Beware My Friends

[Grizwold]

I realize that all of you ppl. are very security concious but i'm gonna post this anyway. I also am very security concious but 2 days ago I received an email from xbox live telling me to pick my free avatar that was my bonus for starting an xbox live acct. Funny thing is i have never opened an xbox live acct. in my life!! Needless to say, this set me to investigating the situation. I resoved the issue with microsoft & continued my search for issues. To make a long story short I found that my bank acct. had been hacked along with several other accts(wally world, newegg & blizzard to name a few.
I have spent the last 2 days getting new credit cards & changing passwords & login info. I think it is finally under control.
I run Norton 360 on high security settings along with all of microsoft's security programs also on high security along with several 3rd party malware & spyware programs. I run deep scans daily.
I still don't know exactly who hacked me & probably never will but i posted this to remind you all to be super vigilant with your security! Check frequently & don't let ANYTHING unusual get by you. In this day & age many more ppl. of all ages have the knowledge to create viruses & malware.
I guess I have raved long enough but being hacked is not a pleasant experience & I don't want to see any of you have to deal with what I have the last couple of days.............Griz.

p.s. one thing to watch for is any charges to you cc's or checking accts. in small amts. like $.99 or $1.04(which was the amt. xbox live charged me). If those transactions go through they wait a few days & clean you out!! Sorry for the length of this post. Hope I didn't break any rules!

[Sir-diealot]

Thank you for the info.

[Grizwold]

You are very welcome Sir!

[Nicoaran]

OK, who forgot to feed the forum last night? It just ate my post to Grizwold. So instead of typing the whole thing out I'll paraphrase:

Grizwold, as a fellow WoW hacked account survivor. I'll recommend thishttp://us.blizzard.com/store/details.xml?id=1100000822. I thought people were nuts for having one of these, but my account was hacked while my subscription was under an expired status, and after arguing with Blizzard for months to finally convince them it wasn't me. This was the first purchase I made and linked it to my account. As you'll notice they push the "Buy from the Blizzard Store: angle, but you'll notice There's an app for smart phones also, which is what I use. On my Crackberry it cost me $1.99 to install, on my new droid phone it was a free app. Not saying yo NEED to get this, but as someone who had q WoW account hacked. I recommend it. Not sure if anyone else out there uses it or not. I'd like to hear other people's opinions on what they do to secure their accounts.

Nicoaran

[Grizwold]

Thanks for the advice Nic. I'd love to be able to use one of them but i live in an area with NO cell service. I have a very nice Nokia that serves as an expensive paperweight so that item would be of no use to me. 

[Monkey_Grill]

I purchased the actual Authenticator a while ago for the extra security it provides. It's great how cheap they are, only about $7.

[Nicoaran]

Right, Grill. I was actually surprised at the price also. I remember thinking how crazy Blizzard was when they were introduced. After being hacked, I wish I would have bought one years ago.