Curse

Aera Lure · Oct 30, 2009, 03:19 PM // 15:19

Just thought I'd share a bit of information to help anyone who'd listen protect their account. Its not a vent or anything (although I am very upset with Anet). Its just a friendly bit of advice for anyone on hiatus.

I've been away from GW for a little over a year. Pretty much just idly awaiting GW2, my account simply there awaiting renewed activity at or around GW2's launch.

I got an e-mail a couple days ago that my Play NC password had been changed. I contacted Support within 2 minutes and about 24 hours later they replied and reset the master password. Too late by this point. Everything was gone. Same old story.

Support tells me the same old song and dance that I must have downloaded 3rd party software, failed to run virus applications, given my password to someone, used RMT, used my Play NC or game passwords elsewhere and/or had weak passwords. All untrue. Did nothing of the sort. In fact that PC I played on was simply a platform for testing the occasional web design I did (I'm a designer and a Mac user) and playing GW when I played. Nothing else. It was a clean, virus-free and almost completely app free computer.

Support tells me that someone (RMT) accessed my game account via the Play NC site. Personally, I think this is a huge problem that needs to be fixed. One should not be able to get the Play NC account password somehow and then access and destroy the game account without going through game account password verifications minimally and (in my opinion) direct involvement of Support. There's a security issue there. I now have problems with Anet, trust in my account's safety, trust in GW2 future account safety.

I think, though, the moral of the story for anyone else on hiatus or only logging in occasionally - change that Play NC password regularly. That password right there can and will cause you to lose you're account eventually. I personally think the only saving grace for many accounts is somewhat regular activity. If you start going on hiatus for an extended period of time, that is when it seems an RMT will make a move on your account (thinking there will be no one to notice or take action).

So maybe Anet banned another IP. All well and good. I contributed some good to that fight I suppose by notifying them immediately. I wish to do more, though, and warn anyone else.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ayelet Feldspar

Thank you for your warning and advice. I appreciate it.

I hope it helps.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ayelet Feldspar

I'm naive I know, and I don't have a lot of experience with hackers and such, but how does the RMT know when an account has been inactive? How does an RMT even know that your account exists?

I dont think they do or could. Support told me, and I'll only paraphrase, that its common for RMTs to have your account information for a long time before acting on it. Doesnt mean they could figure out if you were away for ages. In retrospect, I should not have worded things such as to imply they could. Very sorry.

When I said you may be more at risk if you are on hiatus for an extended period of time, I meant that you would then be likely not to have been regularly cycling a change of passwords, both on Play NC and on the game account. In my case, this is true for me. My Play NC and game account passwords were very strong, different, and never used anywhere but there. Each of them. Nonetheless, it had been a year since I changed either.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ayelet Feldspar

If this is obvious to some I apologize for asking, but I'm pretty paranoid about my account, and I'd like to know what to avoid.

If you have linked your account to PlayNC, go and change that password. Immediately. To be safe, also change your game account password. Make them very strong (7+ characters, numbers and letters, upper and lower case). Change them regularly. Make them different. Do not use them anywhere else for anything.

If you havent linked your account yet (ie, bought anything from the store), my current advice is do not. Not until the option is minimally there to have requirement that you enter your current in-game password before changing it. Its astonishing that this is not a requirement. Its how I lost my account and, I am sure, others as well. I'm thinking how PlayNC works needs to be reconsidered for much better security.

Then, follow all the usual Anet dos-and-donts: change your passwords regularly, dont let anyone use them, make them strong, use them nowhere else for anything else, run regular virus software scans, do not download third party software related to Guild Wars, avoid RMT like the plague it is.

Quote:

Originally Posted by stanzhao

any chance you could quote what was actually sent to you by support etc?

I would really rather not. I wish Support to engage with me on what happened and, to that end, wish them to understand that I will not quote them. I do wish to work with them. I wish them to work with me. I wish communication to continue.

I only wished to say here that yes, PlayNC was the route through which my account was hacked. This they said. They then went on to list the usual ways that I likely compromised my own PlayNC password (I did not). They then were very helpful and prompt in getting my now empty account back.

Others have confirmed here in the thread that there is a run of account hackings, and that through PlayNC anyone can get your game account information far too easily. That's enough to raise an alarm bell for making 100% sure you secure and pay attention to that site. That's what I wished to raise here. I told them as much, since I knew it to be so. Makes me feel a little better that others had the same concerns. Maybe they will address it. That is my hope.

Carboplatin · Oct 30, 2009, 04:42 PM // 16:42

to add further to the frustration, Since my guildwars account is linked to my PlayNC account, I can't change my gw login email no matter what. So now the last hacker will forever know what my email is for my gw login, so its only a matter of time before it happens again.

