Guild Wars 2

My account was hacked at 1:30am January 14th by someone appearing to represent Arenanet Staff. While I was dubious of the sender I wanted to check out the link and it appeared to be legitimate. Thinking there must have been a mistake I made to correct the error and provided my account information. This was obviously the wrong thing to do and my account was quickly accessed with almost everything of tradable value salvaged and sold. My account was then used to send other players the same mail requesting they seek to rectify their details.
I was told not to give out my information to friends or family, I have not done this. My account has been depleted. 2 and a half years worth of work down the drain. I implore, please use my example as a warning, and do not be as trusting as I.

Have you contacted support? Hopefully they can be of some assistance. Be mindful that all in game mail (if that were the case here) will be stamped with the ANET logo if it’s a legitimate ANET correspondence. Otherwise, the mail will have a note at the bottom detailing that it is NOT an official message from ANET.

Guildie here, she was able to get her account returned to her but unfortunately she has NOT had her account restored. A-Net is giving her a hard time about it and it serves as a dire warning for others.

I know Brazen she is from my guild in ART we have been friends for about a year and I noticed one day she was acting funny. She wouldn’t respond to any of my early greetings I do to guildies and it was weird. It was soon later I figured out she had been hacked from complete dismay she had told me about it. She would never give out her information to anyone she is very picky about that of all people I know in my guild. What had happened might have been a mistake on her end but not intentional please use this as an example.

Good luck, I hope you get your things restored. Support can be really helpful in most of these instances. I’ve only one unfavorable experience.

I met Brazen in GW2 and have known her for a long time now. It is really unfortunate what has happened to her. I know that she is not the type to give her information out to others. She has invested a lot of time in playing this game and obtaining the things she has. I hate to see that someone who has supported the game and had something like this happen to them. On top of that she is unable to get her account rolled back? Hand another win to the scammers/hackers out there an another lose to a dedicated player then. Makes me take a second thought about supporting Anet and any future expansions or games.

GraceOmalley is a very nice and good person, she has played with me for quite awhile, I believe I ran several fractals with common friends about a year ago when I first met her. She is always very helpful and very generous to whoever needs help in the guild wars 2 community, running dungeons or fractals or helping people with items or gold (selfless). Before I was able to see or talk to Grace online she received this phishing mail and she was duped, the reason I mention before I spoke with her, is because I would have warned her about the danger and re read the phishing emails that I had received, similar mails first promising me 5000 gems (that I was randomly selected) and referring me to a link and then later an identical mail trying to trick me into also following a link stating that I had “suspicious currency transactions and that this was a global community and that my account would be suspended in the next 72 hours unless I would followed the link”. Please help her as much as possible and return her items and ban the thieves. When I received those emails I would like to express here, I felt harassed and unprotected please help my friend and someone I see as a asset to the entire guild wars 2 community.

Friend of Brazen here. We’ve been doing dungeons and fractals together for a long time, and teaching Teq/Wurm for even longer. She’s helped explain content to many less experienced players and is an active member within the community.

Yes, this was a mistake on her part, but people make mistakes. She certainly didn’t sabotage her account on purpose. The phishing mails in-game can make people panic a bit. Hopefully support will be able to remedy this situation.

I received a similar in game mail with a link. I started to panic for a second, but I saw that it was sent by another player, not Anet. Also, the message itself just sounded wrong. I simply reported it and ignored it. If I had trusted it, the same would have happened to me. I wish GraceOmalley.5631 the best and I hope she can reclaim her lost items.

Brazen is a friend for numerous years on Guild Wars, I heard her incredible hack story and she surely needs to recover what she has lost after all the Time and Money she invested in game, she belongs to the class of honest and real players besides the loyal friendship and fun she brings to her guild and friends.
Please retraced her account back to where it was with all her legit belongings.
Thanks,
Make an example and show that justice prevails in and outside GW and restore her account.

