Erased-Broken or Not?, How to fix? Options

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

But in SR4, where everybody and his mom has an active comlink 24/7, there is no way in hell. You might be able to avoid leaving Data trails if you go run exclusively in Angkor Watt and even then that's iffy (I wouldn't be surprised if the Naga liked their MTV).

Not as hard as you might think... Multiple Identities, with multiple comlinks... If you , as a runner, are running with the same comlink, 24/7/365, and same Identity, then yes, you will eventually leave a trail that a Zugmachine can navigate... constant changing of Identities, SIN,s and Licenses, and constant vigilence against leaving a coherent trail, along with the stripping and burning of old SIN's and whatnot, will allow you to operate under that Identification Radar. Only real problem is that it is not a cheap process to maintain. Having the Erased Quality makes it a bit more palatable, and slightly easier to do. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/talker.gif)

[Manunancy]

Though there's a complication with that : many legals activities suppose that you have a coherent datatrail. If you're going a pile of identities none of which is genuine, you're going to have troubles interacting with the high quality services. Granted most of those are way beyond the average shadowrunner's income, but that's going to be a problem if they get a crapload of money and whant to do something with it.

There are backchannels to get those sort of services without interacting with the legitimate businesses and the associated controls, but they're usually controled by organized crimes factions who will have their own verifications and can bring all sort of unpleasant complications, unless you're willing to fork a lot of cash.

[hyzmarca]

Unless you change your face whenever you change IDs it will be fairly trivial to tie them together. Cameras are everywhere and in everything. Unless you've spend essence or PP on the ability to do massive facial alterations on the fly, it really should be impossible to avoid being IDed.

And even if you can resculpt your faceal bone structure on the fly, lets not forget that they could just analyze and cross reference local Matrix traffic and figure out that ID A stopped broadcasting at the same time and place ID B started broadcasting.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Though there's a complication with that : many legals activities suppose that you have a coherent datatrail. If you're going a pile of identities none of which is genuine, you're going to have troubles interacting with the high quality services. Granted most of those are way beyond the average shadowrunner's income, but that's going to be a problem if they get a crapload of money and whant to do something with it.

There are backchannels to get those sort of services without interacting with the legitimate businesses and the associated controls, but they're usually controled by organized crimes factions who will have their own verifications and can bring all sort of unpleasant complications, unless you're willing to fork a lot of cash.

Which is why I made tha comment that it would have significant costs attached to it...

And even if your Identity is supposed to have legal activities attached to it (they generally do), those activities are rarely checked to verify that you are who you say you are. Last tiem I spent money on my credit card, they did not perform a background check to see if I attended the Middle School I said I did. All tehy wasnt to verify is will the transaction succeed. That is usually the extent of verification that goes on today. I do not really see it changing in 60 years. Yes, you will leave a trail, but who cares. As long as you can avoif any Legal Entanglements, you should be okay... If you encounter the entanglement, then you just Strip/Burn the Identiy, purchase a new one, and move along. Erased is a great help in this regard...

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Unless you change your face whenever you change IDs it will be fairly trivial to tie them together. Cameras are everywhere and in everything. Unless you've spend essence or PP on the ability to do massive facial alterations on the fly, it really should be impossible to avoid being IDed.

And even if you can resculpt your faceal bone structure on the fly, lets not forget that they could just analyze and cross reference local Matrix traffic and figure out that ID A stopped broadcasting at the same time and place ID B started broadcasting.

Which is why you use alternate ID's to establish those small trails, so that it does not appear as if they JUST appeared... in addition, The higher rated ID's are assumed to come with some history attached to them. No different, really, than the Witness Protection program in the US. False identities created with a complete backtrail....

Current Character I play has 10 Completely different ID's, with a mix of genders (Male and Female, obviously) and mix of Metatypes (Human, Elf, and Orc)... they all have completely different backgrounds and different spending habits. They all have places to call their own, and their own contacts and friends. And their Aura's are even different (Magic helps here a great deal). Does it take an exceptional amount of Time, Resources and Influence to keep them all valid? Indeed, but it can be done if you want it bad enough... On the chance that the character needs to generate a new identity and burn an old one, he does it, and spends the money to make it work.

