Security Notice - Therian-Guide

DISCONTINUE USE OF THERIAN-GUIDE – DO NOT VISIT!
Original Post re: Therian-Guide Allegation (archive), (image), (image archive)

Recent allegations made against The Therian Guide have caused the safety of the site to be called into question. Particularly, at this time, I believe the site to be extremely unsafe for users under the age of eighteen. However, due to a pattern of threats made by the administrators against further users, I also believe the site to be unsafe for adults to use as well. The links above detail the allegations made, and provide evidence to back them up. A summary can be found below.

The allegations levied against the site can summarized as the following, from least to most severe.

1. Administrators have the ability to read private messages of users on the site, and they hide this fact.
2. Therian Guide employs several cult-like tactics to retain members, and ensure they ignore criticism of the site.
3. Administrators have threatened critics of the site.
4. An Administrator has allegedly groomed and had sexual conversations with minors on the site.

As numerous pieces of evidence have come to light surrounding these accusations in the past several days, I urge all current and prospective users of therian-guide to discontinue accessing the site at once. If you have been subjected to threats, sexual enticement, or other illegal behavior on behalf of the administration team of therian guide, please immediately contact law enforcement.

Actions taken on Kinmunity

1. Therian-Guide links have been BLOCKED from Kinmunity; in order to protect the safety of our users, we will not permit outgoing links to TG to exist on this site.
2. Therian-Guide's owners have been BANNED from Kinmunity; because they present a direct safety risk to our users under the age of eighteen, they are not permitted to use Kinmunity.
3. In order to protect minors on the site, Kinmunity does not allow users under the age of eighteen to: use Kinmunity to plan or attend real-life howls, attempt to meetup with or Kinmunity users, or access adult areas of the site.
4. Adults caught soliciting minors on Kinmunity, including eRP (erotic roleplay) or textual solicitations, will not only be banned, but also will be referred to the appropriate law enforcement agency for prosecution. We don't play around with this - don't do it.

I have attached a GPG signed statement on this matter.

 

[Lighter]

The Library Backup of the previous Kinmunity is on this site. Will it be relocated?

 

[Naia]

This backup is unauthorized and was done without permission of Kinmunity staff or the authors of the original articles. However, if they do have such a backup, this could help us restore the library and I would appreciate it if they could be forwarded to me.

 

[InkyDaily]

...ew.

 

[Lighter]

This backup is unauthorized and was done without permission of Kinmunity staff or the authors of the original articles. However, if they do have such a backup, this could help us restore the library and I would appreciate it if they could be forwarded to me.

Here it is.

 

[Naia]

Here it is.

Thank you. I am working on getting them into the articles library as soon as possible. In cases where an author is still a Kinmunity issue, I will add their article and associate it with their current Kinmunity account. In cases where the user is no longer a member, or it is not possible to find out their new username, I will set "KinBot" as the author account, and put their former username in the original source field, as well as add a note on top of the article.

 

[Lighter]

Is it possible to get law enforcement to force the site owners to remove the profiles of those who did not know about their crimes when joining, are totally condemning their criminal activity, and therefore want existing accounts deleted? @SibylR is such a case, and there are most likely others.

 

[Jethero]

Is it possible to get law enforcement to force the site owners to remove the profiles of those who did not know about their crimes when joining, are totally condemning their criminal activity, and therefore want existing accounts deleted? @SibylR is such a case, and there are most likely others.

Supposedly you can get the GDPR stuff involved, since their host is in Germany, but so far all TG has done is ban your account. No one's actually had their accounts deleted, although they do have a month to do it. Still, if they don't delete the account within a month, they're liable and can be taken to court.

 

[SoothsayerSasha]

On first glance I found a favourable statement in their terms:

"10. [...]content posted on the forums is the property of the respective authors"

The question is, will they respect their own rules in this regard?

 

[Jethero]

On first glance I found a favourable statement in their terms:

The question is, will they respect their own rules in this regard?

I think it just means they won't take credit for the content their users post, like if they made an essay or something. Perhaps also so they can't be liable for the content their users post.

 

[SoothsayerSasha]

I think it just means they won't take credit for the content their users post, like if they made an essay or something. Perhaps also so they can't be liable for the content their users post.

My thoughts were is if they put a "we have the rights to modify, adapt and publish your content solely for the purpose of displaying" type clause, even if not contractually binding, would make less of a case for them to delete user content on their own accord. I like the GDPR route, that is a possible avenue to explore, always rings positive to hear a standard for the protection of users.

 

[Naia]

Is it possible to get law enforcement to force the site owners to remove the profiles of those who did not know about their crimes when joining, are totally condemning their criminal activity, and therefore want existing accounts deleted? @SibylR is such a case, and there are most likely others.

Unfortunately, the law often moves much slower than technology. The situation was reported to law enforcement, as well as to the relevant data protection authority. However, as you already know, they have a grace period of thirty days to honor deletion requests. In the case of my (rejected) account, they blatantly refused to do this. However, being in the United States, I am not a position to contest this in court if the data protection authority does not take administrative action.

As the appropriate warnings have been given, and any existing evidence turned over to the appropriate law enforcement agency, I feel it does not do us well to continue to discuss the matter. If you have personally been groomed by LycanTheory, please make a report here - this matter is now closed from a Kinmunity perspective.