Yet Again, Real Police Called Into Virtual World Over (Not Really) Theft Of Virtual Items
from the not-again dept
Back in 2007 we wrote about how police had arrested a kid for "stealing" virtual furniture in the virtual world, Habbo Hotel. At the time, we pointed out how problematic it is when real laws (and real police) cross over into virtual worlds. What if "stealing" is a part of the game? Even if it's not, it seems like these are cases where the folks who run Habbo Hotel should handle it via terms of service issues, rather than getting the real police involved. If virtual items are "stolen," then Habbo should be able to give them back. That's one of the nice things about a virtual world where there is no scarcity and where there's the ability to bring "stolen" things back.However, it looks like that's not happening any time soon. A bunch of folks have sent in the news that the Habbo Hotel folks have now asked Finnish police to investigate 400 cases of "theft" in their world. Seriously. Of course it is a bit more complicated than that. They're really upset about phishing scams that let scammers get users login information, which they then use to get into their account and transfer the virtual goods away. But that's not really "theft" and it's a misnomer to call it that. And, really, if Habbo Hotel users are getting phished so frequently, perhaps the Habbo developers should focus on building a better login system that is not so susceptible to simple phishing scams...
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Filed Under: habbo hotel, phishing, theft
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Virtual Law Enforcement
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virtual theft
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Re: virtual theft
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Re: Re: virtual theft
another penalty is time lost. a lot of items in games represent an investment of time, if your toon is rotting in jail, you are losing valuable leveling, raiding, farming, or crafting time.
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Bad programming
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Re: Bad programming
Trading is part of the game, if someone logs into your account and then transfers your furniture to another account, tell me how this is because of an insecure database.
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So what? Take it up with Habbo. Don't waste my tax dollars over this crap.
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real cost = real problem
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And yeah, I get that the line gets blurry, but this isn't one of those times. Habbo could make this right with a keystroke. At most, this is a civil complaint.
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Habbo sells virtual goods. Other people trying to undercut prices with stolen goods, makes it more difficult for Habbo to sell virtual goods. As well, the issues of trying to sort out reconciling 'victims' of digital item theft -- if the stolen items have already been sold offsite and traded multiple times, this leads to the users now in possession being quite upset (regardless of whether they realize they are in possession of stolen goods). Simply creating a duplicate to restore to the original user's inventory throws the economic balance out of whack.
For crazy virtual micro-economy, Gaia Online, its Exchange forum, circa 2005-2008 was quite interesting. Then the introduction of cash-based premium currency, as well as the seeming increase in phishing scams, as well as flash exploits, derailed things.
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There are many problems that arise if habbo would just give people the furniture back, ie what if someone traded with the scammer, and now they loose the furniture because it was "stolen goods", how do they get re compensated? This world is designed for young teenagers, how many false reports do you think would happen of they thought they could get free items?
Virtual doesn't mean easy to fix without breaking the game dynamic..think this stuff through or at least learn what habbo is, what it does and who the users are before brushing it all off as "virtual".
The lines are not blurred at all, real world money.
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Are we going to investigate someone for murder if they kill someone's character in the game? Remember, that character (and their belongings) cost money. I'll help... the answer is absolutely not.
Civil complaint, not criminal, sorry.
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you ban the scammers account(s) and reverse all the trades that account conducted since the victim's account was compromised. too bad habbo lacks that ability.
databases are pretty good at this kind of thing, you just have to write your programs so they can make use of the technology:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACID_transactions
the problem is that most, if not all online games lack these capabilities because they have to 1)log and retain the data necessary to track user transactions and 2)have the tools available to identify fraudulent transactions and reverse them. that means collecting and potentially analyzing lots of data, having people create the tools for tracking fraudulent transactions, and having people actually do the work to track and fix these problems.
hardware and personnel cost the game companies money, so for habbo it's cheaper to just call the finnish police.
coincidentally, added cost is the exact same reason why ISP's hate government mandated retention of user activity data.
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Oh and a piece of advice: you better step away from the virtual world for a bit. It's blurring your perception of reality.
