Steam Effectively Acting as a Revenge site.

[aphfid]

I would request that those responsible at steam consider this post for truth and accuracy and honestly consider if there needs to be a change in Steam policy and in how Steam responds to exceptions, particularly in reference to the recent Lost Ark Scenario.

What is a revenge site?

A revenge site is a platform that allows one group of people to publish damaging information about others, without any verification or consequence. The revenge site refuses to remove any information and tells those at the effect that they must address their complaint to the poster. The poster is then free to extort in whatever way they choose as a price to have the information removed from the site.

While I support, in principal, the banning of botters and cheats, I don't support the haphazard damaging of reputations of people who have not cheated, and the subsequent extortion of personal information to have these bans removed.

The steam game banning system is owned, maintained and operated by Steam. Steam provides and promotes the functionality for publishers to ban players and tells those who are at the effect of this abuse that they must deal directly with their abuser. The abuser is then free to make whatever demands they choose, and the abused is left with the choice to give in to the demands of the abuser or be left with permanent damage to their reputation.

I am still hopeful that Steam might do the right thing and reverse this, so I have not as yet acceded to my blackmailers demands to have the ban removed from my account. My understanding, although it might be incorrect, is that to have the ban removed, I am required to set up an amazon account, provide additional personal information and link my steam account to my amazon account.

I don't currently have an amazon account, and do not want to set up an account with amazon. I can't help but wonder if not having an amazon account contributed towards the criteria leading to the ban being placed on my account. My two friends who played at the same time as me did not get banned, but they both have amazon accounts.

What makes this even more egregious than the typical revenge site is that Steam, unlike most revenge sites, play an extremely active role in this entrapment: They very actively promote the game on steam, invite players to try it out and then claim they have no responsibility when it is abused.

A significant portion of those affected by this ban have no understanding of the consequences of the ban. They think it just means that they won't be able to play "Lost Ark". They say so in their negative reviews and posts on steam forums and reddit - basically "who cares, I don't want to play lost ark anyway". These people wont be applying to amazon to have the ban lifted, and by the time they understand the impact of the ban, it will be too late for them to do anything about it.

I didn't initially understand the consequences either, and initially I didn't care. It wasn't until my friends expressed concern that it might stop us playing other games together in future that I bothered to look into the ban.

For most people what has happened is completely unfathomable. They know they haven't cheated. It has never even occurred to them to set up a bot so they can't imagine that there are any real consequences of this ban. My friends are in total disbelief that four days later I still have a ban on my account. I'm slower and have poorer keyboard reflexes than most players and my progress in this type of game reflects that. I am totally incapable of doing anything in any game that could in any way resemble "botting" unless being slow and pathetic is an indicator of being a bot.

Steams "hands off" attitude regarding the consequences of this ban is an irresponsible and extreme abuse of trust. It is also damaging to the integrity of the game ban system itself, and inviting willful abuse.

Steam should be rolling back these bans and putting the onus on Amazon to reapply the bans appropriately.

[Muppet among Puppets]

aphfid eredeti hozzászólása:

Steam should be rolling back these bans and putting the onus on Amazon to reapply the bans appropriately.

That is a valid point.

I found it concerning how the statement of the company that created the bans was like this:
"Because of increasing numbers of complains we bacame aware of a problem...... and ask affected people to write to us".

This is in two ways wrong, as if they accept a certain number to not be noticed before they "see a problem", and also to accept some numbers may stay anyway.

[Mailer]

Let me give this another gloss-over, actually...
So, presumably the following is your insufficient response:

From: https://steamcommunity.com/app/1599340/discussions/0/5946473955238608413/

All bans related to this incident have been reversed, both for the Lost Ark game and Steam accounts. Any ba(n)s or marks on your account will be removed without penalty shortly. If for any reason you have persisting issues, please reach out to [Customer Support](https://www.amazongames.com/en-us/support/lost-ark/contact-us). Thank you!

And contacting customer support via their link requires you to have an Amazon account. Fair enough, I can understand that this is a problem for you since the game only initially requires you to have a Steam account.

---

However, technically Amazon has been open about the role of an Amazon account since before the game came out, if you read the FAQ for Lost Ark:

From: https://www.playlostark.com/en-us/game/faq

WHY WOULD I LINK MY AMAZON ACCOUNT IF I DON'T NEED IT TO PLAY LOST ARK?

Linking your Amazon and Steam accounts gives you access to the game forums and allows us to authenticate your game account and provide customer support.

Therefore I wouldn't expect this condition to change, though I personally think that this is not the correct practice for having a customer support in general. IF you want your game ban removed though, I would consider biting the bullet and linking an Amazon account.

[ShelLuser]

Using big words and yet I get the impression that you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. In fact, I find your post hilarious.

"Their abuser" you say when talking about gaming hubs. But question: in order to get banned you first need to get noticed, and the only way to accomplish that is by participating in said gamehub.

Action = reaction. If the result of your own actions is a ban, then that's hardly abuse. In fact, it's the opposite: protecting themselves against player abusers.

