Comments on: How Matt Almost Lost 22000 Gold http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/ Practical advice for World of Warcraft healers and leaders Thu, 09 Feb 2012 07:13:30 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Hokiejaybee http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-21162 Hokiejaybee Tue, 23 Jun 2009 18:49:26 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-21162 in a similar scam, don't only (mis)trust guild mates/alts. but, remember that hackers know the innerworkings of the game well. and they know that people have friend's lists. and they know that you can put notes on friends lists. i got a whisper from a RL friend the other day, on his main, and i'm fairly certain i know what was contained on my note on his friend's list. this wasn't an odd hour for this friend to be on, and it wasn't on a night when he wasn't supposed to be on [i.e. vacation]. my friend whispers me, "hey, what's up?" "not much, doing the tourney dailies. you?" "nothing, except this huge deal. i know i still owe you 2200 for the chopper, but can i get like 3000 more real quick? i've got a farmer here in IF about to dump me XXX stacks of saronite and titanium WAY CHEAP so that i can prospect/make titansteel/arrows/whatever". [obvious paraquote there, but you get the point] so, i trust this friend. i've lent him gold before [i.e. see the chopper balance lol]. he's always paid me back. i pretty much piss gold and making it in WoW is a hobby of mine. 3k is less than 1.5% of my gold [do the math, i'm not a goblin :), just efficient. ]. as i finish up the tourney dailies, and am preparing to port into IF, he's pestering me. radar up. this is not like him. he's my RL friend and i said i'd be there in a minute after the dailies. he wouldn't pester me about to port in and give him gold. normally, he would: wait, small talk, port dala and come help me finish dailies, etc. he knows my fondness for pets..... then, at one point he calls me "mate". a term NEVER used by him/us. radar not only up now, but pinging very loudly. so i say, "hey steve, i'm on my way to IF. oh, hey, are we still going to andrea's on friday night for drinks?" [a] my friend is not named steve [b] we don't have a friend named andrea [c] we don't live in the same city any more and can't get drinks together friday night :( his response: "yeah, i can't wait." "reported, get what you can from his account now". before i even have a GM ticket open, my friend's account goes offline and via my friend's list i see all of his alts get online for about 2 minutes each. presumably selling/mailing on each toon :(. talk about feeling helpless. anyways, long story. moral is. in today's cyber pirate world. you can't even trust your friend's accounts. your hacker knew your guild order based on armory. and knew to talk to you first. and knew the name of a toon to use that was also highly ranked and not currently online. savvy. my hacker knew me and that gold exchanged hands between us because of a note on a friend's list. so, be wary of even your friend's accounts and pay attention to their speaking style/wording. sad sad days. as you can see, his note for me on his friend's list, as you can guess, was "still owe for chopper-2200." he would do dailies and such and mail me like 100-200 per day to pay back a loan from last month for the last mats for his bike. each day he'd just update the note on the friend's list with the new balance. in a similar scam, don’t only (mis)trust guild mates/alts. but, remember that hackers know the innerworkings of the game well. and they know that people have friend’s lists. and they know that you can put notes on friends lists.

i got a whisper from a RL friend the other day, on his main, and i’m fairly certain i know what was contained on my note on his friend’s list.

this wasn’t an odd hour for this friend to be on, and it wasn’t on a night when he wasn’t supposed to be on [i.e. vacation].

my friend whispers me, “hey, what’s up?”
“not much, doing the tourney dailies. you?”
“nothing, except this huge deal. i know i still owe you 2200 for the chopper, but can i get like 3000 more real quick? i’ve got a farmer here in IF about to dump me XXX stacks of saronite and titanium WAY CHEAP so that i can prospect/make titansteel/arrows/whatever”. [obvious paraquote there, but you get the point]

so, i trust this friend. i’ve lent him gold before [i.e. see the chopper balance lol]. he’s always paid me back. i pretty much piss gold and making it in WoW is a hobby of mine. 3k is less than 1.5% of my gold [do the math, i'm not a goblin :) , just efficient. ]. as i finish up the tourney dailies, and am preparing to port into IF, he’s pestering me.

