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Posted by: Gaile Gray

Gaile Gray

ArenaNet Communications Manager

Next

Here’s an update about progress in game security and the resolution of a recent situation from Chris, the lead of our Game Security Team:

Since launch, we have refined and expanded our tools and processes to investigate malicious player activity. In the last couple of months we have deployed numerous methods of detection that have been highly successful in identifying players performing actions that violate our User Agreement. In the month of June alone, we have taken action against more than 10,000 accounts that were identified to have performed malicious activity in Guild Wars 2. While not immediately apparent in game, this has made a significant overall impact on the number of players attempting to abuse cheats and exploits in our game.

We use all available information, including player reports, when taking action on an account. Unfortunately not all detection methods and are perfect, and data can sometimes be misleading. This became readily clear to us when players began reporting that their accounts were being terminated after attempting to run the Metrica Province jumping puzzle.

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle. Due to this bug, there was an unintended side effect that caused false positives on an element of our malicious activity detection system. We have since identified players that were caught up in this false detection and have reinstated their accounts.

It was unfortunate that this happened, but as Guild Wars 2 grows, so do we. We would like to thank the community for bringing this to our attention. Due to your passion for our game, we were able to come to a swift resolution for this issue. We have made huge strides in keeping the game fair for everyone, and could not continue to do it without your support.

Gaile Gray
Communications Manager
Guild & Fansite Relations; In-Game Events
ArenaNet

(edited by Gaile Gray.6029)

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Posted by: Thundolfe.9302

Thundolfe.9302

The response is appreciated but do you guys have an understanding how bad it looks when you send people ticket responses like ‘we have complete confidence in our methods and we did not make a mistake, and all future tickets will be closed’, and then surprise, you made a mistake?

Terrible attitude and method.

You must do better.

(edited by Thundolfe.9302)

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

The response is appreciated but do you guys have an understanding how bad it looks when you send people ticket responses like ‘we have complete confidence in our methods and we did not make a mistake, and all future tickets will be closed’, and then surprise, you made a mistake?

Terrible attitude and method.

You must do better.

Firts off all Gaile Thank you for getting clear bout this. It shows how transparent Arenanet is. Not hiding behind mistakes but being open and honesat.

Then to Thundolfe. You are right it sounds wrong and cruel when you are wrongfully accsued. But keep in mind that there are people trying to get out of a ban no matter what. They use any hesitation of words against the support people. They are plain bad people. The harsh tone is needed for those people who where wrong.

Arenanet could have handled this quitly. Not saying anything and just unsuspending the people involved with a cryptic thing like ‘your where suspended,but on further review there is not solid proof. Though we still think we made the right decision you are unsuspended. However we do encourage you to stay clear from harmfull activity’s in the future.’

This statement (i made it up myself) would be from a company that wants to do badly. Arenanet however has proven to be open and transparant. They made a mistake and are not trying to hide it. I take my hat off for that!!

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: Gaile Gray

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Gaile Gray

ArenaNet Communications Manager

Next

-snip-

You must do better.

Yes, and that is our intention and our goal, every single day.

We do know how sad this situation made people, and we truly are very sorry. I think that we should look at those who were erroneously impacted with complete sympathy. We’ve reinstated, we’ve sent emails, and we’ve posted. We will continue with that same level of transparency for situations — good and bad — in the future.

However, even while considering those players (whose numbers were modest) first, we also should look at the removal of 10,000 (!) exploiters, cheaters, and botters and remember that the game is better for a higher level of diligence against those who breach the User Agreement.

I am not — I promise you — making excuses. I am just looking at things from a broad view. I know how seriously folks around here took those false positives and I feel sure that we’ll continue to improve on systems in the future.

Gaile Gray
Communications Manager
Guild & Fansite Relations; In-Game Events
ArenaNet

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Posted by: Robles.7458

Robles.7458

I understand that this problems can happen, but banned people in game shouldn´t be banned at acount issues forum because it is hard that they tell their problem if they can´t write here.

They always can use other webs like reddit, but I think that if they have bought the game, they should have the right to write here without ask for help to a friend.

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Posted by: Gaile Gray

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Gaile Gray

ArenaNet Communications Manager

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I understand that this problems can happen, but banned people in game shouldn´t be banned at acount issues forum because it is hard that they tell their problem if they can´t write here.

They always can use other webs like reddit, but I think that if they have bought the game, they should have the right to write here without ask for help to a friend.

I appreciate your position. I used to feel the same way, but since we all do have other means to get help, I’m not sure that having 100 people posting “I was unjustly banned,” when maybe only 1 was really involved in an error — is quite a risk and it will cloud the forums.

Gaile Gray
Communications Manager
Guild & Fansite Relations; In-Game Events
ArenaNet

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Posted by: Crimsony.2514

Crimsony.2514

I understand that this problems can happen, but banned people in game shouldn´t be banned at acount issues forum because it is hard that they tell their problem if they can´t write here.

They always can use other webs like reddit, but I think that if they have bought the game, they should have the right to write here without ask for help to a friend.

I appreciate your position. I used to feel the same way, but since we all do have other means to get help, I’m not sure that having 100 people posting “I was unjustly banned,” when maybe only 1 was really involved in an error — is quite a risk and it will cloud the forums.

I totally agree with this.

