An interesting story about avatar identity theft and virtual property.
There has been some research about this over at Annenberg and Douglas Thomas has been talking about the legal problems that will arise as this becomes more of an issue.
http://www.jackmyers.com/commentary/media-business-report/11193066.html
Avatar Identity Theft Prompts Review of Gaia and Virtual World Rules
A week passes. During that time an increasingly and palpably depressed Clementine attempts logging on at least once a day. Alas, Bluebird is still banned, in oblivion, or both. After a few weeks pass, Mom re-contacts Gaia. They indicate that Clementine -- despite Terms of Service indicating never to give out one's password across Gaia –- has provided her password to a scammer. There is no recourse suggested.
The month grinds on for mother and daughter and it becomes clear this will not be resolved through available channels. Intervention by this journalist with Gaia public relations results in Clementine regaining access to Gaia with the user name left to her by the hacker, but her original avatar name is lost, she is unrecognizable in-world to her friends, she has none of her possessions that were accumulated through active in-world effort and all but a small amount of her Gaia gold is gone. "My watermeat is here," Clementine tearfully finds. "That's good." (Watermeat is her virtual pet; visualize a fish on a leash.).
Clementine, dejected, unenthusiastically searches all of the areas of the site she once frequented, feeling a shadow of her former self. When she looks in her account at the marketplace (like an eBay exchange) she realizes that while she was banned someone had traded her possessions for $134,508 in Gaian gold. Her identity lost, her valuable possessions stolen and sold, for the first time she now knows what it feels like to be the victim of a serious crime.
