Feedback talk:Gaile Gray/Archive Support Issues/Nov - Dec 2010

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Festival quests removed!!!

Incident 101104-001748

So I and many others in the forums were surprised after the end of Halloween when the new build not only changed the towns decorations back BUT also removed all the current/active Festival quests from our Logs including old (2009) and new (2010) versions. This was especially troubling for one particular quest ("the Waiting Game")! As I like many others got it last year and keep until after the event when could slow down and focus on doing this very long item (complete ALL the UW quest) once arranged time to do with other guildees. It worked that way last year at least and encouraged folks that don't play that often to have a reason to come back and play even after the seasonal event was over. Do you know why this changed/happened differently this year? Accident (oversight that can be fixed) or on purpose (if so, why?). I think if people at least understood or had some hope of a correction they would feel better! p.s. There is a petition to bring it back started at http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/petiton-restore-waiting-game-part-t10457658.html Please review and apply any assistance possible. Thanks!
18:25, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi. I checked with the Live Team, and the quests were reconfigured to clear the quests log after an event ends. I understand your comments about that particular quest, but a large number of players prefer to not have seasonal quests filling their logs all year long, when they're only able to complete them during a specific event period. As far as I know, there are not plans to revert the change; this is the way the quests and the quest log will function in the future. -- Gaile 01:04, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

[Incident: 101019-000352]

Can you please read my incident report. I previously posted on this page a few months ago, but I recently have learned some new information about my computer. I don't know what the procedure is over hacked accounts, but I'd like if you guys would check it out. Much appreciated. Kbar 22:58, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi. I've checked the ticket, and the Support Team responded to you on the 12th giving you more information about your account. As they said, the evidence we have on hand does not point to an account theft or a "hack." The fact that someone you know accessed your account may explain how the account was linked to botting (which resulted in its closure). However, the team cannot remedy a situation where someone fails to maintain proper account security or knowingly allows someone else to use the acocunt. Sorry that I could not help, but the circumstances do not allow me to do so. -- Gaile 01:12, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

[101107-001672]

Thank god I've found this place

Hi Gaile,

I wrote you an email earlier. I am not sure if you have received it or if the email thing works right. This is my first time using the wiki page for support. Anyways, if you have received it and reviewed my questions, then just ignore this message. This is purely a note to you in case you don't check your emails. Forgive me, but I am anxious.

I was the one asking for help about being falsely banned for engaging in real world money trading. The email's Subject name was: Falsely banned, thank God I found you!‏

I know a lot of people come to you claiming they are innocent, and you must be driven quite mad from time to time by the kind of pressure you had to endure. Well, just please make sure my case is reviewed carefully. Frankly, I had no friggin clue as to why this would happen to me, well, I guess you get those a lot too. :) --Hellswung 07:14, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

(sniff), I know I should be patient, but it is really hard since I have been waiting and waiting and received NOTHING whatsoever at all. At least some insight, ANY, into the matter at hand would be good to ease my anxiety. Just letting me know that someone will give it a look will have put me at ease...

sigh, is that so much to ask for? --Hellswung 18:26, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Do be aware that today is a holiday, and there is the possibility that tomorrow may be taken off as well to give a long weekend. Continue to be patient. You should have received an automated response in the least, and should, in time, receive a response from Support informing you of the condition of your ticket. G R E E N E R 19:25, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

OK, I had no idea this was a holiday, being that I am a Chinese player playing from mainland China. So if that is what is going on here, I will go ahead and focus on other things such as life. Anyways, thanks for responding, that kind of helps, though it is still maddening, a lil. :) --Hellswung 19:28, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Gaile, any insight at all? What is going on please? It is past a week now since this has happened? Please? Any feedback would be helpful at this point. What sucks is that my problem is pending review, but no one is giving me any updates on their findings or if they are planning to look at my problems at all! --Hellswung 16:41, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Consider "pending review" to be the best answer possible at this point. Gaile usually steps in when there may be extenuating circumstances, but generally not while the proper processes are underway. I'm sure that Gaile, Support, and the community are hoping that your situation gets resolved promptly and appropriately, and we all empathize with the fact that you are unable to enjoy the game at this moment. G R E E N E R 19:38, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

You know, that is a very diplomatic answer. You have the quality to become a government spokesman, and I mean it in a good way. :) Anyways, what you said is logical but not very comforting. What concerns me is the lack of response from support while my issue is now already a week old. I know it sometimes takes a lot of time for a particular issue to get resolved, but in my case, it is not only taking long but it also has no feedback whatsoever, and that made me wonder if there is really ANYONE looking at it at all. If they just stash the ticket under somewhere and forget about it.

In addition, "Pending review" is just my guess. Maybe they just don't care enough to properly go through it. It must be on a very low proriety, while it is understandable for a while, it is not if it keeps getting ignored. Therefore, if Gaile can give it a look while she is able to, I will be really happy. Where is Gaile btw? :( --Hellswung 02:38, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

At this point I would expect Gaile to be doing something about it; the protocol for contacting her is usually to wait until a week after Support has stopped responding. She's usually pretty quiet here (like the rest of the ANet staff on this wiki) unless she has something in particular to talk about. --ஸ Kyoshi 03:11, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

OMG!! It is recovered!! OMG!! I cannot believe this!!! This is rediculously long!! Anyhows, thank you Gaile, I felt you must have contributed to this process. However, I am not letting this go until I find out exactly what went wrong with the ban! I cannot believe I can just get banned like that. I dont want to experience any of this in future plays. Gaile, whenever you are free, care to give me some input as to what might have triggered the ban?--Hellswung 17:41, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Sadly, patience may not pay off in this case. In an attempt to combat those who actively cheat, Anet does not divulge what they detected nor how they detected it. Giving out such information, even to those such as yourself who were wrongfully suspended, could compromise their techniques. Gaile has said that they are constantly refining their approach, so your only solace may be that your case has helped them better separate the cheaters from the innocent, and hopefully stopped others from suffering like you have.

There are some steps that you can take to avoid future problems. Many of these can be found on User:Gaile Gray/Support FAQs/Account Security. By the way, welcome back to the game. G R E E N E R 20:18, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) It is true that we cannot possibly discuss the parameters that we use to determine the use of third-party programs, bots, exploits, cheats, etc. For as I've explained many times in the past, the instant we say "We look for A, B, and C," the botters, cheat makers, and hack coders will work around A, B, and C to continue their nefarious deeds. :) (Do look at the document Greener linked; it has some solid info!)

When you consider the huge number of people playing Guild Wars, you can see that the number of "false positives" is very low. With the frequent refinements that we make to our processes and our review system, and with the capacity for players to discuss such matters with me, I do not believe you would run into such a situation again. Welcome back to the game! -- Gaile 01:19, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I've read all of the security tips while I was banned. Gaile, I am just really curious. I know you cannot give out details, but can you just on principal tell me what went wrong in my case. Was it because I traded a lot? or was it because I was scammed? Say, if it is none of those things, then I know it is probablly caused by some unknown software they might have mistaken for something else, and I am not an IT person so I will just shut up and go back to playing. Otherwise, I know it is my play style that caused this. Anything on principal from you will do to ease my mind. You know, it had bugged me a lot in the past week. --Hellswung 01:45, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

She kinda just told you she can't tell you anything about the flags. --ஸ Kyoshi 05:35, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

We can all guess at what might have happened, but it won't really help. The best thing to do is to just keep playing honestly like you have been, and keep your system free of viruses/malware by using reputable virus scanners. I stress reputable because there are about as many if not more fake scanners as there are real ones. For example, Norton antivirus is a real product while, Nortel antivirus is a fake product. This link will help you understand what I'm talking about [1]. --Lania 21:44, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Norton is malware. So is McAfee. elix Omni 23:01, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, they are both crap (though McAfee is getting better lately, the program itself is just bloated to hell). But just because they are crap antiviruses doesn't make them malware ^_^. I personally use Avast because it's free and has a high detection ratio, but Kaspersky, NOD32, Gdata, are also good alternatives IMO. As far as the worst performing Antivirus goes, I think Kingsoft, Trendmicro, and Panda tops that list. --Lania 00:35, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

I also use Avast and it's been very reliable. But for the love of all that's holy, turn the sound off right away if you get it. Scared me half to death when it updated, and I swear I almost screamed when it detected a Trojan. --ஸ Kyoshi 02:15, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, we run Avast on all the machines in our CS lab. It can get pretty noisy around update time. elix Omni 02:17, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

I have it permanently on silent mode. That is the main thing about it that I absolutely hate. The popups were annoying too. --Lania 05:35, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

[Incident: 100527-000313] Account Closure

[Incident

100527-000313] & [Incident: 101103-001241] - Honestly, I have come to one conclusion...

For a while I thought the support team was just being completely ignorant of my support tickets, I promptly responded to all of the proposed questions as well as giving them proper information, only to be told I had done so many things wrong! Obviously being accused of something I did not do, I protested. I fear I am going to be one of those people who end up on The Innocence Project.. Anyways, I was in class today and it finally hit me - I think I was hacked. Why else would I have been banned after being offline since the weekend? Imagine my surprise after my friend texts me to check my GW account and I get presented with an Err045 :(. I really hope there is some method to determine if someone else was on my account, maybe an IP check or trade history / language check? :(. Anyways, I just had a breakthrough and hopefully my rudeness towards the support team can be forgiven and my account can be looked into, thank you so much for your time! 24.78.142.37 19:25, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

It looks as if you've created nearly a dozen tickets about this matter. The first bit of advice I would give you is to never create duplicate tickets -- it slows things down and could, in a rare situation, cause information loss. You should be aware that the account would have been checked for the possibility of it having been stolen or "hacked" months ago. I do not believe that was this is what happened in relation to your account, but I will ask the team just to be extra sure.

You should read the Bot Ban Details document to learn more about the situation. If I learn anything more about this -- and again, I feel that it is very doubtful that I will -- then I will let you know. -- Gaile 01:27, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply! Im sorry for my ignorance concerning the matter and my slowing down of the support system, I appreciate you asking them to check :) I look forward to your future reply and a clearing of my name! 24.78.142.37 03:53, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Hey Gaile, I thought I`d give it a week to see if you had found anything but it doesn`t look like you have posted a response yet :o! Have you found anything pertaining to the clearing of my name? ^^ 24.78.142.37 02:10, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I did look into the account termination, and your account was part of the 3,700+ account closures that took place the week of May 24, 2010 where the accounts were involved in the use of unauthorized third-party programs and/or guild-versus-guild match manipulation. (The majority were the former, but a few dozen were blocked on the same date for match manipulation.) Detailed research preceded those closures; that research ensured that the blocks were appropriate. Therefore, reinstatement is not possible or appropriate. You say you did not bot, and I understand. There have been other players who said the same, and what I have come to believe is that these folks were unaware of the malware present on their system or of the way it was interacting with the game. But as I said in the Bot Ban Details document, there are definitely ways for an account to be corrupted through any "bad copy" of a third-party program with malicious "additions." I'm sorry that this happened to you, and it forms yet another argument for not using anything that is not an integral part of the game. -- Gaile 06:31, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, I`m not exactly sure what you mean, are you saying I was infected with a virus or I downloaded a bad version of Texmod and there is nothing that can be done :(? Does that mean A-net created a double standard (or something like that) where they said certain programs were okay but then banned them for using it? If so that really sucks, but I want to hear the truth from you. 24.78.142.37 16:30, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

The best source of information you're likely to get is found in the link that Gaile provided: User:Gaile Gray/Support FAQs/Bot Ban Details. Their stance on third party programs has not changed, though many do try to misinterpret or misrepresent it. Another link you may want to read is: User:Gaile Gray/Support FAQs/Account Security G R E E N E R 17:30, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you kindly Greener :) 24.78.142.37 03:33, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Archived?

Hello Gaile. It's not because I haven't checked this page for a while that a crontab task isn't doing it for me. It sent me an alarm tonight telling me something changed at "Account Theft". I've been kind to them and didn't spam them after your last message stating this was under investigation. No reply from you nor from the team on the security issue. Can I has input? AndrewB 09:29, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

To save Gaile the trouble, this is [Reference #100526-004142] and the first post from your last archive.  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 09:42, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

She ignored it on purpose, she knows what I'm talking about (99.99% sure, thanks for the link anyway). I opened a new ticket just to see what they have to say about it, and they closed it immediately. I'll give it 48 hours. AndrewB 13:27, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I archived because I'd addressed the matter. The account closure won't be reversed, and that's why the team is closing the tickets when you make new ones. Having said that, though, I understand that you're concerned about what you felt was a security vulnerability, and I've sent another email today to get that addressed. (From what I understand, it's not a vulnerability but it could be seen as one, therefore I agree with you it should be fixed.) -- Gaile 20:24, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Hello again Gaile. Just so you know: I updated the ticket you replied to. I'm really grateful to you because you are the only person who actually gave me some kind of customer service, but I completely disagree with the way you (= the team and you) work. You confirm again the team is a bunch of morons paid to copy/paste standard pre-made vague messages that do not reflect the real story but just what's easiest for them to respond ("because we can!" referring to the "judge, jury and executioner" idiom). When they run out of standard messages, they simply ignore you, even if you have valid unexplained concerns (proof is you took the time to reply...).

For those who still don't understand: It was already decided the account will not be unblocked, yet they still have/had no idea about whether my account was hacked or not, because they still don't/didn't understand the security vulnerability I explained to them. You are lucky I graduated 3 months ago, because I'd have proven it to you by stealing a few accounts (with dozens of Guild Wars players, I can't imagine nobody at my college uses support). As stated by you in the ticket, the matter should be discussed by now, yet I did not hear from them. Also, the fact it took NC Soft 6 weeks to plan a meeting about a "possible security issue" makes me think my problem is not the only thing that goes wrong in the company... . I'm sure you'll disagree, but these are facts (even if I bring them in a rude way to you). AndrewB 08:53, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, I wonder what this "vulnerability" that you speak of... Since gaile and support says its not an actual vulnerability, can someone disclose the information? Is it that whole thing with the Keyfob? or that NCsoft master account deal? --Lania 09:23, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Hello Lania.

1) Everything has yet to be confirmed by NC Soft.

2) It's not a vulnerability that puts every account at risk. Only a specific case puts you at risk (but that doesn't matter, there's a problem).

3) What also worries me is that Gaile said it's worth taking a look at this "security issue", but 6 weeks later they still haven't looked at what I call internet security 101.

