the most recent scam, be careful.

RankNine - Momaganon

hello community.
my server, morai, suffered from a huge wave of scam that almost hit every faction recently. items and chars worth many billions got stolen and abused for phishing/scam. many of our friends quit after being the victim of that crime.

the scamer/hacker appears very dumb ingame, but his actions prove that its just an act to earn your trust.

thanks to core connect we finally managed to discover who was responsible for all the scams.
its a couple from egypt, which uses proxy server to still access PWI, even tho the region is banned (ironically for an excess of scaming coming from that country).
according to pwi forum rules, i am not allowed to give you the names, but be sure that this couple has a lot of chars in almost every big faction.
recently they became more greedy and less careful, which lead to the final bust.
while investigating, we found out that the couple seems to be active on other servers aswell, thats why i started this thread now. BE AWARE! do not trust or trade anyone your items, DONT visit any link that promises free stuff.

their usual tactics:

-faking the names of officers of factions, then pming everyone thats online, trying to get them into smalltalk to eventually lure them to a phishing site, by claiming you get free stuff.

-once they got info to accounts that visited their site, they proceed the same tactic with the friendlist of the hijacked chars. we usually trust our friends, right? thats what they abuse.

- "hey, let me try your gear" is also very common. they will ask you to try on your tome, or your necklace. gone forever.

everyone be careful and feel free to share if similar stuff happened on your server.
whoever wants to know the names of the couple, feel free to leave a forum msg or pm me ingame.

XDeliciousx - Morai

Thank you for this topic Rank, it was really needed. I hope people start be more careful coz amount of scam is higher than ever. Many of my friends got caught because this person is really smart but acting dumb. DONT trust anyone!

scruncy

tickets with screenshots and videos have beed submitted.
I really really hope pwi can and will do something about this issue.

thx for the warning.

SakuLv - Dreamweaver

Always BOUND your gear!
And yes , these days cant trust any1.

In DW we had same issue. Ppl fell for fake site and their stuff were taken. (that happened when ppl dont think much, just rush for free stuff)

And of course, some scammers/hackers made fake names of Dynasty Officers.
For around 2-3 weeks could see them run around, Trying to Scam ppl from WC, as catshop and of course from guild too- talking all nice, asked to lend money via mail. (but this happened like pretty long time ago!- but seems its happening again in other servers)

This week i saw catshop trying to scam ppl, i send ticket about it and seems its gone now!

Desdi - Sanctuary

It hit Sanctuary too, some people were giving warnings in WC.
Be careful everyone!

RankNine - Momaganon

SakuLv - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Always BOUND your gear!
And yes , these days cant trust any1.

In DW we had same issue. Ppl fell for fake site and their stuff were taken. (that happened when ppl dont think much, just rush for free stuff)

And of course, some scammers/hackers made fake names of Dynasty Officers.
For around 2-3 weeks could see them run around, Trying to Scam ppl from WC, as catshop and of course from guild too- talking all nice, asked to lend money via mail.

This week i saw catshop trying to scam ppl, i send ticket about it and seems its gone now!

sounds very much like them.
did you ever find out the mains of those scamers(if so, pm me here pls) and did you send tickets?
PWE needs to remove them, they cause too much trouble and misery among the community.

sylgja

Thanks for the heads up. We have the names circulating, hopefully this will reach more people now.

This is a scam system I've encountered on other games as well, so this has been around a long time and has proven to be very successful, obviously.

Zoldi - Morai

SakuLv - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Always BOUND your gear!
And yes , these days cant trust any1.

Even my Emperor is not bound, but I don't trust anyone


Thanks for the topic.
It seems that a lot of people got caught even without typing their credentials in those fake websites. I guess there is a trojan or something that infects your computer as soon as you visit it.

And for information, if you got your items stolen this way, PWE won't do anything for you at all.

SylenThunder - Twilight Temple

No need to worry about binding your gear if you don't give your account information to ANYONE.

That's the biggest thing. Don't give out your account information. Not to your spouse, your sibling, your BFF, no one. And make sure that they can't easily guess your information either.

Socqar - Lost City

They did hit Lost City as well. Past days people have been spamming a fake webside through friend-list. Many people was caught... some for the site and some for lending gear to **** chars just to try it out.

