(April 3, 2012 at 2:57 pm)whateverist Wrote: Do moderators have access to PM's sent between members?Yes. Administrators can access them as a large list via the Admin CP. Moderators would have to sign in as other people's accounts (which they have the ability to do in order to help change settings, etc). Anyone with root access to the server (currently theVOID, Synackaon, and I) could also theoretically access them via the database.
Quote:Do you think there are ever good reasons for accessing such PM's for any reason whatsoever?Yes. We have caught multiple spammers this way. We have also caught numerous trolls and sock accounts (malicious ones) by the gloating PMs they send to other people.
If so, for what reasons and who should do it?
This shouldn't be news to people; we've been quite open about this ever since Saerules was banned a couple of years ago after failing to report and actively encouraging a troll who revealed himself to her in a PM. In addition, we make it very clear when signing up that we have the ability to do this:
http://atheistforums.org/member.php?action=register Wrote:You further agree that all information you enter into this website is accessible by the Administrators, and possibly the rest of the staff team, and may be used to investigate rule violations.