4) I had the "How It Works" ready but I'll wait 24 hours for them to reply, it should be discussed by now. AndrewB 12:30, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

I would recommend not posting a security vulnerability in a public location, valid or no. elix Omni 14:55, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Publishing vulnerabilities is a common practice AFTER it has been patched by the vendor [2]. If it's not an actual vulnerability then it wouldn't be a problem anyway. Just in case it "is" an actual unpatched vulnerability, can you privately e-mail me the details of it so I'd have a better idea of what it is? --Lania 15:56, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

It is not appropriate to ask for the private transmittal of security concerns, particularly when I've made it clear the matter is being researched. I'm really unhappy that you have done so. I see that as no different than someone asking for a private copy of an exploit to "verify it." Please do not do this again. -- Gaile 20:47, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Since it's something that needs to be fixed, even though it's not a "security vulnerability" and yet Anet/NCsoft doesn't want even an ounce of info to leak , is there a workaround available to close this possible vulnerability/exploit? I'm not really interested in what the exploit is, but rather a method to prevent an exploit. If it's something that Anet is that worried that it going public might result in additional account hackings then it must be a problem. For example, when an exploit is discovered where it has already led to security breaches, Microsoft releases a security bulletin that loosely describes what the exploit is, and publishes a workaround to temporarily close the vulnerability until they can get a patch released. [3]. That link is a Microsoft security advisory about a DLL remote code execution vulnerability. There is not enough information there to "replicate" the exploit but enough to help customers limit the vulnerability until MS released the update. Like I said, I thought initially that this "exploit" was on the same level as a social engineering phishing scam, and I am sorry that I asked for the info. Rest assured that he did not send me anything so the info isn't leaked not that I would leak it to anyone else anyway, and I disabled my wiki e-mail function as well. --Lania 23:50, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Andrew, the team is actively working on a fix. The matter, as I've said, is not a "security hole" but it is noted as something that we should fix. Please be assured the matter is not being ignored. I relayed the concern to several team members and they looked at it right away. At present, we're working with the company that provides some of our back-end software to get this patched. In the meantime, again, this isn't a huge deal and I don't see how it poses a general security risk but I (and we) agree with you it will be good to clear it up.

If you have any materials you'd like me to relay to those working directly on the issue, you're welcome to send them to me, as you are welcome to send me any other concerns or comments. (Please use email this user.) I sent your earlier notes and they were clear and detailed, giving the team the impetus to verify and start the repair process and again, I want to thank you for the information. -- Gaile 21:40, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Let me summarize this: Your account is banned, the Support Team, or whoever is doing this at ArenaNet/NCSoft CLOSED your account for a REASON (they double, triple, w/e checked your case!), Gaile repeated: "I archived because I'd addressed the matter. The account closure won't be reversed" (WON'T BE REVERSED).

Which is what, dozens of people asking the Support to look at their case/ticket because they were accused of botting or whatsoever which has lead to account closure, heard; either from the copy/paste support answers (seriously? ArenaNet/NCSoft earns so much cash and still can't (or doesn't care to?) hire a COMPETENT SUPPORT team (1st place for players (= CUSTOMERS) to go when a problem occurs)) or for those few of knowledge of this page, from Gaile.

Now you (AndrewB) come, show them (6 weeks ago?!) a way to easily steal other player's account and even demonstrate it on a few accounts(????) and yet they don't care about it - even completely ignore your private messages to support. Action is only (is it?) taken when you go public?

What do you think you will get from this?

1.) They WILL NOT reinstall your account, because if they do so, they will have to look at ALL cases where they blocked accounts until the day they will fix the issue you have pointed out because they did not know of it and kept banning innocent players who demanded not to have done anything wrong but still were blocked as "the team has investigated the case clearly and can say for sure, that you have breached , blablabla".

2.) Since ArenaNet/NCSoft does NOT care about their customers (no solution, workaround for players to prevent the account theft you have described to them), X will make that problem public to certain well known hacker forums as well as probably to GuildWarsGuru, NOT because X want hackers to be able to do damage, but because X want a COMPETENT SOLUTION to PREVENT being hacked for ALL Guild Wars players, thus X go to the people who know their job and ask them for help. And for your lawyers: No, I will not do this, but "someone else" has already done so:

I found this page through a link from a forum where they already describe how you can do this (There is your urgent problem ArenaNet, will you hop off your stuffed seats and do something for your customers now?). Only thing I will tell here (gwiki) is that you as a player may better NOT start guild wars before the next update to fix this as this seems to be a serious problem if it works as described on that page.

Email This User doesnt work for me, any other way i can send ArenaNet the page where i found the message? I myself stopped playing this game 3 years ago due to incompetent support team and dont feel like wasting my time helping well paid programmers closing their security holes but it is (not?) fun to check out other player's accounts. And if you will be able to fix this only with the help of a players you have ignored and demanded to shut up previously, this may not be a good story for guild wars 2 security.. -- JFK 18:57, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Hello JFK.

1) The account is banned due to the use of a third-party program, which is definitely a breach of the EULA. I didn't do it (I wasn't around for 7 months), so read point 2.

2) Gaile said this can only be reversed when accounts are found to be compromised, which is how I found about this (I used support before I left Guild Wars, the only lead I had...).

3) Yes, it's been 3 months now since the first detailed report. I want you to know that I only did it with my own accounts (even banned, you can still change e-email addresses and passwords (main and storage account)), I did not toy with other people's account. It works, unnoticed by the owner (not even a "Your password got changed" e-mail).

4) Again, it takes the user to do a specific action with the support system in order for somebody else to steal his/her credentials. It is however possible to do by only using the available NC Soft services, which is a problem.

5) About what you think: We're their business, they really do care. Making things look unimportant makes them avoid problem (point 1 described by you).

6) Once this gets fixed, I'll tell you how you could do it, and then we'll see how much of a vulnerability this really was? ;) AndrewB 10:16, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

This is still at the forefront of my mind, Andrew, and I thank you for your discretion and your sensible approach to the matter. I hope to have more to say very soon! -- Gaile 05:14, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Help! False botting accusation [Incident: 101111-000323]

I would like to leave this up to support to fix however I have no faith that my case will be looked further into after my latest response from the gm. I swear I have never done anything wrong. I do not use macros of any sort and I own a G11, the software for the keyboard isn't even installed. My mouse is the Steelseries XAI, there are no macros programmed into my mouse either. I run vent and occasionally will leave GWW up in the background for quest map / HoM reference only (while searching for a specific quest route). Every in game action I have ever made is manually executed by myself via hotkeys, WASD, and mouse clicking / scrolling.

I enjoy farming while watching TV and will do so to pass time until something else comes along. I may look like a bot because of my structured playing but I am not one.

I always work on things in a structured order. My first goal was to obtain mats / money for my Destroyer weapons, then move onto holiday events for the ToT rewards, then back to obtaining the mats / money needed to buy my armors. I have worked very hard on my account over the last 5 years and do not want to see it all thrown away for something I did not do.

Please help. I am afraid you are my last hope.

Kljark 04:53, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

I am looking into the matter. Thanks for your patience. -- Gaile 04:42, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you Kljark 21:07, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Just a heads up that we're going on a 4-day weekend to celebrate that odd American holiday, Thanksgiving. I sent an email about this subject, as I mentioned. I will follow up, too, but with so many people being gone, I think you may not hear until next week. -- Gaile 05:16, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi Gaile, it's been a while since I've seen a reply. Just want to check on the progress of this investigation. Kljark 01:39, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

I have replaced this post in its proper position, which is chronological order by start date. You're free to update a thread in its proper position, but repositioning it is not appropriate. -- Gaile 20:07, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

I have pinged two team members to re-request a review of this matter. I hope to have a response, and therefore more information to work with, in the next 48 hours. Thanks for your patience, and I apologize for the time this is taking. -- Gaile 20:25, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

I discussed the matter of your account termination in detail with a senior agent and the lead of the support team agents. I felt it was worth reviewing one more time. I take on board your contention that you have been playing, not botting, and that you're a very efficient farmer. However, the data I've reviewed and the discussions we've had in connection with the data simply do not sustain that claim. Too many factors point to non-interactive "play," as in botting, AFK "playing," and so forth. Basically, when I look at the many numerics and points of data we gather in relations to each investigation, it's pretty much not possible for a human to "farm" in the fashion you've outlined. Therefore, this account will not be reinstated. I understand that you will most likely not agree with the decision, but I am convinced, as is the team, that the decision is the correct one in this case. -- Gaile 00:31, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

(Kljark's gf) I do not understand what "the many numerics and points of data" means. To me it sounds like: there is no proof of a third party system (because there is none) and NCSoft is only terminating the account because of unexplainable data. Kljark sits three feet away from me. Our computers are right next to each other, we are networked to each other (along with a third computer for music / tv) and so I can assume we all show up as one IP address in your database. I find it hard to believe your team has never come across gamers that network multiple computers within their own home. If you are coming across "afk" data it is most likely because I am in charge of puppy duty (she had stones which were causing bladder problems, I can send you the bills if you'd like). I am also the self appointed music / television changer which causes interruptions in my farming. We've been gaming together for six years now and I assure you that neither of us use macros or bot. Look at my account details if you would like to compare. I stopped playing when Kljark did only because we had to move on to another game. Breakdown of our farming during the 1 1/2 months we were back: On a weeknight we averaged 15-20 ecto each and during the weekend 40-50 ecto each (155-200 ecto / week for each of us). We quested and farmed a total of 9-10 Stacks (approx 2250) ToT bags each in 3 days (then the family showed up). We ran every available quest for Trade Contracts... the quests were listed on GW Wiki for our convenience. Kljark farmed 7 stacks of granite for his weapons while I opted to buy the granite at $14k / stack. There is a lot more we did (HM missions / duo UW runs).. but you should be familiar with those details by now. Being capable of farming $1.4 mil / week each it makes no sense that we would waste our time doing these other things instead of out right buying them. We live 2 1/2 hours away from Seattle, if you would like us to demonstrate how a HUMAN can farm (much more efficiently than any bot)we would be more than happy to drive over and farm for you... and FYI we were playing casually hence my many many in game breaks and the not-maxed-out HOM's. Naya Moon 03:28, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

If you don't believe that they have reasons, then you'll understand if your paragraph, which sums up to a cry of "we didn't do it", doesn't register as more credible than their data. Furthermore, what exactly do you think ANet has to gain by banning someone who hasn't done anything wrong? --ஸ Kyoshi 05:15, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

For your information Gaile. It is possible to execute commands much more efficiently than a bot program or a macro. Maybe you and your team should learn to take EVERYTHING into consideration. Leaving it up to "This guy did something faster than what 'stupid' humans can do means he's a bot" does not constitute sufficient proof. But it's not like NCsoft pays attention anyway. Wrongfully banned? Oh, it was NCsoft. It's alright. One of these days you will cross the line and get sued. ~Tethys

@Kyoshi We ran Don't Fear the Reaper 10-12 times each because of an in game glitch that reset the quest line. (Along with Something Wicked this way Comes). I know absolutely nothing about programming a bot... however, I find it extremely unlikely that one can be made to run those quests over and over in two days. Kljark was banned within days of us running these quests. The issue here has nothing to do with us using an illegal program.. the issue is they aren't reading the data correctly because we were never asked how our computer system is set up. Naya Moon 06:20, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

"One of these days you will cross the line and get sued." Uh, what? Every user agrees to a Terms of Service that says ANet has the right to terminate any account at their discretion. You can't sue them for doing something they told you they would do, and which you agreed to. You should read those click-throughs, might learn something about how idle this warning of yours is.

"I find it extremely unlikely that one can be made to run those quests over and over in two days." With those overpowered candy skills? I imagine that would be pretty easy, considering the page for Don't Fear the Reapers says it can be completed with two of the four allotted skills.

Regardless, you have made your own assumptions about how they're interpreting your data. Were it so simple as "these two computers in this household were doing things at the same time", my brother (or at least one of us; were you both banned?) and I would have been banned long ago. --ஸ Kyoshi 07:07, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

I am neither banned nor was I under investigation my account is completely accessible to me. Yet I am ASKING that my account data be compared to Kljark's data for the reasons I have mentioned above. I would not post my main character name on a public forums begging to be investigated if I were not 100% sure we are both doing nothing wrong. The public needs to be warned that networking together, running the same qeusts, and running the same solo builds at the same time may put your significant other at risk of being banned. We do everything at the same time.. because this is how we play. Our data should mirror each others in everything but the above mentioned breaks I take thus making my farming / questing less fluid.(IE: I died a lot because the puppy HAD to go out NOW and could not wait for X mob to die.) Our computers are identical in everything but color and mouse brand. The entertainment computer is sub par to our gaming computers. Naya Moon 14:47, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

The OP's account was terminated due only to his activity. The termination was absolutely not related to anyone networking, playing together, or anything of that sort. Obviously a lot of people play on a network: families, roommates, friends living in a college dorm, etc. Players are free to network, run the same quests, run the same solo builds, as they desire. The account termination related only to the activity on that individual account. -- Gaile 18:15, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

and yet we do the same exact quests (together, unless they are solo) and farm the same hours every day and I am not accused of doing anything wrong.... this system of "verifying" is obviously flawed. I still ask you check my account activity and compare it to his. Our computers are networked so that I can pull info from his computer and he can pull info from mine and I am concerned this is somehow affecting your data. Or.. we are still more than willing to show up and farm for you.Naya Moon 00:03, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

I do not see how networking could impact the data. You're not playing on his account; he's not playing on yours. The data that is reviewed in cases of bot research is exclusive to a single account and couldn't -- to my understanding -- be influenced by any other input. As I said, we have people who play on the same IP and, in some cases, play on the same network, and this has never been cited as a possible issue. I confess that I am curious: on average, how many hours does the OP play Guild Wars per day? -- Gaile 02:07, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

This is my casual gaming schedule. All times listed are in Pacific time zone.

Weekdays: (5hr/day average)

4:00PM Home from work and start dinner

5:00PM Start playing GW

10:00PM Go to bed

Weekends: (10-12hr/day)

9:00AM Wake up and do the weekly chores (if no chores, play GW)

12:00PM Start playing GW

4:00PM Start dinner

5:00PM Start playing GW again

10:00PM Go to bed

I have the next two weeks off from work. I was planning on running my weekend schedule during this time but now I need to find something else to keep me occupied. Currently I am checking up on gaming news while eating dinner. (note the time stamp)

If you have need of my farming skills the next two weeks, please let me know. GW2 dev testing? :D If you read my original ticket, I stated that I had a job interview with Arenanet in the past.Kljark 00:40, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Reporting a Gold Seller

Just wanted to let you know, I saw someone in Kamadan selling Guild Wars gold for real life money, and I took a screen of it so you can see for yourself. The character's name is Lady Opp.

Screenshot of the gold seller

Hopefully you'll be able to shut her down or do whatever it is you guys do. --Nathe 22:20, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Just so you know, it's better to send the report to support directly instead of here since Gaile handles support issues that have slipped through or needs additional attention. Generally when sending the report it's best to describe time, date, location, character name, and what they were spamming. Support usually perma bans their account within a few days. --Lania 23:49, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes, please use /report or submit a ticket to support. They can react more quickly than I can (since I'm just one person and I have a lot of things I'm engaged with). Often, a /report results in action within an hour or two. -- Gaile 03:54, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

False botting ban [Incident: 101118-002367]‏

Hello Gaile. I recently discovered the ToPK in guild wars and found it was an easy place to farm. I have only farmed for maybe two days and got banned for botting even though I used no 3rd party program and found it easy to farm for a couple of hours while watch TV. I contacted support however all they said was that they take great care prior to account termination. Which is obviously a lie as if they did that they would have seen that no 3rd party program was used. I think you are my last hope and would appreciate it if you could help me get my account back. Thanks!

