15th 2023 7:43 • Wreckage • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

1. Game history needs to stay visible to everyone. There is no reason to hide it.

2. An incognito mode to hide that you are currently online would useful.

3. People who are complaining about the constant messages of other player's online status are using the friend's list incorrectly. It is a tool, use it like a tool. Forget that it says "Friends". Get your list down to only people you care to know when they log online. It's a useful tool, it just needs renamed maybe. If you have 150 friends, eliminate 140 of them, you will still be friends, but without notices.

Feb 8th 2023 17:21 • Buddhanature • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

It is unconscionable that this report has not been responded to and the requests in it not implemented by admins after two and a half years.

Privacy in all areas mentioned should always be an option.

It is very creepy that we cannot control what information is made public about ourselves and our activity on this website.

And it is extremely annoying that BGA does not even acknowledge this thread. This lack of response sends a big signal that their "strong love" to players is false.

("'Strong love' from the team," at the end of 2021 Happy New Year announcement.)

Feb 14th 2023 6:44 • TheFlyingBoat • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This continues to be a major issue. Players ought to be able to hide game history from others, including friends, if they so choose.

1) It is just a reasonable right for people to have to be able to have some level of control over what information is made public and what isn't.

2) It is useful for running tournaments where preventing others from knowing current standings to prevent tournament metagaming is valuable. Allowing backsolving of the standings through game histories directly prevents that

3) It is very useful to prevent stalking and other abuses of privacy

The arguments against it are silly.

1) Cheating: If you suspect cheating there should be a way to report it to the admin team for investigation and THEY can investigate game logs and punish accordingly

2) Looking at game histories to learn: Making it an option doesn't prevent you from looking at the games of those who do choose to make their game history public. Also maybe it can be possible from the game screen to look at anonymized high level games for those who want their game history kept secret.

3) Arena game ranks can change super quickly so we need to see what games are going: Then make only arena games unhide-able. Problem solved.

This is 2023 and you promised action in January 2021. This is unacceptable.

Feb 23rd 2023 17:04 • mich292 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

WE NEED OFFLINE MODE ON STATUS.

NOW! Or we don't pay for site anymore. How is this not implemented yet. SERIOUSLY.

Feb 26th 2023 4:09 • Bindie • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

My game of It's a Wonderful World will not finish. The game has completed yet it is frozen and still says the game is 95% complete. This needs to be fixed badly as this match is holding up a tournament and the guy on the It's a Wonderful World bug reports says this is a BGA problem and BGA need to fix this. Please fix this as I cannot create any arena games due to this.

The game is located here : boardgamearena.com/9/itsawonderfulworld?table=347299816

Mar 12th 2023 17:21 • MadManMark • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Just a generic interface comment: there is no way to vote that you do NOT agree with a suggestion (as I do, in this case), only that you agree. This makes the voting system for suggestions potentially very misleading.

Mar 17th 2023 2:52 • ExaltedAngel • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I stronlgy disagree on hiding online status and even stronger on hiding game history, which is a total nonsense in my opinion

Apr 2nd 2023 15:24 • octan10 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Option to hide ELO to avoid biased attack among players

Apr 4th 2023 9:36 • YannisDr • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I do not generally agree with this hidden feature.
First of all, an implementation of secretly "unfriend" someone should exist (if this doesn't already).

Second, this community must be based on interests of each other. For example many times I have discovered a new game, just because another player seems to favor it a lot (checked his game history, saw that it has a great experience at a certain game, and I checked it out).

Last, but not least.
Perhaps, instead of implementing this feature, devs should allow changing username more than only once. Some people realize that their name identifies and reveals them to others.
There is no difference whether I play with a guy called "Joe Smith" against the "josmth23" username; The gameplay enjoyment remains the same. If she/he wants later to reveal me her real name, she can do so in the chat.

Apr 18th 2023 16:15 • Boomai • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Friends feature needs a review because as of today:
-cant mute the annoying "online/offline" of friends logging in
-cant be invisible to friends (for privacy issues i do not want people to know when i am online)
-cant group them

May 19th 2023 19:43 • carleyer • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Privacy including online viability and friends features definitely needs to be reviewed.

I have a player stalking me online on multiple sites. I am able to hide from him on other platforms, but he still hawks my game history here. Him not being able to message me or spectate me, does not mean this access isn't uncomfortable.

I wish to block him outright. But at least having ownership to hide this information from him, would limit the appeal of hawking my profile for info.

May 26th 2023 8:53 • rascal • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Please implement manual STATUS (on/off).

Jul 5th 2023 13:24 • Stuff by Bez • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I agree with rascal - the privacy should be an option.

Jul 6th 2023 10:45 • Braidy • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I can vouch for carleyer's report. We play a lot of games together and this person stalks/spectates them in many aspects of life both online and in real life. In terms of BGA almost ALL of our games together are spectated by this stalker under the guise of a 'visitor' despite repeatedly being asked not too. There are currently NO privacy solutions to deal with this.

We cannot make our games private from spectators.

