So its very much likely that hundereds if not thousands of people randomly spread out on different parts of the globe, who do not frequent the same sites over the net or run the same programs on similar sytems with the same level of protection, hence who barely have anything in common other than playing the same game would have 'RAT' (or whatever other form of trojans you can pull out from your) on their PCs. And the one factor that connects them all together, ie the game, is As A RULE clean as a whistle.
Lo! Your IQ must be beyond single digits! Just kidding, but refrain from throwing out stupid one liners or people might start questioning your motives if nothing else.
Originally posted by Slampig
When my account was inactive for about a year it was hacked as well. But it all stopped when I got the authenticator.
As far as Atlantica Online, when I said "a" company I was referring to Blizzard of course. Could care less about Atlantica Online, tried it once and it wasn't for me, so if you guys lost all that stuff it is a shame.
In the grand shceme of things, to think that Blizzard is doing this, and here is the KEY WORD from my post, PURPOSEFULLY, is ridiculous. What would they stand to gain? If there is a problem on their end there is a problem on their end. It doesn't mean they are out to get you, what ar they going to do with the gold or items they take anyway? Sell them to themselves?
I dont know why you would post such a comment. You are pretty much validating the OP's paranoia. It kinda proves the OP right when someone who is defending Blizzard with all zeal, admits to having been hacked due to no fault of his own but said attacks once stop when he bought/used Blizzard's authenticator. Going to take your side here and say that you got that whatever free app, but even then to have your account be safeguarded from attacks ONLY after you have this authenticator says a Lot. Why even have a login and password if without this allmighty authenticator your account is prone to getting attacked at anytime? Doesnt make sense yea?
If you dint mean 'any' company, then explicitly use the word Blizzard. Dont use confusion caused to your advantage
As for the "WHYS", I cant be arsed enough to explain it here, since fanboys are going to deny it if its right under their noses, anti-fanboys will jump on the point without even understanding it and to have a rational discussion in middle of the back and forth between the two abovementioned parties, is futile at best.
While I think there is a problem with this whole situation somehow or another I'm not trying to say Bliz is trying to intentionally do anything but I did think up another thing that burnt my ass the one time my account was stolen. I use a lot of different passwords. When my account was stolen, they weren't able to get into my email, yet, they were able to change my password on my wow account.
I see that as a big security threat on it's own right there, should be an email validation to change passwords imho.
So its very much likely that hundereds if not thousands of people randomly spread out on different parts of the globe, who do not frequent the same sites over the net or run the same programs on similar sytems with the same level of protection, hence who barely have anything in common other than playing the same game would have 'RAT' (or whatever other form of trojans you can pull out from your) on their PCs. And the one factor that connects them all together, ie the game, is As A RULE clean as a whistle.
Lo! Your IQ must be beyond single digits! Just kidding, but refrain from throwing out stupid one liners or people might start questioning your motives if nothing else.
You really have no idea how wide spread malware is do you? Very few computers are "clean" as it takes a lot of work and multiple applications to do it and even than you are only finding what is known.
Most people use the same computer to broswe the web, download games/apps, read email, etc and if they have a active antivirus app at all they only update it once in a great whiile.
People aren't getting emails from blizzard about being hacked. Those are phishing attempts. Just because the link "looks legit" doesn't mean it is, there are ways around that. This is the probably the most common way people get there account comprimised, it happened to, I'm not ashamed to admit it. I had no idea at the time what was happening.
If you ever get an email from blizzard about your account being hacked or anything along that line, and that you need to visit blizzard to "verfiy" that it was hacked, you need to delete that email and CALL blizzard to verify that your account is ok or not. Or in the least, open your browser, go to Bnet or WoW directly, enter your account info. The first clue you'll get that your account is compromised, is you won't be able to log in.
I do have an issue with Blizzards security though, it's the same issue I have with pretty much everyones security. The email you get about a change of password, rarely ever requires you to actually verify that you changed the passworld. More often then not the email is just tellin you it's been changed and to ignore it if you did change it. They should require verification in the email if you change account info.
So I follow the link like an idiot, log into my account. Few minutes later I get an email that my Bnet password was changed. Odd, I didn't change it. First and last time I ever clicked a link in a email "that blizzard sent me".
Other time I got hacked. Again, my fault. Used the same email and password as my WoW account on Curse. Curse got compromised, I thought nothing of it. Unfortunately, that same password was used for my email. Wouldn't you know it. The same day my WoW account is a stolen, my email accounts password was also changed.
