World of Warcraft Blog
If you are a World of Warcraft gamer, you probably know how lucrative high level WoW accounts are. Therefore, there is every possibility that hackers will be on the prowl for your World of Warcraft account. In fact, even the most careful players have had their accounts hacked. Therefore, you wish to safeguards your WoW accounts; here are a few tips that might come handy:
• Be extra protective of your email ID. Do not give out your email addresses and passwords at random places. Do not use the same mail id and password at places where you buy Wow gold or power level your characters as the one that you use to log in to your WoW accounts.
• Do not click on links inside Blizzard emails. Visit Blizzard website using a bookmarked link. Also, be extra cautious while typing the Blizzard URL on the web browser. Remember, there are several websites that have similar URLs like world of warcraft and any misspelling can get WoW accounts hacked. Moreover, Blizzard never asks for your password in-game. Therefore, if you have provided it at any point of time, chances are that your WoW accounts are hacked.
• Get a Blizzard authenticator. This is for those players who do not change their passwords frequently. If you haven’t changed your password in over six months, getting a Blizzard authenticator, available on the Blizzard website, is strongly recommended.
• Get your Adds-ons from trusted sources only. Use clients such as curse.com to buy add-ons for your WoW accounts. Also, ensure that you go to the actual/ authentic curse page to buy world of warcraft add-ons and do not click on fake Google ads that direct players to fraudulent websites where the chances of your WoW accounts getting hacked are very high.
• Do not share your WoW accounts information with anyone. Whether you want to buy cheap WoW accounts or are interested in selling WoW accounts, you must remember never to share the details of your WoW accounts with anyone. You never know when or how such critical information and details get misused by hackers.
Most importantly, have a strong and effective anti-virus available, up to date and running at all times. Getting a spybot software system is highly recommended to secure your WoW accounts. It is also important to update your operating system at regular intervals. Use secure browsers and get your WoW updates from reliable sources only to avoid getting your WoW accounts hacked.
FOR ALL CUSTOMERS WHO HAVE PURCHASED A WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT FROM OUR STORE:
As of Novemember 11th, 2009 ALL World of Warcraft accounts must be merged with the new Battle.net account system. The following information contained within this email is extremely important for the security of your account.
1. NEVER MERGE MORE THEN ONE WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT INTO A BATTLE.NET ACCOUNT.
2. THE FULL NAME ON THE BATTLE.NET ACCOUNT MUST MATCH THE FULL NAME REGISTERED TO THE WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT.
DON’T KNOW THE FULL NAME REGISTERED TO YOUR WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT?
PLEASE CONTACT US AND WE WILL RE-SEND YOUR ACCOUNT INFORMATION TO YOU ALONG WITH THE FULL NAME REGISTERED TO YOUR ACCOUNT.
3. Create a Battle.net account here: https://us.battle.net/account/creation/landing.xml?rhtml=true
TO HAVE ACCOUNT INFORMATION RE-SENT
CONTACT US BY:
Phone: 866-999-1177
Email: support@buymmoaccounts.com
Ticket: www.buymmoaccounts.com/support
Live Chat: Located on the right hand side of our web site.
Thank you,
We appreciate your business.
FOR ALL CUSTOMERS WHO HAVE PURCHASED A WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT FROM OUR STORE:
As of Novemember 11th, 2009 ALL World of Warcraft accounts must be merged with the new Battle.net account system. The following information contained within this email is extremely important for the security of your account.
1. NEVER MERGE MORE THEN ONE WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT INTO A BATTLE.NET ACCOUNT.
2. THE FULL NAME ON THE BATTLE.NET ACCOUNT MUST MATCH THE FULL NAME REGISTERED TO THE WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT.
DON’T KNOW THE FULL NAME REGISTERED TO YOUR WORLD OF WARCRAFT ACCOUNT?
PLEASE CONTACT US AND WE WILL RE-SEND YOUR ACCOUNT INFORMATION TO YOU ALONG WITH THE FULL NAME REGISTERED TO YOUR ACCOUNT.
3. Create a Battle.net account here: https://us.battle.net/account/creation/landing.xml?rhtml=true
TO HAVE ACCOUNT INFORMATION RE-SENT
CONTACT US BY:
Phone: 866-999-1177
Email: support@buymmoaccounts.com
Ticket: www.buymmoaccounts.com/support
Live Chat: Located on the right hand side of our web site.
Thank you,
We appreciate your business.
And it begins. We have just received the first expansion phishing scam email. “You’ve been invited to participate in the World of Warcraft Cataclysm Alpha”. This is just a reminder that Blizzard will never ask you for your account information, and do not click any links in e-mails regarding the new expansion. The phishing email can be found below.
