How to find if someone is invisible on Gtalk / Gmail chat

I discovered a bug in Google Talk’s invisible status feature available in its Gmail Chat version and Gtalk Lab Edition version. If use smartly, you can figure out if some is avoiding you or really offline.

Here are steps:

Set the chat as off the record with target user (how?). This can be done only when the other user is online. (need help?)
Now try sending chat to that user when he is invisible or offline.
If he is invisible, then he will receive chat.
But if he Is offline, then you will receive error “ did not receive your chat”.

Explanation:

Point 1: When a chat is set off the record, it will no longer get stored in your Gmail account.
Point 2: When you send a chat message to offline or invisible user, it gets delivered by default. At receiving end if user is online, a chat screen pops up showing him your message. If he is offline, your chat message will go to inbox as a mail.
Now if you put together above points then you will notice that, when you set chat off the record it can’t be delivered to inbox as mail, so it will be delivered only if user is online (no matter if he is invisible).
Now the only tricky part is finding a user online for once to set chat off the records. This doesn’t seem hard as invisible status is still limited to Gmail version of Google Talk and you may be in luck if your friend uses Google Talk desktop clients/gadgets or third party IM client to chat.

14 comments:

AnonymousAugust 14, 2008 at 12:40 AM
great.... can't wait to check it out... :D
AnonymousFebruary 1, 2009 at 8:32 AM
doesn't work:/
Shubham NeO ©®February 1, 2009 at 12:17 PM
It does work, make sure you have not blocked the person you are checking and let the list of friends load completely before checking !
SrijithJanuary 14, 2010 at 8:25 AM
Here is a perl script to find invisible users in gmail. It checks for all users in your contacts.
http://blog.sriunplugged.com/linux/find-invisible-users-in-gmail/
aandrrAugust 8, 2010 at 2:05 PM
Detect invisible users on Yahoo Messenger,Detect invisible Yahoo Messenger IDs in Who is invisible ( http://www.who-is-invisible.co.cc )
vyompvOctober 2, 2010 at 7:57 PM
Hello

I have made a small java program which can find invisible users/buddies in gmail and users/buddy who has blocked you in gmail easily.
Please visit the site to get the software. A recent update version gives all the combined solution.
Please visit this link http://vyompvblog.blogspot.com/2010/06/find-invisible-users-of-gtalk-gmail.html ; visit the latest update mentioned in the site to get the blocking users too.
AnonymousFebruary 3, 2011 at 3:16 PM
I like http://www.Jdetector.com I using it for a year and is very good
AnonymousMarch 30, 2011 at 2:15 PM
Yahoo invisible status detector: www.Jdetector.com - 100% accurate.
SrijithApril 7, 2011 at 12:15 AM
Here is a perl script to find invisible users in gmail. It checks for all users in your contacts.
http://blog.sriunplugged.com/linux/find-invisible-users-in-gmail/
aandrrApril 7, 2011 at 12:15 AM
Detect invisible users on Yahoo Messenger,Detect invisible Yahoo Messenger IDs in Who is invisible ( http://www.who-is-invisible.co.cc )
SadsacJune 23, 2011 at 4:16 AM
Here is another invisible scanner http://www.ymland.com it is a very simple and helpfull tool

to detect invisible users.
Xpl0si0nSeptember 2, 2011 at 12:45 PM
you can try www.xeeber.net - 100% accurate
shaiksaik 132November 18, 2011 at 12:11 PM
its not 100% correct , when the user logout with invisible mode then its not work.
if he logout with the available mode then only its work.....
AnonymousMay 10, 2012 at 1:30 AM
You forgot http://www.messengerstatus.net/.Is on 1st place in google.com on "yahoo status" and works perfect. I always use it.

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