The Pioneer Press, a Minnesota-based US newspaper, are this week reporting news of one unlucky online gamer - Geoff Luurs, 20, who's Final Fantasy XI account was hacked resulting in the theft of thousands of dollars worth of in-game items and virtual money.
Luurs' avatar, 'Sots', had amassed the stash over four years of play, and the newspaper reveals that in total his horde was apparently worth 75 million Gil - or nearly 4,000 USD. US police authorities have, so far, refused to investigate this crime, despite Luurs identifying former friend 'Ayri' as a suspect.
Luurs believe the thief is likely to sell the items through a site like ige.com, but the police have responded by saying that in-game objects have no monetary value, and therefore no crime has taken place.
"What happened here is somebody stole almost USD 4000 and got away cold," countered law professor Joshua Fairfield. "This is just a matter of zeros. The first time IBM loses USD 10 million, we're going to see some police action. The argument that a magic sword isn't real, that doesn't make sense to me. You can ask the question, why would somebody buy that? But you can't say it's not worth real money."
It is suspected that Luurs may have divulged his account details, hence another reason for the confusion here, such activity contravening the game's terms and conditions. More on this as we get it.
http://play.tm/story/15934
its fucked up that he got hacked... and i play ffxi, i would hate that happening to me
but still
Luurs' avatar, 'Sots', had amassed the stash over four years of play, and the newspaper reveals that in total his horde was apparently worth 75 million Gil - or nearly 4,000 USD. US police authorities have, so far, refused to investigate this crime, despite Luurs identifying former friend 'Ayri' as a suspect.
Luurs believe the thief is likely to sell the items through a site like ige.com, but the police have responded by saying that in-game objects have no monetary value, and therefore no crime has taken place.
"What happened here is somebody stole almost USD 4000 and got away cold," countered law professor Joshua Fairfield. "This is just a matter of zeros. The first time IBM loses USD 10 million, we're going to see some police action. The argument that a magic sword isn't real, that doesn't make sense to me. You can ask the question, why would somebody buy that? But you can't say it's not worth real money."
It is suspected that Luurs may have divulged his account details, hence another reason for the confusion here, such activity contravening the game's terms and conditions. More on this as we get it.
http://play.tm/story/15934
its fucked up that he got hacked... and i play ffxi, i would hate that happening to me
but still
