New RMT attacks

[madpersian]

Out of curiosity, have you gotten your accounts back? If not, have you tried strong arming POL's customer support line to get them to look into what happened? Or did you stop at the "your name's not on this account, we can't help you?"

I'm just curious because you can almost definitely get the account back.

[Nevex]

I can speak for the hacked people: no good so far.

According SE customer service the given personal info does not match and nothing can be done about that.

On top of that, Servont purchased "A Crystalline Prophecy" a couple of days before the hack and provided SE with that info (name, both regular and reversed first/last name, as well as the reg. code), and they're still unable to do anything.

So yeah, something smells.
SE can't be dumb enough not to recognize that those people are indeed the original onwers after all that provided info/codes and yet they keep tossing the "Ok all this crap matches but sorry your personal info does not, and since it can't be changed then it's not you lulz" answer.

[madpersian]

They can do something about it. You just have to make them.

Get all your info in order. Download and print 12 months prior CC statements showing your payments for Square Enix. Call and go through your problem politely with a customer service rep. When they tell you they can't help you ask to be transferred to a manager. This must be done, they are required to. Just stay polite.

After you are speaking with a manager and they tell you your info doesn't match. Tell them that you want an explanation of Square Enix's charges to your CC account, since they claim you do not have an account with them. You should have specific transaction numbers on the CC invoice to give to the manager. This number should point in their system to a payment for a specific POL content ID.

Since you should have a long history of payments, ask how it can be that your CC has been charged for this account for a certain period of time without you owning the account. There can be significant expenses for a company when they get charged back and too many on a company's record can mean higher CC transaction fees which is something SE cannot afford cutting into their revenue. This threat works even better when there are multiple accounts and CC involved.

If they give you problems, tell them that you will be notifying your CC company of fraudulent charges on your CC from SE for whatever period of time and demanding charge back of all of it, since they claim the account was never yours to begin with. Along with that, tell them you will be writing a letter of complaint to their CEO, BBB, and applicable State agencies.

At some point during this the manager should get the point that you are for real and begin to actually help you.

Just be completely organized and have an answer for everything they ask you. The key would be having the exact dates of payments, the CC info and the transaction IDs. You may have to go through your CC company or even write a letter of complaint for this to work.

But seeing how much time and effort we spend on our FFXI accounts, its certainly worth it rather than giving up and having your account stolen (no matter what the vector of account theft was).

[Byrd]

Sort of off topic, I still wonder why SE can't just implement a 72 hour waiting period on server transfers. Apply for a transfer, start the process, wait 72 hours, then you confirm you want to move, then you're golden. It can still all be handled electronically.

For those people who are transferring servers to join friends or whatever legitimate reason, a 72 hour wait won't hurt anything other than their patience. For RMT who have stolen characters, a 72 hour waiting period would allow plenty of time for the affected player to have a lock placed on the account.

That reminds me, anyone have a handy link to the SE suggestion box?

[madpersian]

I suspect its because a wait period puts people off on making purchases of any kind. I know in WoW there were HUGE complaints about the initial waiting period for server transfers. They want to collect your money so they are going to implement as few impediments to getting it as they can.

[Stubwub]

They can do something about it. You just have to make them.

Get all your info in order. Download and print 12 months prior CC statements showing your payments for Square Enix. Call and go through your problem politely with a customer service rep. When they tell you they can't help you ask to be transferred to a manager. This must be done, they are required to. Just stay polite.

After you are speaking with a manager and they tell you your info doesn't match. Tell them that you want an explanation of Square Enix's charges to your CC account, since they claim you do not have an account with them. You should have specific transaction numbers on the CC invoice to give to the manager. This number should point in their system to a payment for a specific POL content ID.

Since you should have a long history of payments, ask how it can be that your CC has been charged for this account for a certain period of time without you owning the account. There can be significant expenses for a company when they get charged back and too many on a company's record can mean higher CC transaction fees which is something SE cannot afford cutting into their revenue. This threat works even better when there are multiple accounts and CC involved.

If they give you problems, tell them that you will be notifying your CC company of fraudulent charges on your CC from SE for whatever period of time and demanding charge back of all of it, since they claim the account was never yours to begin with. Along with that, tell them you will be writing a letter of complaint to their CEO, BBB, and applicable State agencies.

At some point during this the manager should get the point that you are for real and begin to actually help you.

Just be completely organized and have an answer for everything they ask you. The key would be having the exact dates of payments, the CC info and the transaction IDs. You may have to go through your CC company or even write a letter of complaint for this to work.

But seeing how much time and effort we spend on our FFXI accounts, its certainly worth it rather than giving up and having your account stolen (no matter what the vector of account theft was).

This works. Before I played FFXI I played Ragnarok Online and lost access to my account. Gravity has horrible customer service, especially back then. It makes SE look like heaven.

Once I threatened them that I would dispute every charge, and bring the law/my CC company into this, they started to work with me.

[Destinye]

I suspect its because a wait period puts people off on making purchases of any kind. I know in WoW there were HUGE complaints about the initial waiting period for server transfers. They want to collect your money so they are going to implement as few impediments to getting it as they can.

What? Complaints in WoW? I thought WoW was this perfect MMO everyone keeps comparing FFXI to?

[madpersian]

This works. Before I played FFXI I played Ragnarok Online and lost access to my account. Gravity has horrible customer service, especially back then. It makes SE look like heaven.

Once I threatened them that I would dispute every charge, and bring the law/my CC company into this, they started to work with me.

Yeah, seriously, don't fuck with the CC companies... they own big subscription service companies that make their money off small dollar periodic fees.

[Ohaigaiz]

To people thinking this is a conspiracy on SEs part:

ha
hahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahaha
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

Yeah man, a VERY established, albeit famous company is 'hacking' random people who all seem to be connected to get people to buy security tokens. I'm sure they are that needy, scraping for pennies with this shit.

