What is TNT doing about all these CG incidents?

[keithp]

I didnt want to post this on the actual site for many reasons, but we can safely discuss it here.

 

With all these CG incidents I dont think TNT is doing enough to stop them or help victims get their account back. So many people who had it happen were not able to get their accounts back even after giving the right info, and these people have been members for years. When they freeze someones account nothing should be able to be done with it, it will remain the same (ex, pets,np's etc..) So that in itself yes does help you so you dont lose anything. BUT, why are they being so nasty and not just giving people their account back and just ask them to change their password? It's like TNT just doesnt care at all, they tell people to just make a new account. That defies the purpose of playing for years!

 

But yet to get an account back if you forgot your password they ask you 50 questions it seems and there is more rules than most people playing understand I bet! Plus the questions they ask most people dont remember. All your abandoned pets, shop items you had, all your neofriends. I am lucky I remember any of that the next day! Those are the wrong questions to ask. You expect most tweens, or older kids to even read the rules, I bet not. It's a game site, all people want to do it play and have fun, not read pages of rules. Would facebook be so successful if you had pages of rules, probably not.... even neopets needs to lighten up! Sorry for the rant... anyway

 

TNT must do something to stop this CG! Make something to block anybody from clicking on a bad link. Have some program that detects these bad links before someone can click on it, much like an antivirus stops you from going to a bad site. And let everyone get their account back, they should understand this is happening so often so if someone reports it and matches some of the info only they would know, they should be sympathetic becuase they should not have a site that is able to get messed around with so easily! Thats their responsibility to fix it asap! And they just seem to relaxed like "who cares we have millions of users anyway well never run out of players"

 

They should "freeze" the whole site until it's fixed so the account losses stop, until it's safe to go on again. Than once it's fixed everything is back up and running, and safe. But they probably wont, because they'll loose money... if it was a hack on NC mall I bet it would be taken care of swiftly!

[Viridian]

Neopets is for the company just a source of money. They do care for their players, but not enough to actually spend tons of money on the problem.

 

Mind you, TNT is trying to find the cookie grabbers. However every time that TNT finds a way to stop them, the CGers find a new way to do their thing again. It's a vicious circle that may very well never end.

 

I must agree with the lousy questions... I got a document with all my information which I update once a month, ever since the first time I've heard of a CGer.

[keithp]

 

I must agree with the lousy questions... I got a document with all my information which I update once a month, ever since the first time I've heard of a CGer.

 

Yeah, now picture 12 or 13 year old's remembering all those questions and writing stuff down.... none of which would ever happen! It spells doom for most young players. I've had an account hacked and gave all the correct info, and they still didn't say I knew enough! I'm sorry but fair and neopets doesn't go together. They need to spend more cash and fix the issue, or take down NC mall and stop wasting our money! Down the line I see the site closing down as just another fad gone....

[hrtbrk]

It's a hard issue to fix because these malicious players work around whatever deterrent TNT puts in place. It would be a waste of money on their part.

 

The only way it would probably ever be stopped is if they disabled all user coding and custom designs for look ups and shops. That being said, I wish we were given an option in our user prefs to disable user code in shops & look ups for obvious reasons. Plus, some are so atrocious to look at :whistle:

[IrishLiz]

It's a hard issue to fix because these malicious players work around whatever deterrent TNT puts in place. It would be a waste of money on their part.

 

The only way it would probably ever be stopped is if they disabled all user coding and custom designs for look ups and shops. That being said, I wish we were given an option in our user prefs to disable user code in shops & look ups for obvious reasons. Plus, some are so atrocious to look at :whistle:

 

That's actually a really good idea! I wonder how hard that would be to implement.

[Masaryk]

Some of my friends play World of Warcraft. From what I understand, account scamming is really common on WoW. Pretty much everyone I know has had items and gold scammed from their accounts. Some have even had characters deleted.

 

When someone has their account compromised on WoW, it only takes a couple of days for Blizzard to give back the account. There isn't a pile of questions to answer. It's quick, it's easy. TNT really should be able to simplify the account access procedures. I don't see a reason for it to be needlessly complicated. Why can't everyone just have secret questions to answer - stuff that isn't stored in cookies, so it can't easily be stolen. The banks do it for when you forget your password. I don't think that TNT needs to make their account access more complicated than the banks.