It seems after asking them to review the case and not just dimiss it that they saw it was a false ban and have gotten my account back. They should not just assume their systems are perfect as people who didnt do anything could get their account banned.

Anyway glad it sorted itself out. I would like to think Gaile maybe had something to do with it ;) hope this doesnt happen to anyone else.

They don't assume their system is perfect, only that it's more credible as a source than the person it banned. Which is usually true. --ஸ Kyoshi 17:47, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

I think that's putting things very well, Kyoshi. :) -- Gaile 06:35, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Account Ban [Incident: 101120-000010]

Hi contacted you back in August about being banned.. after talking to you.. my account was giving back... now months later... my account does not work... I don't even actively play anymore after the last time they banned me for no reason....apparently my NCSoft master account no longer works either.....hoping you could help me out again... I have a support ticket in... gave them all the info AGAIN.‏ --Siver Vixon 00:57, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

Siver, looks like you created this post on the same day you wrote Support. As I ask above, please allow Support to fully process the request before contacting me. I am not the first (or usually even the second or third) point of contact of such issues. Also, because you wrote on a weekend and there's a bit of a queue for tickets, you haven't have a detailed response yet but I believe that will come very soon. Thanks for understanding. -- Gaile 03:51, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks

I just wanted to pass on a thank you to the support team. I discovered I had been hacked this morning, my password changed. I contacted support about the matter, and after they locked down my account, I went about digging for access keys. I had access to my account restored within two hours of discovering it had been stolen. It would have gone faster if I had the keys nearby, but they were at another location when I discovered the hack. All in all, it made the painful experience of being hacked a bit easier.-- Pyron Sy 01:03, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm so sorry to hear that you were hacked, Pyron Sy! :( I am very glad that our team was able to get that account restored to you in short order. Being hacked is a painful experience, and I hope all is well with you and your account in the future. -- Gaile 02:38, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

NCSoft and the lack of security

Incident: 101119-002166

Let me share my nightmare with NCSoft and their lack of security. At 9:12 AM I receive an e-mail from NCSoft saying , “Someone at 38.105.20.111 has reset your Guild Wars Game Account password for account xxx@xxx.com. If you did not make this change, please contact support immediately at support@ncsoft.com.” I was at work, but actually had my e-mail open when this came in. I immediately sent an e-mail to NCSoft support saying I didn’t authorize this change. I get no response from them. I e-mail again and go to the NCSoft site and open a ticket. Still no response.

At 10:44 AM I get another e-mail, “Someone at 38.105.20.111 has reset the password and/or the password hint questions and answers for your NCsoft account xxx. If you did not make this change, please contact support immediately at support@ncsoft.com.” Again, I immediately e-mail support saying I didn’t authorize this change. I franticly look for a number to call and find one. Their hours of operation are 1 to 5 PM Central time, so I can’t call them for at least another 3 hours!

I call them at the stroke of 1:00 Central time and after jumping through some hoops, they reset my passwords again. I go home and log in to my account to find everything is gone. Five years’ worth of armor, dyes, materials, weapons all gone. The only thing they didn’t do was delete my characters.

There’s still an open ticket, so I update it that everything I’ve done over the last 5 years has been stripped and I get no response.

Moral of the story is NCSoft security is garbage. I will never, ever buy another game from them or any company associated with them. Not that it will do any good, but I’ve filed a formal complaint with the FTC and reported the incident. 20 November 2010 (UTC)

You know, the smart thing for NCsoft to do is instead of informing that the password has changed via email... ask for authorization to change the password via email, such that the hacker needs the credentials for the email account as well. Also instead of a direct change, it should be a password reset and NCsoft would email you a one time password that allows you to log into a subsystem where you enter a new password. Also lock the password reset system after one reset a day. Not sure how many times this was suggested, but it has been suggested multiple times... only to get a generic "we're working on it". I mean I can understand Anet not being able to do anything but NCsoft is raking in plenty of cash with AION, and Lineage series... they can spare the man hours to make the NCMA more secure. There are some MMO's where security is great, like WOW with their keyfobs, or other games where you need a PIN number or separate password for each character. Heck there was another that had a rudimentary anti-keylogging system built in like a Web based keyboard. Some are atrocious where the login and password is sent via unencrypted HTTP and can be easily intercepted with man in the middle attacks (easy to do in large networks). --Lania 17:09, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

Addition: After being able to briefly log on to my account, verifying that everything is gone, it's now blocked (Error 45) for my "security." Hello Anet, I've already been robbed blind. The incompetence is mind-boggling. 20 November 2010 (UTC)

That was some shit you've been through there. I really feel sorry for you man. The lack of real time phone support and their inability to restore hacked accounts is clearly idiotic to say the least. The game is really good, but support? Clearly worthless garbage.

I really don't understand the reasoning behind their unwillingness to restore lost items/gold, even though they have explained it numerous times that that was due to items/gold being laundered in the economic system and they cannot move them back once the items/gold change hand.

I'd like to point out that I read one of the archived message here detailing an incident about banned acount and gold/items removed. A player who had unknowingly helped a RMT player with a run through Nightfall for about four or five days' work and was paid with large amount of gold of 300 K. She was banned unpon discovery the assistance she provided for helping the RMT player accessing contents otherwise wouldn't have been able to. Her account was later on restored after proving that she had not known the RMT player.

Here is a bit of irony. Her hard earned 300k was removed from her account. Why? Gaile said, the gold comes from questionable source, and therefore it was ill-begotten to begin was, so should be removed.

Now let me get this straight. You cannot return LEGITMATE items/gold, once lost, because they would have been changed hands among other players, but you can remove hard earned gold even though the transactions are no less legitmate than the hands changed transactions.

Those are quite some rules huh? It is funny sometimes they just improvise and make some up along the way.--Hellswung 19:47, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

iirc, they can remove items from the system which are "ill gotten", but they cannot move items back through trades. If it was RMT/botted gold then the removal of it from the system is probably warranted, if not so pleasant for the person whose account was restored. --ஸ Kyoshi 22:16, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

That doesn't really say much. I am questioning the reasoning behind that. So "ill-begotten" items/gold obtained through legitmate method is subject to removal, but lost items/gold, which become "ill-begotten" after being lost to hackers and scammers, are NOT subject to retrival??

What kind of fucked up logic is that? (profanity not directed to you, Kyoshi, just anger in general and towards Anet support) --Hellswung 06:52, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Well they claimed some kind of a technical limitation and if that's the case then that's bad design that they didn't anticipate (ie. The game/server programmers didn't anticipate that there would be hackings or didn't care and didn't place a system where people can have their items restored)... but I kinda think that's BS. If they can remove stuff on a individual basis, they should be able to create it too... I think it's more of a issue of man power and resources and it would take too much time to go through and figure out exactly what was lost and restore all of it accurately...but they have the manpower to remove them cause somehow letting people keep that "300K" which that person "worked for" even if she was over-payed... would break the economy. I hope in GW2 they have a much more efficient system setup. --Lania 16:57, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

As per Lania, by "can" and "can't" I literally meant "are able to" and "aren't able to". Of course we don't know the mechanics behind it, but it's what we've been told. And considering some things I've heard about the way the game is programmed (or the effects of the bad programming) I wouldn't consider it too far-fetched.

Regardless, this is far off track from the original discussion. This page is not for attacking and defending ANet/NCsoft/Gaile, but for appealing to Gaile for help with support. --ஸ Kyoshi 21:53, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Right, considering how many people who have gotten their accounts back because of Gaile, she is doing a remarkable job. I was being narrow-minded, but I wouldn't mind things improve regarding obtaining lost items. --Hellswung 17:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Just a thought here. If Support didn't respond to your emails/support ticket, did you check that they had your contact details logged correctly? I once made a mistake in entering data and they had my contact email wrong. As for locking the account, that is standard practice. They will lock it to protect your account from further unwanted intrusions until you've verified that you are the rightful owner, and then go from there. -- WarBlade 20:20, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Yep, WarBlade, I verified they have my correct email address. BTW, I still haven't gotten a reply. 22:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

You know, if their security practices were more stringent, support would be able to respond in a more timely manner since they don't have to deal with so many hacked accounts. --Lania 22:39, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Staff: "cba" --Neil • 22:41, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I'm going to answer off the cuff, although I can discuss this with one of the GM leads tomorrow if I need to do so. First, let's talk about the account theft. It's sad, and I'm truly sorry that it happened, both as a staff member and as a player. But your account does not appear to have been stolen through any kind of security breach of the NCsoft or Guild Wars system. The fact you got warning emails doesn't point to an internal security breach, but rather, was intended to let you know the status, which then revealed that somehow, someone got access to your account credentials through an external source and used them to access your game account.

The account was locked down soon after access was detected, which is a good thing. I don't personally know of too many companies with that many detailed means of contact in situations like this. Naturally, we don't have a way to predict account theft in advance. We can't say "Hmmm, the tealeaves tell us that at 11:17 PM tomorrow someone is going to try to access Account No. XXX, so we have better lock it down now." The system may detect the access after it happens, and when it is detected, we do take proactive measures to try to protect the account. That could happen within a few minutes or within a few hours. In some cases, a proactive lock may not happen at all. For instance, if a "friend" steals your account, and you've shared your account credentials with him, we would have no way of knowing if that the access was unauthorized as opposed to you simply playing on your account from your friend's house. (Or no way until you contacted us and we investigated the matter at depth.)

In your case, you seem to have discovered the incident before it was detected, but in any case, I think all was done that could be done. The sad truth is that the vast majority of account thefts are perpetrated by employees of Real-Money Trading companies (RMTs). And once they have account credentials, they can access and strip the account in a matter of minutes. Frustrating? Yes! Hurtful to the account holder? Definitely! But again, if our security is the best we can offer, if it's monitored for loopholes or vulnerabilities and updated when needed, and if account thefts still happen (mostly because of shared credentials on various sites), I think it's safe to say we're doing what we can, even if we would like to be able to do more.

Item restoration is not possible in nearly any case. We've done it in a few very rare instances, and we'll always look for ways we can do more. I've explained the why's and wherefore's of this limitation before; I hope you won't mind me not repeating myself in detail now. In a nutshell:

• We can't generate items. This is a programmed limitation that is for the good of the game as a whole; no one can simply "whip up" another armour set or sword.
• In nearly all cases, we cannot access an account and pluck off a stolen item to return it the owner because the ownership chain is not clear.
• We cannot offer individual character or account roll-backs.

I'd love us to be able to do any or all of those things someday, if not for Guild Wars, than for Guild Wars 2. However, instituting such a process is a very complex issue on many levels -- design, programming, execution, policy, and so forth.

I wanted you to know that Support wrote to you on November 20th concerning the password reset. I don't see any updates from you on or after that date. If you need additional help, could you please check for that email and, if necessary, update your ticket? And finally, again, the account theft you experienced was not due to a breach of the NCsoft or Guild Wars security system. As such, I feel your subject line on this wiki page is inappropriate and should be modified. Thank you. -- Gaile 02:53, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi, Gaile. Is there no way of having an email sent with a confirmation link that resets a password only once that is clicked instead of allowing a password to be changed straight from the NC Master Account? I know you (or someone else) has said in the past that requiring the old password created too much hassle for both players and the support team, but as it is unlikely that RMT account thieves would have access to both your NCMA and email address, I think a link confirmation system would give players better peace of mind, while increasing the support team's work load very little, if at all. Thanks! --★KOKUOU★ 03:07, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Kokuou -- Hmmm... would sending a confirmation email help at all, when in most cases, the email account has been stolen, too? In those cases, the RMTer just opens the email, clicks "Yes," and continues to process the theft. I'm more than happy to discuss and learn, though. -- Gaile 03:22, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

A bigger concern is that if the thief manages to gain access to the NCMA, as was my case, they can simply change the contact email without verification or notification from the current email, and change the game passwords without knowledge of the existing passwords. Making the NCMA more secure from theft would help a great deal in cases where the email account is not compromised. Changing the contact email should not be possible without either confirming via the current email, or verifying the account with support first. Then, confirming all game password changes via email should also be required.-- Pyron Sy 03:53, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I think that is a good idea too since it requires the account thief to know the credentials of both the NCMA AND the email. Also, I just don't understand why the requirement to enter the old GW password to change the password was removed? If that was there in addition to email confirmations, the thief would need 3 separate passwords to successfully change the GW client password, instead of just one to steal the account. There might not have been actual security breaches (like malfunctioning SSL encryptions or SQL injection vulnerabilities) but having subpar security practices isn't much better. It's like having a 3 pin lock for a door (NCsoft security) and have had it unlocked with a cloned key (stolen credentials) even though the lock itself didn't malfunction. If you needed 3 separate keys to open the door, and each lock had 32 pins, not only would it be more time consuming to precisely clone the keys take more time, you'd have to get all three keys in the first place instead of just one. Also, in general this really has nothing to do with GW alone... but the NCMA which affects all NCsoft MMO games. At this point the GW client alone is more secure because you need 3 separate account info, email, pass, and char name, instead of just 2 with the NCMA, user name, and pass. --Lania 05:43, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

{Edit conflict} I'm getting a feeling of deja vu about your questions, PS. I seem to remember passing along these very suggestions a while back. I can't remember exactly what the response was, but let me toss out these points as part of the discussion: Most of the time when someone changes the associated email address, it is because the GW player has lost access to the old one. Maybe a move and a change in ISP, so Roadrunner doesn't work and Comcast is the new ISP. Sending to a "dead account" makes no sense at all; no one will every respond and if confirmation is required, well, the account owner will be in an endless loop. Perhaps the player has experienced an email account theft. In that case, he or she would not want information about a reset sent directly to the thief.

