MMO players face malware deluge. - Polidicks

[release]Players of online games are increasingly becoming the target of virus writers, reveals research. More and more malicious programs are being written to steal the login credentials of popular online games. The Microsoft research revealed a family of malicious programs aimed at titles such as Lineage, World of Warcraft, Maple Story and many others. Hijacked accounts are plundered for in-game booty or sold on through the net's underground market places. [B]Loot and booty[/B] Cliff Evans, head of security at Microsoft UK, said its latest look at the software threats facing Windows revealed a strong growth in one family of malicious programs known as taterf. In the last six months, Microsoft has seen more than 4.9m infections caused by Taterf - a figure up 156% on the total seen in the last six months of 2008. Mr Evans said the virus used a variety of tricks to steal login names and passwords for the most popular online games. "It's all about getting login credentials," he said. "The question is what might they do with those credentials." "They might sell them because they are worth something," he said. "By using them they can obtain certain things within the game or they can buy services through some sort of market place." "There's clearly a financial angle to it that makes it worthwhile," he said. Steven Davis, chief of game security firm Secure Play, said: "Online game account information has been an increasingly lucrative target for crooks as they can steal the account or loot game currency." "Crooks also use stolen credit cards for gold farming which has become a much more serious problem," he said. "They are attacking games because it is easy and there is no real interest from law enforcement." Mr Evans from Microsoft said gamers could follow some simple steps to avoid having their account stolen. "Never log onto a game account unless you are on a machine that you trust," he said. "And never download cheats or cracks from websites." [B]Version control[/B] Other trends revealed in the research were a move away from fake security software aka scareware. Statistics gathered by Microsoft show that the number of machines it found with such programs installed had fallen from 16.8 million machines to 13.4 million. By contrast, said Mr Evans, worms that travel networks independently looking for victims were seeing a resurgence. Such self-guided programs were now the second biggest security threat to Windows users, he said. Mr Evans said the trends revealed in the survey gave grounds for hope. "At the moment we're holding things at bay," he said. "There's constant change in terms of the cyber criminals changing their tactics. It's a question of keeping on top of that." Every significant update of Windows or new version showed a decrease in the number of infections per thousand machines, said Mr Evans. The first version of Windows XP had about 35 infections for every 1,000 machines scanned, said Mr Evans. By contrast, he said, only 4 in every 1,000 of the machines running the first version of Vista needed disinfecting. The statistics cover the first six months of 2009 and data comes from several sources. It includes Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal tool which runs on 450 million machines worldwide; 100 million machines using Windows Live One Care, malicious webpages scanned by search engine Bing and corporate security services run by Microsoft. [/release] [release]List of targets: TATERF TARGETS Rainbow Island Cabal Online A Chinese Odyssey Hao Fang Battle Net Lineage Gamania MapleStory qqgame Legend of Mir World Of Warcraft [/release] [url="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8338227.stm"]Source[/url] Must be some big money in this, it just amuses me to think of a few guys sitting in a room stealing virtual currency.

Eve Online, greatest MMO. I can't see it contracting any virus of any sort.

[QUOTE=MachiniOs;18168607] Must be some big money in this, it just amuses me to think of a few guys sitting in a room stealing virtual currency.[/QUOTE] I'm fairly sure they sell the currency. There's lots of lifeless losers that would buy it.

Most of those games don't even require a virus to hack. Maplestory is a prime example, it's security is so shitty that I hacked my own account back after it got hacked, a simple pin hack was all it took. Glad I stopped playing shitty games years ago. WoW's the only one on that list that at least tries to give the impression it's safe.

fuck, runescape aint on the list

[QUOTE=The Epidemic;18168683]I'm fairly sure they sell the currency. There's lots of lifeless losers that would buy it.[/QUOTE] Depends on what game too. Back in the day, Jedi on SWG were selling for multiple thousands. Hacking one of those and selling it would of been some easy cash, since that games economy back then was pretty much all player based, selling it with the credits on would make a better profit than selling them, then the account.

