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First Person Shooters (Games)

Valve Bans Another 30,000 Steam Users 102

Posted by Zonk from the you-get-what-you-pay-for dept.
bryhhh writes "Valve has announced that they have banned another 30,000 steam accounts which had been used to try to illegally gain access to Valve games without a valid purchase. Only last month 20,000 accounts were banned for the same reason, only this time Valve states that, 'The accounts that are disabled today will not be reactivated'."
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Valve Bans Another 30,000 Steam Users More

Valve Bans Another 30,000 Steam Users

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  • ...as long as all users -will- actually be people who tried to circumvent copy protection/authentication without buying the game.
    • replying to my own, since I remember reading this last week ;

      Since one of the latest patches presumably fixes the requirement for the CD to be in your 'puter ; I am still thinking that anyone who bought their game (either in store, or over Steam) are allowed to screw around with their files (no-cd .exe's / modified .exe's), and no ban can be justified by this.
      As soon as multiplayer files are being manipulated , I think banning is in line, as it compromises the game's fairness (not that VAC is able to sto

    • yes well, how about if they were some people who had preordered hl2, or bought it from retail in an area where collectors edition wasn't available.. and now, having already beat the boring hl2 wanted to get some hl1: source goodness. guess what - you can't upgrade to get it! (you would need to create a new steam account and then buy a whole new package for full price, if you wanted to play hl1: source and hadn't originally purchased a package with it). now, you could get pretty tempted in that situation.

      ba
      • yes well, how about if they were some people who had preordered hl2, or bought it from retail in an area where collectors edition wasn't available

        What are you talking about? I got the regular preorder HL2 edition and it comes with CS Source.

        • Re:Good riddance... (Score:2, Informative)

          by Alrua ( 704865 )
          What are you talking about? I got the regular preorder HL2 edition and it comes with CS Source.

          CS: Source != HL1: Source

        • every edition comes with counter strike: source.
          every edition DOES NOT come with half-life: source(which is the original half life ported to the source engine, basically a little better gfx, sountrack and an upgraded physics engine).

          day of defeat: source is too apparently going to be just silver and up edition download, which brings a nice questionmark over it's longevity and playerbase as it's an add-on ONLY for a subset of the players(with them being unable to upgrade).
      • I hadn't thought about the HL:Source option yet (also here in the Netherlands, right at the start,the HL2-only version was the only one available in stores) :

        I still think that there were there is a market, it will be supplied ; I am wildy guessing here, but them not giving the straight-out option to buy HL:Source afterwards might have to do with the st(r)ings attached to the contract with Vivendi ; and the hassles this has allready lead to in the past.

        As I have the original version of HL1 around here ; I

        • yes, but there already is demand for it..(look at steampowered forums).

          what's more is that the ati voucher people can upgrade for some around 10$, so they even know there is demand for it and offer it for some...

    • Try again. A "No-steam-no-cd" patch was avaiable two days after the release. I should know, i've played half the game at a friends' who downloaded it. Somehow i feel it's a more painless experience for him that for paying customers.

  • The real reason... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Repiv ( 821449 ) on Thursday December 23, 2004 @01:33PM (#11170062)
    Gabe sat on the account server! On no!

    Anyway, those bans sucked last time. My friend who legally got the game ended up banned.

    • Re:The real reason... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by wizbit ( 122290 )
      You mean he bought it at a retail joint or online? Not that he "bought" it at a lan party for $1, right? And I assume his legally obtained code was never used and afterward safely tucked away and not provided to anyone on, say, IRC as well, correct?

  • No complaints (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Richie1984 ( 841487 ) on Thursday December 23, 2004 @01:35PM (#11170084)
    It seems Steam is really proving useful in preventing illegal use of Half Life 2 and, once certain bugs are ironed out of Steam, I can see it being used across the board as the main deterrant of pirating games. Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing is another discussion entirely.

    The only things I would be concerned about are ensuring that of the 30000 banned, all of them are actually banned for valid reasons and not due to any error. Valve has said they wont reactivate these accounts, so once it's gone, it's gone.