radar up. this is not like him. he’s my RL friend and i said i’d be there in a minute after the dailies. he wouldn’t pester me about to port in and give him gold. normally, he would: wait, small talk, port dala and come help me finish dailies, etc. he knows my fondness for pets…..

then, at one point he calls me “mate”. a term NEVER used by him/us. radar not only up now, but pinging very loudly.

so i say, “hey steve, i’m on my way to IF. oh, hey, are we still going to andrea’s on friday night for drinks?”

[a] my friend is not named steve
[b] we don’t have a friend named andrea
[c] we don’t live in the same city any more and can’t get drinks together friday night :(

his response: “yeah, i can’t wait.”

“reported, get what you can from his account now”.

before i even have a GM ticket open, my friend’s account goes offline and via my friend’s list i see all of his alts get online for about 2 minutes each. presumably selling/mailing on each toon :( . talk about feeling helpless.

anyways, long story. moral is. in today’s cyber pirate world. you can’t even trust your friend’s accounts. your hacker knew your guild order based on armory. and knew to talk to you first. and knew the name of a toon to use that was also highly ranked and not currently online. savvy. my hacker knew me and that gold exchanged hands between us because of a note on a friend’s list. so, be wary of even your friend’s accounts and pay attention to their speaking style/wording. sad sad days.

as you can see, his note for me on his friend’s list, as you can guess, was “still owe for chopper-2200.” he would do dailies and such and mail me like 100-200 per day to pay back a loan from last month for the last mats for his bike. each day he’d just update the note on the friend’s list with the new balance.

]]> By: Wowmomma http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-21070 Wowmomma Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:28:40 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-21070 I've set up our guild so that no one has full access to anything but me. Officers have access to all tabs on their mains and all Officer Alts go into a rank that has no permissions for anything except /o chat. Additionally, all requests for alts to join absolutely must come over Vent without exception, even for the lower ranking members. I've been accused of paranoia as well but they quickly understand once I explain the damage that can be done when you're careless with your guild security. .-= Wowmomma´s last blog ..<a href="http://wowmomma.com/2009/06/observations/" rel="nofollow">Observations</a> =-. I’ve set up our guild so that no one has full access to anything but me. Officers have access to all tabs on their mains and all Officer Alts go into a rank that has no permissions for anything except /o chat. Additionally, all requests for alts to join absolutely must come over Vent without exception, even for the lower ranking members. I’ve been accused of paranoia as well but they quickly understand once I explain the damage that can be done when you’re careless with your guild security.
.-= Wowmomma´s last blog ..Observations =-.

]]> By: Thelendis http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-21000 Thelendis Fri, 12 Jun 2009 04:51:41 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-21000 I encountered a similar situation with my ex-guild mid-BC.. sometime late at night I got a whisper from a Lvl1 Warrior claiming to be a fellow officer ('Hi, it's me N., my main seems to be buggy, can't log in. Can you inv me, there is some stuff I have to organize..') After a bit of exchange and a lot of pressure from his side 'well GM, is sure gonna be mad, if het gets to know you don't trust your fellow officers etc.' I almost caved in and just to be sure decided to ask about a piece of personal information I picked up about him chatting on Vent... naturally he failed and I realized what could have happened if I had just sent out an invite and promoted the imposter. After this we noted down a set of questions and their answers in case of another attack on our precious belongings. I encountered a similar situation with my ex-guild mid-BC.. sometime late at night I got a whisper from a Lvl1 Warrior claiming to be a fellow officer (‘Hi, it’s me N., my main seems to be buggy, can’t log in. Can you inv me, there is some stuff I have to organize..’)
After a bit of exchange and a lot of pressure from his side ‘well GM, is sure gonna be mad, if het gets to know you don’t trust your fellow officers etc.’ I almost caved in and just to be sure decided to ask about a piece of personal information I picked up about him chatting on Vent… naturally he failed and I realized what could have happened if I had just sent out an invite and promoted the imposter.
After this we noted down a set of questions and their answers in case of another attack on our precious belongings.