I believe the NCMA resets require knowing the answers to security questions. And I can't help but think the character name requirement is going to stop any would-be GW account thief in his tracks, too. I will see if I can learn anything more about these suggestions. With the holiday this week, and with ArenaNet and NCsoft (Seattle) being closed due to snow (yaaay, snow -- I love it!) we probably can't expect an answer until next week at the earliest. As always, if the update is delayed, that doesn't mean it's a dead issue. :) -- Gaile 06:12, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

We had snow too, and now it's like 10 degrees and everything is super slick ^_^ I'm afraid to drive to work tomorrow... I do have a question about how much Anet has a say on what happens with the NCMA? Ie... how closely does Anet work with NCsoft about security issues like that, and does the Anet cybersecurity staff have any ability to upgrade the NCMA? Another thing is that, yeah NCMA password change requires the knowledge of security questions but not for the password for the games that's linked to the NCMA which as far as I can tell includes AION and lineage as well. I think the issue that people are raising is that the game password can be changed w/o knowledge of anything else other than the credentials for the NCMA. If the thief doesn't know the character name, the thief can craft phishing emails asking just for the in game name. I am sure these dirty theives have a database of confirmed account emails and character names gathered through various methods such that when they do get access to the password, they can just find the character name in the database and gain access to the game account. Of course for AION and lineage, they don't need that info... Which makes me think that account theft for AION and lineage is probably more common and problematic than Guildwars, am I right? --Lania 07:54, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Lania -- you ask a lot of questions, and they're good ones. ArenaNet works daily with our NCsoft publishing entities on all sorts of matters. Let's see, just today I exchanged more than a dozen emails with various folks at NCsoft on subject ranging form security (you can count on that!) to a secret project I'm working on. (Not a big deal, but I'm excited about it nonetheless.) I know you wrote up a detailed and respectful list of concerns, and I liked it so well I routed it to... let's just say "to people who know stuff" as well as "people who have influence." :D I can tell you with certainty that there's more to come on this subject, and of course you're welcome to continue to email me, as you have today, to share your concerns and your ideas. Constructive input, even criticism, is more than welcome! Thanks. -- Gaile 05:13, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Gaile, while I appreciate your response, but I believe the title is appropriate. I've never shared any account information with anyone or ever posted it on any site. I don't play GW at friends' houses or anywhere else, but my own computer in my own home.

Let me reiterate, the moment I received an e-mail that my password had been changed I tried to contact Support, repeatedly. It wasn't until I called them that they took any action, and that was resetting my master password, and THEN locking my account, many hours after the fact. So, there was no quick action by Anet or NCSoft. Not even close.

It's been said many times, but there has the be better security at NCSoft. It's been demonstrated how simple it is to get the password on the master account reset with no need for confirmation. The most basic web sites have enough security to require confirmation before resetting a password. Sending out an automated response with no means of stopping the reset is not sufficient.

As I said earlier, I've filed a report with the FTC. This is nothing short of identity theft and is due to the poor security measures taken by NCSoft. While I don't expect it will do me any good, maybe NCSoft and Anet will take another look at security and will protect others. I stand my my earlier statement. There is no reason for me to ever trust NCSoft or any company associated with them. 12:50, 27 November 2010 (UTC)

Just a side note; "And finally, again, the account theft you experienced was not due to a breach of the NCsoft or Guild Wars security system. As such, I feel your subject line on this wiki page is inappropriate and should be modified." The subject title is that there is a lack of security on NCsoft, and I would have to disagree that it is an inappropriate title. It may be that the username and password system is secure and hasn't been "breached" but merely having these barriers in place and nothing else does not help.

I have been through the same situation as the original poster, and the email notification about the password reset merely served to let me know my account was being hacked, and all I was able to do was watch as my characters moved around in-game on a side account. I replied immediately to the email saying it wasn't me and upon receiving the (rather late) reply asking for verification that I am the original owner, I replied within 5 minutes with all the details. However the person accessing my account was still free to do as they wished for around 15 hours, during which they pretty much completely emptied my account. A rather extreme analogy I can think of is that an account is like a child. If you have your child kidnapped (account hacked) and are told about it a minute after it happens (email notification that a password reset has occured), you would probably call the police first (email NCsoft about it) then try and find the child yourself (reset the password or lock your account). The last step cannot be taken for an account, as there are no failsafes if an account is breached, and instead all that happens is a slow process which gets you an account back, ignoring anything that was taken from it.

So, ok my account got hacked. My 12 character password was breached, but this is after 4 years of using it. And I believe that my account was hacked through my NCsoft master account (which I believe cannot be unlinked) and so, while this is also not a "security breach", I think it is definately a weakness in the security. My password is a random chain of characters, so the only way I can see it being cracked is via bruteforce. Maybe it's easier to write a script to do this in a browser, and if so then the NCsoft master account exposes an account to much more risk than a GW account that is unlinked. For there to be no other level of security after the username and password is, in my opinion, ridiculous. Even putting a limit on the number of times a password can be entered and maybe sending an email if this limit is reached to notify the account owner email could easily prevent such situations. But unfortunately, it is seemingly only the player at fault. After this experience, I am not keen on putting any faith into NCsoft account security.

PS. Apologies for any incoherency, it's very late and I've gone back and edited stuff in...92.27.94.153 03:23, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

AFAIK you can't currently "brute force" a password on NCMA because it will lock out after 10 or so tries. Also the amount of time it will take to brute force a 12 character random password on the website is immense, way beyond the life time of a person, assuming it takes 0.25 seconds for the password to go through, the page to refresh, and there is no limit to the number of tries. If it was breached through the NCMA or just guildwars login page, then either you fell for a phishing attempt or your computer was infected with a keylogger. Even the best antivirus will only detect 99.5% of all known threats, and about 75% of new unknown threats. Realistically, even the best antivirus only detects about 95-97% of all existing threats, while the average will protect from about 80-90% of threats... some antivirus programs aren't worth their money at all, only protecting from about 50-60% of threats while producing a lot of false positives.... then there are the fake antivirus programs that look real and they protect from 0% of threats... LOL ^_^. Currently there are over 2 million different types of threats, and growing by over 6,000-30,000 a day, making antivirus programs with a good heuristics and behavioral detection system crucial.

So yeah, it's impractical to be sure that you are 100% free of malicious software even with the best antivirus program. To be 100% sure, you need a inbound/outbound software firewall, a hardware firewall, some kind of a network intrusion detection system, a packet analyzer etc etc... and you'll spend enormous amount of time scanning through packet logs, firewall logs, etc to make sure nothing happened... and if something did happen, you're too late anyway. So, yeah it's a tad bit unrealistic to expect the average consumer to be able to protect themselves from 100% of all keyloggers, trojans etc that have infiltrated very legitimate looking sites as well as commonly used social networking sites like facebook, myspace, twitter etc... Yeah like you said, there needs to be some secondary countermeasures against keyloggers and the consumer side antivirus is just not a good enough for it to be the only countermeasure. Also I agree that the OP title is misleading. I think it should be something like, NCsoft needs to update their security practices.--Lania 06:02, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Also this is what a phishing site looks like on an unprotected browser [4]. Notice that the interface looks completely identical, and the actual login screen was also exactly the same. The screen shows what happens after you enter a fake login credential, and is a good way of detecting a possible phishing site by entering fake credentials... plus it fills their database with garbage too. The other way is looking carefully at the web address too. --Lania 06:11, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Just an idea... when an account is hacked like this and the "victim" account is locked would it be possible to have the "offender" ip and initial accounts associated locked too? This could make it possible to stop the items from being moved around and thus be returnable. Aro 06:25, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

I am assuming you mean locking an IP out of Guild Wars. (We don't have the power to lock an IP in a general sense. :) ) I don't think that would be effective because there are cases where a lot of players are on the same IP. So locking out an IP could punish innocent players. Take a college: there may be 5, 10, 25, or even more GW players in a university, and locking out that IP for the actions of a single person would be wrong. Mike O'Brien (the founder of ArenaNet) told me that back in the day, his entire apartment complex -- 1,000 units -- had the same IP. So as you can see, locking out IPs would be pretty risky. I do appreciate what you're saying, though, about how nice it would be to prevent transfer of stolen items. -- Gaile 08:25, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Yes, that would be bad. Meant more like same ip/account+traded/interacted with the hacked account. Still not a good solution though as they could sell things while stripping the chars. Maybe the best way to word it is to have the ip added to a watch list for potential action. Lock my account button from master account/in-game could work? Require going through support to unlock thus causing a hassle for you folks so not sure of the tradeoff. Aro 09:30, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

I think Anet does lock accounts that had some suspicious activity, like acting as a middle man for transferring large amounts of items and gold from the victims accounts. Still though, these thieves do go through quite a lot of lengths to hide their activity like using proxy IP's, VPN's, botnet controlled IPs etc which makes locking an IP completely ineffective. This is why a lot of hacks appear like they are being accessed from within the states because some of the Chinese hackers likely control servers and zombie computers in a botnet in America or Europe that they can use as intermediaries to log in to accounts. Though it might be interesting if ANet could enforce IP filtering/blocking based on known open proxies, and IP's listed in black lists... but then again, the effectiveness of that would be limited since smart hackers wouldn't use blacklisted IP's to try to pass off their login as legitimate. Also, locking trial accounts that can be easily remade has limited effectiveness too. In the end though, it's tough to beat an army of Chinese or Russian hackers because not only are they very smart, they also have people working 24/7, and have probably accumulated a lot of data on how Anet bans accounts, and what kind of in-game behavior to avoid to avoid bans.

Also IMO ISP's need to get their act together to get IPv6 going, and that would basically eliminate the need for shared IP's like with IPv4. --Lania 01:08, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Well, I've filed complaints with the FTC and BBB. NCSoft actually responded to my BBB complaint, but only to say that they believe their security is adequate and that I must have done something wrong. Well, I didn't. I've never shared any account names or passwords, never played on any computer but my own. I took every precaution I could so something like this wouldn't happen, but it did due to their incompetence. I'm an innocent victim and NCSoft and Anet have washed their hands of me. I've given up on this game and will never buy GW2, nor any other game associated with either company. Also, I won't hesitate to tell others about the lack of security and the poor service I received. Signing off...04:00, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

The OP having made a final post, I'm going to archive this thread. I want to close with a comment that is, I feel, food for thought: If NCsoft had some sort of security issue, wouldn't a huge number of accounts have been impacted? After all, NCsoft games have millions and millions of players, and we know that RMTs buzz around NCsoft games, looking for any opportunity to steal accounts, strip them, and sell the goods for real-world money. Isn't is worth noting that the vast, vast majority of accounts are not stripped, are never accessed by anyone except the owner? And since that is true -- and it is -- then isn't it logical to assume that those whose accounts are stolen, or "hacked," are being victimized by people who get access through external means, not through some issue with security on the NCsoft side?

As I have said before, most who are victimized have used common credentials. Their user name and/or their password has been used somewhere else, and an RMT has obtained that info. Just this week, nearly 2 million credentials were stolen, and only time will tell how that personal info will be abused in the future. Secondarily, a lot of "hacking" is actually done by friends, family members, guildies, or other people who learn the account credentials and then do bad things with that info. I've been interacting with players for more than 12 years, and it still surprises (and saddens) me to see how many people are betrayed by someone they know.

Some who read this will think I'm "covering for the company." Honestly, I am not. If there's a vulnerability, I'd be the first person in line to ask for and try to help find a resolution. But I don't know of any vulnerabilities, and not for lack of looking. From my experience, account thefts are usually the result of (1) stolen credentials, (2) abuse by someone who has acquired the credentials (usually with the victim's knowledge and consent, such as a shared account), or (3) social engineering, such as an RMT saying they need an account's credentials in order to fulfill an order for in-game gold. (And yes, a few dozen fall for this scam every single week. :( )

@OP: Again, I am sorry that you were a victim. -- Gaile 03:43, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

I just want to add something before you archive this... Security "best practices" is a constantly evolving thing. Both consumers and companies have been lagging behind by at least 3-6 years. I'm not talking about patches, and software updates, but actual human practice of using software and keeping your information secure is very outdated for the most part. That is because people don't teach themselves about the latest threats, scams, and what kinds of hacks are now possible. I'll bet that 99% of smartphone users don't know that their smartphone could be part of a smartphone botnet used to secretly distribute spam from their phone... and at least 95% of smartphone users are ignorant of what is considered best practices for the consumer. Most of PC users think that just having an up-to-date antivirus and a firewall is good enough, but having poor user practices will make all the time and money you used to buy and setup your antivirus and firewall meaningless.

So, Who's responsibility is it to teach the consumers and employees? For the employees, the IT department should be communicating with them on a regular basis of what to do and what not to do and administer scheduled training sessions. But for consumers that is something that's tricky. The companies that sell the products generally do poorly when it comes to teaching the consumers on anything more than the basic practices that are at best 5 years old. Practices like never share your credentials, passwords, update antivirus etc etc have been around since the mid 1990's... and most companies don't generally try educate the consumers beyond that. But is it really the company's responsibility to teach consumers? Not only is it costly, but most consumers generally are not receptive to education of mundane "boring" material that most think that "oh it will never happen to me". I think there has to be a better approach to teaching the consumers but most don't seem to want to take 10 minutes a day just to keep themselves updated. --Lania 19:37, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

One thing I'm hoping GW2 has for the sake of this kind of problem is some kind of rollback system for accounts and items. It would be reasonably possible to adapt some code from source revision control system to monitor changes upon each account, committing after each login or logout; I believe svn is under a permissive enough license. In combination with a universally unique identifier; something easy but secure, say, 256 bits/32 bytes for a total of 2^²⁵⁶ possible combinations, or 1.15792089 × 10⁷⁷. That would put the probability of nuclear war annihilating the server many orders of magnitude higher than the probability of encountering an item with a duplicate UUID, and this system would make it entirely possible to revert account changes of arbitrary complexity without affecting the server at large, while still preventing staff from spawning their own items. The archives could become quite large as time goes on, but even if the records are only kept for a month (or even two weeks), the help would be phenomenal. I can explain in more detail if necessary... you might want to talk to Joe or one of the GW2 programmers if you want. It soundss complicated, I know, but I think it a rather elegant solution and it would be comparitively simple to program and use. –Jette 19:53, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Hey guys! Gaile already said that new security measures will be put in place for Guild Wars 2, so they're not ignoring the new threats. I'd like to discuss this too to give them some more things to think about, but I don't think we should do this here, as this is for support issues. So Lania, can you move this to a "suggestion place", so Gaile can clean this up? AndrewB 09:43, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

That's fine, the section is hogging the page. I'll take it somewhere else, though I hope the GW2 team reads the suggestion pages enough to see it. –Jette 21:59, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

This has just happened to my wife, for the second time this month, the first time we got the account back before any damage was done. We're working on it currently, What can we do about this?J.Y. Dec 31, 2010 --The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.92.209.99 (talk).

Your best bet is to read up on account security suggestions. You may want to clean your computer, change your password and ensure you're using an email dedicated solely to GW. Other options are found on the page. G R E E N E R 23:18, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Funny thing, after the first time she DID change all her account information to GW,the perpatrator requested a password change, & then changed both her account pass AND her NCsoft master account password. HOW is this safe in ANY way shape or form? & yet it happened again & NCsoft doesn't seem to be responding to her emails . . . J.Y. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.92.209.99 (talk).

