Scammers target World of Warcraft accounts

by Steven Williamson on 25 August 2009, 18:34

Tags: World of Warcraft, Vivendi Universal Interactive (NYSE:VIV), PC, RPG

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qatoq

Add to My Vault: x

World of Warcraft (WoW) players are being warned to be on the alert for a new phising scam that is designed to access and steal their accounts.

An email, that has apparently been sent from WoW's publisher, Blizzard Entertainment, offers recipients the chance to trial some new mounts for the game by visiting the link attached. The link sends gamers to a professionally designed login page that looks remarkably similar to the official WoW login site.

Users are then asked to type in their password, email address and then input the answer to their secret question. The information is being fraudulently used by cyber criminals to steal WoW accounts that contain in-game gold and other assets which are worth real money, warns security firm, Sophos.

"Given that online gaming is a billion dollar industry, it is not surprising that scammers are targeting this particular community," said a spokesperson for the company.

"To avoid becoming a victim, never click a URL in an email to visit websites," the company warned.

Following the recent announcement of the third expansion to World of Warcraft,World of Warcraft Cataclysm, the official Blizzard forums have also become a target for attack in recent weeks, with scammers posting links to similar unscrupulous sites.

HEXUS.gaming was alerted to the phising scam by e-victims, an organisation committed to the aim of helping victims of Internet crime. Their website offers "free, practical and easy to use advice on e-crime and online incidents," as well as real-time updates on new scams and e-crime currently doing the rounds.


HEXUS Forums :: 9 Comments

Login with Forum Account

Don't have an account? Register today!
Posted by Stephen C - Tue 25 Aug 2009 18:54
URL doesn't seem to be working there.
I quit around 2 years ago and I'm still getting these mails weekly.
Posted by Georgy291 - Tue 25 Aug 2009 20:49
lol sad people targeting more sad people
Posted by oolon - Tue 25 Aug 2009 21:03
To me it seems strange that blizzard does not have an audit path for objects. That way it would be very easy to trace the items, and nuke them out of existence. Which would be a listen to players not to buy stolen goods, without a market, people will not buy it. To minimize data this could be done with just high value items, or high data system for character to character gold transfers. This may seem harsh but it is in line with the rule of the real world which I believe is if your caught with stolen goods you forfeit them even if they were bought in good faith.
Posted by aidanjt - Tue 25 Aug 2009 23:45
How much gold do you think totals the WoW economy?.. Then add every single item that exists in that economy, and give each of those items a unique integer.

How long do you think it will be?
Posted by oolon - Wed 26 Aug 2009 00:18
aidanjt
How much gold do you think totals the WoW economy?.. Then add every single item that exists in that economy, and give each of those items a unique integer.

How long do you think it will be?

I think it would be alot smaller than a unsigned long long int which is a whole 8 bytes in size. That gives you numbers up 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 I think that's probably enough. Every item probably already has a unique number, even if its based on type and number, or type and location. However I didn't suggest tracking all the gold, I suggested tracking the transfers, and look for suspicious things, gold repeating being transferred to a character but nothing being given in return etc.

SEE NEWER »