Pay to remove ban?

[DJ]

My friend's account got a ban request because of a friend that had mistakenly reported him for another friend that scammed him, so he message him telling that to talk to an admin about how it was a mistake about reporting him. So he was talking to some admin and gave him his account so that the admin could "remove the ban request" but he was told to go to discord and have a chat with a valve worker. Instead of getting his ban request removed he was told to pay 3000php so that the ban is removed which is alot.

Now here me out. His report was a mistake, He did not do the "crime", he does not have money, and struggling IRL. So my question is, why does he need to pay?

[Wolf Knight]

thats a scam, report the person that contacted him

accidently report means nothing, the account has to have broken rules for any action to be taken.
there are no pending bans, there is not steam admin, steam/valve does not talk to you over discord, nor do they demand any kind of payment to remove a ban. its a common scam tactic.

[ShelLuser]

It is indeed a scam but... have your friend report the person that contacted him and then move on. If you do it yourself while not having had any interaction with them it could be picked up as a false report.

But always think these things through: if people report you by mistake then that's their problem, not yours. There is such a thing as false reports...

[8ullfrog]

~ From Tito Shivan
-There's no such thing as Steam Admins.
-There's no such thing as duped items.
-There's no such things as pending bans.
-Steam Staff will NEVER ask you to handle items.
-Steam staff will Never contact you through chat or profile comments
Please report and block those users through their profile.
~ From cSg|mc-Hotsauce:
All steps...
Scan for malware. https://www.malwarebytes.com/
Deauthorize all devices https://store.steampowered.com/twofactor/manage
Change your password on a secure device.
Generate new back up codes. https://store.steampowered.com/twofactor/manage
Revoke the api key https://steamcommunity.com/dev/apikey
Make sure you follow these instructions TO THE LETTER or this will keep happening to you. And do not give out Passwords or Steam Guard Codes TO ANYONE. Steam/Valve Employees will NEVER ask for that information and NEVER threaten to ban you.

I used to have this spaced out nicer.

[McGillicutti]

Originally posted by 8ullfrog:

~ From Tito Shivan
-There's no such thing as Steam Admins.
-There's no such thing as duped items.
-There's no such things as pending bans.
-Steam Staff will NEVER ask you to handle items.
-Steam staff will Never contact you through chat or profile comments
Please report and block those users through their profile.
~ From cSg|mc-Hotsauce:
All steps...
Scan for malware. https://www.malwarebytes.com/
Deauthorize all devices https://store.steampowered.com/twofactor/manage
Change your password on a secure device.
Generate new back up codes. https://store.steampowered.com/twofactor/manage
Revoke the api key https://steamcommunity.com/dev/apikey
Make sure you follow these instructions TO THE LETTER or this will keep happening to you. And do not give out Passwords or Steam Guard Codes TO ANYONE. Steam/Valve Employees will NEVER ask for that information and NEVER threaten to ban you.

I used to have this spaced out nicer.

OP this is the best advice :)

[McGillicutti]

Originally posted by ShelLuser:

It is indeed a scam but... have your friend report the person that contacted him and then move on. If you do it yourself while not having had any interaction with them it could be picked up as a false report.

But always think these things through: if people report you by mistake then that's their problem, not yours. There is such a thing as false reports...

No!!!

Often the friend's account was compromised and that's why you got contacted in the first place.

You need to report and block both.

I had a friend of years suddenly contact me to tell me about how I was reported for trading items blah blah. Then wanted me to contact someone. Well I contacted the Mods I know on Steam and they explained it's a scam, proceeded to tell me to block and move on, and not just the one pretending to be a Steam Moderator, who wasn't, but also the friend in my friend's list as their account had been compromised.

I knew that in them not mentioning their brother and other things that I knew of them from before, ways to warm up a conversation and remind someone you haven't spoke to for maybe 2 or 3 years but remains on friends list if you happen to both be in same game again some time later.

I was suspicious from the beginning, asking them how I got blamed for what they did (realizing the person I knew wouldn't do that in the first place). It makes no sense, and in that yeah think it through when someone contacts you with this kind of claim, but beyond that recognize that's no longer your friend on the account if they'd tell you such a bogus story, and therefore it's time to report and block, along with who they told you to contact. Then move on knowing you didn't give anything away or make yourself available to be infected by some website or whatever they'd tell you all in stealing your account to go after the folks in your friends list knowing some amount of them will fall for this bogus story.

Good luck.

[جهنم]

Dont think that was an accident lolll

[nullable]

Will confirm, this is a very common scam. We see it asked about daily. It's basic social engineering and fear is a powerful motivator to get you to act against your own best interests. Case in point, "pay us money or you'll be banned." And unless a user is already wise, that's bound to get a rise out of them and enough people panic and start pressing whatever buttons they're told to resolve the situation and by the time they figure it out... too late.

Whenever fear or greed are being used to motivate you to do something, big red flag, take a step back it's almost certainly BS.

[GuRu Asaki]

VALVE does not contact people directly, & why would you
visit some other 3rd Party Platform for an issue that is
not even related to that Platform at all? Even more so,
why would anyone ask for money to resolve an issue like
this?

As the above has said, it's a Scammer...

All problems related to STEAM, such as Bans, will be settled
through a STEAM Report Section... Which you would contact
Valve first, & it is always Private between you & them, there is
never the case where 1 of them would be contacting you in a
manor you have written here in this Post...

[XORsum]

Oh man the big bad world online is much to dark and full of terrors for children :/