That said, I’ve seen complaints elsewhere on the internet about closed accounts and feeling like they’ve run out of options. Sometimes with (excuse me) pretty terrible English which I’m sure doesn’t help things.

I recognize that it’s possible that some or most of these posters could be trolls who hacked and got banned.

But I also feel like it would be helpful to make the appeal process more explicit and less informal, so everyone knows how to access it and what a truly final decision looks like. Someone shouldn’t get a mail saying “the decision is final” when they still have a route to appeal.

Anyway that’s just my two cents to be honest none of this effects me in the slightest one wya or another >_>;

Thanks for all your hard-work managing the sometimes tumultuous GW community!

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Posted by: Thundolfe.9302

Thundolfe.9302

-le snip

I certainly don’t blame you for this Gaile, I know that you spend a ridiculous amount of time answering questions and complaints. I’m just saying, I think your agents and processes need a little bit of refining

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Posted by: Darkk.3018

Darkk.3018

Even though I was not affected by this bug, it has left me worried should a situation like this happen to me. I would like to ask whether you’ve changed your email responses to people? If I knew I was completely innocent, I would be very distressed to receive an email that said

“The account will remain permanently closed and is not eligible for reactivation under any circumstances.” or

“and we will not entertain further discussion about this incident. Subsequent tickets will be closed without response.”

Those responses would horrify me if I received them and I would not know what other avenues of help I could use given that the official forums would be banned? I could always try other forums/reddit but sceptics will be everywhere :/ I do think chances of things like this happening are pretty slim, but I have experienced things that I’m told also only had a small percentage of happening.

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Posted by: gassy.8975

gassy.8975

I hope people (like me) aren’t going to get banned for jumping out of Rata Sum and landing in certain areas that cause us “to fall out of the intended boundaries of the” city. It was an innocent action and there was nothing to exploit!

I’m hoping other areas like Rata Sum won’t fall into the same category.

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Posted by: Theftwind.8976

Theftwind.8976

Quick question Gaile. I did that JP a couple of days back in order to do the Sky Pirates achievement and did fall through the instance to end up on my feet and alive on the ground below forcing me to start it all over again. Are you still banning people in regards to this bug? I mean is there a chance that my account could be banned because if there is I want to go on record that I did fall through the instance and the wife was watching over my shoulder as I fell and survived. She was waiting for me at the point I fell from within the jump puzzle.

Theftwind (HoD)

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Posted by: Kashrlyyk.5364

Kashrlyyk.5364

Yes, and that is our intention and our goal, every single day.

We do know how sad this situation made people…

People playing this game does include 12 year old children, people suffering from depression and/or people having low self esteem. And your support team sends out messages like this:

We have complete confidence in our detection and in our decision to terminate the account. Therefore, we will not accept an appeal in relation to this account termination.

The decision to terminate the account is final. This decision has been thoroughly reviewed by our team, and we maintain absolute confidence in our conclusion.

The account will remain permanently closed and is not eligible for reactivation under any circumstances.

What is that? You didn’t know that people playing this game might have those diseases? THAT IS EXACTLY THE REASON WHY YOU HAVE TO BE NICE TO PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET!

You can’t defend yourself in court with “If I had known he has a weak heart I wouldn’t have jumped out of a bush screaming ‘boo’.”. The fact that you DON’T know that is the reason you should not have jumped out of the bush.

However, even while considering those players (whose numbers were modest) first, we also should look at the removal of 10,000 (!) exploiters, cheaters, and botters and remember that the game is better for a higher level of diligence against those who breach the User Agreement.

The ONLY reason in my view for a permanent account ban is anything that makes ANOTHER player loose items or characters. Apart from that there is nothing that warrants a permanent ban.
You could deactivate mining for resource node hoppers or chat for people posting racist comments.

Because a permanent ban means you take away REAL money from people and I am sure there are people getting wrongly accused and permanently banned and they DON’T get there accounts reactivated because of another of your errors or because of your disheartening and disgusting email.

Also the fact that someone on reddit HAD to inform “Better Business Bureau” BEFORE ANet or you replied is extremely worrying.

Isn’t this part of your “Terms of Use”:

Do not debate Customer Support decisions or actions. Threads or posts designed to announce, appeal, or contest your own or another player’s suspension or account termination—be it forum or game account—will be removed without notice."

That’s the level of transparency you have in your rules. BTW it was “ArenaNetSupportTeam” that suggested on Reddit to break that rule.

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Posted by: Wolfey.3407

Wolfey.3407

As a person who was falsely banned for being a bot (was playing as a ranger)
I got the same prompt 3 times:
" We have complete confidence in our detection and in our decision to terminate the account. Therefore, we will not accept an appeal in relation to this account termination.

The decision to terminate the account is final. This decision has been thoroughly reviewed by our team, and we maintain absolute confidence in our conclusion.

The account will remain permanently closed and is not eligible for reactivation under any circumstances."

After arguing and demanding them to go through their logs, I was able to have both a higher up Anet staff member & someone from NCSOFT over ride the ban and admitted anet screwed up.

It would be nice if anet changed the copy pasted prompt to something a little more friendly?

Maybe something like:

"
Thank you for filing a ticket,
Your account is currently being investigated for _____botting,hacking, w.e.____.
During the investigation process you will not be able to log in to Guild Wars 2.
If at the end of the investigation if you’re found guilty of ___________
your account will remain terminated.

