First off ive got to say is pretty piss poor, in fact, very piss poor.

so, I was away for the weekend on a nice easter weekend vacation, had alot off un, it was great. I get home and I check my email and I see something quite odd from blizzard account administration. Now my first name is IAN, keep this in mind, the email read like this.

"Dear KRISTINE,

Hello kristine,

This e-mail notification is to inform you that the World of Warcraft account, ******, has just been merged into a Battle.net account. If you were not the person who performed this account merge, please contact Battle.net Support immediately..."

and there was additional jargon etc.

Notice the NAME on the email.....not my name and in fact a womans name???  So im like what the hell does this mean, you know what I bet my account was hijaked. I contacted billing and indeed my account (which had been inactive since november) had been reactivated on a wrath of the lich king trial (thanks for alowing people to reactivate my account for fraudulant purposes blizzard) and from what I can gather it has been emptied of all its belongings. So with the help of the billing rep, I get the acocunt back under my control. I start the client download so I can see what damage has been done.

So I get home from ebing out for the day, everything is installed and updated, I go to login with my new credentials, and it says the account has been suspended, and I say....wtf. So I chekc my email, and it says a 72 hour suspension has been put on the account for exploiting or whatever, initialy I didnt care too much about what was happening, but now even AFTER speaking to an accounts rep, and dtetermining that indeed my account had been hacked, my account still get suspended for nothing I did??? second strike blizzard.

So now I am awaiting a reply from account admin so I can try to log into my acocunt to see what kind of damage the gold farmers have done and to contact a gm to get the recovery process started. If there are any additional problems, I think im just gonna say forget it, and go back to playing EVE like I have been the last 2 months. I like WoW and all, but I only play it 4-5 months out fo the year, and it may not be worth the effort to fix something that shouldnt have even happened. Blizzard you need to pull up your f'n socks and beef up security and verification procedures befor handing my account over to someone else, something that was probably all done electronicaly! pathetic.

Yes sadly Blizzard treats the victims that were hacked as if they are criminals. I beleive they should be able to be charged with fraud for shutting down accounts that have been hacked. After all you paid for a service and they shut it down after someone hacked your pc. Blizz in their own way are criminals.

Originally posted by Starbuck1771

Yes sadly Blizzard treats the victims that were hacked as if they are criminals. I beleive they should be able to be charged with fraud for shutting down accounts that have been hacked. After all you paid for a service and they shut it down after someone hacked your pc. Blizz in their own way are criminals.

Your damn right. I mean my account at the time it was hacked wasnt even active, i was between play sessions. but I mean ive INVESTED money into that account, and if they dont fix this crap they are essentialy robbing me. Unfortunately thier terms of service alows them to do whatever the hell they want. This expierience, if it goes badly, may just push me back into a full time offline gamer, MMO companies are looking more and more criminal as years go by and im getting kinda tired of paying them for what in the end I have no rights to? laughable

Blizzard's strong point has never really been security.  Although it has improved in WoW throughout the years.  I remember in Diablo (particularly D2) soooo many people's accounts got hacked, stolen, corrupted, etc.  It's really hard to prevent every possible scenario, but when it comes to personal account or billing information, they really need to tighten that belt.

From what my friends have gone thru, I think the 72 hour suspension is standard practice. I think they do it so they can review the logs and restore everything without conflict.

Originally posted by ianicus

Originally posted by Starbuck1771

Yes sadly Blizzard treats the victims that were hacked as if they are criminals. I beleive they should be able to be charged with fraud for shutting down accounts that have been hacked. After all you paid for a service and they shut it down after someone hacked your pc. Blizz in their own way are criminals.