Really sucks what happened, but one thing Anet could possibly do is follow the mailings that were sent out during the time frame of the hacking, and ban all of those that had a part in doing this. Even if those people claim unawareness, they were still a part of a malicious activity, and as a loyal Guild Wars player, and fan, I would feel EXTREMELY relieved just knowing that the company that says they’re here for it’s players and community base is doing something to keep these types of people out of the game.

I support Brazen’s quest for account restoration. As one of the senior officers in her guild I’m well aware of her character and would be extremely surprised if what happened was different to what she has stated.

In addition I will mention I heard reports from guildies of her (online) character being present and acting strangely an hour or so after she had gone to bed for the night. We had stuff removed from the guild bank to which she had some access. The guild bank stuff is not a major issue, but if she has to repeat all the work she had done on building up her characters that would be very disappointing.

I agree with the previous posters! Brazen clearly does not deserve to be victimised but does deserve to have her account restored, which you would expect Anet to fully understand and support under the circumstances!

ArenaNet is hesitant because restorations are easily exploitable and need to be fully investigated. Even now, nothing’s stopping you from duplicating any items remaining on your account. They will also only do this once over the lifetime of the account, so if you’re hacked again, they won’t be doing it again. Note that support is also busy due to the influx of new accounts and login problems.

This thread will have no effect on your ticket. If your ticket is older than 3 days, you can post here: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/support/Tickets-for-Review-3-days-older-Part-2-merged

Is the password on your email the same as your account? If so, you have a much bigger problem to deal with. Also keep in mind that now that your account/email has been verified to the attacker, you will likely now be receiving phishing emails from legit looking senders (such as support@guildwars2.com, it’s easy to fake these) with personalized messages including your account or character names. This time however, the game will not tell you that it’s a fake message and if you fall for it again, that’s it.

Im her guildie and support for restoration.
I have been playing since Headstart and now, more than ever everyone on game have been getting lot of scam.
Even my girlfriend almost got catch in one scam through a in game mail telling about account suspesion. I know theres a message below mail saying its not from arenanet, but in the panic, for all your hard work, sometimes you just ignore it, get in panic and click on link to check…
The point is: Brazen always been a awesome guildie, always worked hard for everything she got, always supported GW2 and for a long long time.
We CANT get on a point where we just ignore what happened and why it happened, ignore all the scammers works and just crucife a victim. She made a mistake indeed, ONCE, everyone does, but she really deserve to be that hard punished for it? Im sure she learned and will not happen again.
I understand restoration could be exploitable if not fully investigated, but if need to be FULLY investigated just please go ahead track the mail that came from her account in the time she was hacked and get to the real ones who deserve to be punished.
Give her stuff back would not be a big deal, will not change the Market, and if they can track mails they can delete what was stolen… I really hope you guys from Anet read this while keep in mind all time and hard work she had for years playing and supporting the game and company.
For us who somethins like this never happened, cant even imagine how it is, I would be stricken if something like this ever happened to my account and work I had for years… its time and money we put into it, and time = life time.
I hope everything goes ok, because its a real sad event… =(

The person that is having an issue with their account will need to continue their dialog with support. Vouching for other players will do nothing and is frowned up in the forums.

Source:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/support/Account-Issues-Forum-Do-s-and-Don-ts/first#post2123126

Please do not post petitions or testimonials. Your case will be carefully appraised and we will do the best we can to help, but having 10 friends vouch for you clogs the system and doesn’t add anything or change the outcome.

JustTrogdor.7892:

The person that is having an issue with their account will need to continue their dialog with support. Vouching for other players will do nothing and is frowned up in the forums.

Source:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/support/Account-Issues-Forum-Do-s-and-Don-ts/first#post2123126

Please do not post petitions or testimonials. Your case will be carefully appraised and we will do the best we can to help, but having 10 friends vouch for you clogs the system and doesn’t add anything or change the outcome.

Ok understand this… She HAS gone to support… and for the reasons I am getting ready to state it was felt it was needed to be brought here…

So most of you on GoM know me or know of me… I’ve played since launch thousands upon thousands of hours… I was one of the first commanders on the server, I was one of the first with a legendary, one of the first with multiple legendaries, and one of the first with Eternity… I’m also not afraid to admit I have supported this game financially through thousands of dollars of in game gem purchases.