All the cool kids hate blizzard, why would anyone expect these people to admit that it was their fault.
So its very much likely that hundereds if not thousands of people randomly spread out on different parts of the globe, who do not frequent the same sites over the net or run the same programs on similar sytems with the same level of protection, hence who barely have anything in common other than playing the same game would have 'RAT' (or whatever other form of trojans you can pull out from your) on their PCs. And the one factor that connects them all together, ie the game, is As A RULE clean as a whistle.
I never said that, but don't fret, I enjoy your ad hominem's.
By your logic OS X is completely safe since we rarely hear about it being breached.
Diablo 3 stores character info server side right .......... so then why was there customer service message until around an hour ago basically a scare tactic telling people that if you did not get an authenticator and your account was compromised customer service could only restore it twice and that there were only periodic save points and you would experience a tremendous loss in game progress if u did not get an authenticatior. How can there be such a huge gap in save points if character info is saved server side
Originally posted by hellsnot Diablo 3 stores character info server side right .......... so then why was there customer service message until around an hour ago basically a scare tactic telling people that if you did not get an authenticator and your account was compromised customer service could only restore it twice and that there were only periodic save points and you would experience a tremendous loss in game progress if u did not get an authenticatior. How can there be such a huge gap in save points if character info is saved server side
Maybe this is Blizzard's way of saying: "Hey, we're tired of you (the consumer) being a complete moron when it comes to computer safety, so either you get an authenticator or get your PC together!" but, probably not.
I'm an IT consultant and have never had any security issues with my system or accounts for ANYTHING. I educate people on security FFS.
Those who can, do; those who can't, teach.
As far as account compromises, your system and your security doesn't need to be breached. Nor does Blizzards.
Is the email address used for your WoW account unique to only be used with WoW and is in no way associated with any other login method to any peripheral gaming website?
Same goes for your password. Is your password completely unique to WoW and never used anywhere else in any variant?
My bet? They aren't.
My WoW account was totally secure without an authenticator. I never had problems for years. I made 1 mistake that I can trace back to that led to my account compromise. I created an account on a gaming website with the same email and password as my WoW login. My account was deactivated for about 7 months. I created the account on the website and 2 months later I got emails from Blizzard stating my account was banned.
Why is it WoW getting hacked and not other MMOs?
Some other MMOs have smaller problems of the same type, but the scale is off. WoW is huge. The biggest in the West. Naturally its the biggest target.
Why are there so many more virus and malware for PC over Mac? Same deal.
The vast majority of people claiming innocence in a compromise have stories full of holes. Its easy to point fingers but there is no reason to point one at Blizzard. Even though I agree they are pretty retarded to not have an IP region check or better standard account security.
This is breaking a little silly, and I don't want to sound crazy, but I've never been hacked, ever. I have good software solutions, and I protect myself with an extensive whitelist for websites. No account of mine had ever been compromised, until a few months after the release of the authenticator. I hadn't been playing WoW for a while, but I one day got an email that my account had been banned for disallowed behavior (i.e. gold selling and whatnot). An account that wasn't even active and hadn't been for some time had been hacked and reactivated, presumably to sell all my characters' gold and valuables and advertise, with the knowledge that it would be closed shortly afterward.
That doesn't seem like a logical thing for gold farmers to do, and it didn't make sense or sit well with me.
"There are two great powers, and they've been fighting since time began. Every advance in human life, every scrap of knowledge and wisdom and decency we have has been torn by one side from the teeth of the other. Every little increase in human freedom has been fought over ferociously between those who want us to know more and be wiser and stronger, and those who want us to obey and be humble and submit."
John Parry, to his son Will; "The Subtle Knife," by Phillip Pullman
You really have no idea how wide spread malware is do you? Very few computers are "clean" as it takes a lot of work and multiple applications to do it and even than you are only finding what is known.
Most people use the same computer to broswe the web, download games/apps, read email, etc and if they have a active antivirus app at all they only update it once in a great whiile.
And you pretty much have no idea on What malware is do you? Not every malware (which by itself is a broad term not pertaining to certain XXX code, script or ware) snoops the affected person's computer for login information to a game. What I was talking about to that other poster was concerning the rampant hacking in this game called Atlantica Online. Offtopic to a certain extent, but please refrain from interjecting without knowing what is being spoken about. His claims to have a RAT grab account information, for thousands of players whose sole point of similarity is the game in question, is ridiculous if nothing else.