 

Your damn right. I mean my account at the time it was hacked wasnt even active, i was between play sessions. but I mean ive INVESTED money into that account, and if they dont fix this crap they are essentialy robbing me. Unfortunately thier terms of service alows them to do whatever the hell they want. This expierience, if it goes badly, may just push me back into a full time offline gamer, MMO companies are looking more and more criminal as years go by and im getting kinda tired of paying them for what in the end I have no rights to? laughable

I know the frustration.  My whole family has once lost all accounts on the same day and took weeks to recover that.  The baby was angry b/c he likes to look at the animals on the screen.  Cow he will say when a tauren shows up on the character selection screen :P

Now after working with blizz for 2 weeks to get things back I come to understand their situation.  There are many hackers who steal inactive accounts and use it to spam trade or sell gold or, simply to loot guild banks.  How on earth can they steal an inactive account?  Either they already had stolen the password before it went inactive, or the owner somehow left the log in information somewhere.  I do not believe they can randomly guess the login name and password.

What blizz need to do is to balance the pain of the victim (if he is a true victim) from ease of operation from hackers.  They need proves that you are who you claim, so they usually need some form of proof, not just an email or a phone call.  We all know emails and phone calls can be faked easily.  We need to send in photocopies of ID matching details of the registered information for the account.  That makes sense.  Hackers do not have my ID card, nor can they fake it that easily.

After establishing the ID of the victim and confirming that its really a victim and not the hacker in disguise they actually do a very fast partial restoration, restoring some gold (proportioinal to your alt's lvl) all the BoP items.  They then go back to the logs and check your history, and do a full restore later on, by hand, character by character.  I applaud the effort of Blizz, the amount of effort they paid, and the cost in manpower to do that.  Auto full restoration is too risky, and makes life too easy for hackers.  No restoration is too painful to victims.  They adopt a road in the middle, and naturally not the most pleasing to those who are true victims.

Instead of blaming blizz, why not blame the heckers.  I remember I once reported loss on a vehicle stolen and used for crime.  The police hold the vehicle for investigation for months before I can get it back.  I do not bark at the police.  I feel myself guilty not looking after my own car well.

Originally posted by Lorenz0

Blizzard's strong point has never really been security.  Although it has improved in WoW throughout the years.  I remember in Diablo (particularly D2) soooo many people's accounts got hacked, stolen, corrupted, etc.  It's really hard to prevent every possible scenario, but when it comes to personal account or billing information, they really need to tighten that belt.

Given the 12m accounts active and god knows how many inactive accounts, given the slack attitude of many gamers in protecting their login information, its hard to stop hacking altogether.

Fact is, security has to start from the owner.  If the hacker can get hold of your login name and password, blizz can do nothing, they cannot stop the hacker from loggin in with the same password, while allowing you to log in.  Either you both play at once, or both are temporarily banned, while they sort out who is who.

The 72 hour banning is a way to stop the hacker from travelling to orgrimmar and selling the last ditch of things you have in the AH.  I once lost an account, and when I got it back, the alt is flying to orgrimmar, what is on him is already mailed out or DEed, he is naked.  Blizz banned the account while the hacker is flying back to orgrimmar, so luckily all my stuffs in the bank and in AH are intact.

If they do not ban it in time, I would have even less to start with when I got back my account.

D2 is different.  Its a f2p game, and you can create as many online accounts as you wish per D2 account.  So its kinda messy and almost impossible to establish who is the original owner.  You do not need to fill in any personal information when you create your D2 b.net account.  IF you lose it, you lose it.  Blizz cannot help you.  And its free.  So create another one and start from scratch again, too bad.

MY biggest gripe is the fact I had ALREADY spoken to an account rep, and still my account was banned although the passwork and login credentials had already been changed by me and the account person. Its a little retarded if yu ask me, the account access problem had been solved (and ps I dont leave my account info written down, I have NO idea how theyt could have gotten that unless I was infected by some type of virus back when I was playing (in november) and they happened to use it now...odd....either way I know its difficult for them to prevent fraud, but there SHOULD be nore verification done in terms of this mergin wow account with battle.net account info, it looks like its VERY crappy right now. Why dont they ask for the secret question answer? I REALLY doubt the hacker would have known that.....in the end there IS MORE blizzard could have done to prevent this from happening, period.