Only dumbasses get viruses.

[QUOTE=:smug:;18168776]Only dumbasses get viruses.[/QUOTE] Dumbasses play most of those MMOs.Just think how easy it would be with a keylogger then all you have to do is log in and steal the money.

[QUOTE=MachiniOs;18168925]Dumbasses play most of those MMOs.Just think how easy it would be with a keylogger then all you have to do is log in and steal the money.[/QUOTE] At least this won't happen in Star Trek Online because only smart people like Star Trek like moi.

[QUOTE=Thom12255;18168960]At least this won't happen in Star Trek Online because only smart people like Star Trek like moi.[/QUOTE] Star Trek online is shit so only dumbasses play it.

Duh, that's not really news. It's actually much lighter crime than stealing real money, and a lot of MMO players are little dumb kids with no idea of security at all.

They deserve it, Gives them time to contemplate a life

reminds me of the time I got an Email from Blizzard saying that my password change was taking place and I just needed to click the activation link to activate the new password. thing is, I canceled my subscription years ago, I doubt they even had my billing info still saved. so I just deleted the Email in hopes that the person who tried to change my password didn't get it. I haven't received any bills from Blizzard yet, as far as I can tell, so I think I'm in the free.

A computer's biggest security flaw is the user.

This is why you should stick with RPing on Gmod servers. then the worst you get are LUA viruses.

[QUOTE=pentium;18169261]This is why you should stick with RPing on Gmod servers. then the worst you get are LUA viruses.[/QUOTE] Too bad rping on Gmod servers is awful and time would be better spent cutting your limbs off.

[QUOTE=Max of S2D;18169260]A computer's biggest security flaw is the user.[/QUOTE] No, that would be a cat. One cat can send viruses into your computer PLUS 5,000 child pornography pictures free!

Whew, Runescape isn't on the list :D /sarcasm.

[QUOTE=Wakka V2;18168633]Eve Online, greatest MMO. I can't see it contracting any virus of any sort.[/QUOTE] But it's SSOSOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO dull.

You know what it wouldn't be hard If you made a virus an called it "FREE GOLD INFINITE MONEY IN ONLINE GAME (incl virus)" and people would still download and run the program if it was a 6kb binary file

On the WoW forums, they would try to put keyloggers on your computer by advertising with methods like... TEACHER HAS MOST SEX LEG! IT GORGEOUS SHE IS [url]www.obviouskeyloggerya.com/sexleg.htm.jpg[/url]

Lol good, none of those games are fun.

[QUOTE=The Epidemic;18168683]I'm fairly sure they sell the currency. There's lots of lifeless losers that would buy it.[/QUOTE] Or people with a life that don't want to spend hours farming money.

at least only the shit ones are being uh, publicly hacked.

Hacking computers inside computers?

[QUOTE=mrkaki;18169584]No, that would be a cat. One cat can send viruses into your computer PLUS 5,000 child pornography pictures free![/QUote] I get it! Also, no Runescape? that would be pure gold, the ten year olds that they could scam...

[quote]Rainbow Island Cabal Online A Chinese Odyssey Hao Fang Battle Net Lineage Gamania MapleStory qqgame Legend of Mir[/quote] Who the fuck plays these games?

[QUOTE=Figgis Fiddis;18174043]Who the fuck plays these games?[/QUOTE] are you retarded? Seriously, have you been stuck in a hole for 20 years? I don't play them but sooo many do.

[QUOTE=Figgis Fiddis;18174043]Who the fuck plays these games?[/QUOTE] Cabal, Maple, Lineage? Lots do. Well Lineage not so much anymore, but yeah.

[QUOTE=binkow;18174690]are you retarded? Seriously, have you been stuck in a hole for 20 years? I don't play them but sooo many do.[/QUOTE] Never even heard about 80% of em.