Accounts Banned for fraud, look/post here

here is more info from Gaile Gray chat




Erroneous Fraud Blocks: 1 Nov 2009
On Sunday, November 1st, a few Guild Wars accounts were erroneously blocked for payment fraud even though their purchases were entirely legitimate. It is necessary for the company to be very careful about fraud because it is a significant issue these days, but the Support Team discovered this morning that, unfortunately, a few innocent folks got caught in the net yesterday, and for that we apologize.

The Support Team is aware of this situation and is actually shifting personnel to deal with the issue. They will be responding to tickets as quickly as they can. Reinstatement takes a bit of time because each key must be adjusted manually (and some accounts have many keys), so please be patient while the team strives to remedy the situation. If your account was affected and you have not been reinstated by tomorrow evening (Tuesday, November 3rd) please feel free to post your Support Incident Number here and I will look into the matter for you. Again, we extend our sincere apologies for this mix-up! -- Gaile 19:51, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Update: 2 November 2009
Those players who were involved in this specific incident will be happy to know that their patience and understanding will have a reward. Those of you who attempted to make a purchase and were erroneously blocked for "fraud" will find that the purchase price will be credited back to the you, and the item or items that you attempted to purchase will be given to you with our compliments. -- Gaile 01:12, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

D: Can I have a block next time? –Jette 01:14, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
Sure, my pleas... I mean, nope, sorry. -- Gaile 03:42, 3 November 2009 (UTC)
Sweet! That is a relief!Im duanuys the same user who wrote about the fruad block most recent help thread D
[edit] Wrongful Perma Ban code 045
Payment Fraud
→ moved from Feedback_talk:Gaile_Gray
Heya gaile hope your still around, I have heard alot of good stuff about you and after having my ticket untouched for the entire day with no response was hoping you can help me and/or shed some light on wth is going on with my account?

I bought the game last month triple version and have been playing it happily for a month, left wow for guildwars because of the feedback from friends I recieved and the research I did into the game, I play or have played every mmorpg there is since D&D 1.0 from gary gygax, but in all my days never seen one like guildwars that banned innocent folks for stuff they did not do and have documents to prove it, then when tickets are made having them not even be looked at or replied on.

I just recently purchased multiple upgrades to my account via the in-game store and have read online that many others have seen similar wrongful bans for fraud just for buying alot at once, wow any true gamer is gonna get what they want all at once not piece by piece. now I very unhappy with CS since I joined anet/guildwars so far it has been the worst of all the games I have played. VERY good game, very bad CS. They even perma ban right off without warnings and with no e-mail notifications or chances to dispute.