Note to everyone else. DO NOT link your playNC account to your guildwars account, which means, don't buy anything form the in-game store ever. Cause if you do, you are stuck with the same gw login forever.

Holdav · Oct 30, 2009, 06:14 PM // 18:14

I've not played for a while (about 3-4 months) due to work and other things but i though i'd get on over halloween, get some new hats etc.

And i've been hacked V_V

Storage (800k LOADS of mats, most of it was full, collectable things like Charr carvings etc. Everything Nicholas has given out, tonics

)
Everything from my Monk (Armour, Weapons money)
Ranger (only his collection of bows, i say only, but they left me with a collectors bow... guess i'll never see my beautiful Dryad bow again)
And basically the list goes on...

Well, I just wanted to moan to someone so sorry to everyone who comes into this topic. I guess this is a good enough reason to hang up my GW boots.

Braxus Warmonger · Nov 03, 2009, 07:56 PM // 19:56

So I don't know how this happened... but here goes:

I was never able to connect my Guild Wars serial code to an NCsoft master account. I made 5 accounts in the attempt and never was able to so I said the hell with it and continued to play since I never went on NCsoft anyway. About 5 weeks ago I couldn't enter my account anymore. So I spoke to technical support and after a long process and number of verifications they reset my password stating that the serial code had been registered to a master account for months. Being very excited to get back onto my account I logged in before work this morning (showing up late due to my lack of patience) and, to my utter dismay, I was missing a large amount of gold, and a few major purchases that I had made just before I was no longer able to enter my account. (approx. 800k worth)

I'm really hoping that when I log in later tonight the items will be there but any idea as to wtf happened would be awesome.

Bob Slydell · Nov 03, 2009, 11:38 PM // 23:38

The NCSoft account has, no... IS a major security flaw. Believe it or not, if you use some weak password there, you will get hacked. Then the guy gets into your GW account, can actually see the acct name in the form of an email and then can change the password to it with no option of even knowing the old password (same with NC masteraccount) so basically he did just that and when the password was changed, he helped himself to all your goodies. My suggestion is to make up a very strong password with NC and GW in the form of random number/letters even in upper/lower case letters and write them down on a piece of paper, then keep that paper handy but safe.

A strong password that is so good you can't even remember it (hence needing the paper) a hacker over the internet isn't going to see your piece of paper, lol.

Dandoft · Nov 03, 2009, 11:53 PM // 23:53

So, I just tried to log on to GW today and got the error message... so i reset my password and all that crap. I get on to find that my account has somehow been hacked.
They stripped my inventory of everything, but left everything in my storage (including a req 8 15^50 sephis axe). Another weird thing is that they left an eternal bow with an inscribed chakram and 400g on one of my characters... I've never seen either of those items before.
WTF happened? Why would someone hack my account of a couple mid-ranged items and 94k, but leave everything in my storage including some high-end weapons?

Tresa · Nov 04, 2009, 01:15 AM // 01:15

I care, as well. My husband and one of my in-game buddies have both been hacked in the last 3 weeks. Had it been one of the kids, I would have chalked it up to a silly mistake, but when it happens to two of the most anal-retentive, paranoid people I know...

My husband and I have chalked his up to a keylogger, but where from, we can't figure out, as he doesn't use 3rd party software, doesn't bother with fishy emails, and has pretty solid security on his computer. He uses different passwords for everything, and they're always ridiculously complicated (he prides himself on this) and his GW account's email address isn't used for anything else.

What really added insult to injury was that as his account was being stripped, the PlayNC site's login was down. So, we had to sit there and watch and wait. Fortunately, everything that was taken is replaceable, and they didn't delete anything.

Inde · Nov 04, 2009, 02:53 PM // 14:53

Other sites with stories:

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showthread.php?t=492026 - if you don't want to filter through that specific people:

http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=116
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=102
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=106
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...9&postcount=97
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...9&postcount=55
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...1&postcount=48
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...06&postcount=1
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=166
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=165
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=154
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=196
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=182
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=226
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=212
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=203
http://guildwars.incgamers.com/showp...&postcount=283

Zipster · Nov 11, 2009, 10:37 PM // 22:37

So after 4 years of play my account was hacked Monday morning 11-9. Everything seemed to have happened in about a 2 hour window. I lost 3 sets of obsidian armor (naked characters now), stacks of high-end crafting material (ectos, gem stones, jade, amber), 125k of gold and miscellaneous other items. ANet responded with 12 hours and "reopend" my account but hasn't responded to me since.

Questions I have are:
Any chance of getting back the lost items? (not holding my breath)
Can't they track the trades?
How did it happen? I run symantec which is up todate. Symantec did pick up a keylogger alert a couple weeks back. It quarantined it and I deleted the file. I've re run a full virus scan afterward and found nothing.
What does Anet suggest to check for malware? Or the community suggest?