Ofcourse, the layman has/had numerous malware on his system at one time or the other, but I was even speaking on the behalf of IT professionals (atleast 4 of them) who were "hacked" in that game, even though all of them take the highest measure to keep their systems clean, and do not run a free AVG edition scan once a month like your imaginary Average Joe gamer or whatever. If you are saying that No One has a safe system and Dont Know how to keep a system clean, then I only advise you to come out of that eggshell since there is much more of the world that you need to see.
Looking at you speaking on the behalf of "most people" makes me think that you want to only consider the worst case scenario in order to show the side you are defending look much better than what it may be. Be a realist and look around you dont be a fool and resort to stare though a tunnel
Originally posted by Treekodar
I never said that, but don't fret, I enjoy your ad hominem's.
By your logic OS X is completely safe since we rarely hear about it being breached.
Hey, I was only helping you out there. Since you had an absurd notion and no room whatsoever to help further your point, I was only helping you to give you a reason to make your point your own.
If you have any proof or explanation to show to how those people under such an unique demograph can be suffering from a 'RAT' infestation, then please do so. Would like to hear you explanation on the matter. It would probably be more interesting to read that than your vain attempt at trying to put words into my mouth
On more important news I have to say I have had my battle.net account hacked 3 times over the last 10 years and I think once was due to too simple a passcode and the other 2 times phished out from under my pheet.
I think it's more due to the popularity of the service and the scope of it rather than any corporate conspiracy. Their phone validation seems good enough to me to stop those attempts, plus I've learned how to read the meta-data of any email I recieve.
So, you can worry. But no need to blame the company. They'd have more to lose with bad security than to gain.
I hadn't been playing WoW for a while, but I one day got an email that my account had been banned for disallowed behavior (i.e. gold selling and whatnot).
Never trust email. Never trust email. Never trust email.
Spamming emails written to look like an official warning and directing you to urgently take action are a standard tactic for collecting usernames and passwords from people who can be tricked into visiting a fake login website.
I agree with the op. To sell 6million 10 dollars auth tools would be 60 million extra dollars. Activision is striggling right now, and I'm sure they are doing everything they can to sell any product they offer that is purely +revenue.
Thats great.. except of course they don't cost $10 and they haven't sold 6 million of them. And of course the small idea that revenue is not profit.
The whole premise that Blizzard is hacking their own customer accounts to drive people to buy authenticators is ridiculous. Anyone who seriously thinks that needs to see a shrink. The bad publicity from these incidents is doing tremendous damage to the brand and that's not limited to D3 but to WoW, Starcraft and their hopeful next cashcow Titan.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
You really have no idea how wide spread malware is do you? Very few computers are "clean" as it takes a lot of work and multiple applications to do it and even than you are only finding what is known.
Most people use the same computer to broswe the web, download games/apps, read email, etc and if they have a active antivirus app at all they only update it once in a great whiile.
And you pretty much have no idea on What malware is do you? Not every malware (which by itself is a broad term not pertaining to certain XXX code, script or ware) snoops the affected person's computer for login information to a game. What I was talking about to that other poster was concerning the rampant hacking in this game called Atlantica Online. Offtopic to a certain extent, but please refrain from interjecting without knowing what is being spoken about. His claims to have a RAT grab account information, for thousands of players whose sole point of similarity is the game in question, is ridiculous if nothing else.
Ofcourse, the layman has/had numerous malware on his system at one time or the other, but I was even speaking on the behalf of IT professionals (atleast 4 of them) who were "hacked" in that game, even though all of them take the highest measure to keep their systems clean, and do not run a free AVG edition scan once a month like your imaginary Average Joe gamer or whatever. If you are saying that No One has a safe system and Dont Know how to keep a system clean, then I only advise you to come out of that eggshell since there is much more of the world that you need to see.
Looking at you speaking on the behalf of "most people" makes me think that you want to only consider the worst case scenario in order to show the side you are defending look much better than what it may be. Be a realist and look around you dont be a fool and resort to stare though a tunnel
I picked the term malware on purpose because I know exactly what it means to make a point. The average PC is not anywhere near "clean". Even the average corporate/goverment computer isn't that clean. It's only those environments where inbound and outbound access is strictly controlled (like a classified environment) that have any hope of being unauthorized software free and even than it's a constant battle against new methods or just user lapses in judegement.