Please get back to me regarding this matter, I love the game but having to live through a wrongful perma ban for something I did not do is BS. I have a ticket in the support section of guildwars website and so far been all day with no reponse, funny they are around to ban accounts on a sunday but not to deal with paid consumers...lol. LilithChan 00:00, 2 November 2009 (UTC) ps- almost forgot to add it, support ticket #091101-001389 LilithChan 00:16, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes support here is so terrible it just hurts,but look at it this way its even worse with games like AoC Lilondra 07:12, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
According to GWGuru this is a known issue by support and you need to contact them to resolve it. Currently, they're backed up with this problem because it is so common, so I would recommend waiting for your ticket to be resolved. Gaile is probably backed up with this as well. There have been a number of people who were banned for fraud accidentally and a number of people who feel they were hacked through the NCSoft store. For right now, I would recommend that everyone avoid buying from the online store. Karate Jesus 15:33, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Actually, I should probably add this quote from Guru.
"This is confirmed happening for our German friends as well and on other various fansites.
Since yesterday there have been increasing reports of users in our forum that have had their account locked because of credit card fraud. Apparently, there was an error in the game shop making the credit card data not transfer properly. When the actual charge took place, there was no money available (because of the data not transferring correctly) so the affected users were then locked out automatically.
We have already requested a response from NCsoft/ArenaNet. As we get more information we will announce it.
If you have been affected you should contact NCSoft support. They will require the following data:
NCsoft Login (if available)
The last 4 digits of the activation code for the bank account / credit card used"
There ya go. Hope that helps. Karate Jesus 15:37, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Actually no this is not my case, I am american not german, I JUST bought this stuff like october 31 and have documents to prove the transactions were successful both from ncsoft e-mail confirmation and from my visa statement both which show ncsoft got thier money yet I am still on a PERMA BAN not even a e-mail or other form of communication and issue is still unresolved and my ticket has not even gotten a response and it's now november 2 11:12am EST.
I have never EVER used any kind of mod or 3rd party software, never ever visit suspicious sites, and I run multiple security suites thus have no viruses and/or keyloggers and therefore have not been hacked. This is NCSOFT/ANET error PERMA BANNED on a sunday when ncsoft CS is closed the day after a purchase from thier store that was valid and successful.
Don't worry they have a ticket they just choose not to repond and/or even state whether or not it is being investigated at all and I am still PERMA BANNED wrongly from a game I paid for and spent over $117.50 on so far total, should be compensated for the time I am unable to play due to THEIR MISTAKE. Worst CS I ever seen in a game EVER. funny they seem to use the COMMUNIST view of guilty until proven innocent instead of the INNOCENT until proven guilty motto and for a CS are way to free with the PERMA BAN banhammer, most other decent mainstream mmo's reserve PERMA BANS for 100% WRONG, never got a Permaban in any other MMORPG EVER, they just reserve those for the worst offenders not the innocent customers ANET/NCSOFT seems to enjoy screwing...lol LilithChan 16:30, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Nice, you found a way to put communist in there, you are so awesome. Cracko 16:31, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Please LilithChan, even if you are not part of the German problem, because of it, support is totally backed up (also it happened over the weekend when they don't have a full crew). I have had nothing but positive experiences when dealing with support, and I'm sure they will get it worked out for you as soon as possible. Just be patient. Would you rather they not block your account if someone else were committing fraud with it, or hacked it? I mean, they simply block the account until they can determine the nature of the problem. -- Wyn talk 16:34, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
"This is confirmed happening for our German friends as well"
Lilith, note that the phrase used says "as well". It is commonly happening to americans, not just Germans. And as I said earlier, it is a common problem and Support is aware of it and probably backed up due to it. Give them time to work it out. It's only been 1 day since we became aware of this and we're already aware of hundreds of cases. Be patient. EDIT: Also, Support takes weekends off as well. They have lives and families, who I'm sure they enjoyed Halloween with. Karate Jesus 16:39, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
"I have been unable to play GW for 1-2 days now and am very distressed by this especially as I have heard nothing... blah blah blah." Holy shit. Go outside or something, they have a backlog and will get to you eventually. I'm astounded you expect next business day turn around for a game with no monthly fees, especially when there seems to be major issues at the moment. The block was applied automatically, that's why it occurred on a weekend and why the review was not instantaneous. Chill. When it's been like a week and you haven't heard anything you have grounds to bitch. Misery 16:45, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Karate Jesus, did you check the time stamp on that quote? 24.197.253.243 17:30, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Nope, should I have? Also, you can call me KJ. And this is a known issue as of the 31st from what I've heard and, as I said earlier, even support takes weekends off. Karate Jesus 17:32, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
(Reset indent) We shall see what the results are hopefully soon, finally at least got a reponse to my ticket. so now just waiting for them to get it sorted out, and as far as being a holiday you need to check federal database on holidays, halloween has never been a recognized federal holiday in the states and most of those who work still have to work on that date regardless, time off really depends on the employer as technically it is not a holiday. Maybe to those such as myself it is but only because it is samhain in pagan and neopagan traditions, But this thread has nothing to do with religion nor politics so I will elaborate no further in that direction.

now I will just have to wait and see something I have never been very good at, Patience and MMO withdrawl are alot less savory to me then nicotine withdrawl which though harder to quit then most drugs was somewhat manageable with coffee and extra food, and I have never been very fond of being ripped off anymore or less then anyone else, however being disabled what little I have after paying all my bills and food shelter, going to a game I am not even able to use due to an unjust ban without cause does make me less inclined to civility. For now I am just going to take and watch some boring reruns, and wait until such time as I recieve a reply into the results of their investigation.

