Account Hacked? What did they Steal?

[akaBlues]

I've heard the horror stories and thought, "How can an account get hacked?" And of course thought that since I never travel to unknown sites and never answer 'those' emails or in-game texts that I would not get hacked (I've been playing since first week of retail launch of SoM). Well sometime between this past Friday evening and Sunday evening I was hacked.

I have one 65 toon and was quite concerned that his money, gear, chests, house, etc. would be totally wiped. When I recovered my account, I logged in to find that only his gold was wiped, and nothing else?!?! And no alts were touched. Was I lucky? Is this the typical MO? What has happened to others that have been hacked? I am quite relieved and consider myself fortunate, but very curious about the whole episode.

[finisterre]

I've heard the horror stories and thought, "How can an account get hacked?" And of course thought that since I never travel to unknown sites and never answer 'those' emails or in-game texts that I would not get hacked (I've been playing since first week of retail launch of SoM). Well sometime between this past Friday evening and Sunday evening I was hacked.

I have one 65 toon and was quite concerned that his money, gear, chests, house, etc. would be totally wiped. When I recovered my account, I logged in to find that only his gold was wiped, and nothing else?!?! And no alts were touched. Was I lucky? Is this the typical MO? What has happened to others that have been hacked? I am quite relieved and consider myself fortunate, but very curious about the whole episode.

You were lucky!!! I had a huge problem with my gmail account and most of my MMOs accounts compromised.
In wow for example all my characters were deleted and a LEVEL 1 character was created in each realm (server).
The good part was that I was able to recover it.

[Gui_Incognito]

I can think of two reasons your inventory is intact. First, to make any significant money off your items, they would need to be posted on the AH. This hack is probably more of a smash and grab and he/she doesn't have the time mail all your valuables that aren't bound (basically crafting mats only, probably not worth it). I could see legendary fragments or symbols of Celebrimbor getting stolen but not much else. Of course a few hundred silver could be made by vendoring your stuff but maybe it was even more rushed than that. Probably works by logging on to main, transfer gold, log off, next victim.

I would see about submitting a ticket and talking to a GM to bring it to their attention. They should be able to see who the gold was sent to which would hopefully lead to a banning, though with F2P that won't really deter the thief. Anyway, consider yourself lucky you just got a thief and not a griefer too.

[Orca11]

Sounds like a professional hit by a gold seller... your equipment is bound, and he didn't want to waste time transferring resources to auction later. That type wouldn't have any desire to trash your stuff, just steal what they can sell.

I'd suggest using a plugin like LastPass or a client app like KeyPass to store your passwords (you'll want to back up your password DB if you use a client app... DropBox works well for this). You want something that will generate long, random, and meaningless passwords for you, and fill in the appropriate fields on a website. This way you never use the same password twice, and you never have to write anything down.

Once you've got that... PERMANENTLY DELETE all emails that even reference where you have accounts. As you've found, if someone gets your email it's too easy for them to reset passwords on any account they know about, so don't give them any help. Just be glad they didn't try to get your RL banking info.

[elosefast]

This has happened alot lately, and seems to be happening alot more frequently as well. Happened to a kinnie of mine a couple days ago, luckily they only took the gold he had on his main and left all his gear and alts alone. Seems they just get in and go for the highest lvl toon and take the money and go as fast as possible because they know it will be reported almost immediately in most cases.

Best thing you can do is change your password often. I change mine about once a week, and never use the same password for multiple sites.

[jfsw]

I was logged in Saturday night and as I was playing received the 'Your friend XXXXX has logged in' message in my General Chat window. Funny thing was - it was my wife's toon and she was sitting next to me working on her family tree! I proceeded to watch as her top 4 characters logged in and out while she attempted to access her account. I finally sent the hacker a IM stating that I had reported him as hacking my wife's account. My wife was able to get her password changed before any of her other toons were compromised, but the hacker made off with her gold and many inventory items. My wife had stacks of crafting mats, food and shards/flakes stolen. The in game GM's are currently working to restore her items and $$$. Good thing I was on to witness this or all of her toons could have been cleaned out!

[OhNooze]

So how would they get your account info?

[Devildoc]

Ugh, I just had my steam account hacked today and it uses different login/passwords than the WoW account that got hacked some weeks ago.. and anti-virus software is not picking up anything and I've changed email passwords and the like...

It's a real pain.

[Xzim]

All of you need to stop buying gold and power leveling services and you won't have to worry about getting hacked.

Or if you're going to buy gold then do it off of your cell phone or public computer.

[sirwillow]

Ugh, I just had my steam account hacked today and it uses different login/passwords than the WoW account that got hacked some weeks ago.. and anti-virus software is not picking up anything and I've changed email passwords and the like...

It's a real pain.

It's not just antivirus software that you need to be running.

A good strong firewall- not just windows firewall.
A good strong reliable antivirus package
At least one good strong anti-spyware/ anti-malware program. Two of them don't hurt. Counterspy and Malwarebyte Anti-malware are two that I strongly recommend.

Do at least weekly scans and make sure they are constantly updated. There are also plugin's that will help you know if sites are clean or possible danger spots that you can use in your browser.