Anyways...

[Fortinbras]

You seem to be under the impression that Shadowrun is an Orwellian world, rather than a distopian one.

If there isn't a way to avoid being traced by the man, then there would be no Shadowrunners. Unwired gives some great examples of how things like Data Balkanization and Data overload can make it very hard to track someone down.
Don't forget that, much like in the real world, people are bad at their jobs, machines break and some wage slave rarely cares enough about his meager paycheck to contradict the computer.

Inability to track folk through computers isn't a pie in the sky idea. I know tons of people who avoid it every day.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

You seem to be under the impression that Shadowrun is an Orwellian world, rather than a distopian one.

If there isn't a way to avoid being traced by the man, then there would be no Shadowrunners. Unwired gives some great examples of how things like Data Balkanization and Data overload can make it very hard to track someone down.
Don't forget that, much like in the real world, people are bad at their jobs, machines break and some wage slave rarely cares enough about his meager paycheck to contradict the computer.

Inability to track folk through computers isn't a pie in the sky idea. I know tons of people who avoid it every day.

Not sure if this is directed at me there Fortinbras, but I completely agree with you. But, there is never any harm in covering your bases. I tend to go to extreme lengths to cover my bases if I can do so. Has kept me ahead of the LS/KE/CC Goons for a long time... Of course, some characters are better at it than others... *shrug*

[Fortinbras]

Not directed toward any one person directly, save the OP.
Shadowrun should breed a little paranoia, but not so much that if your face is caught on camera you feel the need to blow up all your cars, kill everyone you know and change your DNA.

[Smokeskin]

It's impossible for runners not to leave data trails behind. I don't mean that it is very difficult, I mean impossible in the same sense that I'd say it was impossible for your PC to eat the sun. It simply cannot be done in setting. It never could be done, not even in SR1. Balkanization and extraterritoriality simply meant that it was harder for people to connect the dots.

But in SR4, where everybody and his mom has an active comlink 24/7, there is no way in hell. You might be able to avoid leaving Data trails if you go run exclusively in Angkor Watt and even then that's iffy (I wouldn't be surprised if the Naga liked their MTV).

Characters who play Pink Mohawk in a Black Suit game are going to get headshotted by a sniper no matter what qualities they have. As has been stated, you can't hack a hillbilly. Erased doesn't destroy physical records or human memories.

I believe you're taking a grayscale issue and looking at it in black and white.

If you look at the following categories, I'm sure you can come up with actions that fit in each of them, making it obvious to you what the advantages of Erased are:

Things any runner can get away with
Things only an Erased runner can get away with
Things no runner can get away with

The boundaries between them will of course vary from table to table, but in everything but the most extreme pink mohawk games, there are things only Erased runners can get away with.

Do you really not see the difference between the authorities having a recording of you killing someone, and only a few witnesses or cops who reviewed the footage before it got erased remembering what your face looks like? In the latter case, nothing can be released to the media, photos can't be circulated, there's nothing for facial recognition software to use. The same goes for prints and DNA and financial trails and whatnot. You're left pretty much only worrying about witnesses.

[Mäx]

Do you really not see the difference between the authorities having a recording of you killing someone, and only a few witnesses or cops who reviewed the footage before it got erased remembering what your face looks like? In the latter case, nothing can be released to the media, photos can't be circulated, there's nothing for facial recognition software to use. The same goes for prints and DNA and financial trails and whatnot. You're left pretty much only worrying about witnesses.

You seem to be under the impression that Erased somehow magically destroys all the non digital files too, which it certainly doesn't do.

And ofcource if someone wants it bad enought, all those destroyed digital files can be gotten back.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

You seem to be under the impression that Erased somehow magically destroys all the non digital files too, which it certainly doesn't do.

And ofcource if someone wants it bad enought, all those destroyed digital files can be gotten back.

Asssumming that a Technomancer really wanted to Quest for that Data, sure...
Of course, Data could have been transferred to Offline Cold Storage prior to Erasure as well... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[Smokeskin]

You seem to be under the impression that Erased somehow magically destroys all the non digital files too, which it certainly doesn't do.