Originally posted by ianicus

MY biggest gripe is the fact I had ALREADY spoken to an account rep, and still my account was banned although the passwork and login credentials had already been changed by me and the account person. Its a little retarded if yu ask me, the account access problem had been solved (and ps I dont leave my account info written down, I have NO idea how theyt could have gotten that unless I was infected by some type of virus back when I was playing (in november) and they happened to use it now...odd....either way I know its difficult for them to prevent fraud, but there SHOULD be nore verification done in terms of this mergin wow account with battle.net account info, it looks like its VERY crappy right now. Why dont they ask for the secret question answer? I REALLY doubt the hacker would have known that.....in the end there IS MORE blizzard could have done to prevent this from happening, period.

You have spoken to an accounts rep, that starts an inquiry.  They might not believe you and if you have no solid proof you are the owner, I say they have reasons not to believe you yet.  The rep cannot go thru the log during the teleconversation, that takes time.  72 hours to go thru all logs, given the number of hacks everyday, is not an easy task.  I run software house in the past, tracing a bug or a hack is not fun.  You know how much log you need to go thru to figure out what happened?

They could have stolen your account long ago and only use it now when they got orders for ingame gold.  Why would they hack your account before they need to sell gold immediately?  You will report it, and blizzard will take it back.  Unless the hacker got an order in hand, for your server, there is no point to steal your gold and put it in their alt's account.  They will lose the gold fast, and their alt's account at once.

How would they get your password?  I do not know, blizz do not know.  Its definitely not blizz's fault, it might or might not be your fault, no one knows.  Try to arrest a hacker and torture him for more details :P

If the hacker has your login name and password, no verification can help.  How can the game tell you from him?  fingerprint?  eyeball scanning?  Blizz has an option to link your account to a mobile phone, so that you need to dial up a number with your phone number displayed before you can log in.  If you use that, chances are your account is much much safer.  Apart from that, once you lose your id and pwd, blizz can do nothing to stop the hacker.  If you have a solution to this, be ready for a noble prize or a very money reward patent.  Banks will love to talk to you.  The US military and national security, or another country's, will want to kidnap you and milk your brain.

The secret question is only one step in establishing your identity.  Blizz sometimes restores account right away, sometimes they ask for photocopies of ID cards to be mailed to them.  I guess they operate under some guidelines drawn up, and god knows what it is.

I am in no way saying this to make the OP angry ( so don't kill the messanger here ) but most episodes of account hacking are due to the account owner's action in some way or the other.

Many are a result of sharing an account or password with a friend/ family member/ or guild mate, and the remaining bulk of hacks are due to the visiting of sites that are infected ( think "porn" ) and the player not keeping their spyware/virus protection ware up-to-date.

Again, I'm not saying that to piss anyone off, that's just the facts - *most* people that get hacked had at least a passive ( and often )  role in what has happened to them.

Originally posted by Orthedos

Originally posted by ianicus

MY biggest gripe is the fact I had ALREADY spoken to an account rep, and still my account was banned although the passwork and login credentials had already been changed by me and the account person. Its a little retarded if yu ask me, the account access problem had been solved (and ps I dont leave my account info written down, I have NO idea how theyt could have gotten that unless I was infected by some type of virus back when I was playing (in november) and they happened to use it now...odd....either way I know its difficult for them to prevent fraud, but there SHOULD be nore verification done in terms of this mergin wow account with battle.net account info, it looks like its VERY crappy right now. Why dont they ask for the secret question answer? I REALLY doubt the hacker would have known that.....in the end there IS MORE blizzard could have done to prevent this from happening, period.

 

You have spoken to an accounts rep, that starts an inquiry.  They might not believe you and if you have no solid proof you are the owner, I say they have reasons not to believe you yet.  The rep cannot go thru the log during the teleconversation, that takes time.  72 hours to go thru all logs, given the number of hacks everyday, is not an easy task.  I run software house in the past, tracing a bug or a hack is not fun.  You know how much log you need to go thru to figure out what happened?

