Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Game Maker Says 40% of iTunes In-App Buys Are Fraud

Posted by Soulskill on from the most-of-the-remainder-are-probably-three-year-olds dept.

chicksdaddy writes "Hong Kong-based Lakoo, maker of the Empire Online game, says that 4 in 10 in-application purchases by users of the iOS version of its MMORPG are fraudulent, and made through compromised iTunes accounts. But Apple has turned a deaf ear to its requests for help to stop the bogus activity."

15 of 114 comments (clear)

  1. If this were a systemic Problem, by ClaraBow · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'd imagine that more developers would come forward and complain.

    1. Re:If this were a systemic Problem, by commodore6502 · · Score: 3, Informative

      It likely IS a problem but Apple..... like Paypal..... chooses to ignore the abusive, illegal payments. Paypal eventually ended-up before the US DOJ and forced to refund money back to various persons (I got $75). Perhaps the same will happen with Apple in a few years.

      --
      Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
    2. Re:If this were a systemic Problem, by VGPowerlord · · Score: 3, Insightful

      ...and I realized after the fact that this article is about in-game purchases and fraudulent credit cards, not fraudulent programs. Whoops.

      --
      GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
    3. Re:If this were a systemic Problem, by Dahamma · · Score: 2

      Those seem to be totally unrelated issues (beyond the part about Apple not giving a shit, I guess).

      That was someone taking a GPL game and selling it on the store, where the complaint in the article is about people using hacked iTunes accounts for in-app purchases. It's copyright violation vs. credit card fraud, "apples" and oranges...

    4. Re:If this were a systemic Problem, by PopeRatzo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It likely IS a problem but Apple..... like Paypal..... chooses to ignore the abusive, illegal payments.

      What incentive do they have to protect their customers? This isn't the 1970s any more.

      Understand, it's not personal, it's just that the corporations have declared war on us. They're just doing what they were designed to do: profit no matter who gets hurt. Yet you still hear people say that there's "too much regulation". "Too much government". When corporations are the ones funding election campaigns, what do you expect lawmakers to do but whatever the donors say.

      The corporation is a person that doesn't pay tax like a person.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    5. Re:If this were a systemic Problem, by shadowrat · · Score: 2

      as a developer I think i can shed some light on why they would come forward. People complain to the developer. Apple is far better at ignoring complaints than I am. Frankly, I don't know how they do it. I strongly suspect there are people at Apple whose job is to listen to the complaints, get drunk and commiserate on how everything sucks and nobody appreciates the work they do.

      I didn't RTFA, but i would think the developer gets complaints from the account holders that people are buying stuff in their game. The people probably complain to apple, but apple responds in typical stoic fashion. The consumers then complain even louder to the developer.

  2. Re:This ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I don't trust the developers with direct access to my account.

    We just released an app with in-app purchase. You'll be happy to know that we (developers) don't have direct access to your account. Apple handles all the authentication and transaction, and all we (developers) get is a digital receipt of the transaction.

  3. Motivation? by Froggie · · Score: 2

    What seems to be missing here is any sort of motive. Both the game developer and Apple should be worried - running down a competitor's reputation is a fairly poor motive for this, getting refunds doesn't seem to be it, so why are they picking on this app and why are spending other people's money with no hope of retrieving it?

    1. Re:Motivation? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      What seems to be missing here is any sort of motive. Both the game developer and Apple should be worried - running down a competitor's reputation is a fairly poor motive for this, getting refunds doesn't seem to be it, so why are they picking on this app and why are spending other people's money with no hope of retrieving it?

      Looks like most of the Empire Online in-app stuff is buying in-game currency. In other words, this is just another bunch of Chinese gold farmers, who likely purchase the currency then offload it to other compromised accounts.

    2. Re:Motivation? by increment1 · · Score: 3, Informative

      The motive is financial.

      Steps:
      1. Compromise account.
      2. Buy in game goods with compromised account's Visa, gift cards, or (perhaps) fraudulently generated gift cards.
      3. Sell in game goods for real currency.

      The reason this particular developer is getting hit the hardest is probably because their game is the current best way to realize profits from a compromised account. For many other apps with in app purchases, it is probably difficult to convert your purchase back into money.

  4. They don't need to care by Grapplebeam · · Score: 2, Insightful

    With their 80% market share.

    --
    There is no -1 Disagree.
  5. Wrong, hope you aren't spreading panic. by saboosh · · Score: 4, Informative

    Developers do not have access to your visa, regardless of how you pay for content in iOS. All iOS purchases, whether they be appstore or in-app, are payed to Apple, period, end of story. Apple, then, takes care of distributing the payment. Apple mediates everything. The developer is cut a check from Apple after they take a cut, even for in-app purchases.

  6. As a developer using in app purchase ... by perpenso · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Good luck with your app, but for a lot of us, in-app purchases is a sign that maybe I really don't want your app very much to begin with.

    As a developer using in app purchase I am honestly interested in what you would suggest.

    I offer a technical product rather than a game. A single app that combines the functionality of various traditional handheld calculators, scientific, statistics, business, hex, etc. Perpenso Calc. Rather than have a single high priced app that probably included functionality a particular user would not care about I decided to have a modestly priced app that offered basic built-in functionality -- scientific, rpn, fractions, complex numbers, ... -- but was expandable using in app purchases. This allowed a person to pick and pay for only the additional functionality -- statistics, business and hex -- that they cared for. I suppose another option would have been to offer several medium priced apps, one each for statistics, business or hex but what if a person was interest in more than one? They would need multiple apps, that would be more costly. Also more inconvenient if they needed to move data from one calculator to the other.

    In your opinion am I missing something? What alternatives would you suggest? Thanks in advance. Seriously, I am curious.

  7. Re:This ... by lgw · · Score: 2

    The fun part is that checks now work the same way. Anyone who you right a check to (well, anyone big enough to electronically present checks) can present it for any amount and get paid that amount from your account - the amount on the face of the check is nearly irrelevant. Of course, the court system is likely to be quite unhappy with anyone who robs you this way, but that's long after the fact, and there have been problems with fraudsters. Fun, right? Your check will only be examined by a human if presented for some quite large amount.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  8. Re:YES DEFINITELY by jo_ham · · Score: 2

    I blame your wife for having a shitty password.

    Seriously, if this was anything other than "apple" we'd all be talking about account security issues.

    If your Apple ID is compromised then you either a) had an easy to guess password, b) logged into it on a computer with a keylogger installed, c) gave your password to someone you thought you could trust or d) sorcery - Apple products are magic after all.

    Strong password that you don't share with anyone and up-to date security on any system you log in on = no problems.