World of Warcraft: The Cataclysmâ„¢ Alpha Test
Congratulations! You have been selected to participate in the alpha test of World of Warcraft: The Cataclysmâ„¢.
In the alpha test you’ll get an opportunity to test the first zones of the new continent Dragaera and the new levels above 80. We look forward to your feedback on the overall experience including quests, monsters, zones, aesthetics, and more. We would also appreciate reports on any bugs you may encounter. These can be logged using the /bug command explained below.
Â
Getting started:
In order to participate in the alpha test, you must upgrade an existing retail account that has been upgraded with the Wrath of the Lich King, allowing you to connect to the The Cataclysm alpha test realms. The World of Warcraft: the Wrath of the Lich King game client that you use must be patched up to version 3.1.2 or later in order to install the alpha test client.Please be prepared to enter the current retail World of Warcraft account name and password you use, and the appropriate information to authenticate your eligibility to connect to the The Cataclysm alpha test realms. To participate in the alpha tests, you must have a valid retail World of Warcraft account active and in good standing as of July, 1st 2009.
Please visit: [Phishing Web Site Link Here]
to upgrade your retail World of Warcraft account to alpha testing status and take part in the alpha stages of the new expansion. Please note that this will not effect your ability to play retail World of Warcraft.
Your Cataclysm Alpha Key:
0765-54672-56129-09845
Really? No. Players are being contacted in-game by other players impersonating themselves as Blizzard Entertainment to inform them they have won an Epic Mount! And all they need to do to is go to a web site to claim their prize. Surprisingly players are actually falling for this and entering a third party web site that requires their account information to claim the epic mount prize.
The World of Warcraft forums are buzzing with complaints from players claiming that their accounts have been suspended because of chargebacks filed against them by a company that they have no connection with. The problem, though, is that the company behind the charges is unresponsive to complaints, and many players don’t know what to do in order to get their accounts re-authorized unless they pay these bills.
According to the thread, multiple players have received the following message when trying to figure out why their account is currently inaccessible: “Access to the World of Warcraft account *********, has been temporarily disabled due to a chargeback filed against the account’s past payment(s) which were billed to a telephone number via PaymentOne.” PaymentOne is a payment service provider, and has a system in place to bill players’ ISP accounts for their WoW subscriptions.
Chargebacks are normally used as a method of consumer protection—a last line of defense against shady retailers. Effectively, a consumer will dispute a charge on their debit/credit card statements and the issuing bank or credit card company will forcibly return the disputed funds to the person. Exactly why and how these chargebacks were applied to the aforementioned accounts has yet to be determined, but they’ve caused the accounts to have negative balances with Blizzard, which has led to their suspension until the issue is resolved.
The main problem with this claim, though, is that many of the players have never used PaymentOne or signed up for the company’s services; some others have, but most of their accounts with PaymentOne were used over a year ago and were canceled a while ago.
Posts in the forum thread show that Blizzard is willing to discuss the unauthorized charges, but there haven’t been any definite results from pursuing this course of action yet. Even stranger, though, is multiple posts stating that users have contacted their phone companies/broadband providers and are told that they have no chargebacks on their account. A quick Google search shows this isn’t the first time that allegations of fraud and unexpected charges have been leveled against the company.
Another major frustration is that PaymentOne seems unwilling to help players reach a solution that doesn’t involve simply paying these unathorized charges. Posts on the thread state that they’ve either been hung up on when they call the company or are transferred back to Blizzard. Two calls to PaymentOne seeking a comment resulted in being placed on permahold and then being disconnected.
The moral of the story.. DO NOT USE PAYMENTONE FOR YOUR WoW Subscription and beware of useing any of thier other services.
This is the most sophisticated phishing scam we have seen so far. The phishing scam is in the form of an email informing you that your World of Warcraft will be disabled, the email then directs you to a web page to log in and “confirm” your account information. The web page you are directed to looks very much like an official Battle.net account login page and this is the reason this scam is more sophisticated then others.
The web page you are directed to looks like this:
Click here to view full page version
The email that is sent for this scam also looks very legitimate. However one of the links in the email directs to the phishing web site seen above. The scam email can be viewed below:
Greetings,
Account Action: Warning
Account Offense: Violation of EULA and Terms of Service – Transfer of Account Ownership
Details: An investigation of your World of Warcraft account has found strong evidence that the account in question is being sold or traded, and a dispute has been filed regarding your account ownership. Blizzard Entertainment can provide no details regarding the origin of the dispute. In accordance with EULA section 4, Paragraph B, listed below:
World of Warcraft -> Legal -> End User License Agreement
and Section 8 of the Terms of Use:
Blizzard Entertainment -> Legal -> Terms of Use
A 3-hour probationary suspension is pending on this account, awaiting confirmation from a specialist. A warning has been issued. The investigation will be continued by the Account Administration team to determine the any further suspensions. If the account in question is found in violation of the EULA and Terms of Use, further action will be taken. Be aware that any additional inappropriate actions may result in the permanent closure of the account.