OP... you do realize that your private profile doesn't block the community from reading your post history, right? ;)

What was that saying again.... "those who complain about moderators the most are usually the reason why we need those mods in the first place".

(edit)

And now I see this is about an in-game ban?

Even more hilarious... it's not Steam who bans players from games - unless it's a game from Valve -, Steam has absolutely nothing to do with other game developers / publishers banning players of any of that.

In my opinion OP is the kind of player who goes back to Gamehub to whine and complain and such about having bought a game there and the devs dared to ban them. Now Karen needs their money back because... otherwise... how dare they abuse her like that?!!!

Bans usually don't pop out of no where.

[aphfid]

Mailer eredeti hozzászólása:

There are many-a (pinned) threads about this matter that you are apparently glossing over:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1599340/discussions/0/5946473955238608413/

All bans related to this incident have been reversed, both for the Lost Ark game and Steam accounts. Any ba(n)s or marks on your account will be removed without penalty shortly. If for any reason you have persisting issues, please reach out to [Customer Support](https://www.amazongames.com/en-us/support/lost-ark/contact-us). Thank you!

Perhaps you ought to reach out to their customer support. And if you have, how exactly are they extorting you?

The particularly frustrating thing about these posts is that they aren't true but people believe them because an amazon representative posts them.

Most people still had steam bans on their accounts more than 24 hours after these posts were made.

There are many many more posts by people who have made as many as 6 requests to amazon and have yet to have the ban removed. Some are even changing their language to German, using google translate to translate their request into German because apparently that is the quickest way to get the ban removed.

Others have reported having to be particularly aggressive and persistent to get the bans removed.

I've explained the nature of the extortion - for personal information - in the OP. I suggest before being snide that you actually get some basic understanding of what is going on instead of pulling up one random, inaccurate post and posting it as if it is an accurate representation of what really happened.

Amazon's immediate response to this was to post everywhere that they'd fixed it. Emags and you-tubers picked up on those posts and repeated the message that it had been fixed. However, people were still freshly posting on forums that they were still banned and the bans were reflected in their accounts. Looking at the profiles of people who were posting on forums, most of them still had the bans on their accounts and they were mostly established accounts with a rating greater than zero.

[ShelLuser]

aphfid eredeti hozzászólása:

Amazon's immediate response to this was to post everywhere that they'd fixed it.

So... even though you realize that it's not Steam but Amazon's doing it's still Steam who is enabling a "revenge site"? Just for setting up a game store? ;)

Oh dear, oh dear....

[Zero, Dark Knight]

ShelLuser eredeti hozzászólása:

aphfid eredeti hozzászólása:

Amazon's immediate response to this was to post everywhere that they'd fixed it.

So... even though you realize that it's not Steam but Amazon's doing it's still Steam who is enabling a "revenge site"? Just for setting up a game store? ;)

Oh dear, oh dear....

Steam allowed a malicious actor to do something

and your answer is "but it's not Steams fault" ?

[aphfid]

Mailer eredeti hozzászólása:

Therefore I wouldn't expect this condition to change, though I personally think that this is not the correct practice for having a customer support in general. IF you want your game ban removed though, I would consider biting the bullet and linking an Amazon account. [/quote]]

bah i'm missing a bracket somewhere, i give up.

yep, learning lesson for me. i knew amazons reputation before i joined but some friends wanted me to play with them. i wont be doing that again, and I wont be trusting steam any more. i probably will end up doing the support thing because there's no telling how that might play out in future. but after that, i wont be buying or downloading any more steam games - not because i think it will impact steam in any way - just for my own safety - like i lock my front door when i leave the house. looks like i will be engaging with real life a lot more in future lol. and obviously, i'll steer clear of amazon and smilegate

[Mailer]

aphfid eredeti hozzászólása:

Mailer eredeti hozzászólása:

Therefore I wouldn't expect this condition to change, though I personally think that this is not the correct practice for having a customer support in general. IF you want your game ban removed though, I would consider biting the bullet and linking an Amazon account.

yep, learning lesson for me. i knew amazons reputation before i joined but some friends wanted me to play with them. i wont be doing that again, and I wont be trusting steam any more. i probably will end up doing the support thing because there's no telling how that might play out in future. but after that, i wont be buying or downloading any more steam games - not because i think it will impact steam in any way - just for my own safety - like i lock my front door when i leave the house. looks like i will be engaging with real life a lot more in future lol.

Well given your continued opinion of Amazon, I'm sure that simply un-linking your connection to your Amazon account, after the ban has been appealed, and then promptly terminating your Amazon account afterwards, shouldn't be an issue; and that you are able to carry on as normal after that; hopefully.

Also, please excuse my initial response for the current one instead. I simply did not give it enough time and thought to make it a fair one, and I apologize for that.

[J4MESOX4D]

aphfid eredeti hozzászólása:

Steam should be rolling back these bans and putting the onus on Amazon to reapply the bans appropriately

I'm not sure how complicated the back-end is for this to happen accurately and swiftly but I do think Valve should be aiming to get this rectified as quickly as possible whilst providing communication and assurances to affected users. They should be well over the heads of the developers by now instead of taking their usual backseat stance. I can understand the anxiety and frustration that a situation like this can bring to users especially when there's no sign of the bans being removed despite saying this will happen. If they can apply the bans so quickly then they sure as hell should be able to remove them just as fast.