Kinda pointless further hashing this out, does nothing to solve my issue and opinions are well.... opinions and everyone is entitled to theirs. For now having played every mmorpg under the sun since the 80's and seen the CS of them all, still feel rightfully in My Opinion, that it can be improved upon for this game, namely autobans should never be permanent that should always be reserved for worst case scenarios and only applied by a live agent to ensure good consumer relations. LilithChan 18:55, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Nothing was said about it being a holiday, simply a weekend. Gaile for one does not work on weekends (other than responding here on her OWN time). They do not staff a full support team on the weekend, and with this current problem, I'm sure those that were there did the best they could to respond to as many as possible, as quickly as possible. I'm sure this will be sorted soon. Good Luck! -- Wyn talk 18:59, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
thank you wyn don't mind me, this game was my Birthday present to myself my birthday being the 3rd of november after all, so guess that compounds my negativity at being PERMA BANNED right out of the blue without cause, I as well do pray for a good outcome and for a day when they start being more reserved on the perma banning, as innocents do get caught in the crossfire if a game starts using PERM BANS over zealously, all bans not applied by a person should be temporal not labeled as PERMANENT and maybe folks will be less inclined to get quite so irrate.
Big difference between a Temporal Ban and a PERMA BAN in mmorpgs worldwide, PERMA BANS should be reserved only for Extreme Cases and Never handed out like candy by automated systems which can be and obviously are flawed. Blessed be, LilithChan 19:27, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
(Reset indent) I am very sorry to hear about this, LilithChan. As I posted above, there was an incident where a few accounts were erroneously blocked for payment fraud when their purchases were entirely legitimate. It is necessary for the company to be very careful about fraud, because it is such a terrible issue for any sort of on-line purchase, but yes, a few innocent folks got caught in the net.

The Support Team is aware of this and is actually shifting personnel to deal with the issue. They will be responding to tickets as quickly as they can, and I hope you will let me know when you get back into the game. Our apologies for this mix-up! -- Gaile 19:43, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Ahh gaile, I seem to be ether reading my support ticket wrong or the CS rep just gave me a heart attack, is what he just said is going to happen actually going to be the case that just sounds way to good to be true, maybe I am reading this wrong but if not, I am both quite surprised and very very satisfied with the outcome as it would be exceeding expectations by a record breaking amount, was expecting hopefully something for my time and suffering but what he is offering sounds impossibly&insanely too good to be true? LilithChan 15:06, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

I got my account back! here is what i got from them.

Hi,

After reviewing the issue, it appears that your account was blocked in error. Your account is now released and you should be able to log in to Guild Wars. I apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Please let us know if we can help you with anything else.

Regards,
GMLemoncobra
The Guild Wars Support Team

i am glad i got my account back and its all intact but i still want to know why? was it a simple mistake? could someone have lied about me so i get banned? i also want to know what i can do to stop this from happening again. now i am paranoid if i go afk this will happen again. and i know inde says guru is safe but i am still a little scared to sell/buy stuff on here. and kinda scared to buy/sell and talk on whsp in game. >>

lucky you

and still moving on with the complaints

*crossing finger*
hope im next

Wow, more people caught up in this issue?

That's pretty rough.

It may not be much, but here's to hoping that the issue will be resolved in relative quickness.

Makes me wonder what on their end is causing this to trigger. Sounds like A-net needs to revamp how their system views thing.

Hm.

Thank you.

I am quite certain that there is a large group of folks who are quite angry, I'm just choosing not to be angry over this. There's not much I can do about it, so being angry simply isn't productive. I was angry. I was shocked, horrified, stunned, enraged, confused, upset, and several other emotions. Right now, I am annoyed, but also relieved to know that the account is still there, the characters are all still there, and all the items are all still there.

I don't believe I should have to wait for my account to be given back to me, but unfortunately I do. I still believe that Anet/NCSoft is doing a much better job than Bnet/Blizzard would in this situation. I've personally experienced much worse customer service from Blizzard.

