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Blizzard Introduces One-Time Password Devices For WoW
An anonymous reader writes "Two days ago Blizzard announced that they will be selling keychain tokens to add one-time password support (FAQ) to World of Warcraft. Have compromised World of Warcraft accounts become such a serious problem, that OTPs are already neccesary for games?"
Probably more like Blizzard has decided that people paranoid about having their accounts compromised have become such a serious market segment that it can eke out a few more pennies selling these dongles for 6 euros a pop.
If it was a huge problem, Blizzard would begin requiring them. The fact that they're optional means they're probably just a new way to sap a few more bucks from players who have invested so much of their time and being into this game that six euros seems a very reasonable security blanket.
Start a happiness pandemic
It's both. Password stealing via phishing and other means has hit quite a few MMO's. It boils down to dumb users mainly, and Blizzard surely sees a profit opportunity in their stupidity.
Its not the system that has a flaw, its the stupidity of people for giving away their usernames/passwords for powerlvling etc.
Old programmers never die.. they just can't C as well.
I believe they wanted to spell it "Bill-zard"
base client: 25 bucks
bc client: 25 bucks
name changes: 10 bucks
realm chances: 25 bucks (per character, that's 250 bucks if you are transferring off a realm on which you were established)
wrath of the lich king: (unknown, but be prepared to chop up your first born son)
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
Wowzers, now I can have more security for my account on some computer game than my online banking (I'm looking at you, Citibank).
"Why are you watching the washing machine?"
"I love entertainment, as long as it's clean"
Why can I get this feature for a MMORPG account, but not from my bank, or any other banks I know of?
I value my real money far more than imaginary swords, shields and armor that exist as bits in an entertainment company's database.
Maybe some people's priorities are different...
I'm not security unconscious either [...] no control over what other uses the computer you play on is put
One might argue that a security-conscious person would not let any random people share his computer, unless it had a very safe multi-user system.
c++;
6 euro protecting 1000s of hours of time spent, it's a no brainer.
I was listening to The Instance, which is a WoW podcast and one of their topics concerned Taiwanese WoW players. They had the option to sign up for a different type of secondary authentication which required them to register 3 different phone numbers. You couldn't completely log in unless Blizzard received a call from one of said phone numbers.
Considering the amount of time people have devoted into these accounts, I don't see this being that big of a deal. As a player, I'm not too sure I'd get one, as I try to avoid random websites, certain browsers and suspiscious addons. The current belief now, however, is that people cracking into wow accounts are using more brute force methods instead of trojan/spyware etc etc (but it's not like those have completely disappeared.)
There's nothing wrong with a little extra security, especially when you've played for 3 years.
wrath of the lich king: (unknown, but be prepared to chop up your first born son)
I'm sure there are a few WoW addicts who wouldn't consider that an unfair deal to be in the WotLK beta...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I can imagine that the problem of hacked accounts is *huge* and primarily a problem on the user's end. I'd wager a guess that Blizzard's largest demographic sometimes also engages in P2P/Warez in conjunction with poor security habits. Trojan-laden warez, account sharing, piss-poor passwords and wide-open PC's; users leave themselves wide open to getting their virtual goodies ransacked and run off with.
I played WoW for 4 months a few years ago and was surprised at the number of trojans packed in the executable installers of some popular UI mods.It wasn't a very clever(but it was effective)way of farming usernames and passwords. Considering the global reach and sheer numbers of people playing WoW, and the virtual goods for real life cash trade, I wouldn't be surprised to learn about WoW-specific trojans running around in the wild. Some people make it easy for the bad guys; using the same login details on WoW related forums as their actual wow account, to purchasing gold and other items from shady websites (good way of farming cc numbers, shady websites also use cc info to pay for their own account time, leading to charge backs and other hassles)to just flat out sharing their details willy-nilly with anyone half trusting.
And there's no evil in Blizzard charging two cups of coffee for an extra layer of protection. I'm sure they've spent oodles and oodles of cash in the past dealing with these issues, so there's nothing wrong with recouping past costs and helping to avoid a portion of future expenditures.
I would appreciate separate user names and passwords for account management and character login, too.
Phase 1 : OTP is a plus that you may buy
Phase 2 : A free OTPtoken with each WoLK extension sold
Phase 3 : A collector edition with WoW+BC+WoLK+token
Phase 4 : Mandatory token for all accounts
That way, they cut the grass under the feet of the chinese farmers who sell ready to play accounts and to the reselling of accounts on E-Bay and such...
The devices each have a unique key. If I have #1, you can't use #2 to get into my account.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.