Thank you for your time and patience,
-ArenaNet Support Team
"

Former PvP Forum Specialist
2015-2016
Fort Aspenwood

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Posted by: zerorogue.9410

zerorogue.9410

I am glad this was caught and an it was resolved. (otherwise I may have never done that puzzle again ) I know what bug you where speaking of and have done it a few times myself, (a few by accident and a few to break out of the map for fun and exploration) I myself like to find locations where you are not supposed to be and have found spots in nearly every map.

So when I find that people where automatically permanently banned for doing what was possible with intended effect of skills it makes very concerned with if I will be banned in a same way someday. Being that this is the first incident of it I have heard of since launch does console me. However, I must ask, was there any review by any admin before these ban’s where implemented?

I can understand temporary bans by detections but when your talking about permanently banning an account, that’s fifty dollars + gem purchases + hours spent playing. Now I have no sympathy for botters or cheaters and believe they should receive the fullest extent of the ban hammer. My concern is for these players who are wrongly banned.

As you have said you’ve taken action against 10,000 accounts in this month alone, how can you know all 10,00 where not false positives? I understand double-checking all 10,000 accounts would be daunting task. I only ask at this point you take this occurrence as a warning that you may want to review and see if some the detection methods may be giving false positives.

Thanks arena net for all you’ve done to keep bots and cheaters out of the game and keep up the good work

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Posted by: PreppyDeath.3986

PreppyDeath.3986

How far back did you look for false positives? I ask because, while the problem became apparent with the introduction of a new incentive for lots of people to do the jumping puzzle at once, the problem with the jumping puzzle itself has been around for some time. I fell through the map when I was running it a month or two ago. I wasn’t banned, thankfully, but it’s not hard to imagine that people were banned for this long before the Sky Pirates release, with no idea why.

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

How far back did you look for false positives? I ask because, while the problem became apparent with the introduction of a new incentive for lots of people to do the jumping puzzle at once, the problem with the jumping puzzle itself has been around for some time. I fell through the map when I was running it a month or two ago. I wasn’t banned, thankfully, but it’s not hard to imagine that people were banned for this long before the Sky Pirates release, with no idea why.

A lot of untruth in this thread. I warning to everyone. Yes there are many many people claiming they got banned/suspended falsly. The truth is that almost all of them are false reports. I have been on a forum with an advertisement for a third party program. The program came with detailed instructions how to avoid detection and how to discredit Arenanet when suspended in an attempt to get unsuspended. The really bad guys can be very very bad.

One question is a good question. How far back support goes when identifying false positives. I am not working for Arenanet so I can’t garantee anything. But if you believe you got banned and your clase was previous closed feel free to re-open your ticket (or open a new one if you can’t re-open the originally one). Make sure you use the term ’Goemm’s Lab’ so support knows what you are claiming.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: BilboBaggins.5620

BilboBaggins.5620

Could we please just fix the jumping puzzles? Then there will be no false positives.

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Posted by: Oliver.6159

Oliver.6159

Here’s an update about progress in game security and the resolution of a recent situation from Chris, the lead of our Game Security Team:

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle. Due to this bug, there was an unintended side effect that caused false positives on an element of our malicious activity detection system. We have since identified players that were caught up in this false detection and have reinstated their accounts.

When I read this, I got a feeling and some quetions.

What happens to players, who end ‘oudside the boundaries’ on another place because of a bug or a glitch?
What, if there are just a few players and not, like in this case, a great number of banned players?
Do they have any chance to get an investigation and their accounts back?

Thanks

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Posted by: Rajani Isa.6294

Rajani Isa.6294

I understand that this problems can happen, but banned people in game shouldn´t be banned at acount issues forum because it is hard that they tell their problem if they can´t write here.

They always can use other webs like reddit, but I think that if they have bought the game, they should have the right to write here without ask for help to a friend.

This is why support.guildwars2.com is not tied to the game account, but requires you create a separate account – so you can get help in the case of a false positive.

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Posted by: Rajani Isa.6294

Rajani Isa.6294

I hope people (like me) aren’t going to get banned for jumping out of Rata Sum and landing in certain areas that cause us “to fall out of the intended boundaries of the” city. It was an innocent action and there was nothing to exploit!

I’m hoping other areas like Rata Sum won’t fall into the same category.

I think the Rata Sum issue is different – the Goemm’s puzzle bug teleported you to a place you could NEVER get to normally – the ceiling of the zone.

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Posted by: Pifil.5193

Pifil.5193

There is one thing that I’m not sure of as it hasn’t been directly stated: does this mean we’re safe to do this particular puzzle now? I mean, has the detection mechanism been fixed or disabled here or has your team been instructed to ignore hits in and around this puzzle because of the bug? Basically, can we still get banned and have to wait to be identified as the result of a false positive?

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

There is one thing that I’m not sure of as it hasn’t been directly stated: does this mean we’re safe to do this particular puzzle now? I mean, has the detection mechanism been fixed or disabled here or has your team been instructed to ignore hits in and around this puzzle because of the bug? Basically, can we still get banned and have to wait to be identified as the result of a false positive?