]]> By: Fayre http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20987 Fayre Thu, 11 Jun 2009 09:23:54 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20987 This did actually happen to us. An officer invited what he thought was my alt and promoted the scammer to officer, whereupon he nicked some gold, a couple of items, and (worst!) scammed some guildies out of a few thousand gold ("Can you lend me some cash, I don't want to relog right now?"). Blizzard were excellent at sorting it out, but since then, people must ask on their mains to get an invite for their alt. <abbr><em>Fayres last blog post..<a href="http://www.martos.me.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=172:oh-what-horrors-await-you&catid=1:latest&Itemid=2" rel="nofollow">Oh, what horrors await you?</a></abbr></em> This did actually happen to us. An officer invited what he thought was my alt and promoted the scammer to officer, whereupon he nicked some gold, a couple of items, and (worst!) scammed some guildies out of a few thousand gold (“Can you lend me some cash, I don’t want to relog right now?”). Blizzard were excellent at sorting it out, but since then, people must ask on their mains to get an invite for their alt.

Fayres last blog post..Oh, what horrors await you?

]]> By: Ngita http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20982 Ngita Thu, 11 Jun 2009 01:24:18 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20982 Yea we have had alot of attempts via in game mail and links but they have been somewhat frustrated by the fact that our guild officers name was short and not suitable for italics. So a his alt(and he isnt that young) starting off the very first round of mais with Hey Bro's ..... clued us in pretty quickly. Had a few members get hacked and hit the withdraw limit. but are our only serious loss was between 3.0 and wotlk. Plan was to give free acess to all the crafting items that used to be restricted like plans/vortex/hearts for a week and then AH what was left before its value fell to close to 0. So within 12 hours somebody got hacked and cleaned it out... the amusing part was eventually we got it back by which time its value was fairly close to 0. Yea we have had alot of attempts via in game mail and links but they have been somewhat frustrated by the fact that our guild officers name was short and not suitable for italics. So a his alt(and he isnt that young) starting off the very first round of mais with Hey Bro’s ….. clued us in pretty quickly.

Had a few members get hacked and hit the withdraw limit. but are our only serious loss was between 3.0 and wotlk. Plan was to give free acess to all the crafting items that used to be restricted like plans/vortex/hearts for a week and then AH what was left before its value fell to close to 0. So within 12 hours somebody got hacked and cleaned it out… the amusing part was eventually we got it back by which time its value was fairly close to 0.

]]> By: WB http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20979 WB Wed, 10 Jun 2009 19:26:40 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20979 The number of attempts to gain access in WoW just pains me. The latest one we've seen is an in game mail allegedly from a Guild Officer indicating a link you should click on - the result is a keylog. The hacker will create a character with an Officer's name includes an "i," but the "i" is italicized thereby creating a different character. The italics is hard to pick up in the ingame mail. On the other hand, we had our Gbank wiped out completely in TBC. We were working through Black Temple and had acquired an enormous number of hearts of darkness. One week later, we would have crafted all our SR gear. An officer's account got hacked. We had a limit on the number of withdrawals a character could make, but the officer's alts (8 or 9 of them) all had the same level of access and we got wiped out. Blizz eventually reinstated everything, but it was about 4 weeks later, killing progression at a key moment. Also had a leadership blow-up with 2 officers (neither the hacked officer) and 1 other raider leaving due to things that were said. More of a last straw issue, but still hurt a ton. So the lessons are to, first, limit access to secured tabs to only officer mains, second, to restrict the number of withdrawals anyone (even officers) can make within a 24 hour period, and third, to get the keyfob and protect your hardearned virtual work product. The number of attempts to gain access in WoW just pains me. The latest one we’ve seen is an in game mail allegedly from a Guild Officer indicating a link you should click on – the result is a keylog. The hacker will create a character with an Officer’s name includes an “i,” but the “i” is italicized thereby creating a different character. The italics is hard to pick up in the ingame mail.

