Misty Moonshine

Hi everyone, SASS has received a packet full of notices of "Unlicensed Use" of Imagery owned by several different companies- the Associated Press, The Canadian Press, Epa Images, Hearst Holdings, and Reuters. It seems that by our forum members here copying and posting comments containing images and memes containing images- as well as cartoons - without express permission from these companies has now resulted in some pretty steep fines for SASS. Because the infringement detail was so vast, after spending far too much time in an attempt to hunt them all down, I have been forced to remove certain threads entirely- the "Sticky cartoon thread" and the "funny photos add some" threads entirely. Additionally, I've hidden about a dozen other comments and posts with imagery that were listed in the notices we received. How do we move forward? I'm not sure yet... I don't want to remove the ability to share pictures within the forums, but we cannot (and will not) be subject to fines like this again. It may be time to start restricting access to the SASS Wire Forums to active SASS MEMBERS ONLY in an effort to maintain our sanctuary here... I will be consulting with our legal team as well as our Advisory Board on the best action moving forward. In the meantime, I'm asking everyone to PLEASE not copy and paste photos or memes from any internet news or image source. Thanks in advance, Misty Moonshine

Hi everyone, SASS has received a packet full of notices of "Unlicensed Use" of Imagery owned by several different companies- the Associated Press, The Canadian Press, Epa Images, Hearst Holdings, and Reuters. It seems that by our forum members here copying and posting comments containing images and memes containing images- as well as cartoons - without express permission from these companies has now resulted in some pretty steep fines for SASS. Because the infringement detail was so vast, after spending far too much time in an attempt to hunt them all down, I have been forced to remove certain threads entirely- the "Sticky cartoon thread" and the "funny photos add some" threads entirely. Additionally, I've hidden about a dozen other comments and posts with imagery that were listed in the notices we received. How do we move forward? I'm not sure yet... I don't want to remove the ability to share pictures within the forums, but we cannot (and will not) be subject to fines like this again. It may be time to start restricting access to the SASS Wire Forums to active SASS MEMBERS ONLY in an effort to maintain our sanctuary here... I will be consulting with our legal team as well as our Advisory Board on the best action moving forward. In the meantime, I'm asking everyone to PLEASE not copy and paste photos or memes from any internet news or image source. Thanks in advance, Misty Moonshine

SASS Family: With a heavy heart, I'm writing to let you know that our fellow SASS member, Major Art Tillery, SASS #87441 was killed in a car accident in Kansas this morning. A SASS member for 15 years, Major Art Tillery was a "young'n" in SASS by comparison- joining at the ripe age of 30 and was a Classic Cowboy- both in the category he shot at SASS matches and in the way he treated his fellow man. A member of the Magnificent Seven, he has been a big part of the surge in Classic Cowboy shooters in recent years. He was a true cowboy, and loved sharing his time with others in our sport. Please take a moment and lift his family and friends in prayer. Such a tragedy. Vaya Con Dios, Travis. You will be missed. In respect, Misty Moonshine

We are happy to help you reset your password if you find you have trouble with "Forgot password" option to log into the Forum. Once you meet the new minimum password requirements you'll be in and it'll be like nothing ever even happened. I apologize for not more closely monitoring this post and answering your questions and concerns in a more timely manner. Misty

Hi everyone!! Sorry for the delay in my getting back to you all on this. We've decided to delay the 2 factor authorization for now; but have implemented the new minimum password requirement. We'll give it a little time and see if we need to proceed with the 2FA down the road. Misty