Yes it is perfectly safe to do the puzzle.
Arenanet isn’t auto-banning. The GM’s (human beings) bans people. They are aware of this now so nothing to worry bout.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: kalvin.7851

kalvin.7851

I did the jumping puzzle the Tuesday night the patch for Sky Pirates was released. I got the email of the ban. I have never used a third party software thing. As of Saturday I am STILL banned. And Yes I was told by support the same thing many of you got. I am pretty unhappy. I have been playing GW1 when it released and GW2. Have never ever cheated. I hope they can resolve this or they lost a customer for life.

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

I did the jumping puzzle the Tuesday night the patch for Sky Pirates was released. I got the email of the ban. I have never used a third party software thing. As of Saturday I am STILL banned. And Yes I was told by support the same thing many of you got. I am pretty unhappy. I have been playing GW1 when it released and GW2. Have never ever cheated. I hope they can resolve this or they lost a customer for life.

Hi Kalvin,

I know you are upset and I can understand it. The way the suspension system works is that you where suspended by a GM after the system flagged your account. This means it can take in some situations several days (and yes even weeks or months) before you got suspended. So assuming it was the jumping puzzle cause thats one of the last things you did isn’t right. Also understand that from the point of view of Arenanet it means that not all bans done in the last few days will be undone.

I can be that support has missed you when backtracking the wrongly banned accounts.

I recommend you update your originally ticket (if this is closed permanent then create a new one). Explain that you still disagree with your suspension and that you think you where suspended cause of the Goemm’s lab bug (if creating a new ticket, it might be a good plan to include Goemm’s lab in the subject).

If that doesn’t result in a positive reply and action you can ask the support liason (Gaile) to review your matter. Please do so by replying to this thread and posting your 12-digit ticket number so she can find your specifick case.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: kalvin.7851

kalvin.7851

Okay, I did as u said and updated my ticket like you suggested. The ticket number is 130626-001168.

Thanks

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Posted by: Shadow Dragon.9874

Shadow Dragon.9874

It’s good to hear that this thing got solved Accidents happen but we all learn from mistakes.

We use all available information, including player reports, when taking action on an account. Unfortunately not all detection methods and are perfect, and data can sometimes be misleading. This became readily clear to us when players began reporting that their accounts were being terminated after attempting to run the Metrica Province jumping puzzle.

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle. Due to this bug, there was an unintended side effect that caused false positives on an element of our malicious activity detection system. We have since identified players that were caught up in this false detection and have reinstated their accounts.

Hopefully this bug was fixed properly because I just did (or better say, still am doing) the jumping puzzle in question and I fell at one point at the jumping puzzle and was teleported to metrica provinence’s sky. Don’t remember this being a normal case so hopefully nothing goes wrong with your detector just because the game decided to introduce a bug >:(

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

It’s good to hear that this thing got solved Accidents happen but we all learn from mistakes.

We use all available information, including player reports, when taking action on an account. Unfortunately not all detection methods and are perfect, and data can sometimes be misleading. This became readily clear to us when players began reporting that their accounts were being terminated after attempting to run the Metrica Province jumping puzzle.

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle. Due to this bug, there was an unintended side effect that caused false positives on an element of our malicious activity detection system. We have since identified players that were caught up in this false detection and have reinstated their accounts.

Hopefully this bug was fixed properly because I just did (or better say, still am doing) the jumping puzzle in question and I fell at one point at the jumping puzzle and was teleported to metrica provinence’s sky. Don’t remember this being a normal case so hopefully nothing goes wrong with your detector just because the game decided to introduce a bug >:(

The detector prolly still detect it, but that means a GM will be reviewing your actions. They will see you did that jumping puzzle and know bout the bug triggering this false positive and no to not suspend you now.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: Brutal Arts.6307

Brutal Arts.6307

The automated form letter your support sends out is simply put, incredibly rude. Perhaps you should fix your poor detection system and update your automated responses language. It’s frankly disgusting.

You have gotten what you paid for, all that remains is biweekly gemshop pushing.

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Posted by: Keta.9601

Keta.9601

Personally, I’ll not do another jumping puzzle in the game. And you really need to change your form letters. You’ve lost a fair number of customers among those who were wrongly accused.

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Posted by: Michael Fejervary.8576

Michael Fejervary.8576

Even though I was not affected by this bug, it has left me worried should a situation like this happen to me. I would like to ask whether you’ve changed your email responses to people? If I knew I was completely innocent, I would be very distressed to receive an email that said

“The account will remain permanently closed and is not eligible for reactivation under any circumstances.” or

“and we will not entertain further discussion about this incident. Subsequent tickets will be closed without response.”

Those responses would horrify me if I received them and I would not know what other avenues of help I could use given that the official forums would be banned? I could always try other forums/reddit but sceptics will be everywhere :/ I do think chances of things like this happening are pretty slim, but I have experienced things that I’m told also only had a small percentage of happening.

I was not affected by this, but I was doing this JP the day it happened, and fell and died “A LOT” while trying to finish it.

If I were to have become banned and received such “Final” responses I would have just been done, took my money, and not even have bothered checking anything GW2 related and not known about the issue that happened resulting in the unfair ban.

Now my post game purchases may be modest, but as I play with my 13 year old twins, and their step-mom, across four accounts it isn’t so modest anymore for a family of five (I have a 2 year old that cannot play yet) buying gems for each person.