 

And, on WoW, the Blizzard mods also give players back lost gold and items. Their record-keeping of account activity is that good. I don't expect that Neopets will ever do this, but if Blizzard can track account activity with that kind of accuracy, surely TNT can manage to verify account 'ownership' by tracking small amounts of account usage information serverside.

[Spritzie]

It's a hard issue to fix because these malicious players work around whatever deterrent TNT puts in place. It would be a waste of money on their part.

 

The only way it would probably ever be stopped is if they disabled all user coding and custom designs for look ups and shops. That being said, I wish we were given an option in our user prefs to disable user code in shops & look ups for obvious reasons. Plus, some are so atrocious to look at :whistle:

 

I agree. That would be awesome. Not only would it make it safer, but it'd be easier to shop. Some people have so much junk in their shop, that you scroll for 10 minutes, after waiting 10 minutes for it to load.

[IrishLiz]

Yeah, but everyone who plays WoW pays for the service. That makes it a bit different, I think. (Though I still think that kind of treatment with accounts would be better.)

 

And I hate all the extra stuff in some shops that takes forever to load and/or hurts your eyes.

[Sully]

Some people have been getting their accounts back but not many.

Some people that have been frozen for weeks still haven't gotten a reply.

I got frozen over the weekend and have sent in two tickets and one premium frozen report thing, and no response yet... <_<

[Secre]

It amazes me that they freeze accounts and refuse to give them back for people's protection. In that case they are actuually doing the complete opposite as they are destroying years of hard work and effort, and people just want their account back!

 

It seems more like inefficiency and downright scare tactics on those who haven't done anything wrong more than protection.

[shiranui_xiii]

I appreciate that TNT freezes accounts for the user's protection, but I don't quite appreciate how difficult it is to actually get your account back. I understand that they want to give the account back the the right person, but the questions they ask... They're just terrible questions. I'd be lucky to remember half of the answers the next day!

 

I think it'd be a great move on TNT's part to at least give the users an option to disable coding on certain parts of the website, like user lookups and shops and the like. If I'm shopping for something, I don't want to scroll through ten pages of junk just to find the item. Shops are for items, not for twenty-thousand glittery graphics and terrible sparkly backgrounds. That's why I don't customize my shop. Convenience for the shoppers.

[Chic_Sammy]

Man! This is just horrible. You can't really understand the weight of the problem until you are one of the "unlucky" ones that has been frozen. As much as it angers me that TNT seems to have no compassion for their customers,(the ones that actually pay their salary)I still have that tiny glimmer of hope that I will be reunited with my account. Chances are slim, but hey.

 

I have made a decision to be the most annoying, persistent, customer on Earth. When my last account was unfairly frozenI thought I was relentless. That was a breeze compared to how obnoxious I am going to be about this icing.

 

I know you are saying, "Being obnoxious won't solve anything." Maybe not. However, I am going to go above and beyond this time to get my account back. Whatever it takes. (Well, not foul language or threatening them, I won't do anything stupid.)

[keithp]

The coding idea might be a start for a solution, I mean, whats stopping people from posting bad pictures you know? I ever even thought about that!

 

When I read about WOW I was jealous because that's what Neopets should be like with getting your stuff back. With all their paid stuff I think they could do something similar.

 

And yes those questions, they are the biggest issue and prevent TNT from giving so many accounts back! Your right, give us secret questions only we know (and actually remember!) Once you are asked for the secret question answer not even the cg will know it so if you log out they will not longer be able to get in your account! Better yet, on login we type our pass AND the answer to one random secret question (randomly choosen from secret questions we picked) so that's double protection! I would be ok with that. So we type our password and answer to secret question (like whats your pets name) so even if someone gets your pass, they wont have your question answer.