    • Re:No complaints (Score:5, Insightful)

      by 88NoSoup4U88 ( 721233 ) on Thursday December 23, 2004 @01:50PM (#11170241)
      preventing illegal use of Half Life 2

      If you're aiming at the multiplayer part of the game : Such thing has allready been established by giving out CD-keys, and authenticating them with a master-server before one can connect to a server.

      For the single player part there is allready a non-Steam version floating around Warezland, so it isn't really countering it much.

      I much more appreciate Steam for it being able to instantly supply me the latest patches to the game, and not ending up searching for the right files.
      Also their stance on the mod community, and some of statements VALVe made in the past about how they see Steam to be in the future : Sounds very promising.

      The only thing that I don't like about Steam is the possibility of it going to have a subscription fee : It's just -too- easy for them not to do it.

      The day Steam will be subscription-based, will be the day I'll stop using Steam : Until then, I think VALVe did a great overall job on Steam/HL2.

      • Re:No complaints (Score:2, Interesting)

        by ShawnMcCool42 ( 557138 )
        It'd be counter intuitive for them to start charging for steam. The purpose is for them to make more money by offering a publisher-free avenue for game distribution. Should they start charging there will be little reason for the consumer to value steam as functional. It'd be like being charged a toll at the front door of your local mall.

        • Re:No complaints (Score:3, Insightful)

          by 88NoSoup4U88 ( 721233 )
          But you aren't seriously thinking that Steam will ever supply games made by id Software, Epic Games ?

          I am already doubting if it will ever reach beyond their own userbase ; I see Steam to be a viable platform for 'amateur' modmakers to get a bit of a financial reward for your hard work (but i might have conflicting interests ;) )

          • I'm not so sure about that. I think many many developers may be quite taken in by the potential of being able to distribute their games in such a fashion without need of a publisher. Of course there is the cost of doing this via valve's offered method, but it is still an attractive method I'd imagine.

            Also, whatever the case, it is inevitable really that distribution of games moves towards an entierly online based system, such that, developers not distributing their games online will be seen as unusual. I
    • "I can see it being used across the board as the main deterrant of pirating games."

      Well, speaking for myself (of course), it's sure been a good deterrant for playing the game. Doing the disable-network start-steam wait-forever-for-it-to-time-out enable-network just to get it running is a pain in the ass. (If I don't do that, it takes even longer for it to time out against the Valve servers, if my Internet connection is down)

      Steam is pretty craptacular.

    • Re:No complaints (Score:3, Interesting)

      by damiam ( 409504 )
      It seems Steam is really proving useful in preventing illegal use of Half Life 2

      WTF are you talking about? If anything else, Steam has pissed people off and increased piracy. Pirated versions of HL2 don't need steam for the single-player game.

      Steam may be somewhat effective in preventing multi-player use of pirated games, but Blizzard's battle.net system works just as well, has been around forever, and isn't nearly as evil.


    • The only things I would be concerned about are ensuring that of the 30000 banned, all of them are actually banned for valid reasons and not due to any error. Valve has said they wont reactivate these accounts, so once it's gone, it's gone.

      Hmm, I wonder how much of that is true, and how much is bluster. In the UK I've heard about some small retailers that have claimed that they will not accept returns of anything sold no matter what - but if the customer gets in touch with Trading Standards and then t

  • RTFF (Score:5, Informative)

    by HavokDevNull ( 99801 ) <eric AT linuxsystems DOT net> on Thursday December 23, 2004 @01:38PM (#11170119) Homepage Journal
    According to a mod on the Valve forums

    Banned is different than "disabled"

    Banned = VAC caught your account cheating

    Disabled = You tried to steal HL2 (the first 20,000)

    big difference between the two IMHO...
    • And you dont have to worry about no-cd patches, as its already a cd'less game.

      Now if they banned people for using a no-cd, or virtual cd image with a legit key, that would be news.

      I'm gonna have to play CS tonight to see what a hackerless game is like. ;) GJ Valve.