Thank you for respecting our position on this matter.
=========================================================
It is recommended that you verify legitimate ownership of the account here:http://us.battle.net/login?service=https2F%2Fbattle.net%2Findex.html
THIS IS THE LINK THAT DIRECTS TO THE PHISHING SCAM PAGE. THE LINK LOOKS LIKE A BATTLE.NET LINK. IT IS NOT A BATTLE.NET LINK. MOVE YOUR MOUSE OVER THE LINK, IN THE STATUS BAR OF YOUR COMPUTER YOU WILL SEE THE LINK ACTUALLY DIRECTS TO:Â http://is.gd/HN6mAny further changes in account information, including email address, security question answer, account name, password, and/or account ownership name will be duly noted during the investigation and may or may not lead to further disciplinary action.
=========================================================Any disputes or questions concerning this account action can only be addressed by Account Administration. To learn more about how Account Administration is able to assist you, please visit us at http://www.blizzard.com/support/wowaa/.
Account security is solely the responsibility of the accountholder. Please be advised that in the event of a compromised account, Blizzard representatives typically must lock the account. In these cases the Account Administration team will require faxed receipt of ID materials before releasing the account for play.
Please visit the World of Warcraft Policies and Terms of Use Agreement: http://www.blizzard.com/support/wowgm/?id=agm01712p and http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/termsofuse.shtml for further information.
Regards,
Billing & Account Administration
Blizzard Entertainment
http://www.blizzard.com/support/accountadmin/
How to protect yourself from this scam:
NEVER click on a link in an email without checking where the link is going. You can check the true direction of a link by moving your mouse over the link and checking the status bar on your computer.
PLEASE REMEMBER BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT WILL NEVER ASK YOU FOR ACCOUNT SPECIFIC INFORMATION OVER THE INTERNET. THE ONLY TIME BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT WILL EVERY REQUEST INFORMATION FOR AN ACCOUNT IS OVER THE PHONE. NEVER PROVIDE ANY OF YOUR ACCOUNT DETAILS TO ANYONE.
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Please be alert for a new World of Warcraft account email phishing scam, this email is intended to collect your account security details or to install a keylogger on your computer. The email appears it is coming from a Blizzard.com email however the mail is spoofed and is not from Blizzard.
The email can be seen below. The email contains three links, the first two links direct to the World of Warcraft Terms of use pages, this is to make the email appear to be genuine. The third link goes to: http://battle2009.tk/, Battle2009.tk is NOT an official World of Warcraft site do NOT click on the link and DO NOT go to that web page. If you have clicked on the link and you are a BuyMMOAccounts.com customer please contact us immediately. If you are not a BuyMMO customer and you have clicked the link please call World of Warcraft’s Billing & Account Administration immediately.
Greetings,
An investigation of your World of Warcraft / Battle.net account has found strong evidence that the account in question is being sold or traded. As you may not be aware of, this conflicts with Blizzard’s EULA under section 4 Paragraph B which can be found here: WoW -> Legal -> End User License Agreement
and Section 8 of the Terms of Use found here:
WoW -> Legal -> Terms of UseThe investigation will be continued by Blizzard administration to determine the action to be taken against your account. If your account is found violating the EULA and Terms of Use, your account can, and will be suspended/closed/or terminated.
In order to keep this from occurring, you should immediately verify that you are the original owner of the account.To verify your identity please visit the following webpage:
https://www.worldofwarcraft.com/login/login?service=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.worldofwarcraft.com%2Faccount%2Findex.html
Only Account Administration will be able to assist with account retrieval issues. Thank you for your time and attention to this matter, and your continued interest in World of Warcraft.
Sincerely,Account Administration
Blizzard Entertainment
What is a Battle.net account?
The Battle.net account is a new Blizzard Entertainment account; used to manage and control all of your Blizzard Entertainment gaming accounts in one manageable account area.
I don’t have a Battle.net account should I get one?
At this time we do not see any benefit to creating a Battle.net account and merging it with your World of Warcraft account.
BuyMMOAccounts.com Customers: We do not recommend merging accounts purchased from our store with the new Battle.net system. If you do create a Battle.net account do not merge multiple WoW accounts into a single Battle.net account, this may put your accounts at risk. You also must register the Battle.net account under the name registered to the World of Warcraft account (The orginal account holders name). If you do not have this please contact us.