Now there's a catshop selling the stolen stuff at West Arch... Tickets were sent as well, no idea if some was solved already as I've been busy as ** since weekend

SakuLv - Dreamweaver

RankNine - Momaganon wrote: »

sounds very much like them.
did you ever find out the mains of those scamers(if so, pm me here pls) and did you send tickets?
PWE needs to remove them, they cause too much trouble and misery among the community.

I have no idea about who is that hacker main. And yes i did send ticket about those fake officers running around.
They did scam/**** some guild mates.
And that all happened like last year or so. GMs took pretty long time to get rid of them.

Impunity - Dreamweaver

The only good thing that came out of that text/font from the expansion was that it clearly showed a difference in letters in names; thus making it hard to "copy" it.
Would be nice to have it back, imo.

Side note: Thanks, will be warning my faction and friends.

_Bagyra_ - Morai

As well, you might hear a new storry of:


"This is my friend's account he dont play long time and i have no bank password. Can you pk character for dropping items please?"


OFC now it looks ridiculious and suspiciuos but on some scams they tend to get really close to some people and catch them off-guard

Angel_Spawn - Sanctuary

Sigh, what will dumb people do for virtual "property", they should rather do this in real life if they are so successful here, I`m still waiting to be "****" for like 10+ years of my online gaming experience.

For some reason I don`t feel sorry for people who suffered from this, trust nobody and you will live longer.

RankNine - Momaganon

Angel_Spawn - Sanctuary wrote: »

Sigh, what will dumb people do for virtual "property", they should rather do this in real life if they are so successful here, I`m still waiting to be "****" for like 10+ years of my online gaming experience.

For some reason I don`t feel sorry for people who suffered from this, trust nobody and you will live longer.

they actually do this as a fulltime job, as they are selling the scamed coins and items for rl cash. the guys barb for example still runs around in +5 gear.

Angel_Spawn - Sanctuary

RankNine - Momaganon wrote: »

they actually do this as a fulltime job, as they are selling the scamed coins and items for rl cash. the guys barb for example still runs around in +5 gear.

Then again if they sell scammed stuff for real cash, where does the trust part come in from the buyer, no idea how those trades work but still seems just weird.

deathbytuna

Look out our fake non rl stuff is gonna be taken off our fake non rl bodies.

These two seem like some smooth cats lol.

Zanryu - Lothranis

I maintain the position that if you fall for it, you deserve it.

Xainou - Sanctuary

Never understood how people fall for that in the first place, but now after all these warnings ingame too... err.

Kalopsia - Dreamweaver

RankNine - Momaganon wrote: »

the scamer/hacker appears very dumb ingame, but his actions prove that its just an act to earn your trust.

It's 2014, a 12 year old with a third-world education and internet access can do these scams, which says a lot about the people who fall for them...

miscarcando

when pwi would let us bound/unbound items, this maybe help more. with a code/password system, not a charm. lesser waste for players on gear and much saver against scammers. for players who give away all their infos will help anyway nothing. to save items in your bank and code it makes not much sense when a player is very active.

Jadsia - Lost City

Zanryu - Lothranis wrote: »

I maintain the position that if you fall for it, you deserve it.

I have to agree with this. There have been are so many warnings out there about going to 3rd party websites with promises of free **** out there for years and years. As far as imposters conning people out of gear all I can say is if you really should know who your friends are in-game.

I have trouble sympathizing with victim of scams because they make a choice that puts them in the situation in spite of so many warnings out there.

PWI cannot force people to not give out their account info to others.
PWI cannot force people to avoid 3rd party websites that promise free ****.
PWI cannot force people to know who they are dealing with in the game.

It's the player's responsibility to safeguard their accounts by being vigilant about it.

People make the choice to give out account info that's nobody's fault but their own. People who go to 3rd party sites thinking they're getting free **** do so out of their own greed. I cannot have sympathy for the consequences of that.

Lending gear to someone so they can try I t out? LOL. Give a demonstration to them instead. Come on.

Oh and it would be a hacker/scammer's dream come true if a process to unbind **** were permitted in the game.

scruncy

you are all right .
Yes , you should not give things away
Yes u should go not to 3rd party pages
Yes u should not do this and that

Thats all correct , but this doesnt mean that people who go around and try to trick others or lure them somewhere should be unpunished.

