thiefMicrosoft issued a warning to MMO developers saying to watch out for hackers and criminals. Usually malware program is installed on a computer, for stealing account information from games such as World of Warcraft. Then they sell your hard earned gold and everything else for real money.

Microsoft security development engineer Dave Weinstein said at the company’s Gamefest conference:

“Those of you who are working on massively multiplayer online games, organized crime is already looking at you,”

He also mentioned that accounts are already sold on the black market, next to stolen credit cards and passports, some WoW accounts selling for over $10,000.

“For a lot of the customers out there, there is more store value on their MMO characters than there is on the credit card with which they pay for the account,”

“The police are really good at understanding someone stole my credit card and ran up a lot of money. It’s a lot harder to get them to buy into ’someone stole my magic sword.”

It’s far too common for players to sell their accounts; they might have spent countless hours making the perfect character, and then lose interest in the game. However, selling your account is not allowed in almost any game, online and offline.

Tags: News