Guild Wars 2

My wifes account is currently being used by someone named “Suppers K”. They are online at this very moment.

Please Help

tell her to change her password, fill in a support ticket, and then re-install your computer, to make sure you don’t have any malicious software on there.

She has ran 2 seperate keylogger searching programs and AV. They have found nothing. I believe this is a brute-force attack on Arenanets side.

We have tried to go to the dsupport page; however, it is telling her that her Email Address is not associated with an account.

We are stuck.

Thank you Gaile for the reply. The hacker has changed my wifes character name to “Suppers K”. The hacker is online at this time using her account.

I politely dissagree with your assesment, and believe that the security issue is on your side (the account server). Our home computers are extremely secure. We are “older” gamers (im 49, i will not dsiclose her age ). We dont buy Gold, we dont visit suspicious sites…none of that. So Im sure the breakdown is not on our side.

UPDATE: My wife was sent an email from ANet to reset her password. She went to the link in the email. When she hit verify the site told her there was a problem and to contact Customer Support.

UPDATE: I just logged in to my account and the hacker is no longer online.

Jumping into this real quick…

1. If the account server was hacked from ArenaNet’s side, there would be thousands of people whos accounts would be compromised, and the forums would be flooded. That is not the case.

2. If the password she used for her GW2 account was used ANYWHERE else, it loses its security. Most people tend to use the same password for websites, thinking its secure. The only way she could have gotten hacked like this is if it was a weak password that she had used on another site, otherwise ArenaNet would have detected the thousands of tries on the account to “brute force” the password.

3. Once you get the account, I’d change the email address on it to a completely new one (make a new one if you can) that way it can’t be associated with anything except for guild wars. It’s an extra level of security if you don’t have a smartphone for the authenticator app.

Brianthas.7213:

Jumping into this real quick…

1. If the account server was hacked from ArenaNet’s side, there would be thousands of people whos accounts would be compromised, and the forums would be flooded. That is not the case.

2. If the password she used for her GW2 account was used ANYWHERE else, it loses its security. Most people tend to use the same password for websites, thinking its secure. The only way she could have gotten hacked like this is if it was a weak password that she had used on another site, otherwise ArenaNet would have detected the thousands of tries on the account to “brute force” the password.

3. Once you get the account, I’d change the email address on it to a completely new one (make a new one if you can) that way it can’t be associated with anything except for guild wars. It’s an extra level of security if you don’t have a smartphone for the authenticator app.

Hi Brian,

Thanks for the advice. Though, using the forum as a measurement of how many accounts have been hacked is not logical. ANet has sent thousands of emails encouraging people to change their password. I know this because ANet says so in this forum. There is a reason these mails were sent. Logic tells me that something has happened, on a very large scale, that prompted ANet to send those mailers out.

I still believe they were hacked. All the big games: WoW and Rift to name two have been hacked. The likelyhood of ANet being hacked is high.

What we need is an authenticator like: SWTOR, Rift, WoW, or pretty much every other MMO.

There is an authenticator you can use if you have a smartphone: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/Beta-Feature-Mobile-Two-Factor-Authentication/first#post398418

Don’t believe that there’s been any confirmation on a keychain version yet. If you can add that then it’s a really good idea.

Oh wow! I did not know this. I will go there right now. Thank you so much.

Thanks Gaile for fixing the problem and for the very quick resolution. My wifes account is back to “Normal”.

Thank you again…