Thankfully this situation has gone viral and will probably have a satisfactory conclusion but it just exposes the state of the game ban system and the mess that it can create in resolving false bans. I think visible Game Bans should now be reserved for cheating infractions only and it has to be a conclusive conviction either through 3rd party anti-cheat software or through other proven means. Valve stated that these bans should be 'consistent' with VAC bans but since they started awarding their own Game Bans for griefing and other differing things, it's allowed other devs to issue them for very minor and unrelated matters.

[aphfid]

Zero, Dark Knight eredeti hozzászólása:

ShelLuser eredeti hozzászólása:

So... even though you realize that it's not Steam but Amazon's doing it's still Steam who is enabling a "revenge site"? Just for setting up a game store? ;)

Oh dear, oh dear....

Steam allowed a malicious actor to do something

and your answer is "but it's not Steams fault" ?

yep, steam created, owns and maintains the platform that enabled it. steam invited people to play the game. steam publishes and propagates the misinformation. how can Steam not be jointly accountable? if it wasn't for steam it wouldn't matter, because the only impact would be not being able to play lost ark.

[Mailer]

J4MESOX4D eredeti hozzászólása:

aphfid eredeti hozzászólása:

Steam should be rolling back these bans and putting the onus on Amazon to reapply the bans appropriately

I'm not sure how complicated the back-end is for this to happen accurately and swiftly but I do think Valve should be aiming to get this rectified as quickly as possible whilst providing communication and assurances to affected users. They should be well over the heads of the developers by now instead of taking their usual backseat stance. I can understand the anxiety and frustration that a situation like this can bring to users especially when there's no sign of the bans being removed despite saying this will happen. If they can apply the bans so quickly then they sure as hell should be able to remove them just as fast.

Thankfully this situation has gone viral and will probably have a satisfactory conclusion but it just exposes the state of the game ban system and the mess that it can create in resolving false bans. I think visible Game Bans should now be reserved for cheating infractions only and it has to be a conclusive conviction either through 3rd party anti-cheat software or through other proven means. Valve stated that these bans should be 'consistent' with VAC bans but since they started awarding their own Game Bans for griefing and other differing things, it's allowed other devs to issue them for very minor and unrelated matters.

To be fair, nothing within the Steamworks documentation is explicitly encouraging companies like Amazon to use game bans in a blanket way that they did, in fact I would argue that some of the proposed "best practices" argue against doing what Amazon did: https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/anticheat

It probably did not occur to Valve that they would have to protect companies from themselves when granted this feature, though I'm sure that, if you really dig into this tidbit, there is a clause in the agreement somewhere that has you allowing any developer/publisher to do as they please with those tools, only upon playing their game.
Steam only provides the tools, as far as I see it, but I agree that this is an interesting case that might see some remediations.

[_galaxy]

I had this suggestion

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/10/6670425060414698563/

You can check the thread if you want, I got tired of answering the same pointless questions.

I wish we had a system like this because I do NOT trust developers. Steam let's anyone publishes games on steam, as long as it's not a "troll". Basically stuff like the infamous slaughtering grounds.

[_galaxy]

These days I just avoid pvp games. Not because of the flawed ban system, but because anticheat is always intrusive and without transparency, I can't trust developers to deal fairly with my private information.

[Nx Machina]

You already have a thread where you rant about Lost Ark, a game you claim you played.

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/0/3758850762506935410/

In fact you abandoned that thread and avoided answering posts:

Here is mine from that thread:

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/46DB-4CEC-F7E9-49E5

Game developers inform Valve when a disruptive player has been detected in their game, and Valve applies the game ban to the account.

>>>> The game developer is solely responsible for the decision to apply a game ban. Valve only enforces the game ban as instructed by the game developer. <<<<


Secondly Amazon admitted there was an error that triggered false bans and are removing said bans including instructing Valve to remove the game ban on the profile.

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1599340?emclan=103582791470226069&emgid=5251793712052809901

[ShelLuser]

Zero, Dark Knight eredeti hozzászólása:

ShelLuser eredeti hozzászólása:

So... even though you realize that it's not Steam but Amazon's doing it's still Steam who is enabling a "revenge site"? Just for setting up a game store? ;)

Oh dear, oh dear....

Steam allowed a malicious actor to do something

and your answer is "but it's not Steams fault" ?

It is indeed. Because "doing something" was something completely unrelated to Steam itself but more so this game. Steam doesn't have any say in that. As for your hollow "big companies baaaad" remark, just because a company is big doesn't mean nothing bad can't happen, that things can't get out of their control.

From what I can tell Amazon has made steps to sort the whole thing out, that's hardly a sign of being malicious. Puhlease.

I can understand people getting upset when they suddenly get banned from a game. But there's also something as overreacting and blowing up the ordeal into ridiculous proportions.

Lashing out like this only makes you look vindictive instead of someone looking for an actual solution to the problem.