Security Issues in World of Warcraft
Although account hacking has always been a problem and a hovering threat over the head of World of Warcraft players, it seems that the problem is steadily increasing over time. No official statistics have been released, but at the very least more and more tales of account hacked players have been passed around of late, along with rumors that it may have something to do with a certain merger between World of Warcraft and Battle.net accounts.
Is World of Warcraft security weak?
At the end of the day, World of Warcraft is just an online game. It is not a top secret military application or an online banking utility. The security therefore is weaker than these other applications, but that doesn’t mean it fails completely. Blizzard took steps to minimize the risk of World of Warcraft accounts being stolen through sniffed passwords for example, by ensuring that the protocol used by its servers never transmits passwords in plaintext. All communication between your game client and the WoW servers is encrypted before it is sent which is partly for security and partly to prevent cheating, and the password itself uses a custom salted hash format that is impossible to reverse back to your password if someone picks it up over the network.
How do accounts get hacked?
Although many people don’t want to hear this, most of the World of Warcraft accounts that get compromised by hackers get broken into because of their owners. Many email scams, so-called “special offers” from third party websites, and other methods used by hackers have been especially successful at convincing users to part with their account name and password with promises of some benefit in game. People have even been tricked into thinking that an attacker is really a Blizzard employee and this makes them willing to hand over their details thinking it’s the right thing to do.
Another common method used by hackers to gain access to World of Warcraft accounts is to infect people with a keylogger or some specially written software that just captures the user name and password of a player. These tools have to get onto the player’s computer somehow in order to be effective and come through a variety of means and in different shapes and sizes. Something you may think is a harmless piece of freeware could in fact be harboring a password stealer inside it.
There have also been rumors – only rumors at this stage – that connect the Battle.net merger with an increase in account hacking. This may be from people merging accounts that are not theirs, or maybe from an inherent weakness in Battle.net accounts, but whatever the cause people need to be extra vigilant now.
How do I protect my account from hackers?
This question has many aspects to it. One of the most important things you can remember is to never give your account name and password to anyone even if you think they are a Blizzard employee. Blizzard will never need to ask you for your password, ever. Even if you think the reward seems great, there is almost a 100% chance that handing over your password to anyone will result in your characters being stripped, everything you own in game getting sold to a vendor or send to the hacker’s characters to be sold later, and possibly even having your characters deleted. You will be left with nothing but the embarrassment and disappointment that hackers’ victims feel.
To protect yourself from keyloggers, Trojans and other viruses you should make sure that you have a good virus/malware scanner and that it is always kept up to date. Never open attachments on emails from people you don’t know, and be careful even if they come from people you do know. There have been many viruses that sent themselves to everyone in the victim’s address book, making people more likely to get infected as they believe the email has come from a friend.
A step further: the Blizzard Authenticator
Blizzard has answered the call for increased security by releasing for sale a device they claim can help to make your account hacker-proof. The Blizzard Authenticator is a one-time password generator which provides you with a second, unique password to log in with in addition to your regular password. The additional password changes each time and is impossible to guess. Simple to set up and extremely good value for money, the authentication device can help you to ensure the safety of both your account and your assets in game.
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Excluding the expansions, the Paladin and Warlock were the characters to get a free mount.