      • Re:RTFF (Score:4, Informative)

        by realdpk ( 116490 ) on Thursday December 23, 2004 @02:50PM (#11170808) Homepage Journal
        "And you dont have to worry about no-cd patches, as its already a cd'less game."

        Huh. What? My copy requires I put in the CD to play, even though I'm signed up through Steam. Another reason I don't play this game very often -- what a pain.

        How do you get it so you don't have to put the CD in to play the game, other than a no-cd patch?

        Or does what you're saying only apply to those who bought the game online?

        • Re:RTFF (Score:2, Informative)

          by mdbales ( 611785 )
          Have you tried it recently? The last patch removed the CD check due to some problems that users reported.
          • I haven't, it's such a pain to go through everything necessary just to get it running. I will give it a shot tonight, though. I did enjoy the game when I finally got in to it.
        • If you bought the game over steam you didn't get a CD, and thus it doesn't require a CD to play.

  • While certainly not all of these people are customers, I think that they may be pissing off a potentially large base of customers.

    • Yeah; how damned many more than 50,000 people are really wasting their time with this game?
    • Yep! I won't buy it because of this protection scheme. I understand their motives but they don't fit in with my motives. What if I want to pull it off the shelf and play it in ten years (as I will probably do with my copy of Half-Life)? What if I want to sell it on EBAY? What if I want to put it on my wife's laptop and play it on the airplane while the original copy sits on my computer at home with nobody playing it? Come on people, I know that you really really want to use this stuff but just say no t
  • Quote: Moofie http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=129610&t hreshold=1&commentsort=3&tid=204&tid=98&tid=133&mo de=thread&pid=10811750#10811793 [slashdot.org] "Since I bought it, I can crack it legally. Anybody who thinks different, well, they're wrong." Valve doesn't seem to agree with you....
    • You have the right, but Steam gives them the power to "disable" you if you do it, and there's nothing you can do about it. It might be possible to crack Steam for good, but you could never use it online after that. In other words, no patches, and no CS:S.
      • Then you don't own it. You have the right to do what you want to do something you purchased, even if it's not what the seller intended you to do. If i want to play HL2 and crack it to get the models reskinned to Spongebob Squarepants characters, it's my right, it's mine. Same if i want to apply a no-cd crack. That Valve might not be ok with it should be of little consequence. Yes, i know about the DMCA, but i don't live in the USA.

        You're not buying from Valve, it's a lease contract - you're licensing it
        • Despite the fact that we have the right to crack it, Valve uses technical measures to kick us out if we do. I don't see that as a problem because I don't need to crack it. I don't even see it as software, I see it as an entertainment service. I'm not interested in reverse engineering it, I just want to shoot some guys for a few hours after work.
  • How are they going to handle the appeals for those people who have been banned by mistake? 30,000 + 20,000 = 50,000 will take a long and costly amount of time.
    But of course, Valve/Steam never makes a mistake, so I guess there really is no problem, right?
    • I know of someone whose computer has fried. So obviously he hasn't been playing HL2. Yet he was banned somehow. He's trying to contact Valve to see how in the world this could happen.

      • In this case, the court is your friend. Small claims court. All he needs is a print-out of the banned screen, and a receipt for purchase of the game. Having a box with legitimate CD in hand is not a bad idea either.
      • Someone probably stole(physical saw and copied from his place, comprismised PC, etc.), or randomly generated his key.

    • Re:Appeal? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by snuf23 ( 182335 ) on Thursday December 23, 2004 @02:51PM (#11170816)
      I had a problem when I purchased Sim City 3000. You were supposed to logon to a website, enter your key and get additional content.
      Well, I tried that - but someone had already used my key to setup an account. Keep in mind the copy I bought was a sealed store-bought copy, not second hand. I guess someone used a keygen and got my key.
      I tried going through support and sending them a scanned image of the CD case with key. Nothing. Just a standard thank you for contacting support message.
      I feel for anyone who got their account wrongfully banned/disabled.

