NEWSEA, a rival site to TSR has been hacked and the data of 3,322 of its users has been posted online.
CHANGE ALL OF YOUR PASSWORDS NOW.
Unlike the last information leak, where 614 people had their names email address shared on the grapevine, this new leak is far more dangerous, the online list not only contains usernames and emails, but your PASSWORDS and your country of origin and and some full names.
I understand there are rumors already in the community, and in some cases these rumors are not being believed, I can confirm that I have seen the full list online and I can not stress how urgent it is that you take action to change your passwords. The information is listed in this format: id - username - email – password - firstname - lastname - country
On May the 10th, a few members of staff were approached, and on May 11th were given subscriber passes to Newsea. The idea was to download and share Newsea subscriber only files through torrent sites in an attempt to damage the Newsea business and limit their monetary income. I was under the impression that TSR had bought the subscriptions. Shortly after, I heard that Newsea was willing to sell the site to TSR and return as FA. Talks broke down apparently when Tom accused Newsea of being greedy and wanting far too much for the site, I have no idea what Newsea asked for or what he was offered, but whatever it was, Tom said it was too much but he was certain Newsea would be back with ‘his tail between his legs’. Yesterday I was told that every member of Newsea has had their username, email name and password leaked online. Shortly before this news went public, TSR posted a cryptic and confusing message on their front page.
“TSR members are being targeted in the community by people trying to cause trouble. Please remember that nobody from TSR will ever ask for your password for the site. If anyone approaches you on Facebook, Forums or Chat, claiming to be from TSR and asking you for your login details, do not give them out!”
You may wonder what is so cryptic and confusing about this message? For a start the first paragraph is the focus of events that have never happened, there have been no reports of anyone being approached on facebook, forums or chat by anyone asking for login details. This part of the statement is clearly just an opener and just an excuse to make an announcement so that they can get to the second paragraph..
Passwords stored at TSR are encrypted. ( No they are not. ) Staff, Admins and Mods do not have access to your passwords used, ( some staff and all admins do. )
“but not all sites work that way.” Now we are getting to the point of this announcement .. Sites like Newsea? How perceptive of TSR to know that a rival site was about to have it’s entire unencrypted data leaked online. How thoughtful of TSR to let us know how *cough* secure their site is and how unsecure rival sites may be. We could have done without the demonstration.
This has not just been a hack, it has started with blackmail. With this being posted on or around April 27th
Followed by attempts from TSR to damage the business through sharing.
When Newsea refused to sell and rejoin TSR for what was probably a very low offer, the information gathered from the site was released to the public. ( ..after the careful removal of TSR FA accounts! ) You do not need me to explain what this means to the 3,322 people who have had their emails and passwords displayed for all to see, or the damage to the reputation of Newseas site.
Still not convinced that TSR are liars? TSR have even gone as far as writing words in Newsea’s TSR blog, that were not written by Newsea and replying to messages that were not replied to by Newsea -In fact Newsea have NO access to their own TSR blog. What kind of respectable site would impersonate an artist through blog posts and messages while locking them out of their own account. That in itself is illegal.
Newsea says: “Please do not give the newsea of TSR site message! because the account has been modified by the TSR, we do not have the permissions of that account, all speak of the newsea of TSR site not what we say!”
Hacking. Blackmail. Impersonation. This is how low TSR will go to destroy the competition. For those who have very little sympathy for a paysite like Newsea, remember that paysites are not the only rival to TSR.
February 3, 2012
I have often been asked what happened between Newsea and TSR, I have been asked again today, and this has prompted me to write a few lines on what I know and what I have heard.
For those that do not know, Newsea are a duo of hair designers who are now former FA’s at TSR.
Story #1
The initial story from TSR was that Newsea got ideas well above their station, with diva-like demands. Apart from a raise, they demanded their own personal subscription section on TSR and wanted 100% of the profit for those additional subscriptions – otherwise they would leave TSR and open a rival paysite. Tom had no choice but to let them go as TSR were unable to afford to pay them any extra on their already massive wage of $500 per set also they did not want to have a separate subscription set up for just Newsea. Upon leaving Newsea demanded payment for the next 3 months in advance, Tom refused and Newsea was banned from the site after posting bad things about TSR on their TSR blog.
Source: Thomas@TSR
Story #2
The other story is that when Newsea were asked to join TSR they were offered an initial £300 per set starting pay and told that after they got established their wage would go up to $400-$500 per set depending on demand. Later in the year TSR would offer an additional subscription service for Newsea hair, where Newsea would get a minimum of 30%. This sounded like a good deal and Newsea signed up. However the raise and the subscription deal never materialised and when Newsea asked about the raise Tom turned nasty. Newsea decided to leave as Tom had gone back on his promise and they wished to open a new site. When they advertised their new site on their TSR blog, they were banned from the blog and Tom withheld payment for all their last completed sets uploaded that month. Newsea opened their own site.
Source: A friend of Newsea
Although it seems unclear on the surface which story is true, I believe the second to be much nearer the mark:
- It would not be the first time Tom has gone back on a promise, in fact he will promise anything to get a creator to upload at TSR. The worst possible outcome to him is that they eventually leave TSR when they realise they have been conned, however by then they have closed their own site/left MTS and uploaded everything to TSR, which he then keeps, labels as his own property and no longer has to pay the artist. Kind of a win/win for him. The situation with Newsea sounds all too familiar.