Its like living in a criminal environment in rl. What do you then? You move to a other place where you feel saver.
And this can not be in the interrest of pwi.

Evalria - Sanctuary

All this can be prevented by quite a simple way of looking at things...

If it is too good to be true, it usually is.

Only close friends and family you play with in here will ever care enough to give you something "free" which is known as a gift, a gesture of affection.
Anyone else, strangers, will never do this for you and never have your happiness at heart, no matter how friendly they may seem!
Oh, and especially if they try to "lure" you on unofficial websites that reek of fake. Nice people don't do that. Use your common sense, if there is any left at all.
The only website entitled to give us free stuff is this one, the official one. Anything else... Don't be stupid.

SakuLv - Dreamweaver

Evalria - Sanctuary wrote: »

All this can be prevented by quite a simple way of looking at things...

If it is too good to be true, it usually is.

Only close friends and family you play with in here will ever care enough to give you something "free" which is known as a gift, a gesture of affection.
Anyone else, strangers, will never do this for you and never have your happiness at heart, no matter how friendly they may seem!

Not quite true.
A stranger made me g16 daggers for free, asking no fee for badges or mold. (at that time ppl were selling badges+mold for 40mil)
He could of scam me, but he didn't. So cant say that all strangers wont be kind.

But i did had to make him a promise, that i wont purge him in NW or TW ;D

Evalria - Sanctuary

SakuLv - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Not quite true.
A stranger made me g16 daggers for free, asking no fee for badges or mold. (at that time ppl were selling badges+mold for 40mil)
He could of scam me, but he didn't. So cant say that all strangers wont be kind.

But i did had to make him a promise, that i wont purge him in NW or TW ;D

I edited my post with the more relevant "nice people don't try to lure you on fake websites" because if they really wanted to give you free stuff, they'd just give it out of their own virtual pocket.
So, yeah. I edit my posts a lot, not a good idea to quote me. xD

SakuLv - Dreamweaver

Evalria - Sanctuary wrote: »

I edited my post with the more relevant "nice people don't try to lure you on fake websites" because if they really wanted to give you free stuff, they'd just give it out of their own virtual pocket.
So, yeah. I edit my posts a lot, not a good idea to quote me. xD

Its ok, my quote was meant about the *strangers* ;D

And I agree about the luring. Even if its a friend from friend list- which might be a hacker already

Evalria - Sanctuary

SakuLv - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Its ok, my quote was meant about the *strangers* ;D

And I agree about the luring. Even if its a friend from friend list- which might be a hacker already

Right! Though, to be perfectly honest, I still cannot understand the people who fall for this as in... Their friends got **** and they didn't notice. I take it PW hosts such professional hackers they can perfectly emulate the way of being of another without looking suspicious at all. Or they can fake the person they **** voice on Vent/Skype. How in the world?

I think, if people want to really be sure they are each other, they should come up with secret questions and secret answers between themselves only the true person they know would be able to answer.
Don't agree with this "Don't trust your mother/brother/friend/spouse" etc in-game because it is a bit ridiculous. If people got so paranoid and wanted to be safe and assured all the time, there is a way around it. No need to shun everyone out and become a suspicious Grinch. f:stare

scruncy

i give you guys a extreme example:

all men are possible sex offenders. If you get ***** ,it is your own fault because you should have stayed away from men.

would you aggree with that statement? i hope not , but this is what most people are saying here.

skaitavia

As stated in the short red message that pops up on every server every now and then, never go to any websites that are not specifically PWI related (pwi.perfectworld.com, games.arcgames.com/en/prod/pwi), as they are most likely phishing/scamming websites!

If anyone knows who the culprit is in particular, please send me and/or the mods and CM information, so we can look into this and hopefully end the scamming that they're causing!

Desdi - Sanctuary

scruncy wrote: »

i give you guys a extreme example:

all men are possible sex offenders. If you get ***** ,it is your own fault because you should have stayed away from men.

would you aggree with that statement? i hope not , but this is what most people are saying here.

Honestly, that's a bad example.

It's not too hard to notice when a site/offer seems suspicious and not giving away your account information to other people is common sense. Same goes with suspicious behavior.