The UK”s largest independent games publisher/Designer Jagex Games Studios today announced that they are actively seeking to protect there players against online crime, the press release from Jagex particularly mentions an arrest in the UK of an individual who had been actively stealing details of members accounts of the companies very popular MMORPG Runescape through a method of stealing account details known as ‘Phising’.
A 23 year old male was arrested on Tuesday (24th Nov) in the Avon & Somerset area by officers from the Police Central e-crime Unit, this arrest came “following an allegation that a number of RuneScape gaming accounts had been hacked and misappropriated” said a Spokesperson for the PCeU.
Jagex CEO Mark Gerhard said:
“Account theft and the use of phishing websites is a problem facing the entire online games industry and Jagex maintains a specialist team to combat any law breaking within our games†said Mark Gerhard, Jagex CEO. “Where there is any evidence to suggest someone has committed a crime, as is clearly the case with any phishing or hijacking, we work closely with law enforcement agencies around the world to bring these people to account.â€Â
Jagex also give their thanks to the ‘Hard Working’ individuals over here in the UK and in the USA, particularly mentioning the FBI and that they are ‘Assisting us with similar actions in the USA’.
Follow us after the break for more on this story as well as an editors note..
Jagex particularly state they have a Zero Tolerance policy to this sort of behaviour they also say that only a ‘handful’ of individuals are responsible for over 95% of all account hijacking, on this case in particular Jagex worked directly with the PCeU on discovering the identity of the arrested individual and they also helped to gather the evidence needed for an arrest.
“People who seek to destroy others online gaming experience could be committing criminal offences, leaving themselves liable to prosecution†continued the PCeU Spokesperson. “The PCeU will continue to work with the industry and investigate these allegations where appropriate.â€Â
Editor’s note:
We all enjoy these games and there is no need to spoil it for everyone else. In the modern day and age we live in you will get burned down the line, games companies have had enough of this sort of thing which pretty much is common theft which is against the law and with specialist crime units like the PCeU and even with our higher education institutions offering courses in computer forensics and e-crime you simply have nowhere to hide, you will get caught and you will be found, dealt with and prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Also please remember to never give any of your account details for any services including a game to any other website than the official site of the service, remember to check the address of the site before you enter details and also please remember to check the site is secure you can do this by looking for the padlock symbol in the corner of your browser this means that the page you are on is secure, finally simply never give your password to anyone else even if the request looks genuine most fake ones often do, if the company in charge of the service says they need to access your account for any reason please double check where the request came from to make sure it was actually from them before giving any details and remember they should never need your password as they don’t need it.
If in doubt contact the games technical support department details of which will be printed on their official website.
For more information on online security please visit: http://www.getsafeonline.org/ (UK) or http://www.staysafeonline.org/ (US) for more information.