What do I need to create a Battle.net account?
Email Address, Password, Secret Question, Secret Answer, First Name, Last Name. Your Battle.net account will have different information from your World of Warcraft account, this includes secret question and answer. After creating a Battle.net account you will use your Battle.net login information to access your World of Warcraft account management.
Create a Battle.net account
https://us.battle.net/account/creation/landing.xml?rhtml=true
Information for account traders: When completing a transaction or transferring ownership of a World of Warcraft account you will now need to ask the other party if the World of Warcraft account has been merged with a Battle.net account. You will then need to collect the details for BOTH the World of Warcraft and Battle.net account.
BuyMMOAccounts.com Customers: Customers are NOT protected under our WoW account guarantee if your account information is shared with a third party during an account trade or other activity. We do not believe account trading to be a safe activity.
When merging a World of Warcraft account with a Battle.net account the only pieces of information that Blizzard requires is a username and password for the World of Warcraft account. Once the World of Warcraft account is merged all account changes and updates must be conducted via the Battle.net account. Players will be unable to reset their password or email using their WoW account information; players will need to use their Battle.net information. As the Battle.net information can be different from your WoW information many players are falling victim to hackers obtaining players WoW username and password and merging the stolen WoW account with a new Battle.net account. Once this is completed none of the information on the WoW account can be updated via the account management page as the hacker has the Battle.net information.
What do I do if my account is hacked and merged with a Battle.net account that does not contain my information?
If you are a BuyMMOAccounts.com customer please immediately contact us and we will resolve the situation immediately. If you are not a customer you will need to directly call Blizzards Billing & Account Administration at 1-800-592-5499. When connected inform the representative that your World of Warcraft account has been merged with a Battle.net account, inform them you do not have a Battle.net account. The representative will ask you a few authorization questions based on your World of Warcraft account information, the representative will then create a Battle.net account for you with the information you have provided and move your WoW account from its current Battle.net account to the new Battle.net account. You will now have access to your World of Warcraft account.
There is a new World of Warcraft account phishing email being sent to unsuspecting WoW players. This email is being sent claiming your WoW account will be disabled if you do not reply with speciifc account details. In panic many WoW players are replying with thier account details and in result having thier WoW account stolen.
Below is the phishing email:Â
From: wowaccountadmin <wowaccountadmin@188.com>
To: elliot.paice@ntlworld.com; seblucht@web.de; seniorjws04@yahoo.com; DrKnockerz@aol.com; Cypresslb@gmail.com; thewall13@hotmail.com; ejlind4000@hotmail.com; add0506@yahoo.com; heckler07@hotmail.com; lontine27football@yahoo.com; chain622@hotmail.co.uk; naterpotater12@hotmail.com; shliss@verizon.net
Sent: Wednesday, March 18, 2009 2:44:47 AM
Subject: donotreply@blizzard.comGreetings!
It has come to our attention that you are trying to sell/trade your personal World of Warcraft account(s).
As you may or may not be aware of, this conflicts with the EULA and Terms of Agreement.
If this proves to be true, your account can and will be disabled. It will be ongoing for further investigation by Blizzard Entertainment’s employees.
If you wish to not get your account suspended you should immediately verify your account ownership. If the information is deemed accurate, the investigation will be dropped.
This action is taken because we at Blizzard Entertainment take these sales
quite seriously. We need to confirm you are the original owner of the account.
This is easiest done by confirming your personal information along with concealed information about your account.
You can confirm that you are the original owner of the account by replying to this email with:
Â
Use the following template below to verify your account and information via email.
* First and Surname
* Date of birth
* Address
* Zip code
* Phone number
* Country
* Account e-mail
* Account name
* Account password
* Secret Question and AnswerIf you ignore this mail your account can and will be closed permanently. Once we verify your account, we will reply to your e-mail informing you that we have dropped the investigation.
We ask you to NOT change password until the investigation is fully completed.
Blizzard Entertainment Inc
Account Administration Team
P.O. Box 18979, Irvine, CA 92623
Regards,
Account Administration Team
Blizzard EntertainmentÂ
We can tell this is a phishing email because:
1. The email is from: From: wowaccountadmin wowaccountadmin@188.com, notice the email is sent from the domain 188.com Blizzard Entertainment ONLY sends emails from blizzard.com or worldofwarcraft.com domains.
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2. The email has been sent to multiple parties via the CC function on an outbound email. Blizzard Entertaiment will never send out emails with other individuals addresses in the CC field.
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3. The email does not address you by name or account name. Blizzard Entertainment will always address you by name or your World of Warcraft account username.
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4. The email is asking you to send information that Blizzard Entertainment already has on file. Blizzard Entertainment will never request your account information from you.