Until you start a new section at the bottom of this page, and provide Gaile with a ticket number, there is very little that she can do for you. If you have a seperate, dedicate GW email, and someone else has access to it, that is a security issue that you need to look into on your end. G R E E N E R 11:35, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Alliance Lotto Concerns

Hi Gaile - not exactly sure where to post this, as it is no longer a pressing concern, but still something I would like clariffied. (and accourding to several posts in guru others may have it too) An alliance mate had gotten his account banned (incident # 101110-001085), and although the GM has since recognised that it was a mistake, and released his account, we never really got the reason to as "why it was banned" in the first place. The only thing we could come up with was our "weekly lotos" and flagged him for money trading. Once the links to our loto pages on our alliance forums were sent his account was released. So my question is if we should start up the lotteries again, (his account or someonelse) is there danger being banned? (or better yet a way to not get banned in the first place) as a weeks temp ban and the "pls reopen my account" stress is way too much of a fee for a "lottery licence". I'm sure lots of alliances would rest easier knowing this activity can continue with out fear of the Dhumm Ban Scythe. We as an alliance miss the lotto activity but understandably everyone is too paranoid to run it * Moon * 22:59, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

The account wasn't blocked for trading; it was mistakenly blocked for botting (use of an disallowed third-party program) and was reinstated upon further investigation. I would think the giveaways would be ok, but I worry that I could say "Oh no worries" and then find out someone was mistakenly blocked (or someone was blocked for another reason and it seemed to others that the block was for the giveaway itself). The support team does good work, but as with any human endeavor, mistakes do happen from time to time. Having said that, we understand (and like!) giveaways, we understand (and love!) events, and as far as I can recall, legitimate event and guild giveaways have not resulted in an account block before. I hope you guys have fun! -- Gaile 03:07, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick reply from everyone in our alliance. * Moon * 13:55, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

You're very welcome, Moon. I'm happy to be able to help. -- Gaile 05:07, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

NCSoft Store Costume Glitch

→ moved from Feedback_talk:Gaile_Gray

Dear Gaile,

I decided to post here to bring this issue to attention so that not more people get stuck in the same situation as I'm in:

When you buy a single wedding costume set in the NCSoft webstore, as opposed to the WHOLE pack of all 3, it automatically redirects you to the whole pack payment section.

I, myself, tried to buy my girlfriend the wedding couple attire, instead I got charged (and recieved) the whole pack. My Paypal acount, however, only had 10 euro on it, which resulted in my Mastarcard getting charged for 2.99 euro, thus resulting in a further fee of 5 euro (I pay transaction fee for such low amounts I believe) solely because the NCSoft Store website is glitched.

I've already send an email to NCSoft Support regarding this issue, or more in particular the request to get a refund -with offcourse the removal of the wedding costumes on my gf's acount- so I can rebuy the costume when this is fixed. I also wonder if there will be a refund of whatever amount of money I loose as the result of fees from my Mastercard, because I shouldn't have gotten charged this much in the first place.

Anyways, people, be aware that the NCSoft Store is currently glitched: No matter what wedding costume you select for purchase, it will always direct you to the "whole pack" page.

Here's the link of my guru thread (with further info regarding my issue in particular) http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/ncsoft-charged-me-wrong-costume-t10459757.html?p=5310474&posted=1#post5310474

And here's the proof of the "mistakes" on the NCSoft website (with thanks to Bellatrixa):

Quote:" First picture shows what happens when you click to buy the Wedding Costume alone, second is for the set. You can see the item_ids I was on about in the address bar."

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/2047/store1resized.png http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/827/store2resized.png

Both direct to the same page with a different ID, however the pricing in both cases (the wedding costume aswell as the whole set) is for the whole set.

Thank you for this report. I had no idea about this problem, and I don't think I've seen that coming through as a "known issue." (And thanks to Bella for the addition info). I am sending this immediately to the Live Team and, once again, thanks a bunch for making us aware! (And the fact you already wrote Support is well appreciated, too!) -- Gaile 01:50, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

::I have something additional, albeit slightly off-topic: On November 21st, 2010, at around 9:30 pm EST, I rushed to buy the promotion for the Halloween 2010 costumes, that, as stated in the website, game client and NCSoft store, would cost $9.99 for the pack if purchased before 11:59 pm PST. I could not use the game client since I was at my girlfriend's, so I tried using the NCSoft store, but it would not process my credit card. About 1 hour later I went back home and got into the game client. It was approx 11:00 pm EST, but the game client would not show the pack, only each individual costume, while the NCSoft store still displayed the pack (Although still failing to process the card). It is not a big big deal, but instead of paying $9.99 for the pack, I had to spend $13.98 (buying each costume individually), only because the promotion ended earlier than intended. Honestly, I let it go, but, what the hell? Why is it bugged? -- Large 05:13, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Large -- are you the OP in this thread, as well? Just checking so I know whether I should break into two threads for two separate topics. (And they really are.) -- Gaile 06:14, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) To the OP: A team member who is knowledgeable about how the store works says that what took place during your transaction is not a case of the system invisibly swapping items or of it erroneously charging for things that you did not receive (or did not want). Apparently, if a player uses multiple tabs while shopping he can end up with extra items in his shopping cart. There is a confirmation page that allows each customer to verify and finalize the purchase, and I'm sorry this isn't presented in a more obvious manner, since you missed seeing it. The team is looking at ways to make shopping a bit less confusing and to prevent situations like yours from happening in the future. This situation doesn't arise a lot, but we'd like to get the number of occurrences down to zero, if that's possible. So thanks a lot for your feedback (and for your support of the game through your purchase). We will review the store and the way pages are presented to see what we can do to make positive changes.

If you have erroneous charges -- I think they're cleared, but I'm not sure -- then please contact support again so they can sort those out for you. -- Gaile 07:09, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Gaile: No, I am not. Different happy (albeit slightly overcharged) GW players here. -- Large 13:52, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Large -- I have moved your question to a new thread -- using strikethrough in this thread -- because it's best to keep topics separate and your question and the answer I'm able to provide may help other players. -- Gaile 17:38, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Costume Promotion Question

I have something additional, albeit slightly off-topic: On November 21st, 2010, at around 9:30 pm EST, I rushed to buy the promotion for the Halloween 2010 costumes, that, as stated in the website, game client and NCSoft store, would cost $9.99 for the pack if purchased before 11:59 pm PST. I could not use the game client since I was at my girlfriend's, so I tried using the NCSoft store, but it would not process my credit card. About 1 hour later I went back home and got into the game client. It was approx 11:00 pm EST, but the game client would not show the pack, only each individual costume, while the NCSoft store still displayed the pack (Although still failing to process the card). It is not a big big deal, but instead of paying $9.99 for the pack, I had to spend $13.98 (buying each costume individually), only because the promotion ended earlier than intended. Honestly, I let it go, but, what the hell? Why is it bugged? -- Large 05:13, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I have not heard of this issue before and I'm sorry you ran into it. I have an email out to our Marketing Director to learn more about what might have happened. -- Gaile 17:43, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you very much Gaile for looking into this. ^^ -- Large 18:16, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I just heard back from the Marketing Director and the person who implements the code that puts offers into the store. They were able to confirm that the offer did close at 11:59 PM on the 21st; it was live until that time, as intended, in both the NCsoft and Guild Wars Stores. We don't know why you were not able to purchase the combined pack under the special promotion. Can you tell me the date and time that you purchased the individual costumes, so that I can look into this further? Thanks. -- Gaile 21:13, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I was going to check and see from the email confirmations I got from GuildWars at the time of purchase, when I noticed a funny thing: the email server (hotmail.com) lists the emails to have been received on 11/21/2010, but the body of the email mentions a 11/22/2010 date. As I'm fairly sure I am not a time traveler, this does strike me as odd. I have the order numbers, but I don't want to post them here until you confirm it is a safe thing to do. (So close to GWAMM I don't want to risk a hacking). -- Large 21:32, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure where you're located, but I get that all the time in emails, and it's because we have 24 time zones in the world. If you made a purchase that was recorded on, say, a server in Europe, the timestamps for the mails can be off by up to 10 hours. Some of our servers operate on GMT and some operate on the time zone in which they're located. For instance, I'm posting at about 9:07 PM Pacific Time, but depending on what seeing you choose for the wiki, I may appear to have posted hours in the future. :)

If you want me to look at the emails, I can do that. Send to SupportLiaison@Arena.Net. However, I think that what you ran into was a matter of confusion between the store and your credit card, and once you submitted a new purchase it went through. I am sorry that it didn't clear up before the promotion ended, but I'm relieved to know that we didn't close the offer prematurely! -- Gaile 05:07, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Sending the emails right now. I'm pretty sure that somehow it did get closed prematurely since I'm in EST, and PST is supposed to be 3 hours behind. Anyway, you judge, please. Thanks for the help :) -- Large 05:14, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

The fellow I wrote today looked at the code, and code is pretty straightforward. The promotion ran its intended timespan. The credit card rejection or the failure of the purchase to get processed could have had a lot of causes, most of them external to our system. However, I feel confident the promotion ran through the full period that it was offered, and of this I was assured. Remember, I'm in touch around the clock with all our global support teams, and I am sure that if the promotion had ended early, we would have heard from dozens if not hundreds of players in those "lost" hours. :) -- Gaile 05:22, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Hello Gaile :). Any news on the subject? -- Large 20:15, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

Hi Large. Since I was able to confirm that the promotion ran the proper time and ended as announced, and since the emails that you sent also did not expose any sort of glitch in the purchase process, I'm afraid I don't have anything new to report. I am sorry that you missed the promotion, but the delay wasn't caused by a premature closure of the promotion nor by any other issue on our side. -- Gaile 01:06, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for looking into it. -- Large 03:08, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

[Incident: 101117-000901]

Merely trying to get the ingame store to be in USD instead of euros, shouldn't be that hard :) –alistic 06:25, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Hi. I looked at the ticket just now, and Support will be happy to help you, but before they can do that, they need you to answer questions about the account, which they sent to you yesterday. And yes, I'm afraid they truly do need to confirm that you own the account, so please respond with as much information as you are able. Thanks. -- Gaile 06:35, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Block and tooth pain

Incident 101129-002715 account blocked with 045 code Help. I'm getting a root canal tomorrow and my guild wars account is blocked. I know I'm rushing things, but my plan was to ease my pain by playing gw. When I tried to log on this am, I got code 045. My master nc account is also blocked. I was on line last night playing, so something happened in the past 16 hrs or so. The only thing I can think of is after a large turkey left over dinner and a little wine, I created a new char on gw that may have infringed on copyrights. I'd just finished a book I liked and thought "I'll create a little char!" without realizing that could have been copyright violations. She didn't go anywhere and I was going to delete her this morning. Can you please help. I've been a loyal GW player -- love the game. I don't think I've been hacked as I'm very tight with my security. This is the only thing I can come up with that might block my account. Best, Lynn

That wouldn't likely have gotten your account blocked, more likely a slap on the wrist and a requirement to change the name. But I guess I'm not familiar with how that process works. Either way, Gaile isn't going to rush it, so I wouldn't get too hopeful about a quick response. --ஸ Kyoshi 07:12, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Kyoshi. I just got one of those "give me all your information notes from NCSoft, so maybe I did get hacked..... the coincidence was just too weird. I just going to have to load up one of my play-by-myself games until this is resolved. And read some books! Thanks again. -- Best, Lynn

Root canal is finished and I was out for 24 hrs. so I couldn't have played anyway. I still don't know why my account was blocked, but am giving them as much info as I can based on what was requested. As a side note, I highly suggest that everyone copy all the serial codes, etc from their main account page so that if they have an "event" they don't have to go through what I am.... I'm still not able to get in the game, but am in contact with the support folks. As this is my first time going through anything like this, and as an avid gamer, there's a curious part of me that wants to see how NCSoft handles all this. I'm still upset, but am maintaining a sense of decorum.

Update: Mouth is sore, account is fine! I worked with the NC Support team and was able to verify that I am me -- again keep all info on your game -- all my chars were fine as well as my inventory. So, happy ending! (but mouth is still sore...)

Hello Lynn -- I was tracking the progress of this ticket, and it was going through the necessary steps towards resolution. I'm glad that all is well with your account. And that your surgery was a success! -- Gaile 00:55, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Incident: 101123-002285

Hey Gaile. I submitted a ticket back on 11/23. The next day I got an email saying the ticket had been escalated to a senior staff member. I haven't received any word from Arenanet support since then. I realize the holiday weekend meant that most of the support staff wouldn't be available and I've been patient with you guys because of that. But it's been 6 days without my second account and I'm getting kind of antsy xD Just posting here to try and make sure I don't get forgotten/lost in the shuffle. Thanks for any help you can give me, I appreciate it immensely. Cheers.--TahiriVeila 04:25, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

/sigh nevermind, support got back to me. Just a frustrating process though =\ --TahiriVeila 16:20, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Major Problem

→ moved from Feedback Talk:Gaile Gray

Hi Gaile Spike Firemane here I am writing to let you know my account was terminated today for botting or third party programming I have never used any of that and I was accused of using that. Is there any way I can appeal it since I know I am Innocent of these charges?Incident: 101129-002631 Spike Firemane

Spike: contact support to get them started on an appeal. (Give them as many details as you can supporting your appeal.) If they reinstate you, great. If 2-3 days go by without any response or if they deny your claim, you can also appeal to Gaile. Near as I can tell from reading this page (and various threads at guru), support always responds to ban appeals within that time period. (You might also want to take a look at Gaile's comments about similar situations.)  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 17:51, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

So Spike -- all is well, correct? :) -- Gaile 00:51, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

I did hear from Spike that all was resolved, so I'll archive now. -- Gaile 00:07, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

I need help Gaile [Incident: 101206-000820]

I have contacted support about my recent account hack. I understand that it is impossible to retrieve my items. I simply want to be sure everything possible is being done to ensure that the person responsible is dealt with properly. I would hate to see someone else fall victim to the same person that hacked me. If you could have the matter looked into more deeply I would be very grateful. Thank you for your time. -- Supersonic90 04:49, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Hello Supersonic. I'm really sorry to hear that your account was stolen. I note on the ticket that the Support Team got back to you yesterday with a bit more information regarding the account theft. As they explained, someone acquired account credentials through an external source of some kind. Judging from the details of the theft, the person responsible is an employee of one of the companies that scours the Internet to try to find account credentials in order to steal and strip game accounts and then sell the stolen in-game goods for real-world money. You can be sure that the team does all that it can to deal with the individuals responsible but extracting justice on the company behind the individuals is difficult if not impossible. This is because in order to obtain some sort of legal remedy against a company, we need the support of the country in which the company operates. In the case of most RMTs, their government has not been at all helpful. However, we do what we can to take the appropriate steps against the thief, to the best of our ability.