We cannot hide our profiles or friends. Because of this changing profile name is no use because all the person has to do is look up my profile and see who I am playing games with because I can't make my game history private either.

In the current state, we have NO option but to just keep playing games knowing this person watches us all the time.

This is a major problem with privacy which has seemingly one gone unaddressed for over 3 years now judging by the age of this ticket.

Jul 12th 2023 21:31 • TotoroMom • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Boosting this, as it’s shocking that this issue still hasn’t been fixed.

Jul 18th 2023 23:19 • harezmi • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I think it is important to keep the stats and history open to everyone. I understand some people don't want to share their history and we also need to respect that. One solution would be to make this optional and the user may choose to make the game history private. I'd suggest the only exception to that would be the opponent should be able to see the history for that specific game.

Aug 13th 2023 18:03 • Frooty_Bazooty • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Just wanna add my 2 cents that this request is ridiculous. This obsession that people have with privacy nowadays is crazy

Aug 14th 2023 13:50 • Brother28 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

It is unconscionable that this report has not been responded to and the requests in it not implemented by admins after two and a half years.

Privacy in all areas mentioned should always be an option.

Aug 26th 2023 8:03 • Bulbulle • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I think privacy should be something normal, everybody have the right to have his little space where he can choose to be visible or not. For exemple : if my boss know my BGA pseudo and I lied that I was at hospital instead of going working (that's just an example ^^ ), I can have problems because he can spy my activities on BGA. Another exemple : if I'm actually not working very well and I'm too much on BGA he can know that too and that can deserve me... Or for exemple just coming too late at work because I was playing on BGA... And that's not something normal, my private life is my problem and not his problem... Actually it seems normal for too much people to know everything about everyone, that's not something normal and even if I like a lot BGA, I think that's the biggest problem with BGA. I changed my account because I felt a little "invaded" with a friend of friend that was always contacting me even when I wanted to stay alone. That can be unpleasant too. Normally I should have an "invisible option" and the possibility to not show my game history or choosing who can see it... I don't think privacy option is too difficult to add, that's a legitimate request

Aug 27th 2023 9:03 • ambergris • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

My premium membership is up 7 months from today. I'm not renewing unless this is addressed by then.

Sep 2nd 2023 14:45 • Sjarmtrollet • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Come on.

Sep 5th 2023 0:55 • Sam7000 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I totally disagree with blocking game history. But I'm okay with an option for players to choose to hide when they are online. Players who want anonymity can create an account with a fictitious name. But the played games should never be hidden or blocked. Like thousands of others, I use game history to research new games and learn strategies from top ranked players by re-playing their old games.

Blocking this ability will severely harm not only the BGA, but the gaming industry as whole. The game history is a significant and essential learning tool. If this tool is taken away, many players, especially new comers, won't be able to re-play past games and learn from them and improve. This can cause many players to get disappointed at their weak results and play less or even quit playing all together.

Sep 19th 2023 9:34 • Vyrawyn • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I strongly agree with this ticket, these privacy issues make me consider cancelling my premium account.
Most important: hide online status.

Sep 21st 2023 10:52 • Panthergirl • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Totally agree with hiding online status!! Not sure why I can't "vote" for this.

Nov 6th 2023 16:22 • SidK26 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

While I believe the Online could be a privacy thing, hinding the games should not be an option. Taking example from Chess.com, anyone should be able to look you up and see the games you have played, and analyse them if they wish. It is only just that this part of it remains public.

Dec 8th 2023 15:26 • kingrvb • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This is a major issue, to my point of view. Privacy must not be an option.

Dec 14th 2023 1:53 • Raul4ever • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I don't have a problem with others viewing my game history or my status. I want them to contact me and maybe suggest a game that i can play with them based on my history. I also get to contact others and ask them to play a game with me if i need a partner. This is a social, public gaming website. If you need privacy so much, set your instagram and your facebook on private

Dec 16th 2023 2:56 • Calmon70 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

When a person is able to hide their game history, they shouldn't be in any rankings (XP Ranking, Arena Rankings, etc.). Also, hiding/unhiding should have a huge cooldown. We don't want to make it too esy for cheaters.

Jan 3rd 2024 18:03 • BizzleDizzle • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Ability to disable chat outside of game is needed for players who don't want to receive harassing or aggressive messages.

Jan 6th 2024 17:43 • ExtremePro11299 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I agree with the online status thing as well.

Jan 18th 2024 20:53 • James_Games • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Suggestion to comment above - about an anonymous account. Maybe you could make an anonymous account that is linked to yours with trophies and such, just it’s like a “mask” view - no one would know it is linked.

Jan 21st 2024 19:31 • Oksev • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Add privacy!

Feb 6th 2024 11:20 • Ned Flanders • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

3 years, what are you wainting guys?

Feb 23rd 2024 9:48 • Geronimoo • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Major issue! Make this a priority!

Feb 28th 2024 16:58 • GrognardDM • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I would also like to assign friend's names to the username, as well as have an option so my name is displayed instead of my username.