      • Re:Appeal? (Score:2, Interesting)

        by zarthrag ( 650912 )
        You have a right to take it back to the store and excahange it, in that case. You can simply cite the product as "defective". Walmart is especially good about this, mainly bc they don't yet have any notion of the value of a CD key.
  • What a joke. Anyone dumb enough to use Steam in the first place and then gets their account deactivated, wrongly or rightfully, gets what they deserve for being blind, dumb sheep with no sense of what they're dealing with. And I can guarantee you out of the 30,000 they have deactivated, the number of paying, legit customers they deactivated is in at least the hundreds. That's the way it always works.

    Valve has completely ignored the history and fact that these schemes DO NOT WORK, and when you try to do
  • From what I've read over at the steampowered forums, it looks like quite a few people who were banned originally tried to use a 'warez' CD-key before buying the game.

    When that didn't work, they purchased the game, entered a legit CD-key, had no problems playing for awhile, and then their accounts were disabled.

    Apparently Valve must keep logs of all the CD-keys a certain account/IP address has tried. I don't know if I agree with this. If someone has actually purchased the game, should they be penalize

    • That's a tricky subect. Ultimately, when you "buy" from Steam you buy directly from Valve, which means they can decide to sell you the game or not - as they see fit. They're in their right to do this, i think.

      And no, i don't agree with it. I don't agree with Steam either, for a number of reasons - so i don't use it, at all.
      • Ultimately, when you "buy" from Steam you buy directly from Valve, which means they can decide to sell you the game or not - as they see fit.

        Except they've already sold you the game, in at least some of these cases. I don't think it's fair for someone to pay $50 or whatever they paid, and then have the game not work at all. Valve should issue refunds for the people that legitimately bought the game.
    • This is true. In once certain post I remember Taylor Sherman (VALVe employee) said that some number of fake CD-keys had been tried and multiple attempts of credit card fraud, so they log nearly everything, even CD-keys that were invalid and failed. Can't find the post unfortunately - must have been pruned.

      I do agree that they should be punished, and besides, they did agree that VALVe had the right to disable their account for any reason upon making a Steam account.

  • Accountability? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Primis ( 71749 )
    Also... has anyone thought of asking/callng for Valve to make publicly available how and WHY they're deactivating people? And by that I mean specific records and details? In other words, some proof so that they can be audited? This extends beyond Good Budiness/Bad Business and seems to have wandered into an area where someone should really be regulating/overseeing Valve.

    Otherwise, is there any accountability for them to not just deactivate paying customers once they have their money? I can't imagine th

    • Re:Accountability? (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      They were doing that on the Forums after they killed the first 20,000 accounts.

      It was actually quite funny (from an outsider looking in, I don't have any of the games). You would have a guy screaming about not being able to play, and I'll sue you etc.., then the reply from one of the mods... "your account has been deactivated for buying your copy with a stolen credit card" "your account has been deactivated for using a fraudlent CD-Key".

      The only issue I have with the whole process, is that if you use a wa

  • Refunds? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Thursday December 23, 2004 @02:54PM (#11170845)
    If I buy it online, and you ban me, do I get a refund? How about if I send you the box I got at EB? Better question: If I'm banned from Steam for pirating HL2, does that lock me out of HL1? This is why I don't want activation in games (or the OS, for that matter). Presumably, if you piss off the company, they can lock you out of dozens of your legit products. Imagine pirating 1 EA game (or having your kid do it) and finding every EA game you own doesn't work anymore.
    • > If I buy it online, and you ban me, do I get a refund?
      No you don't.

      > How about if I send you the box I got at EB?
      It doesn't matter... the fact is, you tried to pirate HL2. (Note that their criteria is a few cd keys that were used for it - the first round of bannings was a single cd key, iirc).