They could have stolen your account long ago and only use it now when they got orders for ingame gold.  Why would they hack your account before they need to sell gold immediately?  You will report it, and blizzard will take it back.  Unless the hacker got an order in hand, for your server, there is no point to steal your gold and put it in their alt's account.  They will lose the gold fast, and their alt's account at once.

How would they get your password?  I do not know, blizz do not know.  Its definitely not blizz's fault, it might or might not be your fault, no one knows.  Try to arrest a hacker and torture him for more details :P

If the hacker has your login name and password, no verification can help.  How can the game tell you from him?  fingerprint?  eyeball scanning?  Blizz has an option to link your account to a mobile phone, so that you need to dial up a number with your phone number displayed before you can log in.  If you use that, chances are your account is much much safer.  Apart from that, once you lose your id and pwd, blizz can do nothing to stop the hacker.  If you have a solution to this, be ready for a noble prize or a very money reward patent.  Banks will love to talk to you.  The US military and national security, or another country's, will want to kidnap you and milk your brain.

The secret question is only one step in establishing your identity.  Blizz sometimes restores account right away, sometimes they ask for photocopies of ID cards to be mailed to them.  I guess they operate under some guidelines drawn up, and god knows what it is.

I already mentioned a great additional security measure, ask people for the secret question answer, alo harder to get since its not entered anywhere online accept at account creation, which I did at launch. The fact is there security is very lazy, they ecourage people to do TOO much online, and in turn this alows people to commit fraud in greater amounts. If people had to contact someone at blizzard to do, say the account merger than got my account hacked, this probably would have been avoided. In there end there is certainly alot more they coiuld have done as they spend next to nothing on customer support in an effort to keep as many of the dollars that you pay them a month.
 

There are $15 dollar cell phone plans now (same cost as wow) and you have to pseak to a rep to make major chnages, why cant blizzard do that? same monthly service cost, however blizz is provideing a service that costs them WAY less to maintain than a national cell phone network. Im sorry but this expeirience thus far has just opened my eyes to the major overhaul needed in the MMO industry in temrs of service standards and account security.

*shrug* Sometimes you get unlucky I guess.  I got hacked, emailed em asking if they could move me back to my server just in case I did return to play - my entire character was put back with no further questions.  Perfect response. 

Seems to be a bit o random luck.  Funny thing is I managed to get in and change the billing while they were in the middle of  hacking my account and billed the hackers for a 12 month sub.(now I think about it it was probably a stolen card..seemed funny at the time).

Originally posted by Hammertime1

I am in no way saying this to make the OP angry ( so don't kill the messanger here ) but most episodes of account hacking are due to the account owner's action in some way or the other.

Many are a result of sharing an account or password with a friend/ family member/ or guild mate, and the remaining bulk of hacks are due to the visiting of sites that are infected ( think "porn" ) and the player not keeping their spyware/virus protection ware up-to-date.

 

Again, I'm not saying that to piss anyone off, that's just the facts - *most* people that get hacked had at least a passive ( and often )  role in what has happened to them.

 

 

 

Never once gave my account info to ANYONE, ever, never, ever 100%. I know it happens, BUT this is not acctualy being hacked, this is being stupid and alowing your "friend" to either hijack your account or sell the info. Again, I have never given out my info, or ever writen it down. Im not an idiot and ive been playing MMO's for years (pre WoW)

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Originally posted by ianicus 

 

The fact is there security is very lazy, they ecourage people to do TOO much online, and in turn this alows people to commit fraud in greater amounts. If people had to contact someone at blizzard to do, say the account merger than got my account hacked, this probably would have been avoided.

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The security isn't lazy, you're just being unreasonable. Your account wasn't hacked because of account merger, your account was hacked because someone got your login name and password. And no matter what additional security measures Blizzard might have done to prevent activation of free Wrath of the Lich King trial, if you'd ever have decided to activate your account yourself and play the game the hacker would still have been there and able to hack you. The security measures you're demanding would have just delayed the inevitable.