And the term "IT Professional" hasn't meant much to me for a long time now. Since every paper mill college started to pump out "degrees" and it became the hip thing to do. I have worked with a lot of "IT Professionals" in my time who are not worth the cost of the bussiness cards their titles are printed on. As for the idea that their machines are somehow safer than the laymans, my experience is the oppisite is true and they are on average worst off since they are more likely to "tune" their systems with downloads.
I don't play any Blizzard games right now and really don't like Blizzard all that much anymore, so really don't care one way or another. I acually think it would be pretty funny if Blizzards servers did have some underlying compromise in them that was wide spread as the fallout would be humorious to watch. However while I accept it could happen I know enough to say that it probably has not happened. The simplist answer is usally the right one and the simple answer is people have gotten really good at getting other people to give them the information needed to steal a persons battle.net account. Could Blizzard do things to make that harder? Yea for sure they could but that doesn't mean their servers are compromised or they are doing it on purpose in some scheme to sell authentication devcies.
I agree with the op. To sell 6million 10 dollars auth tools would be 60 million extra dollars. Activision is striggling right now, and I'm sure they are doing everything they can to sell any product they offer that is purely +revenue.
I hope your joking about that.
Blizzard could make 10 times more money putting the same effort into new cash shop mounts and it would be much safer from a PR prespective to do.
Is it remotely possible that the reason that people see problems with their Blizzard accounts is that Blizzard is a bigger target than most other game developers ?
It might be worthwhile to remember that just because a company's security has been breached doesn't mean that their security is worse than that of a company that has not, as of yet, been breached. The only measure of whether or not someone's security is good is the difficulty inherent in breaching it.
The biggest, most juicy, hacking target in the world may have phenomenal security, but fall more quickly than a smaller, less desirable, and less well protected hacking target simply because more effort is spent on breaching it.
Assume for the sake of this discussion that it is possible to break any particular security. I am going to assign some numerical values to variables that really aren't quantifiable under these circumstances so any such numbers are essentially pulled out of my @ss for the sake of demonstration alone. Don't shoot me.
Now lets assign a unit of measure/reference for the degree to which a particular system's can resist breaches in security, called Breaches.
Now lets assign a unit of measure/reference for the effort of hackers to penetrate a computer's security, called Penetrations (Pens for short).
Now lets assign a unit of measure/reference for the desirability of breaching a particular network's security and call it Securities (Secs for short).
A high security network might have a BREACHES score of 100 while a low security network might have a BREACHES score of 10.
A network with highly desirable content might have a SECS score of 100 while a network with undesirable content might have a SECS score of 10.
A lot of effort by hackers to penetrate a given system might be have a PENS score of 100 while a small effort might have a PENS score of 10.
Lets assume that the resources expended on a network's BREACHES score is directly related to its SECS score. The more valuable your content, the more justified you are in spending heavily to protect it after all.
A network with a BREACHES score of 100 might very well attract a PENS score of 100 due to the fact that it is more likely to have a SECS score approaching the upper end of the scale as well. That means a ratio of BREACHES to PENS of 1/1.
A network with a BREACHES score of 10 might very well attract a PENS score of only 10 due to the likelihood that its SECS score is also likely to be near the bottom of the range. This means a ratio of BREACHES to PENS of 1/1. The same as for a high BREACHES system.
TLDR: The net result is that a resolution to keep one's BREACHES up is no more likely to prevent SECS, if a big enough PENS is involved, than is the case for someone who drops their BREACHES readily
When all has been said and done, more will have been said than done.
You really have no idea how wide spread malware is do you? Very few computers are "clean" as it takes a lot of work and multiple applications to do it and even than you are only finding what is known.
Most people use the same computer to broswe the web, download games/apps, read email, etc and if they have a active antivirus app at all they only update it once in a great whiile.
And you pretty much have no idea on What malware is do you? Not every malware (which by itself is a broad term not pertaining to certain XXX code, script or ware) snoops the affected person's computer for login information to a game. What I was talking about to that other poster was concerning the rampant hacking in this game called Atlantica Online. Offtopic to a certain extent, but please refrain from interjecting without knowing what is being spoken about. His claims to have a RAT grab account information, for thousands of players whose sole point of similarity is the game in question, is ridiculous if nothing else.
Ofcourse, the layman has/had numerous malware on his system at one time or the other, but I was even speaking on the behalf of IT professionals (atleast 4 of them) who were "hacked" in that game, even though all of them take the highest measure to keep their systems clean, and do not run a free AVG edition scan once a month like your imaginary Average Joe gamer or whatever. If you are saying that No One has a safe system and Dont Know how to keep a system clean, then I only advise you to come out of that eggshell since there is much more of the world that you need to see.