Thing is that is now four accounts and all future purchases be it gems or expansions now gone as income (since we game together as a family), and that may not be a lot, but when you have how many other unfair banned players just leave and their friends and family members leave it adds up to a lot more a lot faster.

I don’t have the luxury to expel money on a whim for a chance at maybe getting away with cheating, hacking, or whatever may break ToS, but TBH since this all happened though I just really have not been playing much.

I am all for anti-cheating mechanics of various kinds, and some games I have played have even implemented open monitoring of program processes which I really just don’t mind as I (one of the few probably) read the ToS and follow it (even if I do not agree with certain overboard things compared to other MMO’s).

I have to say that the language in which players (aka customers) are responded to when things like this happen is just (as I have posted elsewhere) shameful (and then some) compared to my experiences of how other competitors in the MMO market handle things that could lead to some form of disciplinary action.

I understand that near 100% may claim false ban and be lying, but that should not mean rude wording, bad treatment, or the appearance of support members taking the easy way out for that small % that is telling the truth.

While ArenaNet did the right thing (which I will admit they are usually very good at) and ate their “Humble” pie by posting their mistake it still does not fix the attitude as “NO ONE” should ever be able to find the nerve to claim “100%” or “Complete” confidence in anything really.

I have pointed out many times that Gaile is very good at what she does, and I have seen many people find help that if not for her they may not have (or it would have took way longer), as well as, the fact that many times she goes above and beyond for the community and players.

In many ways she reminds me a lot of “Moorgard” and “Blackgard” community liaisons (more or less) from the first few years of Everquest 2, and when they moved on for what they thought to be better pastures we all felt the loss, and Gaile reminds me a lot of both of them, and she does an awesome job doing her job.

I just think that while Gaile attempted to do a good job (and did for what she would be allowed to disclose) with reaching out to us we all know that even her hands are still tied to what and how she can say things, but even that all still does not give (and not by her doing) any real reassurance on future issues should they happen, or how they can and should handle communications to their players/customers differently.

That is what bothers me the most, and why right now I am just having a hard time logging in to want to play, and right now that’s four accounts less of possible income coming in right now which may be modest, but its still lost income.

How many others feel the same right now? How many others are feeling “Bleh” about all this and logging in less? How many others by logging in less or not at all right now are not putting income into the game?

If my families four account are the only ones feeling this way and logging in less then I deserve a reward for being the only 1-4 out of how many thousands of players?

(edited by Michael Fejervary.8576)

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Posted by: Rajani Isa.6294

Rajani Isa.6294

The automated form letter your support sends out is simply put, incredibly rude. Perhaps you should fix your poor detection system and update your automated responses language. It’s frankly disgusting.

While I can’t speak of the letters, the detection system was working was working just fine. The issue was with a bug unknown to one or more GMs on cheat duty. The puzzle isn’t supposed to teleport you anywhere but back to the start.

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Posted by: Katz.5143

Katz.5143

It doesn’t matter that it was a bug. It matters that the letters sound rude to customers. They can actually change that. The words of the letters sent out aren’t chiseled in concrete never to be changed. It is surely possible to sound firm but not rude. They should think, how can this be said so that the rare innocent person won’t be offended greatly. There are many words in our language and many ways to say things. I honestly believe they can craft a response that sounds better.

It’s a kitten conspiracy. Kittens gonna be kittens. All is vain!

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Posted by: Crazylegsmurphy.6430

Crazylegsmurphy.6430

I’m sincerely sorry to all the players that got banned due to the bug in this JP. I consider it my fault since I probably should have reported this bug a few more times in addition to the 10+ times I already had prior to this Living Story update.

I’m so sorry.

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Posted by: Pixelpumpkin.4608

Pixelpumpkin.4608

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle.

It took me no significant investigation to determine that this bug has been reported many, many times: https://www.google.de/#q=site:forum-en.guildwars2.com+goemm

For fun, here’s a bug report from October 2012.

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle.

It took me no significant investigation to determine that this bug has been reported many, many times: https://www.google.de/#q=site:forum-en.guildwars2.com+goemm

For fun, here’s a bug report from October 2012.

The thing is that bug reports have to be checked and more important reproduced. The falling bug from my experience happens at specifick locations through the dungeon and not fully random. The bug reports dont have any screenshots with the dotted white line showing so it will be hard to reproduce. Specially for a minor bug it is something minor and more of an annoyance then a problem. The thing is that a gm can’t be expected to know bout all bugs in the game. The auto-detect software saw suspicious activity. The GM’s didnt had any reason to suspect that it was not an illegal activity (not knowing the bug) so they suspended. Given the problem of reproducing this bug and given the fact that GM’s can’t know bout all bugs in game, means it is a mistake that can happen.

- Arenanet was open bout it and that gives them credit in my opinion, they didn’t try to hide this mistake.
- It is all reasonable explainable how it couldn’t have been prevented. It was an error in a computer system that wasn’t detectable by GM’s till there was a pattern of people who where complaining bout false suspensions.
- Al people who actually got hurt by this have been tracked down. If some have been overlooked they can contact support and if suspended unjustified they will get their account back.

Last off all. These kind of issues are often used by people to discredit support. Their reason is that these bad people have to gain by discrediting them, namely cause they do engage in illegal activity’s and want to throw dirt at their number 1 enemy in a continuous battle.