What do you mean by non digital files?

[Yerameyahu]

He's of the crazy opinion that non-digital files exist. Ridiculous. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

In any case, Erased works *as written*, regardless of cleverness. Unwanted data is gone within 7 days/24 hours, that's the crunch.

[CanRay]

Dead Tree Format. Cannot be hacked. There will always be paper files.

[Yerameyahu]

Nah. And maybe there are robot file handlers to hack, or document retrieval orders to hack. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Anyway, I'm not saying Erased is OP or not, just commenting.

[Mardrax]

*shrug* I doubt there'd be paper trails of anything but really important stuff. With the ubiquitousness of AR and thing like electronic paper, distribution of files to personell is far easier through digital than paper means.
Unless someone discovers data going missing. That would be plenty valid argument to hook up a printer.

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

Let's sau Johnny Erased goes on a run against Corp A and does a mess in there territory. The Corp uses every resource they have to catch Johnny Erased and after a week their records are gone without a trail. Now, someone in middle management of the security department, Middle Johnson, probably lost its job or was demoted because of the disaperance of those files and such.

Three months later, Johnny Erased goes on a run against Corp A again and does another mess, AGAIN. Middle Johnson is assigned to the operation and recognizes Johnny Erased, remembering what happened months ago, he makes offline copies AND hardcopies of the files to prevent Johnny Erased of disappearing again. Ok, it is just one guy, trying to prove the boss that the guy can hack into their "unhackable" system and erase his prints but the bosses don't believe in him, until a week later, the data trail is erased again and Middle Johnson is the sole owner of any copy of these files, that he can't put back online or they will be erased again.

Erased can take care of a lot of problems, but it also gives excellent plot hooks.

[kzt]

And even if you can resculpt your faceal bone structure on the fly, lets not forget that they could just analyze and cross reference local Matrix traffic and figure out that ID A stopped broadcasting at the same time and place ID B started broadcasting.

Heck, Grid Guide can do that too.

[CanRay]

Heck, Grid Guide can do that too.

Yeah, and Grid Guide is so unhackable. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Saint Sithney]

Dead Tree Format. Cannot be hacked. There will always be paper files.

Any mage with Flexible Signature to recreate your Aura exactly upon viewing it once. Then anyone who sees him doing so, can do likewise.

Oh, and additionally, they can do this for the benefit of a Spirit, which can then use its Search power to find you no matter what.


Hay! You know what's really broken? ^That^

[Mardrax]

Let's until a week later, the data trail is erased again and Middle Johnson is the sole owner of any copy of these files, that he can't put back online or they will be erased again.

Or put them online again, to discover them magically dissapearing after an exact week again.

[CanRay]

If you piss him off enough, a simple dedicated One-Way Transmission of data records can be done from a Datastore that's set to Read-Only. In 2070, you can set a TOASTER to do this and then hook it up in some hard to find place.

I suggest an old age home for Veterans. Having to run a Shadowrun against a bunch of old soldiers would be... Interesting: "OK, I checked up on the histories of these people, and this is the person we absolutely have to worry about." *Brings up holo of a 70-year old man* "What the frag can he do to us?" "Well, five Spikes decided his wallet would be nice last week, and they're still in the hospital unable to speak. He was UCAS Marine Force Recon, their Special Forces. I can't even bring up the rest of his file, aside from his medals. Which are, well, exceptional. And not a single 'Forgot To Duck' Purple Heart in the lot." "Oh, yeah, we stay away from this slot for sure!"

[Brazilian_Shinob...]

A RED campaign?

As long as I'm not going against Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman and John Malkovich, I think I would be fine.

[Draco18s]

Or put them online again, to discover them magically dissapearing after an exact week again.

Its "within a week" not "after 10,080 minutes."

[Mardrax]

Its "within a week" not "after 10,080 minutes."

Ah. You're right. I thought that was written as "after a week", like the 24 hour version is.
It appears the 5 bp hacker or other mysterious plot device is a lot less punctual than his 10 bp equivalent.