Heads up gamers, according to a recent report in the Guardian newspaper, it seems that they have noticed criminals who are selling Valve’s Steam user data on a Russian dark web forum. These Steam accounts are being sold for just $15 each, making them extremely cheap to purchase, especially for those who’d rather not pay money for an entire library’s collection of games.
Now before you panic, relax because it does not mean that Steam was hacked. Rather, these hackers who managed to get ahold of Steam account information might have gotten them from gamers themselves, and in some cases these gamers might not know that they are giving out their Steam accounts to hackers.
According to Alex Holden, chief information security officer at Hold Security, he notes that there are two types of Steam games who might have wittingly/unwittingly given their account information away. One of the types includes achievement hunters who want to collect every achievement in their games and on Steam. However instead of actually working towards it, they pay hackers to help them get those achievements, and in the process might have gotten hacked in the process.
The second group of people are those who frequent the Community Portal. Hackers have spoofed the Community Portal’s website, tricking gamers into thinking that the website they’re visiting is the real deal, only to enter their account information, which is then stolen from them. Valve has yet to respond to these allegations, but either way we guess it’s worth pointing out that you should be careful anyway.
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