Bottom line is that this is an important lesson for both the devs and and GM’s/support people. Gaile’s post is showing they are understanding they did make a mistake and are sorry bout. But people mis-using it to discredit support further then just this are actually helping the real bot’s, cheaters, RTM’s, exploiters, etc.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: Gaile Gray

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Gaile Gray

ArenaNet Communications Manager

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- snip -

But I also feel like it would be helpful to make the appeal process more explicit and less informal, so everyone knows how to access it and what a truly final decision looks like. Someone shouldn’t get a mail saying “the decision is final” when they still have a route to appeal.

Yep! And…

-le snip

I certainly don’t blame you for this Gaile, I know that you spend a ridiculous amount of time answering questions and complaints. I’m just saying, I think your agents and processes need a little bit of refining

You’re very kind, but I’m just one team member. I agree with the comments that suggest that we can improve; yes, absolutely! That is one of the key elements of my role at ArenaNet: to help with outreach, to review processes and policies, and to help make our communications clearer and just all-around better. Change and improvement takes time, but it’s definitely top of the list!

Again, we’re a team, but we’re a team with a mission: to give Triple-A customer service to every player of our games.

- snip -

They always can use other webs like reddit, but I think that if they have bought the game, they should have the right to write here without ask for help to a friend.

I think we need to get better at the ticket appeal process, and then the forum (official or external) elements won’t be so much a factor. We’ll be looking at that on every level.

- snip -

It took me no significant investigation to determine that this bug has been reported many, many times: https://www.google.de/#q=site:forum-en.guildwars2.com+goemm

For fun, here’s a bug report from October 2012.

That’s definitely a valuable observation to include in internal discussion. Thank you for pointing it out.

Could we please just fix the jumping puzzles? Then there will be no false positives.

That is definitely the objective, yes!

It doesn’t matter that it was a bug. It matters that the letters sound rude to customers. They can actually change that. The words of the letters sent out aren’t chiseled in concrete never to be changed. It is surely possible to sound firm but not rude. They should think, how can this be said so that the rare innocent person won’t be offended greatly. There are many words in our language and many ways to say things. I honestly believe they can craft a response that sounds better.

Yes, I agree. We are and will always be working on this: Clarity, compassion, and correctness coupled with consider clout against cheaters. Ok, it’s Fun with Alliteration Day for me.

Gaile Gray
Communications Manager
Guild & Fansite Relations; In-Game Events
ArenaNet

(edited by Gaile Gray.6029)

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Posted by: Michael Fejervary.8576

Michael Fejervary.8576

MR

I can see giving some forgiveness toward the GM’s/Support people as they are not always made aware of everything going on that could be a potential issue, however, that still does not excuse ArenaNet/NCsoft’s tone or attitude with dealing with their customers and Gaile’s (who is doing her job the way she is told and does it well under what restrictions may even be on her) statement on behalf of the company is a start, but not a total solution to win/maintain customer confidence/loyalty.

As an unaffected customer that is still what bothers me (and it seems many others), and not just because of this one issue or mistake, but many ongoing ones and this is just one more thing to add to my questioning where my confidence/loyalty is.

If anyone thinks that they have rights and protections in online gaming they are mistaken (the laws have not fully caught up to things) as they are 100% at the mercy of the company with them being the final “Judge and Jury” on the matter.

Don’t believe me? Read the ToS on just about any online game. Summed up from the boring fine print the ToS is not in the customers favor, it is written fully to protect the company, and just about everyone of them state that the developer/publisher is the final say in all matters. Meaning you have no real legal recourse which is why you agree everytime you log on that if you do seek some kind of recourse you will by means of arbitration and not court action.

As far as bugs. No! That’s no excuse for the developers.

Yes they take time to pin down, but unless they are doing things behind the scenes that is just way off from the norm then they have databases for everything a character does and can pinpoint things such as the x,y,z and height information of where a character was when they triggered a bug causing an issue in that JP, and slowly close them up as bug reports come in.

Most of the time the reason why it takes so long comes down to priority of importance and manpower to handle it. In every MMO I have ever played things like that JP issue would have been a very low priority issue, but had it been something like “Jump here, fall, die, revive at nearby WP, gain 2g instead of having 1s53c removed” the WP would have been shut down (along with the portal up most likely), and this thing ironed out within days tops.

The issue has happened since forever, and it was not a priority as annoying to us as it was, and now we sit and hope that since the detection methods that they have “complete confidence” in are triggering due to it that it should now be a high priority to fix as this can cost them customers in the long haul.

Bottom line. In the end ArenaNet/NCsoft while not horrible compared to other MMO companies is not as transparent about things either as you are trying to imply.

Pointing to the ToS and saying don’t do it again doesn’t cut it, sorry that’s where I disagree with Arenanet/NCsoft. It then comes down to “Do what again? You never even told me what I did to begin with”, and that is not fair to a paying customer as not everyone cheats or uses exploits intentionally.

The online gaming market has changed a lot in the last five years. The move to micro transaction gaming in the US alone has increased greatly, and its getting the attention of those who can pass laws and regulations on them.

Some states have already started passing certain legislation on online gaming companies to protect customers in their states, and those companies have complied.

If the industry doesn’t find a way to better regulate itself with dealing with things and actually giving paying customers that have invested in digital usage rights in the 100’s of dollars (and more) better details about what is going on when said accounts are at risk for complete termination then it is only a matter of time before laws catch up that are not in a companies best interest let alone our own.

