Blizzard to Seek $8.5M from Bossland Bot Maker - World of Warcraft - MMORPG.com

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Blizzard to Seek $8.5M from Bossland Bot Maker - World of Warcraft - MMORPG.com

World of Warcraft News - Blizzard Entertainment is taking Bossland to the mat for cheat programs created for a number of the company's games. Blizzard is seeking $8.5M in damages to the tune of $200 per program purchased in the US. The number of sales in the US alone is alleged to be 42,818.

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SpottyGekko

Ride them hard !

It's about time someone started to go after these leeches that seem to operate with such complete impunity.

Perhaps the internet's "Wild West" phase is beginning to fade a bit ? One can but hope...

cheyane

Oh boy !! Good go after them spare no expense and annihilate them.

Scott_Jeslis

Anyone laugh that the story is on a website named "TorrentFreak"? I usually associate "torrent = pirate downloads" :-D

gervaise1

A long stretch and I suspect - especially as they are seeking to apply a limited German decision to US law. It will maintain the financial pressure however and that may be at the heart of the suit.

Now I play games without bots - although when I was in a WoW raid guild I "had" to have e.g. DBM. And it some of these mods are akin. They make things easier, they modify interfaces etc., they mean people can "finish" stuff quicker. So less revenue for Blizzard. Something to think about yes? 

Octagon7711

Blizzard hates bots with a passion. It's interesting with all that energy they put into stopping them and all those mass bands they still have a bot problem after all these years. Short of building their own consoles which they can lock down I don't see an end to this struggle. But good of them to give them hell.

SpottyGekko

gervaise1 said:

... So less revenue for Blizzard. Something to think about yes? 

Evidently, yes, it seems Blizzard "thought about it"...

If you don't like the way an online game is designed, don't hack it to suit your needs. Modding a single-player games is fine, you're only changing your own game experience, not everyone else's as well.

MaxBacon

If you didn't know making bots for popular games could make you a millionaire...

200$ a copy, only needing 42k sales to reach 8 Million! Dodge taxes here and there, buy a mansion... 10/10.

gg

Wellspring

Why are the cheat programs still up for sale on Bossland's website?

Iselin

Benbrada said:

Anyone laugh that the story is on a website named "TorrentFreak"? I usually associate "torrent = pirate downloads" :-D

It is odd indeed seeing a link from here to a site that mostly concerns itself with torrents and the popular sites that list them.

alkarionlog

only reason I can see they go after the bots is simple, they want to get money from it, if they just wanted to stop people from suing bots, jsut perma banning all accounts would be a start, and make it harder to bot, but that would mean they lose money so yeah better milk the other side.

because serious I don't really see a cort giving a winning cause, unless they make it as a lose of revenue, or using a copyrighted copy of they code to run the bots

cheyane

TorrentFreak reports on all these things. When you see suddenly some site is blocked in your country TorrentFreak will report it and also when the site wins a lifting of the ban and such this site reports it. They also report when websites are shut down by lawsuits too. Like when Demonoid went down.

Scorchien

have no mercy Blizz:)

Ferosix

If you believe Blizzard is doing this to milk $ from the bot makers you are mistaken. The economics just don't work. A lawsuit of this type is costing Blizzard well into the seven figures (i.e. millions) wiping out any real immediate financial gain from a possible successful German court decision.

That being said, I expect it will likely save Blizzard significant $ in terms of the overhead and efforts required to track, ban and manage offenders and possible future offenders (both players and bot creators).

SpottyGekko

Ferosix said:

If you believe Blizzard is doing this to milk $ from the bot makers you are mistaken. The economics just don't work. A lawsuit of this type is costing Blizzard well into the seven figures (i.e. millions) wiping out any real immediate financial gain from a possible successful German court decision.

That being said, I expect it will likely save Blizzard significant $ in terms of the overhead and efforts required to track, ban and manage offenders and possible future offenders (both players and bot creators).

It sends a message.

Bossland is a registered limited liability company (GmbH) in Germany, so they are operating with complete impunity. They were a "legal business" until Blizzard hit them (pun intended).

Taking down these "high street vendors" de-legitimises these bot programs. People will no longer be buying from a "real company", but rather from a shady website.

If you're no longer a registered company, you cannot pay taxes on your product sales. That makes you a target for the Revenue services in whichever country you operate, and with Blizzard painting an $8M target on your back, the tax collectors are going to sit up and take note...