It will be helpful to identify and find friends quickly when looking at tables to join or adding them to your game.

Feb 29th 2024 6:07 • ambergris • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

My premium membership is up in one month. I'm not renewing if this isn't addressed. BGA has had plenty of time to fix this.

Mar 1st 2024 6:17 • Gins13 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Additional privacy ask- please allow what GROUPS you are a part of to be hidden from everyone (as someone could be a part of a real life group that could give away their location)

Mar 10th 2024 1:44 • TsPeacock • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

This really needs to be addressed. The lack of privacy options makes this site look dated, unprofessional and amateurish.

Mar 22nd 2024 19:26 • Rikerslash • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Seeing the games of good players on the website is a major feature of this website, which helps people learn from others. Seeing online status of others is obviously a privacy issue. Maybe there is way to have both. Not showing your online status seems very important for obvious reasons. Maybe remove exact timestamps from game history or add history only one day later without a specific time or something like that to be more safe on the privacy side and still make it possible to learn from others.

Apr 17th 2024 13:38 • Tom Q • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Your BGA user name is (usually) not your real name (and if it is, you are rather an exception here), and you do not have to reveal your user name to anybody (especially to your relatives, coworkers etc.). If somebody harasses you here, you could easily block them. Seeing if your friends are online makes easier to contact them if you want to play together. I don't see BGA having any privacy issues, as long as you don't share here your name, email or phone number on your own.

May 19th 2024 18:50 • SleepyLibrarian • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

How on earth is this issue still not even acknowledged in four Years? While I don't personally need to keep my history hidden, I'm really deeply disappointed that BGA clearly isn't taking this issue seriously. It's one thing to gather a variety of feedback on the issue, it's another thing to let it rot for four years. Can we get some accountability here, please?

Yes, online status and history are real privacy issues for many people, and potentially even safety issues for people with abusive family members or stalkers. Making an alternative anonymous profile is not a fair or viable solution for this problem. No one should be forced to give up their online identity, history, reputation, and connections because BGA refuses to implement even extremely minimal privacy controls. Hiding whether you are currently online is the most basic possible privacy feature, for heavens sakes! If Facebook is outdoing you in privacy features, you are doing something wrong.

I'm also stunned by all the people whining about how they need to be able to see people's game histories. You simply don't have a greater claim on that information than the person whose life that is. If game history is needed for deciding who to play with, don't play with people who hide it. Maybe for certain tournaments/arena games, you can require public records of the games, but people will know they are opting in for those specifically.

May 22nd 2024 22:09 • BestgamerEU • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I really want to keep being able to see game history sense I love to watch others games to learn.

To be able to hide that you are online and mutual friends I'm fine with.
BUT NOT if it means that it would become impossible to see others game history.

May 27th 2024 16:46 • Grunman • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Thats just a paranoid proposal.

Jun 28th 2024 17:42 • LilDawn • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I like to see the names of games my friends have tried-- so I can look at them & see if I could learn to play them. However, I don't need links to their specific games & the rest-- that should not be public imo. :)

Jul 4th 2024 3:56 • fixticket17208 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

It is beyond ridiculous that BGA has still not addressed users' legitimate privacy concerns.

Jul 23rd 2024 0:09 • Mrtuffstuff • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I'm fine with all of this staying public, but I understand the concerns. Just would really prefer granular options for those that want them rather than one-size-fits-all. This platform would not be as cool if everything was just set to private imo.

Jul 29th 2024 17:02 • Pater Absurdus • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I clicked vote for this report to vote against it but it voted for it. How do I remove my vote?

Aug 12th 2024 12:10 • hanabifanabi • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

Because players aren't allowed to have multiple account's (to stay anonymous) and are expected to fill in information on their profile, the privacy concern is a problem. something has to change, either less required for profiles, or fixing the privacy issue.

Oct 14th 2024 15:47 • kmgar65 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

I often stay logged in, playing or not, and it seems pretty simple to go invisible just like you can on, for example, discord. Just let us change our status. On discord you can be in the middle of a conversation on discord and still be invisible. It also just seems like reputation and ranking are fine but, having the history of what you are doing constantly visible to strangers doesn't seem like it is useful. You should be able to hide your history if you want or pare it down to just the last game of each type. Honestly, personal information shouldn't be the default but, something you have to approve to share with others.

Nov 6th 2024 23:37 • Anniemov • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

it should be not public. pls hide recent activity..

Dec 9th 2024 17:26 • Froggie76 • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

It seems a pretty normal feature to have a setting controlling your online status. Often when I'm online I already made plans with a fixed group of friend also sometimes I'm just here to try a single player variant. So it could have settings like "open to invites, busy, invisible, ..."

Dec 20th 2024 18:08 • KPTang • This suggestion has not been analyzed by the developers yet:

We need offline mode.
We've been waiting for this for a long time.
I don't want my friend to keep observing my game. Please..!

#17208: "Better Privacy: Hide Game History, Online Status, and only Mutual Friends"

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