On the other hand, we had our Gbank wiped out completely in TBC. We were working through Black Temple and had acquired an enormous number of hearts of darkness. One week later, we would have crafted all our SR gear.

An officer’s account got hacked. We had a limit on the number of withdrawals a character could make, but the officer’s alts (8 or 9 of them) all had the same level of access and we got wiped out.

Blizz eventually reinstated everything, but it was about 4 weeks later, killing progression at a key moment. Also had a leadership blow-up with 2 officers (neither the hacked officer) and 1 other raider leaving due to things that were said. More of a last straw issue, but still hurt a ton.

So the lessons are to, first, limit access to secured tabs to only officer mains, second, to restrict the number of withdrawals anyone (even officers) can make within a 24 hour period, and third, to get the keyfob and protect your hardearned virtual work product.

]]> By: Olivier http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20978 Olivier Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:56:40 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20978 Same thing happened to my guild a while back, except we hadn't set limits on withdrawals, just limited some tabs. The guy made a killing with our lowest tabs. Blizzard did give us some back, though... And the real Officer who ninja'd the bank a few weeks later hurt us a lot more. We now have a strict policy: only the Mains of Officers have access to the higher tabs, and for limited daily withdrawals. Same thing happened to my guild a while back, except we hadn’t set limits on withdrawals, just limited some tabs. The guy made a killing with our lowest tabs.

Blizzard did give us some back, though… And the real Officer who ninja’d the bank a few weeks later hurt us a lot more.

We now have a strict policy: only the Mains of Officers have access to the higher tabs, and for limited daily withdrawals.

]]> By: Aspect of the Hare » The Fable of the Worst Bank Ninja Ever http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20965 Aspect of the Hare » The Fable of the Worst Bank Ninja Ever Wed, 10 Jun 2009 14:46:10 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20965 [...] This story posted over at World of Matticus reminded me of an incident that happened to me about a year or so back and that miraculously I don’t think I ever posted about. Now because this did happen so long ago, I’m a little iffy on the details, but for the most part this is all true. [...] [...] This story posted over at World of Matticus reminded me of an incident that happened to me about a year or so back and that miraculously I don’t think I ever posted about. Now because this did happen so long ago, I’m a little iffy on the details, but for the most part this is all true. [...]

]]> By: Slimwit http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20964 Slimwit Wed, 10 Jun 2009 13:38:06 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20964 I've implemented similar Guild Bank protections that others have mentioned: each player has only one "main" with Guild Bank access, no matter what guild role they fill. Upon reflection, however, I think I need to make the reasons for this more clear to the officers so they understand the importance of being very intentional when promoting players. <abbr><em>Slimwits last blog post..<a href="http://www.guildportal.com/Guild.aspx?GuildID=105591&News=1020176" rel="nofollow">Mag10 delivers a beating to Kologarn</a></abbr></em> I’ve implemented similar Guild Bank protections that others have mentioned: each player has only one “main” with Guild Bank access, no matter what guild role they fill. Upon reflection, however, I think I need to make the reasons for this more clear to the officers so they understand the importance of being very intentional when promoting players.

Slimwits last blog post..Mag10 delivers a beating to Kologarn

]]> By: Ot http://www.worldofmatticus.com/2009/06/09/how-matt-almost-lost-22000-gold/comment-page-1/#comment-20953 Ot Wed, 10 Jun 2009 01:42:59 +0000 http://www.worldofmatticus.com/?p=5414#comment-20953 No alts. No exceptions. Alts are for the alt guild. No alts. No exceptions. Alts are for the alt guild.

]]>