Hacked / Account Suspended / No ETA

[Cirsce]

After playing all Saturday night with my husband, I woke up on Sunday morning to his account being suspended.

Looking at his account online, there was a gibberish name ( gold spamming type ) created on another server at some point in the 10 hour window that we were offline.

After sending out an email on Sunday. Then waiting 1-2 hours for live chat support this afternoon, this is what we've found out so far.

He never received anything about a log in restriction, he just got suspended.
His account is currently locked while under investigation with no ETA available.
His account should have not gotten hacked because they have an IP checker in place that flags when someone is logging in from an unusual location.
His subscription will keep being used even though he cannot play.

And here I thought being stripped naked and gil-less was the worst that could happen.

There apparently is no quick fix to getting your account back and I'm assuming let alone your items and money restored. Even though he has had his account for over 1 year and just now he decides to start violating their terms by "spamming for gold". This should throw up some logic errors with whoever handles these things.

I've always laughed at people on the forums saying how the server issues were so bad it made them leave. The game is gorgeous, but they need to ramp up their security before it effects their player base.

If they cannot fix the gold spammer / security problem and stop the suspension on someone's account that obviously got hacked, give them an eta on when it'll be back, stop using their subscription fee, and make assurances that it won't keep happening then I can't see how they're going to keep people around.

Scanning the forum this problem is rampant, but the solution to the problem is not keeping customers accounts locked down with no eta. Those accounts should just be given a log in restriction and made to redo their password and get a token if they don't have it.

http://support.na.square-enix.com/fa...aqtop&c=2&sc=0

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TLDR: SE needs to ramp up their security and stop penalizing people who've gotten hacked by gold spammers by locking down their account with no eta. They're causing more harm then good with this solution style. Try using your log in restriction SE, I'm sure that's why it was created.

[kaiyouske]

Totally agree, it's just a simple IP check to see whether or not of the account was legitimately hacked or not.

[Abraxis]

Welcome to the club, we're growing in number quite fast by the hour. Unfortunately don't expect much sympathy from some folks around here as they think that we're all idiots that use passwords like "lolpassword" and click on every single ad banner and open every email link we find and buy gold willy nilly.

There is, as you said, NO easy fix. I'm going on day 7 without any word whatsoever from SE. Talked to them twice, once via phone and another via Live Chat. I wouldn't bother utilizing either as they're honestly about as useful as a condom with the tip cut off. Some people have stated they got an email stating that the account was being accessed from an unfamiliar IP address, but those are sporadic and seems to be a very few amount. Some even say they had a Security Token on their account and STILL got hacked. I have no reason not to believe them either, they have my sympathy. I just hope that SE gets their head out of their ass and realize that there is something tremendously wrong and it needs to be resolved soon or they'll be losing a lot of customers due to their continued lackadaisical methodology.

[kaiyouske]

For those of you guys that are having serious issues with their customer support, I feel that as consumers we have a right to file an official complaint with the Better Business Bureau.

http://www.bbb.org/

[atopax]

I've been having this exact issue since Thursday. This is insane. I might just take you up on the BBB offer, because this level of support is just wrong. Amazing game is being ruined by terrible, absolutely abysmal customer service.

[Abraxis]

I'm not sure I'm at the BBB level quite yet. I know the game is new and all, and they're probably inundated with a ton of crap, with hacked accounts becoming a lot more prominent an issue. But if there is still no resolution to my account by the end of the week I'll be right there as well. Regardless of whatever issues they're dealing with internally, whether due to lack of manpower or otherwise, some kind of notice showing that they are indeed working on the issue would be appreciated. Even an email saying "We are aware of your issues. Unfortunately we are still reviewing your case and will contact you via email within 24 - 48 hours." But NOTHING is atrocious customer service.

Anyone that gets to #1 in the Live Chat queue has a chance of being booted due to the "No agents available" issue. It happened to me the first time I used it as well. But I just queued up again, waited 2 hours and was able to talk to someone. But keep in mind they are NOT able to do ANYTHING for you except "escalate" the situation. Which is useless as just doing a simple email contact based on Account/Suspensions tickets would achieve. The phone number and Live chat are utterly useless in regards to hacked accounts.

[Spoolx]

Dont say that, I'm 7 in queue with live chat...

[atopax]

Happened to me. Got to first place on chat queue then got the "There are no agents available to chat with you right now. Please try again later." Message. Hope you have better luck.

[Cirsce]

@Abraxis Yes, ignorance is bliss. People don't realize the massive amounts of ways you can crack passwords. We work in Internet Security and use lowercase, uppercase, symbols and numbers so the people with "lolpassword" only have a matter of weeks before they're number gets drawn and they're in here with us.

He's considering just getting a new account instead of waiting, since digital downloads are back up. We have friends who had their accounts under investigation for 6 months on on FFXI after they got comprised with a token. SE is either terrible or brilliant by making people spend more money.

@Spoolx / atopax We didn't get booted waiting for live chat, but the support agent could only "escalate" our "escalation". They were nice, but not really helpful.

[kaiyouske]

I'm not a fan of the 'buy another copy' to resolve the 'problem' method. Why are people rewarding SE for having a bad CS? To me, that's not acceptable. If my problem isn't resolved in a satisfactory and fair manner, they are getting reported and I won't be subscribing to this game.