Ferosix

SpottyGekko said:

Ferosix said:

If you believe Blizzard is doing this to milk $ from the bot makers you are mistaken. The economics just don't work. A lawsuit of this type is costing Blizzard well into the seven figures (i.e. millions) wiping out any real immediate financial gain from a possible successful German court decision.



That being said, I expect it will likely save Blizzard significant $ in terms of the overhead and efforts required to track, ban and manage offenders and possible future offenders (both players and bot creators).

It sends a message.

Bossland is a registered limited liability company (GmbH) in Germany, so they are operating with complete impunity. They were a "legal business" until Blizzard hit them (pun intended).

Taking down these "high street vendors" de-legitimises these bot programs. People will no longer be buying from a "real company", but rather from a shady website.

If you're no longer a registered company, you cannot pay taxes on your product sales. That makes you a target for the Revenue services in whichever country you operate, and with Blizzard painting an $8M target on your back, the tax collectors are going to sit up and take note...

Well said.

Eothas

Interesting. Riot Games recently won a lawsuit in a similar case (Scripts for League of Legends). I hope this sets a good precedent for future botting/scripting/hacking sites, that's great!

But I still can't understand how bot/hack users can sue any company and get their account back + bonus items if they are banned, this is so ridiculous, that's why it's hard to deal with bots, even though most of us can identify a bot easily, Blizzard/GMs have to spend 10 hours gathering proof for one single bot or else there is a chance they will sue the company.

Thane

i don't think the bot providers are the problem here.
the real problem are the customers, those who use shit like that.

do they actually concider themselves gamers? i surely hope not.

Soki123

Good , f them the shit they are.

Avanah

Should ban every account that used the program too.

josko9

Well, when you develop tedious grindy games, of course players will rather search for easier alternatives before quiting the game alltogether. Everything about WoW screams grind, and that' some serious grind over there, so bad that it would put most korean MMOs to shame.

Rather than taking the lazy way out and suing those people, they should start developing great games again. You know like 20 years ago? Besides it's not that hard to get rid of the bots, it took ZOS only a month.

Don't get me wrong, those people deserve to be sued, but come on, how come only the most shittiest games get infested by bots?

Soki123

josko9 said:

Well, when you develop tedious grindy games, of course players will rather search for easier alternatives before quiting the game alltogether. Everything about WoW screams grind, and that' some serious grind over there, so bad that it would put most korean MMOs to shame.

Rather than taking the lazy way out and suing those people, they should start developing great games again. You know like 20 years ago? Besides it's not that hard to get rid of the bots, it took ZOS only a month.

Don't get me wrong, those people deserve to be sued, but come on, how come only the most shittiest games get infested by bots?

Give it up. You hate a company because they are successful. You don t like them, then move on and let them do what they do best, and that is make games.

You say WoW is grind, you obviously never played games back in the day.

I m sure you ll say you did, but I won t believe that for a second, with all the dumb comments you make about anything Blizz.

TheScavenger

This seems more like an easy grab of quick cash to me. Why does it matter if someone bots? Its already super easy to level to 110...honestly have no idea why WoW even has levels. Blizzard can solve the boring ass leveling by making everyone able to get to 110 for free...but they want that 60$ per character boost.

Also, at level 110 is completely different than even level 100 which is vastly different gameplay than level 1. Its almost like leveling from 1 to 110 is a complete bait and switch. Its like a totally different game at max level...so why even have leveling at all?

What a rip off scam. I'm glad I don't play WoW anymore

Viper482

I hate cheaters, drain them for all they have.

Viper482

TheScavenger said:

This seems more like an easy grab of quick cash to me. Why does it matter if someone bots? Its already super easy to level to 110...honestly have no idea why WoW even has levels. Blizzard can solve the boring ass leveling by making everyone able to get to 110 for free...but they want that 60$ per character boost.

Also, at level 110 is completely different than even level 100 which is vastly different gameplay than level 1. Its almost like leveling from 1 to 110 is a complete bait and switch. Its like a totally different game at max level...so why even have leveling at all?

What a rip off scam. I'm glad I don't play WoW anymore

You are part of the problem when it comes to these cheaters. The majority of your post is just laughable. Why have leveling in an MMO??

Viper482

Thane said:

i don't think the bot providers are the problem here.

the real problem are the customers, those who use shit like that.



do they actually concider themselves gamers? i surely hope not.

They are being enabled by the providers. This is why you go after the drug dealers and not the users. Cut off the supply.