Hello fellow SASS members! I trust this all finds you well. As many of you know, we have had several battles here on the Wire over the years with scam emails, phishing, and the dreadful spammers. Most recently, there was a situation where it seemed as if a scam artist had gained access to PM's here on the wire. I have had a conversation with our partners over at PSP Inc, and he sent the following message. Please read it and educate yourself to better gain an understanding of how these scammers work. Based on the information below, and in an effort to provide a more secure environment for all of our users, the SASS Wire Forums will be implementing 2 factor authentication and a minimum password requirement within the SASS wire forums. This post is a heads up that you will need to change your password - and can also expect to see a 2 factor authentication in order to access the forum soon. The new requirement will go into effect on Monday, July 29, 2024. Trying to stay a few steps ahead of the jerks that scam and spam us, Misty Moonshine ========================= Getting scam emails is not indicative of private messages being read by hackers. However it could point to someone having malware on their computer, or having a compromised account. For example, SASS Member Joe messages SASS Member Jack, but SASS Member Jack may have malware on his computer which allows a hacker to read the emails coming through. So then SASS Member Joe ends up getting a scam email as a result from the malware. If your forum has been targeted by scammers, it's possible some of your users have mistakenly clicked on the scam and got their computers infected by malware. This issue then spreads as those infected individuals receive emails, and more scam emails go out from the infected individuals to other users. It's easy to infect other users because scam emails will be coming from infected users, therefore it already has established trust so people willingly click on anything sent by their friends & peers. And this is how a virus gets spread to more and more users. Best way to combat this issue is to send out an alert to all, telling them how this scam works, and to inform people to not click on just anything. Also recently there was the biggest password leak in history, about 10 billion passwords were leaked on the dark web. You can read more about it here (https://cybernews.com/security/rockyou2024-largest-password-compilation-leak/) Basically many users are unaware their password to their online accounts are leaked. This means some of your users may have compromised forum and/or email accounts. Since private messages are sent through the forum and emails, if someone's email account is compromised, scammers can easily obtain email addresses from other users. The best recommendation is to ask your users to update their passwords to the forum and their email accounts, as well as run scans on their computers just to be safe. Most people don't change their password ever, so when a password leak occurs, they don't even realize someone else is accessing their online accounts. This isn't to rule the forum out completely, but there are just too many ways to allow scammers to obtain email addresses through various means. Please note that your forum is at the latest version, so there is no further updates I can apply to your forum. There are security options you can enable to make it harder for hackers to access accounts however: 1. Your forum currently does not utilize 2 factor authentication. Enabling 2FA will help secure your user accounts. Right now, anybody who knows the password of an account can just login and gain access to all the private messages and personal details. This also means if one of your moderators have their account compromised, since mods can read email addresses of users, this makes it easy for scammers to collect email address to send out further scam. 2. Your forum currently do not have a minimum strength password requirement. This means users can pick the shortest, easier to hack passwords for their forum accounts. Without 2FA, hackers can use bruteforce attacks to guess user passwords. Basically any passwords shorter than 10 characters can be hacked in less than an hour with today's technology. So enforcing strong passwords should be preferred.

A note to all Forum Users: The goal of the SASS Wire Forums is to provide a fun and resourceful place that users can come and discuss topics in regards to SASS and Cowboy Action Shooting. We also want to celebrate free exchange of information and conversation, and realize that "spirited" discussion can happen at times when the subject matter is one that we feel passionately about. It can be a challenge to express ideas and opinions in the written word and nearly impossible to judge intent of the manner of which it is intended. Please keep that in mind when posting on the forums- be considerate of the challenges we all face when trying to communicate on the SASS Wire. We are not looking to curtail expression- everyone has their opinions and are entitled to them. We want to make sure that everyone is able to participate fully and express themselves without fear of ridicule. There IS a difference between a debate and an argument. Arguments are disrespectful and will not be tolerated. Treating each other with respect is paramount. Please be considerate of the challenges that we all face when trying to communicate on the SASS Wire. Please refer to the following excerpt from the Guidelines: Inappropriate or offensive content and disruptive behavior will not be tolerated. To assist in defining inappropriate content, ask yourself the following questions when making a post: - Is this message SASS-related? (with the exception of the Saloon forum) - Is this message something most members would like to read? - Does this message add value to the forum? - Is this something I would say to a person face-to-face? *If you cannot answer yes to all of these questions, please reconsider posting your message. IGNORE FEATURE TIP: If you find there is a forum user that you no longer wish to see posts from,-regardless of the reason, there is a feature built in to the SASS Wire Forums that allows you to "IGNORE" a User. There are a few ways this can be accomplished. You can either hover over the member's icon that you wish to ignore and a "Ignore" option will come up- taking you to your Ignored Users page within YOUR account. This is where you can manage the content you see within the Forums. You can also arrive at your Ignored Users page within your account by clicking on the down arrow next to your name/account info in the top right corner and select "Ignored Users". This is similar to "unfollowing" someone in Facebook. Thank you, Misty Moonshine & the SASS Wire Moderating Team

There are no "techs" to hold out hope to see this and answer or fix. We don't have tech's.... our hosting service doesn't monitor our wire forums. All they do is maintain the software and keep it safe; installing upgrades, etc. The only way to get changes made is through SASS HQ- we communicate to the hosting service and do what we can to facilitate the request. I will have to contact them and ask them about Post #'s. If we can add them back, we will- but please understand that they are not software developers. Will do the best we can. As Allie mentioned on another post... I cant read every thread or post either... if there is something like this that comes up - don't just "hope" I happen to see it. Please reach out to me directly at misty@sassnet.com Misty Moonshine