Be assured we have frequent discussions about ways to help players protect the accounts even more (although in the end security is primarily owned by the account holder). You'll find some tips on account security in my account security [article]. -- Gaile 02:01, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I received the response I was waiting for from support. Thank you for looking into my situation Gaile, I really appreciate that you are here to help us. It's too bad that there isn't a better way to deal with situations like mine, but I understand that there isn't anything that can really be done. Again, thank you for your time. -- Supersonic90 16:24, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

A bit concerned [Incident: 101124-000780]

Not 100% sure this is in the right place. But anyway :) I contacted support on 11/23/2010 about an issue that concerned me, and the response I got was fairly poor, it ended up being that I was told to post ideas on this wiki to help future resolve these issues. The point I'm trying to make here is really that I with people from former guilds that have been suspended for x when people have used /report.(The only reason I raise this is they recieved a 72? hour ban for spamming recruitment messages in districts) When I reported an incident using a support ticket, I have essentially been told that there was no violation of the rules and no action will be taken. While I understand that each incident must be looked at individually, the only reason i submitted the ticket in the first place was due to feeling rather insulted by what I was pm'd. Now while offensive language wasn't used for the most part (which would trigger the chat filter) the entire message was insulting. Obviously there is the chance to use the Ignore list however that does not prevent initial attack. I have seen the name around before, I believe he used to be in my old guild or alliance however I can't recall talking to him before meaning I can't really see a reason for him to attack me. I just though you might have an opinion on this. I'm not trying to get people banned. I play enough myself to know that I would never want my account banned however I do feel that some action may have been taken on this particular ticket due to the content considering other cases. I love being able to play GuildWars still as I'm sure loads of other people do, however when getting PM's like that from people you dont know and they are allowed to get away with it seems a little unfair.--Nataliexxx 04:41, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Also on another note, a guild member of mine was hacked recently. The amount he lost was something around 4000k. Now while I know there is no way to restore items and gold at all. Having been addressed many times in the past. I think a lock password for salvaging and trade thats seperate from the log in password that need a security answer to reset from NCsoft might be a good prevention method. It's only needed once per log in to prevent you from salvaging or trading with other player. Then it is required once you have logged out and in. This might prevent people from losing a lot of their hard earned gold and items. It would be optional for people that dont want the hassal they do not need to employ using it. However it might prevent people that have accessed someones account from destroying 5 years of playing--Nataliexxx 02:34, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Hi Natalie. I agree with you that the player was offensive in his messaging to you. In many cases, verbal incidents are a two-way street, a case of "mutual antagonism." That was not the case here, from all the records that I checked. In addition, the player in question was guilty of spamming other messaging in the same time period (unrelated to the comments made to you, of course). The player has been given a temporary account suspension.

As to your suggestion, a secondary password system has been proposed in the past and I can certainly understand the merits of such a system, even while I see a few drawbacks. (Bottom line on a personal note: yes, I would use one myself and I see the draw of such an option.) The best thing to do is for you to propose the idea in the suggestions space. Thanks. -- Gaile 02:52, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Thankyou for replying and giving me some more details on the issue. I shall post on the suggestions space yet if it has been raised before im not sure that it will make much of a difference. Anyway thankyou very much for replying :).--Nataliexxx 03:02, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

just an update i have posted a suggestion here if you wish to look at the suggestion i am aware its not your job (well i dont think it is) but thought you might like to have a read :) http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Feedback:User/Nataliexxx/Seperate_Trade/Salvage_PW --Nataliexxx 05:49, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for outlining your thoughts in a suggestion, Natalie. -- Gaile 02:00, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Account Ban

Dear Gaile,

I've had my account since april 28, 2005. I was banned for botting i guess (which i did not do), but all i would likeis my account back so i can get all the stuff i missed out on since i was banned, and i would like to buy GW2 but not without my main and everything i worked on to get it + the amout of hours. I contacted support; which got me no where so please if you can do something, anything at least look into these tickets.

100816-003208 100529-000452

Its very frustrating to me, if anything, if i'm unbanned i'll be helping you guys because i want to buy stuff from the In game Store but anyways sorry again for bothering you but if you look into it we have talked via phone before and you were extreamly nice and helped me work everything out.

Please get back to me whenever its most convenient to you.

-Mike

Hi Mike. First, I moved this to the bottom of the page, as wiki posts are oldest (at top) to newest (at bottom). It's not a big deal for folks to help with things like moving a post, so don't hesitate to be involved with the wiki because you're learning. The wiki is it's really the best way to get in touch with me at the present time, as I mentioned elsewhere, and I want you and every other player to feel comfortable contributing to the Guild Wars Wiki.

I reviewed the tickets, and I reviewed the extensive data related to the account blocks that took place in the relevant time period. I know that you say you did not use any third-party programs, but the data reveals that one was definitely used on your account. As the support agents have told you, it's possible that someone else at your location accessed your account and engaged in disallowed activity. But we cannot and will not restore an account based on that theory, because as was also relayed to you, the protection and security of your account rests primarily with you. Since no one accessed from outside your location, and since you say you personally did not use any third-party programs, you will need to figure out how someone performed this feat, because that fact that someone did so is without question.

I'm sorry that I don't have better news for you, but I do want to point you to this page which I wrote to provide account ban details that are relevant to your account closure. I hope it will be helpful to you. -- Gaile 04:49, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Account Termination Appeal

unfair treatment and partly wrong analyse of NCsoft support

→ moved from Feedback talk:Gaile Gray

hi gaile. you had my issue like 2 years ago, maybe you remmember it. i contacted regina about my issue, but she havent answered in a week, so i would pass it on to you. the message to regina: i changed the names in the message.

my exfriend made a hacker program, hacking account details, and told me about it. and well, at that time it was kinda fascinating, i had no idea you could do stuff like that. so i helped him gather items from the hacked accounts. AND THAT'S IT. i know now it was wrong, and i of course regret it. but it happened and that's it. but the thing i cant understand is, that the support told me "they did the neccesary analysing" and therefor MY account will never be opened again. and yet the ex-friend of mine got his account back some time later? i also remmember that the support told my ex-friend, that he had been involved in a illegal situation, where the person "XXX(censored name)/(my name)" was the guy behind it.

so, the NCsoft support analysed the situation wrong + blamed it on me? and the actual hacker get's his account back, and im stuck with standard message "this account will never be reopened". the funny thing is that all the accounts involved belonged to my friend, where all the in-game name characters had the name "XXX" in it, which was his name. and all the stolen items was traded to his account. so that they cant see that he was the man behind is me a riddle.

i soon after the ban, told them how my friend did it (got it lured out of him), where they could see that it was posted by "XXX" on Guru (another good proof that it was him). so that i told them the information, could make them think that it was me, again? i really cant understand how they can think it was me. to me it seems that NCsoft support just have a hate against me?? and ye i did a bad thing, but alot of people have done that, all i did was being curious, really, who wouldnt be if they get the option to see how it works. and again, i regret it, and i would'nt ever dream of doing anything like that again.

now, my exfriend got his account back by pretending he is another guy, who owned the account before it was hacked. and sended the info like game serials in. and he got his account back? then i made that guy try the same for me, gave him my NCsoft account info, and other info. and all i got back was "this account will never be opened"??? so me, the guy who, in my eyes, didnt do much wrong. get punished, and the hacker doesnt??

i can't do much to prove that im not the hacker guy. but my exfriend is willing to tell you guys how he did, and that he is the guy who did it... it seems to me that someone has to pay for this crime, and then they picked me out?

so what im trying to say is: NCsoft analysed wrong, and they aint listening to me. all i want is a second chance, and possibly the right guys to pay for this. i offered that you guys could observe me, trace me, whatever (if its possible). all i want is PvE and finish my HoM before GW2. + 2 of my real life friends started playing, could be actualy funny to play with them.

and then to another issue. where does the line from people "who's getting another chance of playing the game" and the guys who "is perma banned". because i really cant understand it. is it just completly random from the NCsoft's site, who they like the better? ok. but the NCsoft supporter is lemoncobra, and actually in my eyes he is doing a great job. its just sad that they analyzed wrong, it really sucks to be partly falsely accused. it feels like racism, that the support just dont like me....

this is an incident for allmost 2 years ago, and im sure that lemoncobra would be able to remmember me instantly if you ask him. but it seems he is really sure that they analysed right. but i told about my "proof" if you would call it that. and if it can help my case, i can set up a meeting with this guy "xxx".

the kindest regards, XXX.

ps. is it true that the NCsoft support accepts appeals in some cases? at least that's what lemoncobra wrote to me when i offered i could pay for a new game. and then i begin to doubt in the support even more, that if your ingame crime isnt too extreme, you can buy your account back?!? what's your point of view of how the NCsupport have been doing? because i really feel like its simply not good enough. Xinec 11:15, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

If you accept stolen items to help a hacker, you're guilty of a breach of the User Agreement, just as the hacker is also guilty. Whether the hacker was able to get his account reinstated or not, you were guilty of knowingly breaching the User Agreement, of knowingly hurting other players by getting involved in theft of their items. When you were stripping the items of those hacked account, didn't you stop to think "Hey, these things belong to another player, someone who loves Guild Wars and played well to acquire these things?" I am certain that you knew you should not steal items, nor help another person do so. If you were "fascinated" by the process, you still did something that is 100% wrong.

If the hacker was reinstated, that's unfortunate. You're welcome to send me an email (click the "email this user" on the left) with the ticket number of this incident, and we can look into that matter. Beyond that, what you did was also wrong and your account will remain closed. -- Gaile 18:33, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

I read the OP's comments, and while it's reprehensible to accept stolen items, I don't remember reading anything about how a player may not accept stolen items in the EULA or the RoC. There is plenty of stuff about RMT related item/gold/account transfers and there is one thing about how a player may not attempt to access another person's account, but nothing about accepting stolen gold or items. There is even stuff about how a player may not transfer, store, or assist botters but nothing about assisting hackers in the same capacity... Now the OP admitted to knowingly accepting stolen items, but I think the EULA or the RoC needs to be modified to add something specifically about knowingly accepting stolen items. I think it has to be worded carefully because I am sure there are people who have unknowingly accepted stolen items so a general provision that disallows any transfer of stolen items wouldn't work. I also agree that the hacker should not under any circumstance have his/her account back.--Lania 19:56, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the User Agreement needs to be modified. The overarching rights of NCsoft and ArenaNet to use discretion about account terminations is there for a reason: To prevent people attempting to word-smith every possible permutation of bad behavior. It's not in our best interest to close the accounts of good players, to close the account of anyone without cause. We have the discretion to do so in cases of unacceptable behavior, and that discretion was appropriately applied in this case. -- Gaile 20:42, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Further to the point: Rule 1 of the Rules of Conduct expressly states, "While playing Guild Wars, you must respect the rights of others and their rights to play and enjoy the game. To this end, you may not defraud, harass, threaten, or cause distress and/or unwanted attention to other players. You will not report players maliciously, or cause them to be investigated without reason." And it is to that that I refer in my post. The theft of items from another player's account is unquestionably a failure to respect the rights of other players, and it certainly causes distress to the victim. -- Gaile 20:47, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

i understand what your saying, and i KNOW i did something wrong. yet, i never ACCEPTED ANY STOLEN ITEMS, i did destroy the gameplay for others, and i accepted the consequenses. but that hackers and botters can get their account back, by pretending they "have been hacked themselves" is seriusly sloppy work. and even when i tried i couldnt, and when my "friend" tried for me, via his IP adress. he could not get my account back for me either. AKA the support must have some special hate against ME AS A PERSON. thats again undisciplined work of a support, to not look at the issue, but at the person. aswell as that the support is accepting appeals to get accounts back? just not in some cases, that sounds like direct corruption. and thats what i really want to be looked in at. and about my account, in my eyes, i have sentenced my "jail time" for my crime. yet i understand and have accepted it. but i really dont feel properly treated when other guys can get their accounts back, compared to their crimes. and i cant compared to my crime. and in my eye, my crime was only "not treating other players properly" when i was transfering items from a guy's account to my friend's accounts. that i was busted was only because i used same IP adress as when i was playing on my main account. but corruption and incompetence in analysing a situation, thats just incompetence to me. 83.88.176.153 22:11, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

besides, i was the person who gave you ALL DETAILS about the issue, i gave you information about where the hack was downloaded, and everything. if it wasnt for me, there would be MANY more accounts ripped at this time. after all, my friend told me he know how to do proxy and not get banned anymore.about that guy, he got banned again, for selling his account and ban, and he doesnt sound like he is going to try do anything in GW ever again. but again, in my eyes. i really dont feel like a such bad guy. 83.88.176.153 22:16, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

This guy was not accepting stolen items, Lania. He was actually accessing other people's accounts and stealing their items directly. elix Omni 22:31, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

who are you to judge me omni? i didnt hack the details, i didnt get a reward out of it. am i worse than botters and hackers? afterall they just can get their accounts back from a few mails to the support, and i can't!Xinec 11:15, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

@Felix: Oh, well in that case, Gaile's point stands since that is "directly" defrauding another player rather than indirectly or unknwoingly. --Lania 22:53, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

i aint getting my account back, thats the end of that issue. and gaile is looking into my complaint. this thread is done. Xinec 10:24, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Might be impatient, but...

Hi! My account recently got hacked, and yesterday, I talked with NcSoft support, and the matter was pretty much resolved. They wanted a new e-mail address just to be safe, and I provided one. Now, before they could reply to that, it seems they quit for the day. Now, I might be impatient, but I figured it was worth checking if there's any way to have it "finished" soon. Of course, I can wait, and I do think I'm a bit impatient myself, but I badly want to resume playing, so... So, what I wonder is whether they work weekends as well, and if you could do anything about it, or if I just have to wait until monday. Here's my reference number: 101216-005148 Looking forward to your reply, regardless of what it will say. :) Mirnaera 12:46, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

you might have to wait Xinec 15:11, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

and Captain obvious strikes again! --Neil • 15:57, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Yea, I figured, just thought it was worth to check. :P Mirnaera 16:28, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Reinstatements take time, in part because everyone involved wants to be very, very careful every step of the way. Reinstatements also involve a senior agent, and we do not have senior agents on board 24 hours a day. I feel quite sure that this matter will be cleared up on Monday, but it will not be resolved during the weekend (and as I write you, this is Sunday Noon Pacific time). -- Gaile 20:11, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Yea, I understand that, and am grateful for it. It could be easy to pretend to be the owner, otherwise. And thank you for the information. Might be good to know in the future as well. Thanks a ton, Gaile. Mirnaera 23:14, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

You're very welcome, and thanks for understanding the necessary time it takes to ensure that all goes well. -- Gaile 00:56, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Family gets hit with Code 045

This is odd and a bit different from some of these posted issues, my daughter and my son both got hit in the last week with Code 045 when they tried to log in, incident 101220-004697 and 101218-001383. They are trying to comply with the myriad required pieces of getting restored access. They weren't hacked on GW as they are both in my Guild and no one has logged into their accounts. No one will tell them why they are denied access. They are both straightforward players, my son is a sorely missed source of help and company to our many alliance members and they would like to see him back on. It is very hard when we have been playing for 4+ years to answer some of these questions. They are both worried that GW will delete their accounts without explaining why they are being put through all this. Any ideas? Vjrose 00:24, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Yay hooray, one down, one to go, my sons account is back this morning!Vjrose 16:08, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

I am glad to hear things are moving towards a resolution. These appear to have been cases of "protective blocks" where the accounts were accessed by someone other than the account owner. We try to "lock down" accounts that we suspect may be involved in unauthorized access and then ask the owner to verify ownership before restoring the account. (We need to verify because sometimes the thief claims to be the owner and tries to get the account right back!) Your daughter need to provide a bit more info on her ticket and the team will reset for her. We do have a small crew working during the holidays, and the sooner they have whatever info she can send, the better. -- Gaile 19:34, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

She did provide everything she had which was considerable but they are asking for her Prophecies code and that was 4 years and a couple of moves back, she's pretty much in tears and very frustrated. This is how things go badly wrong, she has been a good customer and her family ahs three accounts, I really don't want to lose them altogether. Are you saying that minus that one code she can't get her account back? Is there anyway for instance for her to have the bank certify her expenditures to GW? What can we do?

