The Nefarious Method That Thieves Are Using To Steal Your PSN Account

Sean @ FG: Thieves are using the Deactivate All function to hijack your primary PSN and you might not even know about it…

[gangsta_red]

Damn, that is harsh business.

[Gardenia]

Some people are selfish pricks doing anything for money. I activated the 2 step verification immediately after reading this story just to be safe. if I'd lose my account and all my PSN games...

[StormLegend]

I read that article and that's just freaking disgusting selling people's PSN accounts for over a $1000! Why do people wrong like that and take everything they've earned? It's sickening reading how that hacker does it easily and acts like it's just business.

[FullmetalRoyale]

Anyone who does things like that is a real "See you next Tuesday," if you know what I mean.

[KingKionic]

Everyone who has a playstation account needs to switch there email address to something they use that doesn't use a credit card,amazon acccount,mobile wallet credit,etc.

That`s how all these phishing scams start.

Gotta be smart in these streets folks. Your security is way more important than some scumbags hijacking ya.

[Ashlen]

This has nothing to do with PlayStation this is just basic net security. Don't use one password for everything online. In fact people who are smart have a separate password for every single website.

For 10 to 20 bucks anyone can buy a password manager off Amazon and store all their passwords securely.

[Omnisonne]

Call me paranoid but I've always been a little suspicious about storing passwords on your own system, or a so called ''safe''. I imagine it doesn't take much effort for any dedicated hacker to break into that program and take all your passwords that way.

[rainslacker]

To my knowledge I have never heard of the stored passwords on systems being stolen or breached. Even if the file itself was taken, without the system key, which is generated through actual hardware within the system itself, it would be excessively hard to break the encryption.

I don't store the passwords myself, as I'm super cautious about such things due to my own experiences with identity theft, but I don't think it's actually an major security risk to actually do so. There are more efficient and practical ways to get people's passwords, so one's stored passwords are generally a targeted attack against you personally, and likely something better would be taken. For instance, simply monitoring the system, the hacker can get your keylog which will reveal passwords, which ironically wouldn't show up from the stored passwords fill in, but could be found through packet analysis either way.

[Christopher]

Well, first, no, you don't need to use a different e-mail account. Just don't use the same passwords anywhere and make sure they are 'strong' passwords and not easily guessed ones. And, where possible, enable 2-factor authentication.

Second, do this everywhere. Not just on PlayStation accounts.

[Papafynn]

Turn on 2-factor authentication y’all!

[WildArmed]

Literally just this.

2-factor auth everything you have, and you'll be fine. It was one of my most requested features from Sony, I'm glad they got around to it!

[Lon3wolf]

Very much so.

[Vitalogy]

There's literally no reason to not use this, I'm pretty sure everyone that have a playstation have a mobile phone.

[MagicBeanz]

And what if they dont?

[madpuppy]

@MagicBeanz "And what if they dont?"

Then you would have to be extra careful with your account and have a really good, unique password.

[Vitalogy]

@MagicBeanz so people can afford a $300 console and $50~$60 games but can't afford a simple $50 phone? It doesn't have to be state of the art high-end smartphone *sigh*

[blackblades]

I haven't yet, this just encourage me to do so.

[DaGR8JIBRALTAR]

Did this immediately b4 I finished reading article. Better safe than sorry...

[jreeves82]

I had the same thing happen to me last year. Playstation support was no help at all. Finally after 6 months I was able to deactivate all and reactivate mine as primary. Bastards

[zsquaresoff]

Yep, got my account hacked 2 weeks ago, changed my user info so I couldn't log on to either on the psn website or on ps4. All game purchases, trophies over the years.... gone :(

[Aenea]

This stuff has been happening for years on PSN and XBL, has been mentioned plenty of times over the years in articles as well, so why didn't you turn on 2-step verification when it was introduced?

Also, just call PlayStation support, they can help. If you still know the serial numbers of the consoles you had thru the years it's not a big issue and it can get resolved...

[superchiller]

The minute Sony offered two-factor authentication, I enabled it. Did the same for my XBL account. I also use different passwords for every site. Really sad that there are so many thieves out there trying to steal your online stuff.

[il-JumperMT]

News flash, never use the same passwords, and use really complex passwords for services with your credit card details.

[Lon3wolf]

Better still use 2 step verification as mentioned above, all services that take cash/details should offer this nowadays.

[il-JumperMT]

Yea and have issues every time you reset your mobile/change mobile.

[Lon3wolf]

Issues I assume you mean transferring the codes to the new phone while still having old phone active a 2 minute job, or just use the recovery codes?

