Gaming site’s one WoW account got hacked

Besides just reporting about the latest happenings within the video game industry, we here at QJ also play a lot of video games for fun, and to just relax. Because of this, we really feel for gaming site Kotaku’s Michael Fahey who has just fallen victim to one of the worst things that can happen to an online game. Apparently, his World of Warcraft (WoW) account has been hacked.

Fahey’s character is called Rande and is on the Ysera server. After logging in last night, he found a “naked” Rande, who has been stripped of his armor and otherin-game items. Thinking that this could be just a bug, Fahey went directly to the server and looked up his character there. Amusingly, he learned that his mailbox and his in-game bank account have been wiped out as well.

We’re guessing that what hit Fahey’s account was the new keylogger exploit that we shared with you a couple of days ago. A keylogger, for those not quite familiar with it, is not actually inherently bad. It is a diagnostic tool that was originally intended to detect errors in computer systems. It captures a user’s keystrokes – and that folks is an open invitation for hackers.

Anyway, the latest keylogger hides behind the HTML file name “tonydanza.a11net” and is spreading across the official WoW forums. Blizzard Entertainment, in the past, has issued a lot of safety precautions regarding this but the exploit continue to persist and spread. Fahey has already asked for some assistance and the Blizzard representatives promised to investigate the matter and help him recover his stuff.

Besides just reporting about the latest happenings within the video game industry, we here at QJ also play a lot of video games for fun, and to just relax. Because of this, we really feel for gaming site Kotaku’s Michael Fahey who has just fallen victim to one of the worst things that can happen to an online game. Apparently, his World of Warcraft (WoW) account has been hacked.

Fahey’s character is called Rande and is on the Ysera server. After logging in last night, he found a “naked” Rande, who has been stripped of his armor and otherin-game items. Thinking that this could be just a bug, Fahey went directly to the server and looked up his character there. Amusingly, he learned that his mailbox and his in-game bank account have been wiped out as well.

We’re guessing that what hit Fahey’s account was the new keylogger exploit that we shared with you a couple of days ago. A keylogger, for those not quite familiar with it, is not actually inherently bad. It is a diagnostic tool that was originally intended to detect errors in computer systems. It captures a user’s keystrokes – and that folks is an open invitation for hackers.

Anyway, the latest keylogger hides behind the HTML file name “tonydanza.a11net” and is spreading across the official WoW forums. Blizzard Entertainment, in the past, has issued a lot of safety precautions regarding this but the exploit continue to persist and spread. Fahey has already asked for some assistance and the Blizzard representatives promised to investigate the matter and help him recover his stuff.