This thread is fucking retarded. You share your account, you have no place in saying this was a 'hacking'. Tell me all of these accounts were only being accessed by one person, and the security of their PC is not that of IE and this is worthy of a scare. There are way too many formalities in a situation where someone else had account information. I don't even care if you shared your account with jesus christ himself.

You share your account, you shut the fuck up and get the fuck out.

[Tarage]

yeah except we both got hacked and this "friend" of mine is now completely looted and on another server. if you can't read all the details, then just don't comment seriously, you just come off as an idiot, which no doubt, you are.

Last thing I'm going to say on this.

ENJOY YOUR LOST ACCOUNTS BECAUSE OF YOUR OWN STUPIDITY! :D

[Linktri]

I don't even care if you shared your account with jesus christ himself.

You share your account, you shut the fuck up and get the fuck out.

I love you.

[The Stig]

Of these 4 people, Caitlyn was the only to exchange ID/PW info via PM on our LS website.

I done some keyword searches and skimmed through the thread.

This forum/LS website, who is the admin, or admins?

If information was sent through PMs, meaning some sort of generic, usually free, forum software, i.e. phpBB/Smart Machines Forum, it is very possible to export the database/SQL and read PMs, if you know where to look, every bit of information is in there.

Just incase you wish to open up more investigations incase the OP is not an admin.

[madpersian]

I done some keyword searches and skimmed through the thread.

This forum/LS website, who is the admin, or admins?

If information was sent through PMs, meaning some sort of generic, usually free, forum software, i.e. phpBB/Smart Machines Forum, it is very possible to export the database/SQL and read PMs, if you know where to look, every bit of information is in there.

Just incase you wish to open up more investigations incase the OP is not an admin.

This is so true. Seen some seriously fucked up cybering shit in pms doing this before. By accident mind you when transfering stuff to another server.

[Invictusx]

You think the conspiracy people were being serious ohai?

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[Nattack]

To people thinking this is a conspiracy on SEs part:

ha
hahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahaha
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

Yeah man, a VERY established, albeit famous company is 'hacking' random people who all seem to be connected to get people to buy security tokens. I'm sure they are that needy, scraping for pennies with this shit.

This thread is fucking retarded. You share your account, you have no place in saying this was a 'hacking'. Tell me all of these accounts were only being accessed by one person, and the security of their PC is not that of IE and this is worthy of a scare. There are way too many formalities in a situation where someone else had account information. I don't even care if you shared your account with jesus christ himself.

You share your account, you shut the fuck up and get the fuck out.

the president of the united states is a lizardman

[Flippant]

This thread isn't so much about the accounts getting hacked in the first place as much as it is about the names on the accounts getting changed, despite having no way to do this through SE's services.

A lot of you seem to have assumed this is some "I got hacked, give me pity" thread. We know accounts get hacked all the time--it's not like this is the first time it's ever happened and it obviously won't be the last time. We know how accounts get hacked, we know why accounts get hacked, and we know how to defend ourselves, for the most part. However, something is different that we haven't seen before and maybe spreading and sharing this information could have helped in some way. Despite this intention, it is truly unfortunate that most of the people here choose to be immature and ignorant rather than helpful. Perhaps, before commenting, it is best to at least try to comprehend the point of this thread. Then maybe we can either get somewhere, or let this pass on as "just for your information" if there is no one that can provide useful information or genuine suggestions.

[drwaffles]

I didn't read all the way through, but did we get any confirmation that the owners of the accounts called SE back and tried giving their first and last names in a reversed order as suggested by multiple people? Really, anyway, it's far more likely that these people's accounts weren't registered under their own names for whatever reason and they're covering it up than someone managed to hack into SE's servers and change information that's supposedly impossible to change.

I, for one, am already pretty convinced that these people weren't "hacked" at all, so this wouldn't surprise me in the slightest. Everyone needs to stop fretting about it - once another hundred or so credible and unrelated people report the same thing happening, then it's time to panic. This looks like an isolated incident to me.

[Natara]

This is one of the account that was hacked?

Dithera - Kujata - FFXIAH.com

and the account was moved to Ifrit?

Dithera - Ifrit - FFXIAH.com

Why did this said new account owner start buying stuff instead of selling stuff?
Looks to me like someone just started to play on the account.

How could it even possible that the account was buying stuff on Kujata onMar 26, got hacked, possible got all loots removed (Yes i saw HQ staves, Novio, Gaiters, etc on equipment history page), moved server, and started to play on that very same day? It's too crazy to believe this. Even if RMT hacked it, did they "pre" sell the account?

Fishy!

[tymora]

Could be some new as yet undetected virus...RMT always coming up with new ones to beat the scans.
There were cases of virus shipped on photo frames and hard-disks before.

[cdgreg]

This is one of the account that was hacked?

Dithera - Kujata - FFXIAH.com

and the account was moved to Ifrit?

Dithera - Ifrit - FFXIAH.com

Why did this said new account owner start buying stuff instead of selling stuff?
Looks to me like someone just started to play on the account.

How could it even possible that the account was buying stuff on Kujata onMar 26, got hacked, possible got all loots removed (Yes i saw HQ staves, Novio, Gaiters, etc on equipment history page), moved server, and started to play on that very same day? It's too crazy to believe this. Even if RMT hacked it, did they "pre" sell the account?

Fishy!

Assuming it was RMT, they probably stripped/sold the expensive gear and bought the basic staves they will need to use BLM. Dark/Ice/Thunder staff. Not sure about the dates though, too lazy to go back and check those.

Back to the OP, quick question: this is probably pointless, but were any of the hacked accounts using the encryption key via flash drive? I still do this even though I'm not sure if it helps my security at all...