[rainslacker]

They don't have to be really complex. Just throwing in random capital characters or symbols exponentially increases the security of the password since it becomes much harder to simply brute force it, although Sony's platform locks out if you try to brute force. Obviously don't use words that have any meaning to you, like your name, the name of anyone on your public facebook account or someone close to you, or "password"...or the more complex "password1".

Obviously, the password 1234 is the most secure>:) I've got the same combination on my luggage.

[Yohshida]

If you fall for this, you literally are a dumbass. Use 2 step auth and different passwords for every Account.

[Artemidorus]

Guarantee it's on the dark Web.

[Liqu1d]

If you reuse emails and passwords and you don't use 2FA where it's possible then you deserve to have your account jacked.

[Nineball2112]

No, no you don't deserve it. SMH

[Liqu1d]

If people don't want to take account security seriously then they obviously aren't too concerned about their account being stolen.

[cfc83]

I got a random message from someone on psn wanting to chat last night. "She" had a gf and was bored funnily enough, with a cam apparently. If it was a bot it was advanced, as it responded to my reply correctly. "She" said she done a random search on an app and came across me. The person had 0 trophies. Has anyone came across anything like this on psn ?

[Liqu1d]

Saw something like that mentioned on Reddit, it was someone phishing for info. The account had no trophies, said the same thing about "I found you on the PS app" and then they asked "how old are you?" which exposed the fact that they were looking for DoB info.

If a 0 trophy account randomly starts asking about personal stuff then it's a phisher.

[cfc83]

Thanks. Their techniques were very poor. They're always going to catch someone out though.

[rainslacker]

Yeah, 1000 people may notice it immediately, but they only need to catch that one person. Same principal that nigerian prince uses.

[ILostMyMind]

I'm safe. Stupid things happen to stupid people.

[JackBNimble]

You're obviously not very smart if you believe that.

Just saying

[rainslacker]

I'm really smart. Used to work in IT security for an IT security company. Used to think that I knew how to protect myself fully. I had my identity stolen. Wasn't pleasant, and much more a problem than what is happening here for many reasons.

Now I am overly cautious to the point of being almost rediculous. I still don't feel safe, and go to extra efforts to protect my financial stability and overall well being.

Bad things happen to everyone, particularly those who think they're safe.

[agent13]

I have seen some of those hacker thieves who sell people's stolen accounts online what they do is disgusting they are monsters and the people who use those accounts are even worse. I wonder why sony doesn't do somthing to stop them. It's super easy to stop that they just have to make two step verification mandatory for every user.
so please set up 2 step verification for your account ASAP it take less than 5 minutes to do that/

[rainslacker]

Unfortunately, not everyone can use it because they may not have the appropriate device. There are other ways to do extra checks....for instance, just sending emails to the user when something major happens, and having them verify it, or at least giving them the chance to respond quickly. Other things I've seen come up more recently too, although I'm not sure if they're effective.

[RyanShutup]

This happened to me a few months ago, not sure how long my account was being used. I enabled two step authentication and whoever "bought" my account lost a lot of money. Scumbags

[DafunkyRebel]

Realize that when hackers try to get your information it's not thee password they are using because it takes too long to get your password. The real target is the server, once they crack the server they can steal all the information on the server without having to activate or log in to anybody's password. So essentially your passwords are useless

[Sm3000]

This is how I get to pay one time for a digital game and put it on my sons ps so we can play together

[OpenGL]

Glad Sony finally implemented 2-step verification. I have way too many games on my PSN account to risk it to a simple password.

[DarkZane]

Yeah, they said they've been using accounts from previous websites that were hacked since a lot of people are really dumb and use the same email and password everywhere.

If you use a unique email and password for PSN, then you're 100% safe unless you get phished.

They can't bruteforce your account because they need your email to login which they can only get via phishing or by using emails/passwords combos they got from another site that was breached.

You can also be smart and use the deactivate all function every 6 months yourself just to be safe. Hackers can't use it if it's already been used.

[Master of Unlocking]

Bunch of worthless POS punks who do that, I swear, if someone did that to me and i find him, I blow off his f*ckn knee caps and wrists.
"There, you got my games, now let's see how you play them with two stumps for hands."

[Dreadnort]

After reading that article, it seems some accounts were taken because uses stupidly used the PSN user and password on forums too. That just smacks of laziness on their part. i have always had a separate email and user/password I use for forums like here. It doesn't take 5 mins to create a google account, something throwaway. keep your important email, user and passwords separate its just common sense.

[PiNkFaIrYbOi]

And this is why I don't buy digital games. So if someone does hack into my account I won't lose much of anything.