Being told to let a hacker in?

#5 - Sept. 19, 2013, 11:06 p.m.

gregschlueter.6394:

I sent a email to Arenanet telling them someone from an IP address in china tried to log into my account. Was asking if there was a way they can block that IP from there servers because they have to be using a program to hack so I am most likely not the only one they hit. I was clear in my wording and even said that that was not me. what I was sent in return was this.

Hello,

Thank you for contacting Guild Wars 2 Support Team.

When you receive an e-mail indicating that someone is attempting to log in to your account, you can Allow Access, Deny Access, or Remember this Network.

- If you choose Deny Access, access to your account will be blocked.
- If you choose Allow Access, access will be granted on a one-time basis.
- If you choose Remember this Network, you will receive an e-mail only when a log-in attempt is made from a new IP address.

So, please choose Remember this Network and click on the check box.

They are telling me to let the hacker in? Do they not read the emails they get?
Had I not known better I may have done that.

So can they block an IP? I can really care less about my account here I don’t play it and have no plans to again was just trying to help other gamers that do value there GW2 account.

Please ask to have your ticket reviewed by a supervisor, and please provide me with the 12-digit ticket number here. I’d like to review this situation.

#10 - Sept. 20, 2013, 7:13 p.m.

I also am confused about the response you received. I would have said straight out that your best option is “Deny access” in this case, because you knew it wasn’t you trying to log in from China.

I’m checking to see what our intentions are with the verbiage you were sent, because we may be able to make it clearer or perhaps someone misspoke in adding a line that wasn’t appropriate. For instance, perhaps there were two options: "Do not accept this access request (aka “deny access”)" and then maybe it’s “remember my network” so you don’t authenticate my own network in the future. I just don’t think that’s it, though, so that’s why I’m checking.

Anyway, if a player gets one of these emails and feels that if there’s any doubt, just Deny Access!" The other day, I got an authentication request from a city quite a distance away. I accepted it. Why? Because I had just tried to log in and I knew the authentication email was coming and because I know my provider uses a variety of IPs that don’t always mirror my exact location.

If you weren’t trying to access, or you were in the game when the email arrived, deny!

#11 - Sept. 20, 2013, 7:16 p.m.

Oh and btw, I can see that a second agent gave you solid advice about this, which is good. I’ll follow up on that first response.

Update: I discussed this with the team and here’s some info: When a new IP address accesses an account and e-mail authentication is enabled, the log-in attempt is blocked and an e-mail is sent to the address to ask the owner if he or she wants to allow access from that network or not. The player can allow or block, but there’s a checkbox near the bottom right that says, “Remember this Network” so that future log-in attempts from the same IP address will not cause the player to receive an e-mail and instead immediately will allow access to the account from that “remembered” IP. Since the player is clicking the link in the e-mail, the “remembering” comment is referencing the IP address that just tried to access the account.

Which means you were not given a good reply, and we will do our best to make sure that doesn’t happen again.

Thank you for pointing it out. If you have any concerns about your acccount, for instance, if you’re worried about security in light of this, feel free to contact Support by filing a ticket through the “Ask a Question” tab on that linked page. I believe you declined to accept that shady IP, in which case you’re fine. Still, if you got that email you should change your password and consider changing your log-in address (Account Name) if you desire. Support can help you with either or both.