[Spritzie]

Like Secre said, making it so hard to get accounts back (When they were frozen for protection, not wrong-doing) or not giving them back at all... they're going to be losing players. Possibly those players friends. Like the person (I don't remember their name) that had someone transfer their UC Plushie pet. If they don't get that back... they might not come back. Or other people in the situation. Especially since TNT can check their records and see where the pet obviously belongs.

 

And I think the disabling coding option, would be a good thing to be mentioned to TNT. It could solve a lot of problems.

[CAV of Gang Green]

The CG scare is going to frighten many users, and make them quit Neopets in fear that the CGers can also hack into personal information. It's a problem that can be solved, but is very hard to do.

 

Freezing the site and taking it down sounds like it will work, but the only way TNT can stop the CGers, is to know the software that they use to hack and steal. It's highly unlikely that TNT can figure this out, and even if they get it right, there's a big chance that the software will update and be able to go around this defence as well.

 

Unless a TNT staff member has taken classes about hacking software, it will be hard to stop CGers and hackers from stealing and freezing accounts.

 

To stop a hacker, you need to have been a hacker. This counts for CGers as well.

[Spritzie]

The CG scare is going to frighten many users, and make them quit Neopets in fear that the CGers can also hack into personal information. It's a problem that can be solved, but is very hard to do.

 

Freezing the site and taking it down sounds like it will work, but the only way TNT can stop the CGers, is to know the software that they use to hack and steal. It's highly unlikely that TNT can figure this out, and even if they get it right, there's a big chance that the software will update and be able to go around this defence as well.

 

Unless a TNT staff member has taken classes about hacking software, it will be hard to stop CGers and hackers from stealing and freezing accounts.

 

To stop a hacker, you need to have been a hacker. This counts for CGers as well.

 

Anyone with basic computer knowledge can use a CG. You don't have to be a programmer or a hacker to use a CG, only to make one from scratch. (And I believe TNT has at LEAST basic knowledge. [We hope.]) And it, technically, isn't that hard to defeat GCs, it's just time consuming and tedious to keep up with it. What's that saying? "Make something idiot proof, and someone will make a better idiot."

 

Also, there's been a good suggestion made here. And it doesn't require taking the site down. They could give the option to disable viewing custom coding. (As long as it was optional, it wouldn't protect everyone. But it would be a very good place to start.)

[Vixensykerd]

I think its annoying how easy it is to protect yourself from CGers (in most cases), and yet there is NO help in the neopets website ANYWHERE as to how to stop them! They tell you not to give your password out and stuff, so why not say "don't click on any links you don't know", or the golden phrase for CGing "if it looks too good it be true, it probably is".

 

I really like that idea about disabiling the rubbish some people put in there shops... I mean, you can do it for the neobards...?

 

They should "freeze" the whole site until it's fixed so the account losses stop, until it's safe to go on again. Than once it's fixed everything is back up and running, and safe

In all fairness, and no disrespect to those that have been, people who are CGed are a minority, and CGing will ALWAYS happen (always has, always will, they'll always find a way around it), so shutting down the site would be a really drastic action. I do think that getting your account back should be easier, but everybody should read the rules... its kinda the backbone of society. Otherwise CGers could say "oh, sorry, I didn't read all the rules and didn't know I wasn't allowed to CG, sorry!". But yeah, TNT should be easier on those that have been CGed

[SuperAttackPea]

I was frozen once for trading with a scammer (I have no idea how you can avoid that). I sent in a form, and they gave me my account back with half of the nps and items. That took 2 weeks. Recently, I got frozen for protection, and I seriously doubt anything happened to my account. It has been 3 weeks and they still have not given me my account back. They even sent me a email asking me for my info when I filled out the form completely. Also, I don't get why they emphasize so much on "original email address". The original email address of my account has been deleted due to inactivity. I guess they are really getting more and more stubborn.

[Secre]

I have now got paranoid to whack a pin on almost everything, and to write down all my stocks, friends, safety deposit box items, basic details, closet items and battledome items on tdub along with pets which I have previously had or have been moved to a side.

 

I have to admit, if I lost this account I wouldn't start up from scratch. This has taken too much time and effort and I'm to attached to my pets...

[malik980]

Is there a higher chance of getting your account back if its a premium account?

 

 

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