We are all free to vote with our wallets. You are choosing to leave Arena.net behind and pursue Star Trek Online. I hope you have better luck with them. I have chosen to leave Blizzard behind and stick with Guild Wars. I like the game. I have a lot of friends in here and a certain amount of loyalty to them. If I abandon this game, I abandon them. I'm the only one in my circle of friends who has had any issues whatsoever with this false-positive fraud flag, and I've used the online store many times in the past. To leave this game over this one incident (no matter how inconvenient it is to me) would cause a far greater inconvenience to all the friends I would have to leave behind or convince to change to a different game. Some of my guildies have been my guildies since the beta test weekend events. I don't leave them lightly.

So with a tremendous amount of thought about not just my inconvenience, or the injustice of finding myself in this position, but about the larger picture as a whole, I'm just not dissatisfied enough to leave it all behind. I will gladly accept their offer and start playing again with only a moderate level of annoyance.

Now if it happens to me again, then I'll be completely irate.

i went and got my nic gifts and had several items i could have sold for money. but thanks to anet mistake i am/was to scared to sell them so gave them away for free to a friends. i used to be a seller as a few of you guys could vouch for. and my friend on gw fergie thinks i shouldnt be paranoid i wont get banned again but its hard to believe that. sorry anet but now i dont know how i feel about you after this.

I'm still waiting on my account... hopefully they'll unlock it sometime tonight. Otherwise I'll make sure to contact Gaile.

Going on 4 days now with my account wrongly banned yay!

This is absurd.

Another day gone by and some more accounts got reactivated.

My friends' accounts, however, are still unfairly banned.

*Grits teeth.*

I gave them my info yesterday morning and I still haven't heard back from them.

I haven't gotten anything since the initial email saying that they are working on it (11/2) so I've just begun day 4 of being unable to play. Unlike many of you I am not afraid that a character who I have put hundreds or thousands of hours into is lost but I had just finished the free trial and purchased the game, then spent that first evening and part of the next day playing then got banned. This has kind of burst my bubble and dulled my initial enthusiasm. Hopefully it will be fixed soon and smooth sailing for awhile so I can get excited again.

Yay they say we will get our money back but there going to make us wait a week to get a response on our question treads.

lol ya im still waiaint i got banned on sunday night german time so im stuck

im hopping it getss fixed ASAP cuz im really getting tierd of not playing

I am happy for you (no sarcasm). Don't get paranoid, probably just a random mistke, wrong account banned or something. Enjoy the game, you have nothing to fear from normal play.

Mr Corpser, I feel bad for you (no sarcasm). Hang in there...

It's more than strangely obvious that these sub-contractors they hired back 6+ months ago to design the online store were a bit dubious in character...

WTF - people banned because they bought extra content online through a supposedly *LEGIT* source (E.G. LOGIN PROMPT).

This is more than sad, and this saga has been draggin on for way too long.

Total incompetence is all that shines from this inquiry.

thx man

ya im in germany and GW is one of my only forms off entertainment so its really taking a tool on my life

and also it was a way to procrastinate a little bit longer on college class work
but now i have to actualy sit and do it when i have time instead of at the last minute

Hi all, I am new here. Just started playing GW for a week, but like many others I had read my account was suspended too after some weekend online purchase from NCSOFT. Been the end of 3rd day that my account had been locked. Still waiting for their answers. I am located much further than most of you here in the forum. I am in Asia. Hope you are doing ok, while waiting for their reply. Cheers

How much longer do we have to wait wow...wtf

Better be one heck of a /sorry

Another thing too is that they should put something on the login screen for the game saying there are issues with our store please don't buy anything now...maybe they wont have anymore bans until they fix it...making it faster to get all of us unbanned.

thanks. but its kinda hard you know? what if they make the same mistake again? people are human as what happened to me proves. and i still waiting for i am sorry from someone anet. since that is the least they can do.

Well, we're on day 4 here, too. I have to admit, even I am losing my enthusiasm. I thought yesterday that it was taking too long.

Apparently nothing happened since 5 p.m. Central yesterday, which is when tech support goes home. They come in at noon today, so we may see another five or six accounts restored.

Way too slow.

When they said they were shifting manpower, did that mean they were rearranging office furniture? What gives?

yea no shit...I just think we should get more than a refund with free items because this is just bs...most likely I'll have to wait till this weekend or some crap....for a $10 purchase.

i have entered day 4 now. GMT + 8 hours. Am going to bed... hope to hear more good news soon. Good night everyone.