Looking at you speaking on the behalf of "most people" makes me think that you want to only consider the worst case scenario in order to show the side you are defending look much better than what it may be. Be a realist and look around you dont be a fool and resort to stare though a tunnel
I picked the term malware on purpose because I know exactly what it means to make a point. The average PC is not anywhere near "clean". Even the average corporate/goverment computer isn't that clean. It's only those environments where inbound and outbound access is strictly controlled (like a classified environment) that have any hope of being unauthorized software free and even than it's a constant battle against new methods or just user lapses in judegement.
And the term "IT Professional" hasn't meant much to me for a long time now. Since every paper mill college started to pump out "degrees" and it became the hip thing to do. I have worked with a lot of "IT Professionals" in my time who are not worth the cost of the bussiness cards their titles are printed on. As for the idea that their machines are somehow safer than the laymans, my experience is the oppisite is true and they are on average worst off since they are more likely to "tune" their systems with downloads.
I don't play any Blizzard games right now and really don't like Blizzard all that much anymore, so really don't care one way or another. I acually think it would be pretty funny if Blizzards servers did have some underlying compromise in them that was wide spread as the fallout would be humorious to watch. However while I accept it could happen I know enough to say that it probably has not happened. The simplist answer is usally the right one and the simple answer is people have gotten really good at getting other people to give them the information needed to steal a persons battle.net account. Could Blizzard do things to make that harder? Yea for sure they could but that doesn't mean their servers are compromised or they are doing it on purpose in some scheme to sell authentication devcies.
Well, not saying it is 1 way or the other, but IF any company were to do such a thing to milk people for money Blizzard would not be a surprise at all. Considering the way they designed the entire game to revolve around the RMAH so they can skim profits off of every transaction, something like this wouldnt be all that far fetched.
Originally posted by hellsnot And yet not one self righteous fanboi will even acknowledge I was compromised while servers were offline
Since nobody adressed this yet let me explain it. A account compromise does not necessarily mean someone logged into your account ingame and mailed your gold to some shady account. If it was just that blizzard wouldn't notice it as fast, what happened in your case was obviously a automatic lockdown of your account.
So when does an automatic lockdown occur? I happens when something so totally and obviously fishy happens that even a dumb algorithm that takes hardly any resources at all can notice it. For example:
hellsnot goes offline due to servermaintenance, for sake of argument hellsnot is a citizen of new york, and had a east cost IP. 2 minutes later someone with a asian IP address tries to access the b-net account management page, 2 wrong passwords where tried, third time it was the right. Alarm bells go off and the account is locked down automatically without human interaction.
Ofc thats a simplification. Point is even if some hacker acquires your email and password, he most likely won't know where you live exactly and which are your usual accesspoints. So it is fairly easy for an automated system to spot especially if the logins are close to each other, either your getting hacked or you shared your account details with someone else.
Edit: I have the mobile authenticator on my phone, it generates a random 10 digit number or somesuch thats required for login every 10 seconds. There is no way feasible way you can hack my account with this thing in place unless you get physical access to my phone.
I would have argued about some of the points you bring up, but to be honest, I just dont have the mind to do so. Everyone is entitled to an opinion and I dont see why I must argue with someone who doesnt share mine for a topic which I never gave give a damn about. But this point stands, as you yourself(or someone, read it in this thread though) have made it clear, Blizzard has a Lot to lose from bad press so while they may not be giving out info to Goldsellers Inc. it doesnt mean that they are truthful about security breaches. Unless it affects CC info I dont think Blizzard will ever admit to having a security breach on their end, so we will never know for a 100%.
Just so we are clear, I never agreed with the OP about his theory. But I did not rule out to possibilty of Blizzard having a fault on their side as well. I hope my statement about Ndoors dint throw you off my point. You may not agree with it, but whatever man, Im not here to convince you or anyone.
What I am waiting for is to see how Diablow 3 stands after the RMAH hits the stands. Now if people start losing "their" money we might really end up getting a good read.
