| ||
Wed 2024-11-20
Tue 2024-11-19
Mon 2024-11-18
Sun 2024-11-17
Love, Acceptance, and Screeching Modems Sat 2024-11-16
Fri 2024-11-15
Search
Archives
2023
12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01
2022
2021
2020
2019
2018
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
One good site
MDN
Nelson Minar
Blog licensed under a Creative Commons License
|
My World of Warcraft account is now more secure than my bank account.
It is harder to steal
5,000 fake Warcraft gold from me than $5,000 real US dollars. Why?
Because unlike my bank, my computer game supports two
factor authentication.
About six months ago Blizzard started selling the Blizzard Authenticator to its US customers for the nominal price of $6.50. It's a little keychain fob that generates random number codes that change frequently. Logging in to WoW requires both a password and the current code. Why bother protecting a computer game account? Because WoW accounts are valuable and are frequently stolen. The typical serious WoW player has between $50 and $200 worth of gold in their account, possibly more. There's a variety of Trojans floating around the Internet custom designed to steal WoW passwords and funnel them to a crook who will log in and strip the account. In my old guild of a hundred people I know at least five people who had their accounts stolen this way. Two factor authentication is nothing new, but in the US it's unusual for it to be available in such a common consumer product. A lot of my friends who play the game have gotten authenticators for themselves after seeing people lose their accounts. Sure wish I could easily get the same protection at my bank. |
|