      > Better question: If I'm banned from Steam for pirating HL2, does that lock me out of HL1?
      Yes, it does. Your account is frozen completely, along with any and all games that you may have bought (HL2
  • So how long is it going to be before someone writes a virus that intentially attempts to steal Valve games through Steam? The virus detects Steam on your computer and goes about trying to "hack" or steal or whatever it takes to get someone banned. Just imagine; use IE to visit a malicious page, your Steam account is banned. Steam is just evil and unnecessary.
    • I think I'm missing something here. In this hypothetical situation a hacker fakes piracy on legitamite customers and valve is the one that's evil? Your right. The hacker would be the hero fighting for the little man. I never would have thought of that before.

      with the rampant piracy in the world something needs to be done. Quit yer bitching about someone actually trying to fix the system and build a better mouse trap since you obviously know all.

      Steam isn't perfect. But despite their problems i have no
      • I don't even play games. I use productivity software. Every single time I've had a problem with being cut off the publisher instantly gives me a 30-90 day key while we discuss contract / licensing issues. Most of the time the fault was on my company's end. And most of the time they end up paying an invoice.

        Just because people make a mistake and violate an agreement does not make them thieves.
  • Hmmm... I can see a class action suit against Steam/Valve in the near future. All previous paying customers that have been 'caught'....
  • Please don't mod me troll for this, But if you changed "Valve" to "Microsoft" and "HL2" to "Windows XP", there would be ALOT more cries of foul-play.

    I don't approve of Valve suspending accounts that are potentially associated with even ONE paying customer. Steam is a (overall) good thing, but I think it's gonna go a little too far.
    • But if you changed "Valve" to "Microsoft" and "HL2" to "Windows XP", there would be ALOT more cries of foul-play.

      This is all too true.
      I saw a troll making a very long post about this once. His basic point was that, unlike the rest of slashdot, the games section is populated by windows pc gamers, more so that regular tech heads. Most of these are young and innocent when it comes to IP issues. Kind of like a missing link between regular users and frequent slashdotters. Anyway, these gamers do love their games and the companies that make them and will brook no critisisms of them. They're also more likely to be confused by comments slamming windows XP, as they still regard it as "Way cool! I have a computer with XP!"

      Steam is ridiculous. It's only working because half life 2 is huge. I really can't see it working for other games. The only reason consumers put up with it is because of the hype. the hype is also the reason comments critisising steam are modded as troll in the games section.

      Paranoid people might consider the gamer influx into slashdot to be the forerunner of a mighty luser invasion. I consider it just a diversification of the slashdot ecosystem.
    • In which case, I must be in a minority of a minority. I don't have any real problems with the XP activation at all, as it has been remarkably painless every single time I've used it, even when I've had to phone my code through rather than use the internet authentication.

      But Steam really annoys me, because it gets in the way. Authenticating Steam takes a lot longer than even the five minute phonecall of XP, let alone the 30-second internet method, and what is more Steam requires that you keep doing it. Micr
      • The problem is, since appearently everyone's accepting XP activation, and appearently lots of people are accepting Steam activation, that next time around MS/Valve/whoever is going to take activation a little bit farther. And then a little bit farther. And I kinda forget where I was going with that. Yeah, I think activation is bad.
  • Why ban these people for trying to hack the account...why not simply remove the ability for them to do so? Seriously, actions like these, where they take a hard edge and undoubtedly affect the innocent, are not elegant ways to handle the problem. These people wanted to play, and they may have had other games that they legimitately purchased that they've lost access to. I've not played HL2 or used Steam...but given their propensity to ban accounts (even for the no-cd crack earlier), I'm not impressed with th
  • HL2 game is located in world with big corporations that are very powerful, and single person means nothing.

    Valve have created most evil system of distributing computer games. And it is banning legal users.

    And nobody noticed this relation...

    What a irony!
  • i can understand the valve wants to keep as much money in their pockets as they can, but steam really is a joke. i have 4 legit copies of hl1/cs we rebuilt my sons box and went to reinstall hl1 on his comp..of course he cant rem his steam pass. how do you recover your account well. his hotmail account had lasped so we could not resend his pass to his email (we have to have a dif email for each of these so we can onlly attach so many to our permanent email accoutn..and who wnats to give valve their real emai

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