Wiznet is a repository of data collected by BYOND games, websites, C programs, and anything else its' users can manage to create an outbound socket or HTTP connection on. Typically, upon entering or launching a site or program with any manner of identifiable information about you (I.E. a username), your moniker, IP address, and the location you're entering are sent to the system for retrieval by games with read access later. There are three primary purposes for the existance of Wiznet (in order of use and intent):

Administration utilities (we can easily ban a troll completely by starting with a good list of what keys and IPs they've used).

Identificiation of owners of pseudonyms on the BYOND system.

Collecting demographics (for instance, it wouldn't be too hard to discover which of Wiznet's networked games is the most popular).

In four words: not in the least. An IP address is not a sacred item and is an easily discernable feature of your online presence, just like your hair colour would be out in public. In addition, any service you've ever connected to using a username and password set likely employs a system similar to Wiznet for in-house purposes; the difference is that Wiznet spans multiple areas, and makes the information public instead of hiding it all for in-house administrative purpose.

Wiznet only has two permission types as far as its records:

duplex: The game owner has permission to read current records from the system as well as export records for addition to the system.

read: The game owner has permissions only to read current records.

All Wiznet users have the ability to read records, and those deemed trustworthy are given access to add records to the system (duplex permissions).

For *developers* looking to make programmatic use of Wiznet on their game, site, program, or otherwise, you must start by applying for access to the system using the link named as such at your left; access is not guaranteed, as the application form is simply part of a screening process. The rest of you idiots need to stop sending me applications with every field completed "idk" and just use the "Web Search" link at left, because there is nothing further for non-developers to gain from the system.

No. If anything, those with authority as far as BYOND goes would rather Wiznet goes away, which provides one of the best reasons for me to continue running it.

Wiznet's search is a simple recursion. Using the key or IP address provided, the system retrieves the opposite type of data and uses that to collect more data. For example, when given the key "naruto123", Wiznet will find IP addresses that naruto123 has been recorded using. Then, using the IP addresses it collected, will iterate another search for any keys used by any of the IP addresses found, and the process repeats ad infinitum until Wiznet no longer finds any new data.

Unless the association in question is so obviously wrong that it boggles the mind how it ever occurred, or a mistake was made by a duplex flow user, no. It takes no leap of the imagination to fathom most of the associations in the database as correct, so it takes spectacular circumstances to warrant my manually modifying database records.

Everybody who is capable of typing can see all monikers that belong to someone. All registered users of the system are granted the right to view IP addresses on file, and duplex flow users are privy to a private set of comments added by other duplex flow users.