So, about 24 hrs goes by and still nothing. Do we get our 5 gifts of the traveler free since we can't go claim them?

im still waiting to do costume brawl and more farming for the quests

i dont even care bout the traveler

Um, I'm fairly certain all that ended Monday.

ya i know

but im hoping for a repeat like last year where i cam back for like 2 weeks

It's now been more than 48 hours since my last message from them. No updates? They could certainly be a bit more communicative than this!

I'm currently 15th in their phone queue.

lol i think i should call aslo

there's a lot of this sentiment here in this thread.

thing is, ANET didn't do it. NCSoft did. Says right there on-screen 'NCSoft store.'

ANET has good people, and they made a good game. (If they hadnt we wouldnt be here right now.) They made a huge mistake as well, but it wasn't anything to do with this incident, or the many others they've been blamed for. It was getting involved with NCSoft to begin with. They are literally the worst company in the buisness, and I'm still sad to think the game I'm looking forward to the most has an NCSoft taint to it (GW2). I hate what NCSoft has done to ANET's name, and I'm sure ANET is regretting it now (for this and many many other resons.)

I can't express how much I hate NCSoft, they have ruined literally everything they've ever touched. I also don't believe for 1 second they've kept people's account info safe...way too many hacks lately to be all user-fault.

I only post here in hopes that some folks will notice the difference between the two entities.

I won't claim to know anything about Mr Strain, but I do know people don't walk off from that kind of a position while things are going well. Too bad everyone else in the world doesnt get to follow his example.

Banning accounts that are actively giving you money is dumb. Banning accounts FOR giving you money is ridiculous. Mistakes get made, it happens to everyone, but NCSoft takes the cake (and then charges people for the cake and then bans them for baking.)

But don't blame ANET for these incidents. They actually do give a damn, and do work at making a good game. It's just too bad they connected with the worst thing thats ever happened to gaming.

/end2cents

Ok, just got through and spoke to Vivian. She's very nice.

She reports that they try to close out all tickets within 36 hours, and acknowledged that mine was more than 36 hours old now, and she has escalated it. That's all I have to report.

awsome
ya shes nice i talked with her on monday

yay im over 36 also

yaya gaming soon

huh? so even if u didnt get a response in 36 hours there going to close ur ticket? or are they trying to get u unbanned in 36hours if so there doing a bad job.

No, they don't close your ticket in 36 hours whether or not it's done. Their goal is to have all tickets resolved/completed within 36 hours. They don't always meet their goal.

o ok was going to say wtf..lol

well off to work hopefully I find out I can play when I get home. ;/

Hopefully this is my final post in this thread. It looks as though my account is now fully restored to me. I'm able to log in, and all my tabs in the Xunlai storage chest are there, and all my stuff that was in them is still there. I have successfully logged into my other accounts as well. Looks like all is good for me now.

It has been a lengthy journey. I got my account banned Sunday afternoon simply for making a purchase at the NCSoft store, and I got everything returned to me on Wednesday afternoon. It has been 4 strange days, but it looks like things can return to normal for me now.

My son should be pretty doggone happy now, too. He's been dying to play since Sunday morning at church, where it was darn near all he could talk about.

lucky you

still banned

As far as I understand it, anyone that made a recent purchase online and got a fraud ban is not only going to have their account restored, the charges credited back, and whatever they purchases added to their account.

If this isn't enough for you all, you need to find a different game to play.

Woah, so for the inconvenience, you get your upgrades free? Finally ANET does something smart.

EDIT: While this is a nice, seriously though, I hope something has been done to prevent this from happening again.

How did you know where in the queue you were?

They have an automated message tell you while you're waiting. I'm currently 3rd in the queue. I've been waiting for about 20 minutes, starting at 12th in the queue.

Edit: Just spoke to Nick from customer service. He confirmed the thing about the item I was trying to purchase being given to me for free. Apparently my account is waiting for one of the senior reps to unban it, and he's not sure how long that's going to take because he's not sure where my account is in the queue and not sure exactly what speed they're unbanning accounts in.

I mean, I guess that's okay, but it's something I already know. I just want to play already.