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Report: #642546

Complaint Review: Sony Online Entertainment - Internet

  • Submitted:
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  • Reported By: Marvin — Denver Colorado United States of America
  • Author Not Confirmed What's this?
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  • Sony Online Entertainment Internet United States of America

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I am playing Everquest 2, and I have been for many months, well, I have spent nearly $400 getting my in game characters to where I want and I suddenly get booted ... and an e-mail follows that says I have been suspended for cheating ...

So I send a response to them saying what are you talking about, and they said that they have concluded that I have been using this program to hack the game ... I asked them to validate this information and show me SOMETHING to prove this (as I haven't been), and they can't furnish a single thing, they just keep going back to their User agreement (which I'm not violating).

So any of you playing Everquest 2 ... or any other game Manged or Run by Sony ... be careful ... your investment of time and money may be suspended or banned even though you were playing the way you should.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 09/20/2010 03:33 PM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/sony-online-entertainment/internet/sony-online-entertainment-sony-soe-becareful-before-you-invest-time-into-anything-they-do-642546. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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REBUTTALS & REPLIES:
3Author
4Consumer
0Employee/Owner

#7 Consumer Comment

Believe it!

AUTHOR: booboofinger - (United States of America)

POSTED: Monday, September 24, 2012

Yes, it's true. I just banned myself and I never used a hack in over 10 years of playing MMOs. My guess is they are using an algorithm to get hackers and that said algorithm is severely unreliable.

Their boards are full of people who not only claim that they have been banned for no reason, but who sound absolutely believable, especially since my own experience.

Why would Sony do this? My guess is there are several reasons. First, by using an algorithm and banning/suspending people without using due diligence to check if the bans are deserved or not is cheaper than paying someone to check what the algorithm flags.

If a person gets permanently banned and they had a premium account (where you have to purchase things like inventory/bank slots, DLCs and whatever) the person is forced to buy everything all over again or leave the game. As incredible  as it may seem, a lot of people end up buying everything again, doubling their profit. 

There might also be a misguided corporate mentality that refuses to admit that their system is not working properly and would rather insist that their system works when there is plenty of evidence that it is flawed.

I sure hope that SOE gets it's act together and starts behaving responsibly and ethically to it's customer base. They put out great games but what good is a great game when people are scared of loging in and getting banned for no reason?

I myself am terrified to ever log in again. I spent over $40 getting DLCs and other things from the in-game store for DCU and run the risk of losing all of that in the crap shoot that is their hacking detection system. 

If I had been hacking, then at least I would know what I was doing wrong. Since I wasn't I have no clue what flagged me, and customer service has not been much help at all. They even give you the impression their customer service playbook was based on Catch-22.

A player's only real recourse seems to be to hit the forums where hopefully some TSR will be kind enough to look into your case for you. But even if that happens, a suspension will still run it's course and you will be locked out of the game. Not to mention all the "U R a Hakerz!" from seriously naive members who think Sony can do no wrong. (Let's see if they sing the same tune once it happens to them).

We as customers would like to assume that companies that we are giving our money to are acting ethnically and with due diligence to protect their paying customers. But in the case of SOE unfortunately nothing could be further from the truth. This is based on my own personal experience as well as countless believable reports from other customers.

Maybe when they start losing enough customers and getting a bad enough reputation for their practices they will stop doing this. Hopefully it will not be too late and at the expense of their games, which even though I find enjoyable, find too risky to play and support at this time.
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#6 Consumer Comment

warning on S.O.E

AUTHOR: Frank - (U.S.A.)

POSTED: Monday, August 08, 2011

I tried to play Free Realms.  Then I see it wants me to download something that it can get into every single file I have on my computer?  ARE YOU ALL NUTS?  

NEVER give permission to legally hack into your computer. That is what you are allowing the Sony company to do.   And if some smart (beep) kid gets into their (SOE) accounts. You are looking for trouble.  All your saved passwords.  All your bank info can be taken.  You can be taken for a ride without you knowing it.  

You have to be smarter then these jerks.  NEVER download a program that can access your computer unless you know who it is from.    Example: some tech support that you called to fix your computer. (You called them. not some stranger that wants your info.)  

Think about that.  They may be able to turn on your webcam while you are getting ready for bed?

Then some young kids can post your naked photo and/or video online without you knowing it.


So again never every download anything that says needs your files.  they never do. that is a spyware that you are downloading and should be deleted ASAP! 

Read all terms of service and beware. There is a lot of bull. So read between the lines. 

So you will not know if the program is running while you check your bank accounts, buy stuff online with your credit card. and that program may just be a key logger.  recording every keystroke you type. 

Enjoy being (beeped) in the rear by the S.O.E company. 

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#5 Author of original report

Update

AUTHOR: Comcast Problems - (United States of America)

POSTED: Monday, January 17, 2011

A little hard to believe ... it's cool with me if you don't 'believe me' all I am doing is giving you facts. My buddy and his wife both got banned, neither one of them did anything even close to cheating. I got suspended ... I didn't do anything even close to cheating either ... the problem is that their customer service refused to take anything I was saying into consideration. They just assumed that I was hacking and suspended me for it, ... they were the judge, the jury, and the executioner. Now, as a person who is paying for this game ... why would I turn around and be stupid enough to risk getting banned? And for what? My problem is what happened, how they handled it, and the fact that they completely disregarded anything I had to tell them. That's terrible customer service if you ask me.

