Discussion: New Security Update on NCsoft Master Accounts

So, i was in the same boat as you all. Frustrated with no answers via email from support in a fast manner. Void of answers on the forums that would atleast help me feel like i was being helped..

I honestly think calling them and actually talking to a human being is the best thing you can do... they are open 12-5 cst, and i didnt even have a wait time, as soon as i hit 1 it dialed for 3 seconds and i was connected to a live person at tech support.

All my issues have been resolved...

My Security question I don't remember after seven years. I can't login and now blocked.

You know a quick email saying We are change the way to login in a few weeks please update your security question would have solved this.

Sadly I think I had the question right the second time but the Capcha mess me up.

This is ********! I can't even cancel my ******* account, I guess this is how you desperate ******* maintain subs. I've notified support via e-maila nd notified Visa so piss off.

Well, I went through the support website and submitted tickets for both my wife and myself; they cleared the questions so we could update our accounts the same day.

Customer service did a fine job. I do feel sorry for them having to deal with the fallout from this rollout.

A big thank you to the CS reps that helped us out.

I have to admit this was ham fisted and seems like something done by people who are not only completely clueless but don't have any idea what a clue is.

So I'm betting it's the fault of corporate. I'm guessing it went down like this. Corporate insisted on a certain date for implementation of the NCsoft launcher. Before the launch happened the programmers found a huge security hole in the program. Something that could compromise more accounts than the Aion problem did. When they came to corporate and outright told them that release of the program in its current incarnation would probably result in at least 10% of their customer accounts being hacked they were told "Well, you're programmers. Fix it. You have till Tuesday."

Since there was no way the fix could be in before that date they used the brute force account security solution. Right now they are working on closing the security hole in the program and just watch your updater version number. Soon after the next update they will publicly apologize in the forums and roll back the overblown account security. They will say that they are allowing everybody to access their accounts with the old information and reset their own security questions. Plus they will drop the duplicate ip requirement.

This is all just a guess on my part of course but seriously this and the NCsoft launcher combo looks exactly like a decision made by a pointy haired boss.

Mmm...

At the moment I am extremely angry with this whole mess, while I remember my secret word, I am not sure howyou fill the date of birth and of course NCSOFT gives you no samples. if your day of birthday is a single number, do you put the single number or you preceed it with a 0? How about year, do you put the last 2 numbers or all 4?

And I totally hate entering those unreadable 60's drug induced psychodelic words, I simply can't read that! I have a medical condition, which has left me with the use of a single eye, and trying to read those blaster words is essentially impossible.

Stormy

Hm, well add me to the list of frustrated long-time customers. My question isn't one of those listed on the first post... I thought I knew the answer, but obviously not - because that was 7 freaking years ago.

At least I managed to rescue my emails and confirmations from an email address that was CLOSED since I don't even have the ISP any more, so I actually do have their communication but... Really NC? Really?

I don't have a long-distance carrier on my phone, so I can't even really call them. Plus, central standard means I'm 5 minutes out of their window by the time I realized I could even call.

My account expires in like 5 days? I *DON'T EVEN KNOW* because it WILL NOT TELL ME... Since I can't you know, LOG IN to find out OR give the timecard I bought to put on it.

Please Avatea and other mods? TELL NC that this was a BAD, BAD THING. They have royally screwed up, to players who have been with them from the START of this game. That's NOT a good way to thank us.

My email question has been sent and I have a confirmation for it, but I'm not going to hold my breath on a friday afternoon to get this resolved before my account lapses.

So yeah. Add this to the -rep file.

hey zeikran..i had the same problem last friday and also live in CST. i put in an email under "ask a question" last friday around 8pm cst and had a response via email to reset my account on saturday afternoon. Hope you have the same quick reply. All is not lost (hopefully)!!

Oh good, crossing my fingers then.

(edit later)
They got back to me, issue fixed.

I just wish that they'd sent out a "change this now, like right now" email.

And it was an Aion GM that I got my mail from, so they must be having this issue very, very pervasively.

I just got around to reading my e-mail and got back in. Fortunately, I remembered the fake birthday I gave them (whew!)

Both my brother and I had security questions that we know the answers to, and yet it keeps telling us they are incorrect. So much fun having to contact support about something I could access just fine (and have been able to since CoH launced) a few days ago.

I find it funny that they are doing this, but it is a good thing. at least its not as bad as Sony which made be choose a Childhood Hero, For some no big but when you had 20 it makes it harder.

Given the lack of any further redname responses in this thread, I presume the official position is "that's all your guys problem" to those who have had problems. I'm curious if that will also be the position if anyone misses out on the "loyalty" reward due to this SNAFU. Or does "loyalty" only go one way?

I contacted support with much (but not all) of the requested information and had the issue resolved within several hours. I wouldn't wait for NCsoft to magically resolve this on their end, just take a few minutes to track down as much of the info as you can from your inbox and contact support.

Well, it's been a while since I last checked.

I assume NC still has it's head up it's own 'secure' @$$ ?

or have they fixed this rubbish yet ?

And no, I haven't contacted customer support yet. I still can't think of a way to broach the subject with them without using the word "idiotic", probably many times. And I really don't want to give someone an ear-full over something which isn't their fault.

Also, call me some kind of dinosaur, but I'm at an age where I don't honestly remember what it's like to be asked for my hall pass, or to be expected to obediently submit to the every absurd whim of authority figures. I actually do kinda expect NCsoft to fix this on their end, without my jumping through hoops.

I'm not holding my breath though. When I eventually do feel like I can talk to customer support without telling them in detail that this whole thing is the stupidest thing I have ever had to put up with from any game company... I hope that they make fixing things a breeze. Because I know the credit card company has great customer service and is very easy to deal with for things like stop payments.

I guess my issue goes deeper than just the legally 'BS' situation of having my payment held hostage. It has something to do with simple respect for the customer. I'm not getting any sense of that in this mess. none.

Add to that the issue that this so called "security fix" is anything but secure. I mean, I (me, the suspected account thief) can log into my city of heroes account and sell everything right now if I wanted to... how the heck does that even make sense? And the (soon to be forced) move to a new patcher, which isn't working for some people. And the fact that I 'KNOW' I answered the security question correctly and that the problem is on NCsoft's end. I mean, after all these years, my IP is banned, because NCsoft screwed up. It's simply degraded my sense of confidence in NCsoft as a company. We're having this problem now, what other problems are in store for us? What about the guy on the previous page who's had to contact customer support 6 times now because he has a dynamic IP? How does any of these changes make even the slightest amount of sense? What kind of people can possibly approve business decisions like this? And if they're still running the asylum, do I even *want* to invest my time in games which they hold dominion over? If this is their idea of how internet security works, then do I want them to have on file a valid CC number with my name on it??

For sitting at the computer, frantically trying to think of what's entered incorrectly, while fighting with CAPTCHA at the same time... all so that I can just access my master account to BUY something... And getting my IP banned without warning. And being told on the support page that I need a ridiculous amount of information to fix it... Just the stress alone over this, p*sses me the F' off. And NCsoft should, at bear minimum, apologize for this garbage.

When you were little, and you had a toy. You might have let an older child play with it. But when you wanted to hold *your* toy again, imagine they refused, holding the toy over your head out of your reach, and saying that they didn't think it really was your toy, telling you to prove that it's yours. That's a frustrating experience. And it bears a lot in common with this so called security implementation. And once you did regain control over your toy, chances are, you wouldn't ever let that toy get within reach of that big kid again, right? That's the visceral emotional level sensation of this mess. I can't imagine a company creating a worse consumer experience if they tried.