I am pretty darn cautious and I'm very concerned how this happened. Obviously it is pointing toward a keylogger and symantec not actually catching it.

twicky_kid · Dec 08, 2009, 05:32 AM // 05:32

2nd time within 3 months. Computer is clean and I don't respond to phishing websites or emails. PlayNC account was hacked. Not going to make this into a huge QQ thing.

Best advise to protect your account. Don't link it with PlayNC. Have your cd-key handy and the payment method used to buy the game with. If you used a credit/debit card NcSoft will be asking for that info when you try to recover your account.

I have a huge issue with PlayNC holding all the info for every NcSoft game you have. Also when the password is reset it sends an email saying it was reset with no confirmation needed.

Red Mistic · Dec 08, 2009, 04:54 PM // 16:54

My long time friend and Guild Wars partner was doing research on a brower game his wife was into called Evony. It appears that from what he learned is that the owner of that game and many other also owned a gold selling site for WoW and Guild Wars. Further it was apparent that once you played any of those games you also got a virus of some sort (sorry I am not very technical so my terminology may not be fully correct). This virus would copy your account info and when you played Evony or the other such games again it would then transfer your information to those sites. Once we learned of this we did numerous virus and spyware scans and after finding nothing we though we were safe. That was not the case after playing the game last week his account was hacked and we are still trying to get it back. I have seen some cases like this, most likely we will find nothing there.

All that we have worked for and now to have it lost for playing another game. A lot of ppl will say "it is just a game" well when one plays something for so long and invest time and money to lose it leaves you empty to a point.

Guild Wars has email notifications when someone changes your password but it doesn't stop the change. And to reset your account you need you NCsoft account username and password. After buying the game most ppl don't even know that information which is a shame, I think there would be some sort of email verification before password could be change but guess not.

Well I just wanted to let everyone know to beware of some browser games because some are not very friendly with Guild Wars...

Good luck all and have fun.

shadowlurk16 · Dec 09, 2009, 01:16 AM // 01:16

After 49 months of play, my account has been stolen by a guy in China. At exactly 12:09 AM on December 7, I received an email stating that my password had been changed by IP: 221.211.44.28

I immediately contacted NCSoft and they have been working with me for the past day to prove the account is mine. It has gotten to the point where I had to send a digital image of my Prophecies jewel case with the cd key visible.

A couple days before the account got stolen, I received a mysterious confirmation email that someone had used my NCSoft account to submit a query with support. I got suspicious so I changed my password on my GW account.

Next day, the account is stolen by some stupid Chinese fool. I don't know how my password got into his hands, but I suspect is was the fault of NCSoft's security system. I have not given away my private information because I, unlike many other people, understand the value of your private information.

My GW account is tied in with NCSoft.com and it seems that it was a mistake to do so since they cannot guard their client's information properly.

I hopefully will be getting my account back within the next day or two. I also want my stuff back if it got stolen by the oriental nerd. Not fair that 49 months of work should go down the drain because of security issues with my private information on NCSoft's end.

boxterduke · Dec 09, 2009, 02:21 PM // 14:21

I've been playing Guild Wars since it came out. I have two accounts, one I play all the time and the other has my Ranger on it from back in the day when we only had four slots of characters only.

I used to hear these stories about people getting hacked and supported them and sympathized and at the same time worrying/wondering what would happen to me if my accounts got hacked. I used to live and breath Guild Wars and it was a way of life for me, something I get to do each day. So getting hacked at the time was really worrying me. So I change my password regularly as well as I never tell it to anyone. My PC is always scanned for viruses/spywares/rouges/etc...

Over the past year, I have not been playing much. Last time I logged in was during this year's Halloween, I grabbed my holiday hats and logged off.

Last night after watching the Guild Wars 2 character video, I thought to myself let me login so I can see what my Ranger got for her 4th birthday. After that I logged in to my main account to stare at my Mesmer for a bit (I love her btw) and then logged off.

I got up this morning to find an email that my password was changed. I tracked the IP address and it belongs to some ISP in China.

I tried to login with no luck. I sent support an email and still waiting on them to respond.

I just hope my Mesmer is intact

Thanks for reading.

I just checked my master PlayNC account and the password is changed there as well. I think they even changed the answer to the secret questions.

This sucks royally and still no answer from PlayNC except the email that my support ticket has been opened.

Vinraith · Dec 12, 2009, 05:50 AM // 05:50

I've been largely inactive for the past year or so, but got an email two nights ago indicating that my account password had been changed. I immediately went to the support page, only to discover that my master NCsoft account password had also been changed, along with the secret questions required to reset said password. I immediately emailed support with these problems, roughly 22 minutes after I got the "successfully changed password" email that started all this.

The next day I got a one line response that my support request was being "escalated."