So if the problem is on the user side how is it that the only hacks or account compromises i have ever had are with WoW? My wife and i played on the same computer. I sent in alot of complaint tickets criticizing WoW. She sent in none. I get three account compromises...she got no account compromises. Couldnt it be employees rather then the company itself?
iplayed blizard games for a very long long time and i will say i balieved blizard were the gold farmers or rather people working for blizz were the gold farmers ive never looked back quitting there games but i did wish i would have sold my acount with 7 80s on it but oh well blizz is one of the last companys i wish to ever give money to again
Comments
So its very much likely that hundereds if not thousands of people randomly spread out on different parts of the globe, who do not frequent the same sites over the net or run the same programs on similar sytems with the same level of protection, hence who barely have anything in common other than playing the same game would have 'RAT' (or whatever other form of trojans you can pull out from your) on their PCs. And the one factor that connects them all together, ie the game, is As A RULE clean as a whistle.
Lo! Your IQ must be beyond single digits! Just kidding, but refrain from throwing out stupid one liners or people might start questioning your motives if nothing else.
I dont know why you would post such a comment. You are pretty much validating the OP's paranoia. It kinda proves the OP right when someone who is defending Blizzard with all zeal, admits to having been hacked due to no fault of his own but said attacks once stop when he bought/used Blizzard's authenticator. Going to take your side here and say that you got that whatever free app, but even then to have your account be safeguarded from attacks ONLY after you have this authenticator says a Lot. Why even have a login and password if without this allmighty authenticator your account is prone to getting attacked at anytime? Doesnt make sense yea?
If you dint mean 'any' company, then explicitly use the word Blizzard. Dont use confusion caused to your advantage
As for the "WHYS", I cant be arsed enough to explain it here, since fanboys are going to deny it if its right under their noses, anti-fanboys will jump on the point without even understanding it and to have a rational discussion in middle of the back and forth between the two abovementioned parties, is futile at best.
While I think there is a problem with this whole situation somehow or another I'm not trying to say Bliz is trying to intentionally do anything but I did think up another thing that burnt my ass the one time my account was stolen. I use a lot of different passwords. When my account was stolen, they weren't able to get into my email, yet, they were able to change my password on my wow account.
I see that as a big security threat on it's own right there, should be an email validation to change passwords imho.
You really have no idea how wide spread malware is do you? Very few computers are "clean" as it takes a lot of work and multiple applications to do it and even than you are only finding what is known.
Most people use the same computer to broswe the web, download games/apps, read email, etc and if they have a active antivirus app at all they only update it once in a great whiile.
People aren't getting emails from blizzard about being hacked. Those are phishing attempts. Just because the link "looks legit" doesn't mean it is, there are ways around that. This is the probably the most common way people get there account comprimised, it happened to, I'm not ashamed to admit it. I had no idea at the time what was happening.
If you ever get an email from blizzard about your account being hacked or anything along that line, and that you need to visit blizzard to "verfiy" that it was hacked, you need to delete that email and CALL blizzard to verify that your account is ok or not. Or in the least, open your browser, go to Bnet or WoW directly, enter your account info. The first clue you'll get that your account is compromised, is you won't be able to log in.
I do have an issue with Blizzards security though, it's the same issue I have with pretty much everyones security. The email you get about a change of password, rarely ever requires you to actually verify that you changed the passworld. More often then not the email is just tellin you it's been changed and to ignore it if you did change it. They should require verification in the email if you change account info.
So I follow the link like an idiot, log into my account. Few minutes later I get an email that my Bnet password was changed. Odd, I didn't change it. First and last time I ever clicked a link in a email "that blizzard sent me".
Other time I got hacked. Again, my fault. Used the same email and password as my WoW account on Curse. Curse got compromised, I thought nothing of it. Unfortunately, that same password was used for my email. Wouldn't you know it. The same day my WoW account is a stolen, my email accounts password was also changed.
All the cool kids hate blizzard, why would anyone expect these people to admit that it was their fault.
I never said that, but don't fret, I enjoy your ad hominem's.
By your logic OS X is completely safe since we rarely hear about it being breached.
Eleanor Rigby.
periodic save points and you would
experience a tremendous loss in game
progress if u did not get an authenticatior. How can there be such a huge gap in save points if character info is saved server side
Maybe this is Blizzard's way of saying: "Hey, we're tired of you (the consumer) being a complete moron when it comes to computer safety, so either you get an authenticator or get your PC together!" but, probably not.
Eleanor Rigby.
I think it's more likely that they don't put a lot of effort(if any) into the non payed authenticator security now.
Im sooooooooooo glad I stayed miles away from this game...............
Those who can, do; those who can't, teach.
As far as account compromises, your system and your security doesn't need to be breached. Nor does Blizzards.
Is the email address used for your WoW account unique to only be used with WoW and is in no way associated with any other login method to any peripheral gaming website?