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So let Habbo set up a dispute process and unwind such transactions.
It's all well and good saying they could just give it back, but that means when anyone is unhappy with a trade of items that they agreed to, they could say it was stolen, and waste moderator time on non-issues as they determine if it actually was stolen or an agreed trade.
So, you honestly think that wasting taxpayer money is more important than having Habbo properly administer its own game?
To say it's not theft because, 1, it's virtual and 2 the scammer used phishing techniques is just plain wrong. If someone logged into your online bank account in a similar fashion, you would happily call that theft. Wouldn't you?
Money is scarce (tied to value). Virtual furniture is not.
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trading items for real money violates pretty much every online game's terms of service, even the games where you pay the game money for items. the "stealing" of virtual items is a TOS problem, not a real world one.
the problem is that the players can be phished, and that the game lacks the capability to track items and transactions, a mechanism for players to file grievances, and a method to rollback transactions that are proven to be fraudulent. that's a development problem.
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The first one is Habbo's problem. If somemone hacks the system, it is habbo's fault for having an insecure system.
In the second one it's just plain stupidity. If you have sensitive information (especially tied to money), you should check and double check before entering that data anywhere. Habbo could be a bit at fault here for not providing a secure login system or alerting the users for the dangers of phishing, but it is still mostly the user's fault.
Habbo can fix this problem easily. No need to call the police. All they need to do is move a few bytes around and possibly suspend the accounts of the "thieves". It's their problem to solve, not the police.
Also, your analogy with online banking isn't very solid. An online bank would have certificates and secured connections. Most of them (where I live at least) would never ask you for your full password or access code. Just random parts of it. Also, whenever an online transaction is requested, they send an sms to the registered phone number with a confirmation code (to change the phone number you have to go to the bank, so no way of changing it). There are multi-layered defenses against fraud and phishing. And if someone actually stole my credentials and stole money from my bank, money is a scarce good, not an infinite one such as virtual furniture.
And finally: who the hell is stupid enough to pay REAL money for VIRTUAL goods? It's like they are asking for it...And also, what happens when habbo shuts down? Do I lose the investment? Just stupid...
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Replacing the items would throw the virtual econamy out of whack and also open up the possibility of virtual insurance fraud.
I create a second acccount, transfer my goods to it, claim theft and get all my items replaced for free. Meanwhile I have sold my other goods from the second account.
In a virtual world where items cost real world money you have to retain a false scarcity to make the site succeed.
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Virtual doesn't mean free.
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I wonder if they would enter with real guns or virtual guns.
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virtual theft
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Virtual Insurance
All they need is virtual insurance. Customers win cos they're covered against loss and Habbo get extra money for doing not very much
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Re: Virtual Insurance
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Re: Re: Virtual Insurance
If someone is pulling off insurance scams the habbo company still makes money as the cost of replacing items is 0. The cost of the insurance could also be set at a level close to the resell value which means there'd be little profit in trying to defraud the system.
Just a few thoughts
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also, insured items could be flagged once a claim is submitted and tracked through the system.
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Re: Virtual Insurance
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currency is also virtual money when you think about it. it's not backed by real gold or anything like that.
a lot of fraud protection in credit cards return a significant portion of fraudulent charges. it's the merchant that suffers when it comes to credit fraud.
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Maybe this will clear it up
You have no property interest in Habbo® Coins, Premium Subscriptions, your avatar, virtual items (e.g., Habbo® Furni or rares), which remain the exclusive property of Sulake subject only to your limited, non-transferable revocable license to use such for in-game play subject to these Terms and Conditions of Sale and the Terms of Use. Any attempt to sell or transfer same will result in an automatic termination of such license. Further, as these are merely licensed game play activities, they are deemed consumed upon purchase like putting a quarter in an arcade game and terminate upon any termination of your account.
See that? Habbo specifically states that users actually have ZERO property rights on virtual items. They also state that the items are "licensed game play activities" and have no actual value. So by Habbo's own words these "stolen" virtual items are completely valueless.
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Pretend
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