It's now 36 hours since I received that response, 48 hours since this started, and I've heard nothing more from NCsoft. I'm entirely certain my account's been cleaned out and I've lost everything I accumulated over 3 years of playing the game, but I'd like to at least be able to get into my account and SEE that.

More than that, though, I'm appalled at the rate of response here. Is this typical of online games? Is this typical of NCsoft? Is this somehow a special case? I'm put off from ever investing in a game like this again, especially an NCsoft game, if it's so easy to abruptly lose everything you've accumulated over thousands of hours of game time and have no one apparently give a damn.

In short: what the hell?

hallomik · Dec 13, 2009, 01:44 PM // 13:44

I tried to log in this morning and my password wasn't accepted. I checked my email, and sitting in my inbox was a confirmation for a password change from PlayNC that I did not request. It came about an hour ago. I submitted a ticket with the details, but I'm certain I will have been cleaned out by the time things gets resolved. C'est la vie, these days.

blueflame8 · Dec 13, 2009, 08:04 PM // 20:04

I just got an email from [email protected] saying
'Someone at 218.8.233.220 has reset your Guild Wars Game Account password for account [email protected].
If you did not make this change, please contact support immediately at [email protected].'
I can't try logging in because the game is installed on my other computer.
So where do I go about getting help for this? I typed in [email protected] and got a invalid url. Can anyone link the website before.
Also does this mean someone has tried hacking into my account?

log1k · Dec 14, 2009, 10:49 PM // 22:49

This week end, I tried to log in my main account to see if I had any new birthday presents. I quit playing GW a long time ago, waiting for GW2. Well, turns out, I couldn't log in. I went on my secondary account, which is in the same guild, to find out that my main account had been online 6 hours before.

Now, I don't care about the gold and ectos I had (about 800k and over 100 ectos) or weapons/FoW armors etc. But I do care about the titles accumulated (r9 Hero, glad, etc) and my Hall of Monuments. I suspect that actually owning your account could be useful in actually linking it to a futur GW2 account, right? That's mainly why I care about getting it back.

My problem is, Since I started playing 4 years ago, I moved twice. I most likely trashed my CD-Key or any other proof of purchase I had.

I've already explained the situation with the staff at NCSoft and am awaiting a reply. I can provide screenshots of my characters winning HoH, answer emails with the email address used as the login in GW, etc. But I can't provide a registration number from 4 years ago. Because of that, I'm scared I will never get my account back.

If I can't, I WILL NOT be buying GW2.

iTzF3aR · Dec 16, 2009, 07:54 PM // 19:54

just read the annoucement, tried to reset it and said my old password was incorrect. I don't know why but I wanted to MAKE SURE I was entering my password correctly and then I tried, didn't work. All my armor, chaos gloves, armor, tormented weapons oh and my Henchman Tonic will be gone.

Sigh

unkleanone · Dec 17, 2009, 06:41 AM // 06:41

I'm a long time player my account is well over 4 years old I believe its around 54-56 months old, I logged in today to check some of my younger characters for birthday gifts and realized my password had been changed. After spending an hour trying to remember my Play NC info I was finally able to change the passwords to something new. Upon logging in I found that pretty much everything that could be sold was gone from all my characters. total worth probably somewhere in the millions. I am always rediculously careful about everything I download and would never even dream of sharing my password wirth anyone so i really have no idea how this happened I have scanned my system with multiple security softwares and have found nothing. This leaves me to think that one of two things happened here. Either ANET's security was bad and someone hacked there way into my account that way or my account was somehow Brute forced.

Allowing that most likely this hacking was not my fault there should atleast be some way to restore what was lost.

As far as I'm aware nearly every other game can restore lost items. It seems fairly rediculous that ANET can't do so.

Basically I really wish there was the ability to restore lost items and such

neighto · Dec 17, 2009, 02:55 PM // 14:55

Yep.

My account is hacked. After over 4 years and many hundreds of hours playing ... I received an email notification that my password had been changed.

I emailed support back over 12 hours ago and haven't heard anything other than the automated response yet.

Not only is my game account hacked, but my PlayNC master account is compromised, and I cannot recover my password. The answers I input for my security questions are coming back as "incorrect". I wonder why I didn't receive email notification of PlayNC account changes? I'm absolutely astounded.

Before you cry foul and blame my pc or network security, please ... riddle me this: there are multiple GW players in my home with individual accounts accross the board. We all use each others systems to game. Everyone elses accounts are safe and weren't affected ... and mine is not the most "valuable" in game. If the overall security on our end was compromised then mine would not have been the priority target. If it were alphabetical then mine is neither the first nor the last.

My wife logged in and checked our guild roster last night. Apparently I was last online 1 day ago.

I haven't logged into GW in almost a week.

I'm doubtful my characters and "stuff" is intact. I'm doubtful my account will be restored if the characters and "stuff" aren't intact.