Guild Wars 2

Hey guys! This is just a warning to everyone.

A couple of weeks ago my account got hacked and all my gold was stolen. Naturally I immediately changed my password and submitted a ticket. I carried on playing (now having to borrow copper in order to travel) while I waited patiently for a response. Finally after nearly a week I got a response from ANet telling me they were sorry I was hacked and that they had changed my password for me. …really? As far as they were concerned the issue was concluded.

I sent a follow up email politely thanking them for changing my password but informing them that (of course) I had already taken that action. I also reminded them that my gold was stolen and never restored. Since the economy in this game is so messed up currently my meager amount of gold (2g on one character and several silver on a lowbie alt) was not insignificant. In fact it made it so I could not afford my level 60 book.
Yesterday, a full week after my message to them I got a response saying: “Due to our current tool limitations, we are unable to restore missing items, characters, karma, influence or currency (gold, silver, copper), nor can we provide a rollback of the account in whole or in part.” REALLY!?! This is how you address the customer service issue of your security problems? How is it possible to release a game without having the “tools” necessary for restoring people’s stolen items? This is the climate of mmo gaming nowadays, any game company should know that and be prepared to support and treat their players well in order to keep them happy.

There are many many problems with this game (most of which are discussed at length in these forums) – but for now this is the one I want to bring to everyone’s attention.

So please – if you get hacked – Do not expect your stuff to be restored – don’t wait for weeks expecting ANet to be on your side and protect you from the thieves. They won’t be.

Frobie.4675:

Hey guys! This is just a warning to everyone.

A couple of weeks ago my account got hacked and all my gold was stolen. Naturally I immediately changed my password and submitted a ticket. I carried on playing (now having to borrow copper in order to travel) while I waited patiently for a response. Finally after nearly a week I got a response from ANet telling me they were sorry I was hacked and that they had changed my password for me. …really? As far as they were concerned the issue was concluded.

I sent a follow up email politely thanking them for changing my password but informing them that (of course) I had already taken that action. I also reminded them that my gold was stolen and never restored. Since the economy in this game is so messed up currently my meager amount of gold (2g on one character and several silver on a lowbie alt) was not insignificant. In fact it made it so I could not afford my level 60 book.
Yesterday, a full week after my message to them I got a response saying: “Due to our current tool limitations, we are unable to restore missing items, characters, karma, influence or currency (gold, silver, copper), nor can we provide a rollback of the account in whole or in part.” REALLY!?! This is how you address the customer service issue of your security problems? How is it possible to release a game without having the “tools” necessary for restoring people’s stolen items? This is the climate of mmo gaming nowadays, any game company should know that and be prepared to support and treat their players well in order to keep them happy.

There are many many problems with this game (most of which are discussed at length in these forums) – but for now this is the one I want to bring to everyone’s attention.

So please – if you get hacked – Do not expect your stuff to be restored – don’t wait for weeks expecting ANet to be on your side and protect you from the thieves. They won’t be.

Maybe they should introduce an anti-hack code to add DR to the amount of times you can login per week. That’d probably fix it, imo.

I thought they implemented a system in Guild Wars 1 to rollback accounts/characters which got hacked a while ago. Why is it not implemented in GW2?

I had someone from China try to log into my acount, the authorization email tipped me off I change password. Kinda worries me, I wish we could just tag our accounts as NEVER TO BE ACCESSED FROM CHINA….NEVER!!!

I mean I will never be in China and play GW2, this I can swear to you. So if someone is logging in from China just block em everytime.

There is a really good “state of security” post. It’s a really good read.

I would love it if they actually had a good security system if they didn’t offer rollbacks. They seriously should refund some money for how poor they handle security in this game.

It’s unfortunate that they were unable to have a rollback feature ready on release day. They finally got that working in GW1 and hopefully they’ll have it ready ASAP for GW2. It’s really frustrating to have all your stuff stolen and not able to get it back. I dread to think if that would happen to me after all the effort I already put into the game.

Cromx.3941:

I had someone from China try to log into my acount, the authorization email tipped me off I change password. Kinda worries me, I wish we could just tag our accounts as NEVER TO BE ACCESSED FROM CHINA….NEVER!!!

I mean I will never be in China and play GW2, this I can swear to you. So if someone is logging in from China just block em everytime.

I’m playing from China.

I work here and I just want to have fun and play the game like every other legitimate player. I share your strong dislike for hackers, wherever they may be. But I’m glad they didn’t automatically block players from accessing the game from here. Otherwise gold sellers would just use a VPN to circumvent a simple IP restriction, and only people like me would get hurt.

It seems that in your case the anti-hack system was successful in warning you of that attempt. I hope your account is protected with a complex password.

Maybe ArenaNet can add a manual feature, allowing the players themselves to create a white list of countries they actually play from, and attempts from every other country gets automatically rejected.

this is how they responded to my post. lol

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/account/Accounts-hacked-no-support/first#post199099

as if i already didn’t know that.

I like the idea of setting a home country or region and blocking access from other areas. As Amon pointed out, it would be possible to use a VPN service to appear to be logging in from somewhere else but it raises the bar a bit. Anything that blocks the script kiddies is at least worth a thought. If there is enough money to be made, the real hackers will probably find a way. I would still want to get the “out of norm login attempt” messages.

out of curiousity.. why are so many people getting hacked? has this always been an issue? are you guys doing something to get hacked? like buying gold or something?

eoJ.5680:

out of curiousity.. why are so many people getting hacked? has this always been an issue? are you guys doing something to get hacked? like buying gold or something?

areananet has crappy security.

[B] Esrever.8613 : [/B]

areananet has crappy security.

Most of it is people who reuse passwords, account names and/or email addresses. Plus the occasional keylogger.

Read Mike O’Brien on Account Security for more from the devs.