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#4 Consumer Comment

A little hard to believe...

AUTHOR: Ronny g - (USA)

POSTED: Saturday, September 25, 2010

...that you would lose your Sony Account for "no reason". It would not make sense for Sony to do this as I would imagine they make money from accounts?..Wouldn't you think? Sony has been around for a long, long time..I am sure they have considered in any attempt to turn a profit for themselves and the shareholders... in all logic and business sense that the obvious way to achieve this is by opening and keeping accounts..not closing them. Unless of course....they have a "reason", and a good one at that.

You state they have concluded that you have been using "this program" to hack the game..but you never mention in this report what "this program" is. Did they actually use the term "this program", or state which program you were caught using?

I am going to paste some reply here which is a section of a post from another complaint site regarding this issue. (yes..I found a WHOPPING 2 whole complaints on complaints board website regarding SOE).. Does this in any way apply or relate to your report? If you search "Everquest 2 complaints account suspension" specifically...a mind boggling WHOPPING 1 complaint shows up. And it was lodged back in July of 08 by another poor sap who got busted hacking accounts of other players and was suspended..lesson learned.

"... With the launch of the merged servers we changed the way we track hacking in game. The server now checks for the hard cap on the maximum fire rate, range, etc.. of every weapon / vehicle / turret / etc.. When they are fired, and where they hit. By verifying the actual maximum game mechanics have exceed we can spot the tiniest adjustments to the game. We are not stopping there though; we are dedicated to erasing all hackers from the game. SOE has assigned part of their research and development team specifically to this task, and I am confident that between their efforts, and the efforts of CS all hacks will be stopped or every person using a hack will have their account terminated. "

SWG - MXO - PS
__________@soe.sony.com
Sony Online Entertainment LLC.


This is copied directly from Everquest 2 players website from the articles..

"Any customer found to be involved in an account theft may have any and all of his/her accounts banned. Prior to taking any action against accounts reported as compromised, SOE will conduct a thorough review of the accounts and determine the appropriate course of action. Accounts will only face disciplinary action based on information gathered through our investigation and not as a result of external allegations. "


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#3 Consumer Comment

A little hard to believe...

AUTHOR: Ronny g - (USA)

POSTED: Saturday, September 25, 2010

...that you would lose your Sony Account for "no reason". It would not make sense for Sony to do this as I would imagine they make money from accounts?..Wouldn't you think? Sony has been around for a long, long time..I am sure they have considered in any attempt to turn a profit for themselves and the shareholders... in all logic and business sense that the obvious way to achieve this is by opening and keeping accounts..not closing them. Unless of course....they have a "reason", and a good one at that.

You state they have concluded that you have been using "this program" to hack the game..but you never mention in this report what "this program" is. Did they actually use the term "this program", or state which program you were caught using?

I am going to paste some reply here which is a section of a post from another complaint site regarding this issue. (yes..I found a WHOPPING 2 whole complaints on complaints board website regarding SOE).. Does this in any way apply or relate to your report?

"As you most likely know, there was a lot of hacking going which was hard for us to track since we had to see it in game ourselves. This is not entirely true any longer. With the launch of the merged servers we changed the way we track hacking in game. The server now checks for the hard cap on the maximum fire rate, range, etc.. of every weapon / vehicle / turret / etc.. When they are fired, and where they hit. By verifying the actual maximum game mechanics have exceed we can spot the tiniest adjustments to the game. We are not stopping there though; we are dedicated to erasing all hackers from the game. SOE has assigned part of their research and development team specifically to this task, and I am confident that between their efforts, and the efforts of CS all hacks will be stopped or every person using a hack will have their account terminated. "

SWG - MXO - PS
__________@soe.sony.com
Sony Online Entertainment LLC.



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#2 Author of original report

Wow, more news

AUTHOR: Comcast Problems - (United States of America)

POSTED: Saturday, September 25, 2010

So, fresh off my suspension, I come into the game and find out that numerous other players have been affected by the same thing that I have been affected by ... SOE has stated that their game detection modification is fool proof, yet players are coming from all over stating that they are not hacking the game and are getting in trouble for something that they aren't doing ... this just confirms my original post ...

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#1 Author of original report

Read if you play Everquest 2 or any other SOE game

AUTHOR: Comcast Problems - (United States of America)

POSTED: Monday, September 20, 2010

I am playing Everquest 2, and I have been for many months, well, I have spent nearly $400 getting my in game characters to where I want and I suddenly get booted ... and an e-mail follows that says I have been suspended for cheating ... So I send a response to them saying what are you talking about, and they said that they have concluded that I have been using this program to hack the game ... I asked them to validate this information and show me SOMETHING to prove this (as I haven't been), and they can't furnish a single thing, they just keep going back to their User agreement (which I'm not violating). So any of you playing Everquest 2 ... or any other game Manged or Run by Sony ... be careful ... your investment of time and money may be suspended or banned even though you were playing the way you should.

le.

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