It's usually best to keep them just because of situations like this, but I'll admit I haven't. I've seen instances where people have recovered their account without having codes, but I don't know how it worked, so you'll have to wait for support to let you know. Regardless, the codes are a conveniences, not a prerequisite, for recovery. --ஸ Kyoshi 16:28, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks much to whoever finally gave the daughter back her access, she is a very happy camper. Its a lot of work but at least it all worked out~~

I'm very happy this all sorted out. :) There is a really valid reason for asking for proof of ownership, but as you can see, we try very hard to be reasonable in what we will accept. It is not necessary, in most cases, to provide every single access key. When accounts go into dispute, that may be required, for obvious reasons of conflicting ownership claims. But for the most part there are other ways to establish that the person asking for access to an account is indeed the true, original account owner, and we work with the info at hand to get that person back onto the account. -- Gaile 07:50, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Code 045 Issue

I'm having an issue very much the same as above,I was playing GW yesterday afternoon and decided to log of to have my tea,when coming back to play an hour or so later I logged into my account only to find a code=045 (inappropriate name).Obviously a report for an offensive name can only be filed when a player is online and the only two characters that I used that day for any period of time were my main Slap and my second Which finishes with the word Bich,Now I know Bich is close to the bone (by having the T taken out) but it in no way Breaks the rules on naming (as stated on the main GW site)These characters are 5yrs and 4yrs respectively so why get a 045 now?.I'm really quite annoyed as last night I had to cancel my guild trip to do the UW (some of them still haven't been able to complete it yet) and it looks like as support are so slow I'm also going to have to cancel an urgoz run and not be able to attend the Guilds Christmas party that I was arranging on the 23rd :(.

Any chance you could help please? [Incident: 101221-003146] SlapMeSilly 09:57,22 Decemeber 2010 (GMT)

Further to this I have just received a reply from support stating that it was the character name Ritualise This Bich that was deemed to be offensive or inappropriate.Now I'm not being funny but if it was the proper spelling I would agree it would be offensive and I very much doubt it would of even got through the filter when creating a name.Secondly it was stated that I review the naming policy on the GW website Which I had done previously anyway,My name does not break any rule stated on there as far as Im concerned.How many more people are going to get 72hr bans for variation names is it not taking it abit too far as players could see most names as offensive :( SlapMeSilly 11.05,22 December 2010 (GMT)

You know full well that your name contains a word that is a direct bypass of the filter. You played with the fire, you got burnt, time to learn the lesson. Don't be cute with your character name, actually be cute all you want, just keep away from the innuendo and vulgarity. As far as "My name does not break any rule stated on there as far as Im concerned."

"This policy may not cover all inappropriate or unpermitted names. ArenaNet reserves the right to reject any name it concludes, in its sole discretion, is indecent, obscene, or otherwise violates our naming policy or the Guild Wars User Agreement. ArenaNet reserves the right to examine names on a case-by-case basis and take whatever action we deem necessary. We may also amend this policy from time to time in our sole discretion."

Covers it all, and you fall well within that.98.167.218.60 12:49, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Yes I am well aware that the name used is to Bypass the filter..............4 years ago! at the end of the day if it's bypassed the filter then obviously that word is not deemed as offensive anymore correct?

Just for example what if a person who's in to guitars creates a character called "I love my Bich" (for those who don't know a Bich is short for a guitar made by B.C Rich) are they going to get suspended just because some people take it the wrong way? there are so many shortened names on guildwars nowadays because Obviously with more players there are less name choices but for the people who have letters in their names that may look like shortened versions of "profanity" doesn't mean that they actually are.Yes mine was intended to mean what it implies but what about in other cases?

Yes my character has the word Bich in it and it was created with that "statement" in mind,but she's been running around Tyria,Cantha and Elona for 4 years and I've never had anyone think that the name was offensive in anyway,quite the contrary as when I have recieved comments they are usually "Love the name :)"

I'm not going to argue at the end of the day,if the name needs to be changed then fair do's,I'm just making a point that the rules need to be made clearer or if shortened "profanity" isn't allowed then it needs to be included in the filter.SlapMeSilly 14.15,22 December 2010 (GMT)

The problem is that there are so many ways to abbreviate profanity that it's simply impossible to include all such variations in the filter. Someone determined to bypass it will find a way, either by letter substitution, removal, or adding a space. It boils down to one simple point: if the original version of the word is blocked by the filter, then you open yourself up to being blocked. The fact that it took a long time for someone to notice and report doesn't change the fact that the name is inappropriate.-- Pyron Sy 14:58, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

"This policy may not cover all inappropriate or unpermitted names. ArenaNet reserves the right to reject any name it concludes, in its sole discretion, is indecent, obscene, or otherwise violates our naming policy or the Guild Wars User Agreement. ArenaNet reserves the right to examine names on a case-by-case basis and take whatever action we deem necessary. We may also amend this policy from time to time in our sole discretion." — GW Naming Policy.

The sole discretion phrase gives ANet all the tools it needs to suspend anyone at any time for any name. Age of the toon has no bearing, since they don't investigate every account every time there's a new character. Instead, what happens is that accounts are vetted thoroughly whenever there's a new complaint; if they find an issue 5 years old, the EULA gives them permission to address it today.

I'm sorry that your suspension came at such at bad time for you and your guild.  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 16:54, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

I can completely understand about that it's difficult to monitor names etc but in all due respect surely when an incident like this happens I don't see why they have to put a mark (creating a suspension for three days) on the account especially if the character has been created for such a long time.Surely the GM's must think well this character has been running around the world for 4 years and this is the first complaint we have received surely the name isn't that bad? if it was that bad surely we would of had a report earlier?!?!?.

If it was a case of the name being created a few days before I could totally understand,but bearing in mind I have never had any reports before I think a three day block is too big of a punishment for such a minor offence (and the circumstances surrounding it).Some botters/Hackers are getting their accounts back easier,I get reported by someone who probably can't read and it ends up messing up my Whole guilds plans,so technically it's not just punishing me it's Punishing my whole guild (to which the whole alliance think this is a totally stupid and ridiculous ban) SlapMeSilly 19.17,22 December 2010

To be "fair" Bich is an actual female Vietnamese name that means jade. But your usage clearly points to the abbreviated usage and deliberate attempt to bypass the filter. --Lania 22:05, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

If you read the names policy and EULA again, you'll see: "We do not issue warnings; the first mark, with its temporary account suspension, is considered a form of warning, and should be accepted as such by the player." — Breeches From another point of view, one might argue, "gee, this guy got away with a bad name for 3 years! Why isn't he getting punished for every day that he violated the policy?"

BTW: if the offense was major, they would not have suspended you; they would have permanently banned your account. Again, I'm sorry for your guild that the timing is bad.  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 22:42, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Lania,Although I'd do agree with the ban if it is found to be offensive thats fair enough even though it does seem slightly over the top in my opinion,but Just from the earlier point I made in regards to it could of been a guitar reference and also you saying that it also means "Jade" where do ANET draw the line?,There are obviously words in many languages that could be read in another language as "distasteful" or "offensive".I was suspended without warning (which it does state I know)I mailed support..............18hrs since I got a second reply saying it was being escalated to senior admin still nothing has been replied to,so technically if they did change their mind heck 2/3rds of the punishment has already been done! so what if my name didn't mean what they thought it did? this obviously means that "some" GM's can't be doing a very good job if it takes nearly the time of the punishment to get something reverted? (only saying this in the respect of if I was a non guilty party) My gripe has now changed from the fact that I thought my name was unoffensive (as many of you seem to think it's offensive or breaks the rules)and now is that if anyone gets a suspension like this then whats the point of appealing against "045's" if GM's (or the appeal system) can't sort a Problem out until the suspension is nearly completed anyway? SlapMeSilly 00.34,23 December 2010

You've already said you created the name to bypass the filter, and the context of the name shows no intent to mean anything other than the offensive word, so what do you expect your appeal to do? From my understanding, 72 hours is standard for a name ban, followed by a forced changing of name. If I recall correctly from before name changes were made available, if you reported yourself to have an inappropriate name changed, it was still hit with the mandatory 72 hour ban. As far as the length of time between responses, I highly doubt that support is open 24/7, so that part doesn't surprise me. However, an innocent party should still appeal to have their account cleared of the mark against it, if for no other reason. Besides, other than being banned on a major event day, what does it hurt to step away from Guild Wars for a day or two.-- Pyron Sy 03:11, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Exactly... it's not like your name was "Bich Minh Nguyen" <- an actual name of a Vietnamese American author. I also find the word bitch offensive as well as sexist. --Lania 05:54, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I know,I did say that it was done to bypass the filter,I do put my hands up to that,that not what I'm trying to point out.I'm just concerned that other players are going to face the same problem as I have even if they have created theirs without wanting to bypass the filter if you catch my drift.I was just raising the point of how long it takes for Anet to get back to you (all my emails after escalation were during office hours)

(Reset indent) Anyway ANET unblocked my account early last night So....................fin :)SlapMeSilly 09.47,23 December 2010

Call the removal of the block a spot of seasonal good will. You will still, of course, be require to change the name. Your account has been free of other marks and that influenced the decision, as well. In a general sense, I'd like to say the following:

• "I've had this offensive bad name for years" is no defense.
• "It's only a little offensive" is no defense.
• "I only got reported because I won a match" is no defense.
• "My friend reported me as a joke" is no defense.
• "It's not really a bad word because I used "creative spelling" to try to avoid the filter for a word I clearly understood was unacceptable is no defense.

Offensive is offensive, and offensive is disallowed. In the case of the OP, the team showed kindness. Pay that kindness forward and please continue to play the game by the rules, as you have in the past, and for which I thank you. -- Gaile 19:43, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I'd just like to point out to any users reading this that I never used an of those excuses apart from point one,kind of makes it look like those are the excuses used in my ticket/replies lol

Just on a quick note as well to be honest the rules regarding names are actually stated clearer on this wiki than on the main GW website naming policy page.In the Guide to Character creation page[5] it states " Warning: Do not create characters with obscene or offensive names, even indirectly, partially or suggestively.To be honest if that was stated on the main GW website or even stated when creating character names in game surely This wouldn't happen as often by players who are unaware that even a slight variation could cause a 045.Could this not be implemented our at least put on the Main website naming policy?SlapMeSilly 12.08,24 December 2010

Slap, you're correct. You didn't use all the excuses listed, I thought my "In a general sense" comment made that clear. You stated that you believed the character would not be blocked because (1) it had been around so long, and (2) you used creative spelling to avoid the word filter.

Please note that we have a pretty detailed Naming Policy, in addition to the Rules of Conduct and the User Agreement. If you would like to suggest changes or additions to the Naming Policy, please feel free to email me ("Email this user," on the left) and I'll take a look at your ideas. -- Gaile 20:13, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

[Incident: 101222-001905]

Hi Gaile.
I wrote a letter to Support giving out important information considering a special topic ( please read about it in the ticket, i dont want to make that public ).
As the time for you to investigate this is running short as the special topic i am talking about, will end soon, i m continously facing a strange problem:
Someone of your team keeps disabling my Account I Created with my Email adress on the Support page to send you the information. I am forced to use the "reset my password" feature to regain access again and again until now where i did not receive an email anymore. (my password does not contain any symbols or non latin letters/numbers)
If my ticket would not contain such a crucial topic which implies guilds probably containing the richest players in guild wars, i would not be suspicious but so i think that they (support team???) try to shut me down because they have connections with the players i named in my ticket. <- This is only a thought i have because of the on going disabling of my support account I have NO PROVE of this.
As you are a person to be trusted "by default", other than those unknown people sitting and reading my tickets, i insist you to please take a look at it. It does not really contain information which REQUIRE your help as support liason, but considering my thoughts, it might be worth to take a look at it. Also, the time i have sent the ticket is today and i am well aware of the time it might take to view and answer hundred of tickets a day. therefore the only reason i am writing here is because of the fear that those players will be warned and remain unharmed until my ticket gets delivered to someone capable of understanding the content. Also a link to [something i mentioned in my tickets] already got deleted shortly after i wrote the ticket, which only empthatized my thoughts. But who knows, maybe this is all just coincidence or a problem with my mailserver suddenly no longer receiving mails from you which i as an desired player of your games would like to find out.
MikeTh 17:06, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Looks like the problem with the Support Account is fixed as i was just able to Log In. No answer yet though, I hope they will see how important that issue is and escalate it to specialized members of your team fast.
-- MikeTh 22:00, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

I reviewed the ticket and am discussing the matter with other Live Team members. Thanks for the report. -- Gaile 20:01, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your answer so short before christmas Gaile. Merry Christmas to your team :)
-- MikeTh 00:21, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

My pleasure. This is Christmas Eve, and the team is taking a well-deserved break, so I do not think this will be addressed immediately, but the team is aware of the situation and will investigate as soon as possible. Oh and I hope you have a Merry Christmas, too! -- Gaile 20:15, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

[Incident: 101221-001708]

I tried to log in on Tuesday to be greeted with "Your Guild Wars account has been suspended for advertising an inappropriate website. You will be able to join the game in approximately 60 hours. (Code=045)" So apparently 12 hours prior to that, I was suspended. I immediately sent in the above indicated incident to support. 18.5 hours later (Not on a weekend) I received a response that they would escalate to a senior staff member. 12 hours later I finally got a response from the infamous LemonCobra. "After reviewing the incident and associated game logs it appears that you have violated the Rules of Conduct by spamming a website connected in no way to Guild Wars." Which is extremely funny because I can now say that he did absolutely ZERO reviewing of anything at all. How can I possibly make such a bold statement? Because he also quoted my supposed violations. The best part? I REPORTED THAT SPAMMER MYSELF WITH incident #101217-002356. It even had a screenshot of his spam!

