McLMan
Afraid of the monkeys
To cut to the chase, everyone should please read this article about Steam security. Doing so could save you a headache I went through back in March.
With the release of Civ V there are a lot of people new to Steam. You can learn from my mistake(s). I would like to go on record and say that I am not a Steam hater. I was glad when I found out that Civ V would utilize it. That doesn't mean I believe Steam is perfect or that you couldn't run into problems. In my opinion taking the steps to verify your account should not be optional. At a minimum they should better advertise the account verification process.
Back in March my Steam account got hijacked. One of my Steam friends that I had been gaming with for several years (before Steam even) sent me a message that said "Found this link to get free steam games: www.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" Mistake #1 was that I wasn't suspicious enough. It was a bit out of character for this friend, but the url looked legit (thought it was for european steam), and I clicked on the link (mistake #2) The link took me to what looked exactly like the Steam Community page with the boxes for entering my username and password. I put in my information (mistake #3) and clicked ok. Nothing happened. I thought it was a dud so I went back to gaming. About 10 minutes later I got kicked from my game with a popup that basically said I can't be in 2 places at once and had been logged off. It was only after I tried to log back into Steam only to be told my password was incorrect that I realized that I had been phished in a chain of phishing. I had 2 other friends fall into the trap as well.
I got everything back by putting in a ticket at Steam Support with proofs of purchase (dates, .pdf's of receipts, etc.) It did take 6 days to get it resolved. The whole time I was worried that a hacker was using my account and I'd end up VAC banned from my games even after I got my Steam account back. Thankfully that didn't happen.
What I didn't realize was that all of that could have been avoided if I had verified my account. With a verified account the phisher couldn't change my password and secret question without access to my e-mail.
What I learned:
Steam is useful, but it's not perfect. Verify your account right now!
HOW DO I VERIFY MY EMAIL ADDRESS?
Verifying your email address with Steam is a simple process:
ON WINDOWS
ON MAC
With the release of Civ V there are a lot of people new to Steam. You can learn from my mistake(s). I would like to go on record and say that I am not a Steam hater. I was glad when I found out that Civ V would utilize it. That doesn't mean I believe Steam is perfect or that you couldn't run into problems. In my opinion taking the steps to verify your account should not be optional. At a minimum they should better advertise the account verification process.
Back in March my Steam account got hijacked. One of my Steam friends that I had been gaming with for several years (before Steam even) sent me a message that said "Found this link to get free steam games: www.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" Mistake #1 was that I wasn't suspicious enough. It was a bit out of character for this friend, but the url looked legit (thought it was for european steam), and I clicked on the link (mistake #2) The link took me to what looked exactly like the Steam Community page with the boxes for entering my username and password. I put in my information (mistake #3) and clicked ok. Nothing happened. I thought it was a dud so I went back to gaming. About 10 minutes later I got kicked from my game with a popup that basically said I can't be in 2 places at once and had been logged off. It was only after I tried to log back into Steam only to be told my password was incorrect that I realized that I had been phished in a chain of phishing. I had 2 other friends fall into the trap as well.
I got everything back by putting in a ticket at Steam Support with proofs of purchase (dates, .pdf's of receipts, etc.) It did take 6 days to get it resolved. The whole time I was worried that a hacker was using my account and I'd end up VAC banned from my games even after I got my Steam account back. Thankfully that didn't happen.
What I didn't realize was that all of that could have been avoided if I had verified my account. With a verified account the phisher couldn't change my password and secret question without access to my e-mail.
What I learned:
- Verify your account!
- Don't use the same password for Steam as your e-mail.
- Be suspicious of messages of free stuff from friends. There's no free lunch.
- If it's too good to be true it isn't true.
Steam is useful, but it's not perfect. Verify your account right now!
HOW DO I VERIFY MY EMAIL ADDRESS?
Verifying your email address with Steam is a simple process:
ON WINDOWS
- Right-click on the Steam icon in the System Tray and select Settings or press the Settings button in Steam's File menu.
- Click on the Verify email address button.
- Follow the on-screen instructions.
- You should then receive an email message from Steam Support.
- Click the unique link provided in this email message to finish verifying your email address. The web page which then launches will confirm your success.
ON MAC
- Open Steam and click on Steam > Preferences
- Click on the Verify email address button.
- Follow the on-screen instructions.
- You should then receive an email message from Steam Support.
- Click the unique link provided in this email message to finish verifying your email address. The web page which then launches will confirm your success.