(edited by Michael Fejervary.8576)

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Posted by: Gaile Gray

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Gaile Gray

ArenaNet Communications Manager

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MF — I believe what MR was saying was that some of the protests are not legitimate. Like “I did that thing, too, and I was not reinstated.” (No mention of the half-dozen cheats used on the same account.) Or, “I did that thing” (with no mention of the RMT sales associated with the account). Some protests are genuine, absolutely. Some are not.

And once again: Giving details that answer the question “What did I do?” is, for the cheater, almost “a blueprint to cheat.” Say there are four ways that Bad Player Bob is cheating (because usually cheaters don’t stop with just one cheat). Bob gets banned, and asks “What did I do?” We say, “You did A.” He then may feel, “Oh, I can now continue to do B, C, and D on my other cheat accounts (or tell my cheater friends what they are presumably safe to do) because I was told that I was banned for A.”

The truth is, it’s a fair question, but it’s not really appropriate to give an answer because it increases the risk of continued cheating, which is not good for the game, the game economy, or the player community as a whole.

-snip-

That is what bothers me the most, and why right now I am just having a hard time logging in to want to play

-snip-

Michael — I really believe you can and should count on improvements on every level: heightened diligence about bugs; better, clearer communications; a continued refinement of the cheat detection system (as mentioned in the OP on this thread), and more.

I can’t say we’ll never make another mistake. But as that thread states, we constantly are learning and improving and no one wants that to happen more than we do! I hope our transparency about this situation, our explanation of what happened, and our intentions for the future will restore your desire to hop back into Tyria.

Gaile Gray
Communications Manager
Guild & Fansite Relations; In-Game Events
ArenaNet

(edited by Gaile Gray.6029)

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Posted by: Teraphas.6210

Teraphas.6210

I love the reductions of cheaters in pve. The bots are near non existant anymore. I dont play spvp enough to tell a dif but im sure the is some. Wvw sees less walking thru walls now but could we see about getting some devs/gms to lurk in wvw more? There is a rash of quirky ac behavior lately.

Things like in Hills an ac built well South of the Lord room on that porch running around it. The ac doesn’t even have line of sight on the door yet there is aoe arrows hitting every inch of the room dropping centered on things you cant even see from out side the room. Or acs placed outside a shield wall on a keep that then procedes to target everything along the top of the wall and then everything on the far side of the wall. Or acs placed at the ne tower just sw of the last switch bback to the lords pavilion that procedes to clear the entire top of that mesa of seige and manages to target dead center of the claimers room.

It just would be nice to know there are people lurking and improving the detection of these odd behaviors. especially when you see a person with a very high wvw rank take over the ac and then it feels like there is nothing it can’t touch

Very least give us a few more catagories when reporting that fit better, I often wonder if reporting as a bot is even worthwhile, or if they will only check for x y and z when we do and miss the odd ac targeting.

You can’t spell Slaughter without Laughter

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Posted by: marnick.4305

marnick.4305

What is that? You didn’t know that people playing this game might have those diseases? THAT IS EXACTLY THE REASON WHY YOU HAVE TO BE NICE TO PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET!

Don’t go on the internet if you can’t stand the anonimity. You know that before you log in.

You can’t defend yourself in court with “If I had known he has a weak heart I wouldn’t have jumped out of a bush screaming ‘boo’.”. The fact that you DON’T know that is the reason you should not have jumped out of the bush.

Of course you can defend yourself like that. It’s simply not possible to know everything, and it’s not reasonable to cater exclusively to the weakest.

Many people who complain about bans are hackers trying to clog up the system, making it inefficient and therefor harming the game. The eventual goal is to make hack detection less effective. Therefor, it is paramount to not argue with people who have been identified as hackers, unless many false positives point to the same issue (in this case Metrica).

That’s still not an excuse but a rationale. Is it better to have 1 false positive or to let 1000 hackers reign the game? That’s a though nut to crack, and I bet you it’s probably the first. Kittens to be that false positive though.

However I would personally give false positive 500 gems per day banned. Probably not possible though.

If I can’t play Guild Wars 2 at work, I won’t work in Guild Wars 2 either.
Delayed content is eventually good. Rushed content is eternally bad. ~ Shigeru Miyamoto

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Posted by: Kraggy.4169

Kraggy.4169

That’s still not an excuse but a rationale. Is it better to have 1 false positive or to let 1000 hackers reign the game? That’s a though nut to crack, and I bet you it’s probably the first. Kittens to be that false positive though.

However I would personally give false positive 500 gems per day banned. Probably not possible though.

The issue is the FPs that are NOT un-banned due to lack of publicity like Reddit gave this ‘bug’.

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

That’s still not an excuse but a rationale. Is it better to have 1 false positive or to let 1000 hackers reign the game? That’s a though nut to crack, and I bet you it’s probably the first. Kittens to be that false positive though.

However I would personally give false positive 500 gems per day banned. Probably not possible though.

The issue is the FPs that are NOT un-banned due to lack of publicity like Reddit gave this ‘bug’.

The problem is that so many people are claiming to be a false positive while they are not and they well know it.