There are now only 28 hours left of a 72 hour suspension that was applied to me instead of the person who did the violation!98.167.218.60 19:46, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Update: 18.5 hours after first submit to be escalated. 12 hours for LemonCobra to "Review". 2 hours to get a response of "After reviewing the issue, it appears that your account was blocked in error. Your account is now released and you should be able to log in to Guild Wars. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. Please let us know if we can help you with anything else.", and at current account still shows suspended despite what he says he has done.98.167.218.60 20:28, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Final Uptate: 4 hours later my account was finally ACTUALLY released from the misapplied suspension. Total tally: 18.5 hours waiting to get escalated, 12 hours till senior staff responded, 2 hours explaining how the suspension was an error, 4 hours after the apology account is actually returned to me. Served more than 2/3rds of a suspension that was an error. Support response time was abysmal, "Review" was a complete failure. Canned apology with absolutely no sincerity. Forget reporting anyone for RMT spam anymore. Guess I'll just let them roam free in Kamadan without consequence. I certainly don't want to be suspended again due to a complete and utter lack of attention to detail from the GM's involved in investigating.98.167.218.60 23:54, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Just chill, thank dwayna that your suspension session didnt carry on through the christmas event, if your the type of person who loves the hats. --Neil • 19:48, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Just be thankful you got a reply from a senior staff member,Mine was escalated at 5am UDT today and I still haven't heard a peep! SlapMeSilly 20.18,22 December 2010

I don't think he needs to chill, I think someone needs to do his/her job and get his account reinstated ex post haste, with a bit more sincere of an apology. Otherwise, what is the incentive for people to report spammers, gold farmers, and other cretins who are breaking the rules and ruining the game for everyone else, especially when there's a good chance of getting mistakenly banned for it? When people help you make your game better, you don't just go "oops.. sorry" when you mistakenly mete out punishments to them. 174.131.10.237 20:23, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

You must remember we are talking about anet <W/e we get from merchandise> here, not blizzard <$100mil-a-month-lolz>? --Neil • 00:07, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I am aware of Anet's financial standing; I wouldn't expect anyone to be compensated monetarily, especially since there's no subscription. That said, when a company punishes the wrong person, they damage the relationship with a good player who is actually putting forth extra effort to help the company support/maintain/manage the game. As I asked above, what is the mis-punished player's incentive now to report problem players, potentially risking another ban down the road? I know that *I* am now unwilling to report people, and I also have put in a number of reports for goldfarmers and spammers; I surely don't want to get mis-punished either. There are things that the company can do which cost them nothing in terms of doing a little CRM and would go a long way to compensate for the mistake. 66.32.146.182 03:11, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

For example, right now, someone is hoarding the present drop in LA D1 and hiding behind the North Xunlai chest where the Grentches can't get to him, thus the present doesn't drop for anyone else. What incentive do I have to report such behavior? No one else can play in that D, and it's a known bug that people exploit every Wintersday. Sure, people can go to another D, but a group of players can monopolize it in every district. 66.32.146.182 03:54, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

My incentive for reporting such a thing would be to better the game, to address issues of unfairness towards other players. I don't know that we need to start an "incentive program" for doing the right thing. If we do, then I've misjudged our community, and I highly doubt that is the case. -- Gaile 03:57, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

It's not an incentive program for people to do the right thing from the start; it's an incentive program for people to not STOP doing the right thing because you beat them with the stick instead of the person whom they reported that deserved it. My incentive WAS to better the game, but I am not going to risk getting suspended/banned for doing the RIGHT thing now; somehow, I doubt the person who got hosed this time is going to anymore, either. 66.32.146.182 04:20, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I'm really sorry that you were blocked in error. It really doesn't happen often, but when it does, it's an irritation for the player and an embarrassment for the company. Please accept my apologies, as well as the team's, for that error. I am particularly sympathetic because you tried to do the right thing -- you actually did the right thing -- and you then had a bit of inconvenience as a result. I am sure that the agent who mis-applied the block has already been spoken to, so that s/he is aware of the issue and takes more care in the future. Again, thank you for your report, and thank you for your patience! -- Gaile 20:06, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Why not offer something like a rare mini unlock key for when Anet makes a mistake of this nature? You give them out at trade shows for the same basic purpose, and it would go a long way to repair a damaged relationship with your customers in this situation. I am not suggesting it merely for the party in this case, but anytime the company makes this kind of mistake. It's simply just a good policy that shows you do value the relationship you have with your customers; it shows that you value their time and investment in your entertainment platform, and keeps them willing to continue helping you manage your game better. 66.32.146.182 03:11, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

We do many kind and generous things for our players. This week, due to an glitch in the in-game store, we elected to resolve an issue that, in the end, benefited 80 players in an extraordinary way. We did this without them even asking and before 76 of them even noticed the issue. Looking at your proposal analytically -- and that is, in part, what I'm on board to do :) -- it seems to me that setting up a system for routinely giving "whoopsie prizes" isn't an appropriate concept, for many reasons. In the end, I believe that most players -- particularly the "highly invested" players you reference -- understand that our agents are human beings, that mistakes can happen, that we are truly sorry for any issues that arise, and that we make an honest and continuing effort to both prevent errors from happening and to correct them as quickly as possible when they do occur. In the end, I think players look to us, and trust us, to resolve issues and to deal with those that arise as professionally and responsibly as possible. -- Gaile 03:55, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Actually, despite your deprecation of it, it is VERY appropriate, and has been done in other games to great effect (including one I operated for a while). Of course people are human and screw up; for example, when my staff made a significant error which materially impacted a player, we made it good for the him/her, because it was the right thing to do. It also gave US incentive to not screw up as much. Result? Fiercely loyal players and the game has survived for over a decade now. I do look to you and trust you to resolve issues and deal with everyone professionally; in fact, this kind of stuff is standard professional CRM methodology. Seeing how this kind of situation is handled, I am starting to doubt that trust, personally. 66.32.146.182 04:20, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Anonymous: Please feel free to make your suggestions on the appropriate suggestions page. -- Gaile 04:24, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Got a link? Should I copy/paste this discussion for context? Not that I think anyone at anet will take it seriously, but I am all about making the effort, since I would like to feel safe helping the game again, as I get REAL tired of goldfarmers. 66.32.146.182 04:32, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Of course, I'm happy to help. Here's the Getting Started page for making suggestions. In my opinion, your suggestion is very simple and would be easily outlined in just a sentence or two. ("Background" isn't essential, because it is so clear without extraneous and singular references.) I know that brevity and concise language are always effective and, due to the volume of feedback in this medium, are also greatly appreciated. Thanks. -- Gaile 04:43, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Feedback:Main — Start there. Feel free to leave a msg on my talk if you have questions.  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 04:43, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

[Incident: 101223-013370]

Hi. I have been told that in the very last resort i should post there with my ticket number so... here it is. I did get the game very recently and i desperatly want to have it running. I have been trying to log into guild wars for hours now but each time i get an error message telling me that it cant find connect to the servers. I can post a screenshot if it help... --The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.209.71.194 (talk).

First of all, welcome to Guild Wars. I'm sorry you're having difficulties getting into the game. I should point out, though, that (1) the ticket number that you have provided is inaccurate and (2) I believe your ticket is most likely only a few hours old. If I am the "last resort" then we have to let the team do its job, and I sense that they've only had a few hours to do that. As I mention elsewhere in this section, players should wait at least 72 hours -- 3 working days -- after they submit a ticket before contacting me. It's a busy time of year, and many tens or hundreds of thousands of people are playing Guild Wars right now. Our team always does the best they can to respond to ticket very quickly, but they do need time to handle each ticket. Please give them some time to get this sorted out. If you need my assistance in a few days, please get back to me with the proper ticket number. Thank you. -- Gaile 21:12, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Try using the Error code page to reference your problem and potentially find a solution. G R E E N E R 21:16, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your kind welcome. As i am now really impatient to get that game running i thought i could post the screenshot of the error i get every time i try to login.

Ease Ron, happy christmas - 86.209.71.194 21:18, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Guildwars is not run using a browser. It is a separate program which is installed on your computer (you run it with gw.exe). The website you seem to be aiming for is written without a "space" or "_". You want to use www.guildwars.com G R E E N E R 21:38, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Greener is correct. Please go to www.guildwars.com and visit this page to download the client. En français, cette page peut être d'aide. Bonne chance ! -- Gaile 21:50, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your help darling. Yseron - 90.15.185.181 12:53, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Mini Polar Bear

Is it possible to get a mini polar this year? cause i havnt seen 1 person selling unded or ded ones (iv been trying consistently as well) but as far as i have seen, no 1 has gotten 1 this yr. User: Austin1

See also: Feedback_talk:Joe_Kimmes#enjoy coca-cola

 — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 05:57, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Oh man, I hate Miniature Polar Bear questions! You see, a few years ago a player asked a question about a new drop, and the designer had kept it secret, and... Oh, it's all just too sad to recount! :) Anyway, the answer is "Yes, it is possible to get a Miniature Polar Bear this year." I have that on the authority of Joe, our Live Team programmer. However, it's true that the closest most of us will get in this lifetime is viewing a screenshot or catching a glimpse of one in Kamadan or Lion's Arch. That is both a good and a bad thing. Many of us -- including me! -- desperately want the rarer minis. Is that because they're just cooler on some native level? Or is it because they're so rare? Now, the MPB is adorable, there's no doubt. And Dhuum is outrageously cool. But those two -- the top of my personal "Hope to Get Someday" list -- must owe some of their attractiveness to their rarity, don't you think? So yes, it's a long and challenging hunt. But, Oh! Think of the joy when you succeed!

To all my fellow MPB hunters: I wish you the best of luck this holiday season. I hope many friends will find that little critter in their drops. If you do, be sure to let me know so I can come visit him. Froggie is personal friends with the MPBs, so he'd like to chink glasses with you in a celebration of your accomplishment, should you be so fortunate. -- Gaile 07:45, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

ok, just checking, and wanted to post something new, your page isnt as active as it has been. I guess most questions have been answered. User:Austin1

and im sure my MPB will be just around the corner, 62 hrs devoted to it, call me a freak but i want my last wintersday to be the best. User:Austin1

Joe says the drop percentage is something around .02% (but didn't go out and say that), meaning the chance of getting one is approximately one in five thousand. The UW chest's drop rate for Dhuum is low-ish, but still achievable. Hmm. Gaile, what was the date you said that the polar bear didn't exist? I have a hypothesis about how the drop tables work: the first two teams to beat Dhuum got a smite crawler and a Dhuum, which could indicate that drops are cyclic (i.e., the 5,000th person to farm the chest gets one) or self-monitored (the chest "knew" it hadn't ever dropped one before, so it did). If only a few people bothered farming the chest before people knew of the bear's existence, it'd lend credence to the idea, but if nobody got a response for a few days then I'll have to keep thinking. I don't farm the winter's chest myself, the bear is too cutesy for me. But good luck to the rest of you. –Jette 17:47, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Well now, let's be completely accurate here. ;) Joe said that players' calculations about the drop rate are pretty close to being accurate, but he didn't state a percentage himself. I've been doing this long enough to know I need to make that distinction, because without a note, this could get spun out into "Joe gave the drop rate" and he didn't. Bottom line: Rare as hen's teeth. :)

Thanks for the good wishes, Jette. I don't hold my breath about getting a little critter, but hunting MPBs has become a tradition over the last few years, so I'll do it (lightly) as the holidays allow. -- Gaile 20:20, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Botting Bans

Will people who have been banned for "Botting/Third Party programs" ever have a chance to get a timer put on their accounts so they can eventually be able to log back on after a period of time has elapsed? I understand some should stay banned however others should not have recieved such a harsh punishment despite the account breaking the EULA. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by 74.65.0.234 (talk).

"We will not reinstate accounts that were found and have been confirmed to have been involved in the use of such programs. " — User:Gaile_Gray/Support_FAQs/Bot_Ban_Details  — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 23:15, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

All Botters/third party users should and thoroughly deserve to be banned for life! If your going to break a major rule like that then tough luck! Santa thinks you've been a bad boy this year!SlapMeSilly 00.07,25 December 2010

Merry Christmas/Wintersday

Merry Christmas Gaile, and everyone else who reads this, and Merry Wintersday for tomorrow :) User:Austin1

Merry Christmas to you, too, Austin. :) -- Gaile 06:57, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

False Botting Accusation [Incident: 101229-000403]

Following my purchases of Guild Wars on Steam, I decided to immediately get into the game, knowing the Wintersday event was going to occur. After getting recruited into [KISS], I decided to resume my gameplay. Then, I remember about birthday presents. So, in an effort to not delay them, I decided to create all my characters at once. However, after finally making a Female Canthan Warrior, I was immediately banned for botting, which I did not do. After having my account wrongfully terminated/blocked for "the use of a third-party tool," I decided to contact support and try to prove my innocence. The following day, my other account was banned too, possibly from being related to my original account. So I can continued to wait. After many days of redirection, I received no such help for the botting issue but instead accused of providing false information. Unless I made a typo, I can guarantee that almost all of the information concerning the account is correct. However, I do have my suspicions that this false information could be attributed to the VanillaVisa Gift Card I used to purchase the Eye of the North. When was attempting to register the card for usage, I could not find any option to change my information, such as name or address. Thus, I decided to use the name already displayed on the website. So, that might be the reason I am being accused of providing incorrect information. However, I certify that all the information I used to register for NCSoft is correct and there is no intentional mistake in it. However, that still leaves my accounts banned from botting, which is yet to be discussed. Now, from the looks of it, it seems my account is doomed. So, I beg of you Gaile, please help me with my issue. -- I= 16:23, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm going to look into this again, but in reading the ticket I have spotted some pretty puzzling anomalies, and I'll need to confer with two team leads to find out where this might head. I will update when I know more. -- Gaile 00:47, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I thank you for taking the time to look at my case. Hope to hear back soon. I= 02:09, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Hello. I followed up with the team, and learned that there were a lot of very odd things related to this game account and others associated with it. I have been told that, due to the irregular nature of the accounts, there is not plan to reinstate them. I am not at liberty to discuss the details, but if you have further issues with the account closure(s), please feel free to discuss them with the Support Team. -- Gaile 01:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, the accounts were only two-three days old, so I didn't do much. At this point, I'm just glad to have gotten a refund. If there is no chance of re-obtaining my account, am I allowed to purchase another one or has that banning permanently prevents me from playing? I= 06:34, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

I don’t work in the Account Security Department, so I’m afraid I can’t give you the definitive answer on that. However, I always advise those making an account to use complete, verifiable, and accurate registration information because I have noticed that doing so seems to reduce the chance of an account being closed and the costs refunded. This applies to both game accounts and NCsoft Master Accounts. I've seen quite a number of issues related to false info in registrations, so that's one bit of advice that may help. -- Gaile 23:02, 20 January 2011 (UTC)