I brought Grace to this game from a game we knew and loved before this one… granted she took a little to convincing but once she made the leap, once she saw the depth of ingame content, once she saw how you could customize your characters, once she saw the AMAZING community… she was hooked… She’s been playing for two and a half years now and played TONS of hours and also supported the game financially with alot of gem purchases…

Grace is a well know and well respected member of the GoM community. As you have heard from others, she has taken to heart my own philosophy of a pay it forward slefless attitude towards others in the community. Quite often she helps others via gold, dungeon runs, Fractals… She even helps alot with TTS guild events…

I have known Grace for 5 years and trust her IMPLICITLY… This isn’t some stupid gamer trying to find their way around the system… This is a respected member of the community who is facing the travesty of her account being hacked via a phishing scam.

The travesty that is the “customer service” being delivered on this case… let me lay out the facts for you-

1) Grace has had to deal with FOUR different CS reps and had to practically reboot the conversation EVERY TIME. Anet didn’t assign a single case manager…

2) Grace provided the time and date of the hack. Anet should have been able to tell the change in password at that time.

3) The hacker setup a mobile authenticator. (which Anet would obviously know when happened)

4) Her Gmail was hacked too and Grace has provided that info to Anet from Google correspondences… Which included the hacker’s Japan IP.

5) The first CS rep admitted it looked like she got caught by a phishing scam

6) The last CS rep refuse the windback telling her to not give her password to friends… (Do they even READ the case notes?)

7) Anet gave her access to her account which was of course gutted and said it looked like everything was fine…

8) Grace has provided EVERYTHING Anet has asked for and only asked for a little good will in return by winding her account back…

Grace has always been a heavily active member of her guild and the server community… What is happening here is unbelievable…

Having been in the customer service industry for two decades I find what has happened here to be apalling at best. Grace would literally gain NOTHING from the windback. Anet would lose NOTHING from the windback. If anything there would be one entity that would get something out of this and that is Anet… They would keep a LOYAL and financially supportive player who is an ACTIVE and HELPFUL member of the community just by showing a bit of faith and a little bit of good will…

As I said before I have been around since launch. I’ve played thousands of hours and I’d like to think I am one of the most well known members of the GoM server. I have spent thousands on gems in this game(all verifiable by Anet). And unfortunately to me I find how this entire situation has been handled, at least from a customer service standpoint, to not be up to the standards I would want out of the reps at my job who make minimum wage…

As such, from this moment forward I pledge to not buy any gems until this situation is handled and resolved in a proper manner… If Grace gets the windback refused again then Anet I regret to inform you I will take my thousands in gem purchases to a game more in line with my own personal customer service beliefs. Simple beliefs to put the customer first… I will walk away from the game I have loved for 3 years and my money will go to support someone else…

Thank you for at least hearing us as we support our friend in need..

Sincerely,
Solomon Darkfury
Gate of Madness Server

And like JustTrogdor said, posting on the forum about it, will do nothing to help her. It doesn’t hurt her, but it doesn’t help her either. It literally is a waste of time.

He even posted a link to the actual post where the ANet employee posted it, so it’s not like he made up the quote.

Having said that, I hope the situation gets resolved in a manner that is agreeable for all involved. And sooner rather than later.

I want to thank everyone for their encouragement and assistance during my liaising with Anet Support. My account has been restored pre-hack and all of my gaming efforts are returned to their rightful owner I have since scaled up my security measures and are especially vigilant as a result of this incident. Thank you again to everyone who gave me guidance and support! So happy

what I’m seeing here that people think that you can trust family and friends with your info… Every time I see someone hacked they say I only gave my info to family or friends. 1 this is the internet and they ARE NOT your friends unless you know them in RL and even then…. Who said you can trust your Family any way ?
and don’t trust anyone on the Internet and Never give out any info.