Same goes for your password. Is your password completely unique to WoW and never used anywhere else in any variant?
My bet? They aren't.
My WoW account was totally secure without an authenticator. I never had problems for years. I made 1 mistake that I can trace back to that led to my account compromise. I created an account on a gaming website with the same email and password as my WoW login. My account was deactivated for about 7 months. I created the account on the website and 2 months later I got emails from Blizzard stating my account was banned.
Why is it WoW getting hacked and not other MMOs?
Some other MMOs have smaller problems of the same type, but the scale is off. WoW is huge. The biggest in the West. Naturally its the biggest target.
Why are there so many more virus and malware for PC over Mac? Same deal.
The vast majority of people claiming innocence in a compromise have stories full of holes. Its easy to point fingers but there is no reason to point one at Blizzard. Even though I agree they are pretty retarded to not have an IP region check or better standard account security.
This is breaking a little silly, and I don't want to sound crazy, but I've never been hacked, ever. I have good software solutions, and I protect myself with an extensive whitelist for websites. No account of mine had ever been compromised, until a few months after the release of the authenticator. I hadn't been playing WoW for a while, but I one day got an email that my account had been banned for disallowed behavior (i.e. gold selling and whatnot).
An account that wasn't even active and hadn't been for some time had been hacked and reactivated, presumably to sell all my characters' gold and valuables and advertise, with the knowledge that it would be closed shortly afterward.
That doesn't seem like a logical thing for gold farmers to do, and it didn't make sense or sit well with me.
"There are two great powers, and they've been fighting since time began. Every advance in human life, every scrap of knowledge and wisdom and decency we have has been torn by one side from the teeth of the other. Every little increase in human freedom has been fought over ferociously between those who want us to know more and be wiser and stronger, and those who want us to obey and be humble and submit."
John Parry, to his son Will; "The Subtle Knife," by Phillip Pullman
And you pretty much have no idea on What malware is do you? Not every malware (which by itself is a broad term not pertaining to certain XXX code, script or ware) snoops the affected person's computer for login information to a game. What I was talking about to that other poster was concerning the rampant hacking in this game called Atlantica Online. Offtopic to a certain extent, but please refrain from interjecting without knowing what is being spoken about. His claims to have a RAT grab account information, for thousands of players whose sole point of similarity is the game in question, is ridiculous if nothing else.
Ofcourse, the layman has/had numerous malware on his system at one time or the other, but I was even speaking on the behalf of IT professionals (atleast 4 of them) who were "hacked" in that game, even though all of them take the highest measure to keep their systems clean, and do not run a free AVG edition scan once a month like your imaginary Average Joe gamer or whatever. If you are saying that No One has a safe system and Dont Know how to keep a system clean, then I only advise you to come out of that eggshell since there is much more of the world that you need to see.
Looking at you speaking on the behalf of "most people" makes me think that you want to only consider the worst case scenario in order to show the side you are defending look much better than what it may be. Be a realist and look around you dont be a fool and resort to stare though a tunnel
Hey, I was only helping you out there. Since you had an absurd notion and no room whatsoever to help further your point, I was only helping you to give you a reason to make your point your own.
If you have any proof or explanation to show to how those people under such an unique demograph can be suffering from a 'RAT' infestation, then please do so. Would like to hear you explanation on the matter. It would probably be more interesting to read that than your vain attempt at trying to put words into my mouth
Blizzard took my virginity and shaved my walrus.
On more important news I have to say I have had my battle.net account hacked 3 times over the last 10 years and I think once was due to too simple a passcode and the other 2 times phished out from under my pheet.
I think it's more due to the popularity of the service and the scope of it rather than any corporate conspiracy. Their phone validation seems good enough to me to stop those attempts, plus I've learned how to read the meta-data of any email I recieve.
So, you can worry. But no need to blame the company. They'd have more to lose with bad security than to gain.
a yo ho ho
Never trust email. Never trust email. Never trust email.
Spamming emails written to look like an official warning and directing you to urgently take action are a standard tactic for collecting usernames and passwords from people who can be tricked into visiting a fake login website.
Thats great.. except of course they don't cost $10 and they haven't sold 6 million of them. And of course the small idea that revenue is not profit.
