It has come to my attention (via a few friends on IRC, whose names I have forgotten), that during any failed Starcraft BATTLE.NET connection (i.e. you have an invalid CD-Key), some sensitive information is (illegally) retrieved from your registry and sent up to Blizzard. This only seems to occur the first time you connect using an invalid key, but not afterwards. I have personally confirmed this using socket traces. As of the writing of this document, 6 registry keys in particular are checked and sent back to Blizzard, who obviously hope to collect names and e-mail addresses of those who attempt "invalid" connections to BATTLE.NET. These 6 keys are: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MS Setup (ACME)\User Info\DefName HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Mail and News\Mail\Sender Name HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Netscape Navigator\User\User_Name HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Mail and News\Mail\Sender EMail HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Netscape\Netscape Navigator\User\User_Addr HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Kali\Kali95\User Info\email Blizzard has the ability to change which registry keys are checked at any time, but currently only these 6 are checked. I would advise doing a "Find" operation in REGEDIT and removing any traces of your real e-mail and name. To combat this outright "invasion" of your computer privacy, I have coded a small program that will make your computer "anonymous" by setting these 6 registry keys to anonymous values. (Setting the names to Ben Dover and downloading@this.info.is.illegal.com, in particular). Just run BNETANON.EXE to display your current settings and click YES to "anonymize" them. Any settings that show up as "" have never been created, so you don't need to worry about them. Can't believe that Blizzard would do such a thing? Do the socket trace yourself: go to http://www.win-tech.com, download Socket Spy/32, and register it using the following codes: Name=Beowulf Company=RAZOR 1911 Code=OHJGH3LNLKM3O372 (note that all the O's are the letter O, not zero) Fire up Socket Spy/32, do "File/Begin Trace" (you may want to also turn on Capture To Disk to save a .TXT copy of the trace) then launch Starcraft and attempt a BATTLE.NET connection. After you are denied, exit out of Starcraft and check out the trace results. If this is the first time you have attempted to connect to BATTLE.NET using a particular bogus CD-Key, you should see what I mean. Note that the registry keys are only polled the FIRST time you try an invalid key, but not afterwards (I THINK). I have included a trace I did myself as TRACE.TXT. What does all of this mean? Well, if you plan to do "war-dialing" with generated keys to find a valid one, you will definately want to make your information anonymous. If you don't ever use BATTLE.NET for Starcraft, then this doesn't affect you at all. - Beowulf [RAZOR 1911]