- This is not the first time I have heard the extra subscription idea, for Premium Artists ( PA’s ) Tom has been talking about this a lot as a way to get well known artists into TSR, so it is totally believable that Newsea was offered this as a sweetener.
- I have yet to speak to anyone who saw the ‘bad things’ Newsea allegedly posted on their blog, I am inclined to go with the second story where posting a site link got them locked out of their site. I also think the current cheery message on their TSR mini site may not have been written by them, it looks to me like the standard editing done by Tom after an FA gets kicked.
It is evident to me that Newsea was well and truly screwed over by TSR.
Now you know what I know, but the only one who really knows the truth is Newsea. If Newsea would like to put their story forward, I would be happy to publish it and set the record straight.
January 27, 2012
TSR FA Murfeel has posted her new policy on her minisite at TSR. In short, it says:
“There is no need to ask my permission to use my meshes for your creations. Why? Because you can take it alll~!!!! XD It’s all free for you to use, any object meshes I upload I don’t need any credit…though the warm fuzziness inside when it’s given is always a nice feeling” “Also, I have no problem with people re-uploading my work on other sites and forums (especially the foreign ones)–just as long as you don’t say it’s YOURS”
Kudos to Murfeel on a very fair and open policy.
Even though Murfeel has set all but one of her uploads to free, This unselfish and ungreedy approach will not go down too well with Tom. Even unpaid SA’s have been banned from uploading their free items to their own sites, with some artists being hacked for less.
It will be interesting to see the outcome of this. Hopefully, after her recent hacking, Murfeel now uses a different password outside TSR to the one stored on the TSR DB.
Still, Tom has more pressing issues on his mind - A long term FA has been diagnosed with something very serious and she has taken some time off. Tom called a meeting to discuss this. Was it to organise a big bunch of flowers and a hope you get well soon card? No, it was to discuss striking her from the FA pool. Nice. She has only been away since December.
UPDATE
January 21, 2012
All is not well at TSR. We have leavings, hackings and fightings.
If you are Toms prized FA, it is not a good idea to let the cat out of the bag that you are getting itchy feet, this results in Tom getting itchy fingers and you losing a great deal of your digital life. It also appears that Toms not-so-prized FA’s are no safer. He has been a busy little gnome this week.
To top it all off we have a Moron-O with a god complex making waves ( and many enemies ) MMM… not sure if he thinks he is psychically channelling Atwa or if she has her hand up his ass. Again. Neither of them seem to be capable of doing the tasks they were assigned to do but are only too willing bark orders and act like they own the place. Atwa’s ‘low profile’ status means she has to keep her mouth publically shut so The Moron is working overtime spouting enough Verbal Diarrhea for the both of them.
We must have missed the memo that put him in charge, well those of us that still have Emails that is..
I smell another mutiny on the horizon.
September 6, 2011
May 4, 2011
A TSR FA has been convicted of fraud in the UK, this is the second time this FA has appeared before the courts for the same crime. I am still awaiting more details on the outcome of the first trial, which took place in January of last year; lack of information on the outcome prevented me from reporting on this at the time. Thomas flew out to the UK in the same week as the first trial took place, whether his flight was in fact connected to the trial is unknown. Details of the outcome still remain sketchy.
The same FA, already famed for allegedly stealing meshes of plant pots from MTS and selling them on TSR, has continued to commit the same crime of defrauding the UK government and has been brought to justice once more.
The fraud took place when this FA officially claimed that she was not working. She Shake and Shafted the UK government into paying her full welfare benefits by claiming she did not work and cannot work in any capacity due to ill health and has no other income, when in fact she was earning a set payment from her work at TSR and was paid $800 per month, which has risen up to $1000 per month. This fraud has been going on since Jan 2, 2006, so even at the lower rate of earnings I calculate she owes the UK tax payers over $50,000 for the period ending March 2011 when she was convicted. She has been ordered to return the money she has stolen, although it is not clear if she has to pay back the full amount, I imagine she would have to. She also has to pay the court fees and complete work in the community by cleaning public toilets.
She is still working as an FA, and still earning her fixed monthly payments, so either she has taken a cut in payments from the welfare system, or she is heading for her third fraud conviction.
I wonder how many other FA’s at TSR are committing the same crime; many countries all over the world have welfare systems just waiting to be abused by the greedy and the lazy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unemployment_benefits Such benefits are paid for by the taxes of hard working citizens, and it is sad to see this system being abused.
This shows TSR’s obvious disregard for the law by illegally employing workers and failing to obtain and register a social security number from any of its employees. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_identification_number
Which brings me to tax, how many FA’s, or indeed TSR themselves are paying tax on their earnings? Not many. For reference, this page shows the Swedish tax system including business tax rates, click on the list on the left of the page to see the tax rates in other countries. How much are TSR and its FA’s stealing from you?
http://www.taxrates.cc/html/sweden-tax-rates.html
I have a feeling this will not be the last fraud conviction we hear about.
November 24, 2009
UPDATED NOV 25
Atwa has announced her upcoming promotion as a Sims 3 FA, but she has asked that this be kept secret until Thomas makes it official on the site news. I have never been one to gossip so I will be very discreet Anita…
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April 7, 2009
TSR Myths and Lies
Welcome to all the new readers who have found their way here after ‘googling’ names and phrases found on TSR’s ’statement’ Listed below are the myths, lies and truths of that statement.
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