The whole premise that Blizzard is hacking their own customer accounts to drive people to buy authenticators is ridiculous. Anyone who seriously thinks that needs to see a shrink. The bad publicity from these incidents is doing tremendous damage to the brand and that's not limited to D3 but to WoW, Starcraft and their hopeful next cashcow Titan.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
I picked the term malware on purpose because I know exactly what it means to make a point. The average PC is not anywhere near "clean". Even the average corporate/goverment computer isn't that clean. It's only those environments where inbound and outbound access is strictly controlled (like a classified environment) that have any hope of being unauthorized software free and even than it's a constant battle against new methods or just user lapses in judegement.
And the term "IT Professional" hasn't meant much to me for a long time now. Since every paper mill college started to pump out "degrees" and it became the hip thing to do. I have worked with a lot of "IT Professionals" in my time who are not worth the cost of the bussiness cards their titles are printed on. As for the idea that their machines are somehow safer than the laymans, my experience is the oppisite is true and they are on average worst off since they are more likely to "tune" their systems with downloads.
I don't play any Blizzard games right now and really don't like Blizzard all that much anymore, so really don't care one way or another. I acually think it would be pretty funny if Blizzards servers did have some underlying compromise in them that was wide spread as the fallout would be humorious to watch. However while I accept it could happen I know enough to say that it probably has not happened. The simplist answer is usally the right one and the simple answer is people have gotten really good at getting other people to give them the information needed to steal a persons battle.net account. Could Blizzard do things to make that harder? Yea for sure they could but that doesn't mean their servers are compromised or they are doing it on purpose in some scheme to sell authentication devcies.
I hope your joking about that.
Blizzard could make 10 times more money putting the same effort into new cash shop mounts and it would be much safer from a PR prespective to do.
Is it remotely possible that the reason that people see problems with their Blizzard accounts is that Blizzard is a bigger target than most other game developers ?
It might be worthwhile to remember that just because a company's security has been breached doesn't mean that their security is worse than that of a company that has not, as of yet, been breached. The only measure of whether or not someone's security is good is the difficulty inherent in breaching it.
When all has been said and done, more will have been said than done.
Well, not saying it is 1 way or the other, but IF any company were to do such a thing to milk people for money Blizzard would not be a surprise at all. Considering the way they designed the entire game to revolve around the RMAH so they can skim profits off of every transaction, something like this wouldnt be all that far fetched.
Since nobody adressed this yet let me explain it. A account compromise does not necessarily mean someone logged into your account ingame and mailed your gold to some shady account. If it was just that blizzard wouldn't notice it as fast, what happened in your case was obviously a automatic lockdown of your account.
So when does an automatic lockdown occur? I happens when something so totally and obviously fishy happens that even a dumb algorithm that takes hardly any resources at all can notice it. For example:
hellsnot goes offline due to servermaintenance, for sake of argument hellsnot is a citizen of new york, and had a east cost IP. 2 minutes later someone with a asian IP address tries to access the b-net account management page, 2 wrong passwords where tried, third time it was the right. Alarm bells go off and the account is locked down automatically without human interaction.
Ofc thats a simplification. Point is even if some hacker acquires your email and password, he most likely won't know where you live exactly and which are your usual accesspoints. So it is fairly easy for an automated system to spot especially if the logins are close to each other, either your getting hacked or you shared your account details with someone else.
Edit: I have the mobile authenticator on my phone, it generates a random 10 digit number or somesuch thats required for login every 10 seconds. There is no way feasible way you can hack my account with this thing in place unless you get physical access to my phone.
I would have argued about some of the points you bring up, but to be honest, I just dont have the mind to do so. Everyone is entitled to an opinion and I dont see why I must argue with someone who doesnt share mine for a topic which I never gave give a damn about. But this point stands, as you yourself(or someone, read it in this thread though) have made it clear, Blizzard has a Lot to lose from bad press so while they may not be giving out info to Goldsellers Inc. it doesnt mean that they are truthful about security breaches. Unless it affects CC info I dont think Blizzard will ever admit to having a security breach on their end, so we will never know for a 100%.
Just so we are clear, I never agreed with the OP about his theory. But I did not rule out to possibilty of Blizzard having a fault on their side as well. I hope my statement about Ndoors dint throw you off my point. You may not agree with it, but whatever man, Im not here to convince you or anyone.
What I am waiting for is to see how Diablow 3 stands after the RMAH hits the stands. Now if people start losing "their" money we might really end up getting a good read.
iplayed blizard games for a very long long time and i will say i balieved blizard were the gold farmers or rather people working for blizz were the gold farmers ive never looked back quitting there games but i did wish i would have sold my acount with 7 80s on it but oh well blizz is one of the last companys i wish to ever give money to again