But guess you have to gain something by believing all those so-called innocent people.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: Pixelpumpkin.4608

Pixelpumpkin.4608

The thing is that bug reports have to be checked and more important reproduced. The falling bug from my experience happens at specifick locations through the dungeon and not fully random. The bug reports dont have any screenshots with the dotted white line showing so it will be hard to reproduce.

I am aware of this. Having worked in 2nd/3rd level tech support for many years, I often come to ANet’s defense when it comes to these discussions here on the forums.

However, in my own work experience, when we couldn’t reproduce an error, we acknowledged the issue, and requested more detailed information. We didn’t leave various tickets unanswered and months later claimed to never have heard of the issue before.

The thing is that a gm can’t be expected to know bout all bugs in the game.

Again, from my own background, I assumed that all bug reports ended up in a ticket system that was easy to check for catchwords when you add new content. And even if not, if you google search the GW forums for “goemm”, you get a page full of bug reports back. This really wasn’t a secret.

To Gaile, I apologize for the snarky tone of my reply earlier. As I said, I know very well how it feels to sit on the other end of technical support and that bugs don’t magically fix themselves. But a lot of players submit these reports, create screenshots and videos and walkthroughs, and it is a bit disheartening to see that the bug posts were not just seemingly, but in actuality ignored.

Anyway, I appreciate that this is being worked on as a bigger issue. If there was anything I could do to help with improving your internal processes, I would.

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Posted by: Gauss.3529

Gauss.3529

Will those old accounts be scanned and banned again or ANet will just forgive them and allow them to have a new life in Tyria?

(My friend is afraid that he will be banned again and confusing on playing new account or the reinstated account)

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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

Will those old accounts be scanned and banned again or ANet will just forgive them and allow them to have a new life in Tyria?

(My friend is afraid that he will be banned again and confusing on playing new account or the reinstated account)

If your friend got suspended on accident they will unsuspend him. So he can play his account again. As stated they are trying their best to not suspend people wrongly. However there is never a garantee. Having a reinstated account doesn’t give you any more risk on getting something like this again, rather lesser cause it is showing in the accounts history and when under investigation a GM might see that and check even better.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: Stark.1350

Stark.1350

The witch hunt really needs to stop. A mistake was made, kitten happens, move on. Man you people beat things to death.

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Posted by: EnemyCrusher.7324

EnemyCrusher.7324

This sounds like a rare but long-standing bug that was only revealed because of so many people doing Goemm’s Lab for the Aetherblade Cache. I hope any players that were wrongfully banned even before the Aetherblade update get reinstated too.

Light of Honor [Lite] – Founder / Warmaster
Sorrow’s Furnace Commander
“You’re the mount, karka’s ride you instead, and thus they die happy!”-Colin Johanson

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Posted by: pulsecodesgnl.3470

pulsecodesgnl.3470

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle. Due to this bug, there was an unintended side effect that caused false positives on an element of our malicious activity detection system.

This draws concern for me. Sunday night our guild had our Monthly Karma event (to burn karma, throw on buffs, and run around and zerg events), and we chose Malchors Leap. After going into the water on the far northwest end we unintentionally found a hole in the boundries of the wall and (curiosity taken hold of us, and the mindless minions following my Commander tag) we began to explore the boundaries of the map not normally available.

I haven’t attempted to log back in since, and haven’t heard about anyone being banned, but does this type of activity need to be avoided in fear of that result? Was there something specific this JP was looking for that rules out all the other nooks and crannies in the game that bug people inside areas they are not normally supposed to go?

One of my favorite things to do in games is to explore, getting on tops of mountains and buildings that are not easily/normally accessible. Should I not be doing that?

Voxtr | Svell | Kvikr | Svass | Sundr | Naud | Kvedja | Traust
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Posted by: mercury ranique.2170

mercury ranique.2170

After significant investigation, we were able to determine that a bug in the jumping puzzle itself was causing players to fall out of the intended boundaries of the puzzle. Due to this bug, there was an unintended side effect that caused false positives on an element of our malicious activity detection system.

This draws concern for me. Sunday night our guild had our Monthly Karma event (to burn karma, throw on buffs, and run around and zerg events), and we chose Malchors Leap. After going into the water on the far northwest end we unintentionally found a hole in the boundries of the wall and (curiosity taken hold of us, and the mindless minions following my Commander tag) we began to explore the boundaries of the map not normally available.

I haven’t attempted to log back in since, and haven’t heard about anyone being banned, but does this type of activity need to be avoided in fear of that result? Was there something specific this JP was looking for that rules out all the other nooks and crannies in the game that bug people inside areas they are not normally supposed to go?

One of my favorite things to do in games is to explore, getting on tops of mountains and buildings that are not easily/normally accessible. Should I not be doing that?

This bug has nothing to do with it cause it is a bug in the teleportation system of a jumping puzzle.

If you end up on top or below the map boundry’s you need to understand if you are just having fun with the moment or using the bug to get an unfair advantage.

Capping a waypoint on accident isn’t a problem, but mis-using the location to get many waypoints and poi’s is exploiting.

Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!

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Posted by: Kilyan II.7164

Kilyan II.7164

The bug is still up or has been fixed? I’d like (I need) to do the jp to get the last achivement to complete Sky Pirates, but I’m not sure… It possible to do the jp in safely without get the ban? I’d not be banned for this. Thank you.