There is no such thing as to much protection.

[Xzim]

There is no such thing as to much protection.

I disagree. Wait... what are we talkin' about?

[Devildoc]

All of you need to stop buying gold and power leveling services and you won't have to worry about getting hacked.

Or if you're going to buy gold then do it off of your cell phone or public computer.

I don't buy gold or anything like that, note it wasn't my LotRO account that got hacked. It was a steam account I haven't played anything on in a few weeks cause of LotRO F2P. Hackers will pay attention to stuff like that and sometimes target accounts that aren't currently being used (thinking they won't be missed and by the time it's found out they're long gone).

I do run malwarebytes along with AVG which also has a firewall. Everything is clean so I'm not entirely sure what happened.

[Davx75]

Got hacked this night, I dont understand how they can do that ..


well , he took everything on all my toons

as an account is so easy to hack, I will stop to play, bye bye LOTRO

[sirwillow]

Got hacked this night, I dont understand how they can do that ..


well , he took everything on all my toons

as an account is so easy to hack, I will stop to play, bye bye LOTRO

First, contact Turbine's customer's support. While they can't get all your stuff back, they can at least give you some gold to get started again.

Second, scan your computer with updated virus and malware software.

Third, make sure that windows and all your other programs (flash, browsers, etc.) are all updated.

Fourth, change your passwords. Make sure they are something that only you can know and a good mix of upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols.

Fifth, learn other steps to protect yourself.

If they got your lotro account name and password it's very possible that is not the only thing that has been compromised. You might want to change your passwords on everything- bank accounts, bills, other logins, etc.

Don't give up on lotro because of it. There's likely a bigger issue there that needs to be addressed first. And as I said, they can get you a little assistance to help you get started again.

[Texicon]

When my account got nailed about a month ago I lost everything that wasnt equiped.

All of my alts, even level 10's had inventory, vault, and shared vault emptied.

Anything equiped wasnt touched and neither was house vault.

[Ceejay90]

I was hacked and lost EVERYTHING even down to craft tools, horses, cash I was stripped bare, all characters and house vaults as well as bank vaults
The most annoying thing? Turbine making me jump through hoops to convince them it was my account. Someone changed my password, but I had a real problem getting access tochange it again! I would still like to know how someone changed my password. Full scan of my comp producd nothng
That said, once Turbine were happy it was my account they were very good, and although unable to replace everything, were IMO quite generous in the cash alternative. Mimor problem is having to file separatly for each character!

[Davx75]

In my friend list someone I dont know has been added , I reported that name to Turbine

I dont know if I really want to play again because if teh hacker can steal one time my password , he can hack my account everytime he want , even if I change it every day ....

Thats why is a bit useless to continue to play

[OhNooze]

Hey guys....if you're looking for a good way to protect your pc you need to look at Nod32.

Best protection you will find imo.

http://www.eset.com

[Davx75]

I scanned my pc with

nod32
kaspersky
avg antivirus
avira
bitdefender


and found


NOTHING

[OhNooze]

I scanned my pc with

nod32
kaspersky
avg antivirus
avira
bitdefender


and found


NOTHING

Hmmm...I don't know.

I use ESET Smart Security 4 (Nod32). It has Antivirus | Antispyware | Firewall | Antispam and I have never been hacked on my STEAM, AOC, WoW, LOTRO or Warhammer Online account.

That said I don't go to porn sites or anything that I don't trust.

[Devildoc]

What really needs to happen is that in order for someone to change the contact email address or password on any online account action has to be taken at the prior email account to verify that the person changing the details is the person who owns the account.

Often times it's the reverse. The message informing you that account details were changed says "if this was you, no action is needed, if this WASN'T you, then here's a website to contact support and jump through a bunch of hoops to reclaim your stolen account". It just seems backwards to me.

[Orca11]

Just curious... are you using a strong password on your LotRO account, and is it different from your other passwords? (Obviously OP was hosed since his GMail was compromised, but I wonder about the others).

Generally even weak passwords can sufficient is the host (Turbine) implements a lockout after several failed login attempts (even 50-100 protects all but the weakest password).

If they could have gotten your password from another site or keylogger etc., then there's nothing Turbine could have done to protect your account, but otherwise it seems they have a security flaw that needs to be addressed.

[Kaarnyj]

One also has to remember that hackers and such are ALWAYS ahead of even the best Firewall/Anti-virus/spyware packages. While it's definately a PITA! one can never be too careful these days . It's gotten ridiculous, but I'd rather be safe than sorry. I run Avast, Avira, daily defender scans, weekly Trend Micro scans (I used to run AdAware...but they've gotten sloppy lately - and alot of anti-virus programs are showing THEM as malware now )

Thankfully, all of it can be automated these days - and happens during the night. All I have to do is read over a few logs in the morning.

Having to use multiple programs/safety measures just to play a game stinks...being hacked stinks even more!

[Varenthor]

I don't understand... how is an account hacked so easily? Is there any other way they can get to you other then a keylogger site or a download onto your computer from an unsafe site?

[Davx75]

The only link I clicked was the one is this thread : http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.p...-over-LOTRO-EU

Maybe there is a trojan/keylogger