But there is one person who could have prevented all this, you. Blizzard sells Blizzard Authenticator very cheap, and it would almost certainly added enough security to stop whatever was the way your account was hacked. But you were too lazy to use it, and your account got hacked.

It was my understanding that you couldn't change the name on an account.  After all, that would make buying and selling accounts much easier.  That alone is a little strange.  I've not read this on any official site or anything, just through discussions and I know other games that were like this.  IMO, the weakest link in Blizz's security was on their forum site.  For the longest time the login never showed up as "secure" in any browser I tried to use.  It's not this way now, with the battle.net stuff, but in the past it was.  I think many peeps got screwed this way.  As far as how long it might take to sort out, well, you just have to deal with it really.  They can't salve these things over night I'm sure.  Not trying to sound harsh but that's just how things work.

Z

Originally posted by IronZ

It was my understanding that you couldn't change the name on an account.  After all, that would make buying and selling accounts much easier. 

They didnt chnage the name on the account, what they did was merge my WoW account with a battle.net account under someone elses name, which I think is ever worse to be honest. Thats like me linking your bank account to my debit card, makes no damn sense at all, from what I can see, the little info required to "merge" a wow account to a fony battle.net account is a HUGE security risk for players.

Originally posted by Vrika

 

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Originally posted by ianicus 

 

The fact is there security is very lazy, they ecourage people to do TOO much online, and in turn this alows people to commit fraud in greater amounts. If people had to contact someone at blizzard to do, say the account merger than got my account hacked, this probably would have been avoided.

---

 

The security isn't lazy, you're just being unreasonable. Your account wasn't hacked because of account merger, your account was hacked because someone got your login name and password. And no matter what additional security measures Blizzard might have done to prevent activation of free Wrath of the Lich King trial, if you'd ever have decided to activate your account yourself and play the game the hacker would still have been there and able to hack you. The security measures you're demanding would have just delayed the inevitable.

But there is one person who could have prevented all this, you. Blizzard sells Blizzard Authenticator very cheap, and it would almost certainly added enough security to stop whatever was the way your account was hacked. But you were too lazy to use it, and your account got hacked.

LOL your a fool if you think anyone should have to purchase EXTRA security for a product that should already be secure. There is no way in hell I should have to pay blizzard for the authenticator. Mt account was merged to a battle.net account that didnt even have the same personal information on it! and you think thats fine? you have serious issues my friend.  If you feel like paying extra to a company to protect your information (that should be protected in the first place) and keep your account safer, well you might as well just bend over and let every company you deal with have thier way with you. Try coming back here once your makeing a little more sense...

My account was inactive for nearly two years when I got a message about being banned for cheating.  All I had to do was ask for proof and they reactivated the account for a month with a copy/past apology.

I do have to say, I am not a fan of Blizzard but that keychain with the random generated numbers is by far the best idea any gaming company has ever used.  If you are an avid WoW player I would highly suggest buying one for your own security especially with the number of hacked accounts that seem to spring up.

Originally posted by ianicus

Originally posted by IronZ

It was my understanding that you couldn't change the name on an account.  After all, that would make buying and selling accounts much easier. 

 

They didnt chnage the name on the account, what they did was merge my WoW account with a battle.net account under someone elses name, which I think is ever worse to be honest. Thats like me linking your bank account to my debit card, makes no damn sense at all, from what I can see, the little info required to "merge" a wow account to a fony battle.net account is a HUGE security risk for players.

Wow, that is seriously screwed up!  I could see things getting a LOT worse if that's the case :(.  I do agree with your later post that we shouldn't have to purchase extra security.  Unfortunately it is a necessity in today's world.

Z

you are very right dude for getting angry i mean i would be but what needs to happen is blizzard just bann every asian account there is theni think that would solve a big part of the problem because most of the hack stuff like that is done by the gold sellers