Steam refunded and Blocked from Discussion

[Pekokopiko]

Yesterday i bought 2 games, Humanitz and Space Marine 2 on my alt account which i just created few days ago btw, just to play on Geforce Now and Boosteroid. I also bought 3 games on winter sales, Metro Exodus, Battlefield 1 and Story of Seasons: friend of mineral town.

But then i decided to refund 2 of those games, no issue whatsoever like usual.

But this morning i just got email on that account from steam that said my original refund request is already refunded (Humanitz & Space Marine 2).. BUT i also got an email that 3 of the game i bought on winter sales is also refunded which i didn't request for redund. AT ALL.

I checked my email etc, sure i got notification for Humanitz & Space Marine 2 refund request, but nothing at all about the rest.

And apparently that account is banned until 2038, it hasn't even create a community profile. Good job Steam.

No login email, no steam auth on email etc. the account only logged on my phone, tab and pc.

[Satoru]

Sounds like your account was hijacked and the attacker began liquidating your stuff

To prevent further damage support locked the entire account

Contact support to recover your account

[nullable]

Well nothing we can do here, what did you learn from a support ticket about the issue.

On the surface it sounds like there's more to the story. Games don't randomly get refunded, and accounts don't randomly get banned.

[Pekokopiko]

Publicado originalmente por Satoru:

Sounds like your account was hijacked and the attacker began liquidating your stuff

To prevent further damage support locked the entire account

Contact support to recover your account

I have access to that account no problem at all, it's just that it randomly got refunded without any notification on email at all.
I look at the request list or whatever, there's only request for Humanitz and Space Marine 2.

I already contact support about the issue but no respond so far

[Pekokopiko]

Publicado originalmente por nullable:

Well nothing we can do here, what did you learn from a support ticket about the issue.

On the surface it sounds like there's more to the story. Games don't randomly get refunded, and accounts don't randomly get banned.

Still no respond from Support.

I though my account got hacked so i checked my emails, but there's no login notification except mine when i logged into that steam a account... I checked the refund request list or whatever and there's only Humanitz and Space Marine 2 but nothing about the 3 game i bought on winter sale at all... I don't really care about banned from discussion since that account only used fro Geforce Now

[Pekokopiko]

Oh and that account apparently can't add phone number and steam guard at all.. the steam app always showed error code 73 or something

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

Oh and that account apparently can't add phone number and steam guard at all.. the steam app always showed error code 73 or something

A very specific reason for that...

What features are unavailable?

Limited user accounts are prevented from accessing several features on Steam, including but not limited to:

• Adding a phone number from some countries or under certain circumstances

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/71D3-35C2-AD96-AA3A

[Pekokopiko]

Publicado originalmente por cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

Oh and that account apparently can't add phone number and steam guard at all.. the steam app always showed error code 73 or something

A very specific reason for that...

What features are unavailable?

Limited user accounts are prevented from accessing several features on Steam, including but not limited to:

• Adding a phone number from some countries or under certain circumstances

https://help.steampowered.com/en/faqs/view/71D3-35C2-AD96-AA3A

:nkCool:

Thank god i got the answer for that.

Thank you mate

[Nx Machina]

The account is compromised and the person on the account refunded those 3 games and the account being banned means they played a game on the account with cheats enabled.

You need to figure out how you gave away all your account details.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

If you fell for scam such as vote for my team, you won something, I gifted you something, or whatever case may be to get you to login via link someone gave you, then you fell for phishing attack.

Another way attacker does is promoting, and showing up in search results as trading, or gambling sites with fake logins that they disguise very well.

The moment login to your account via attacker server they steal your login token session after you approved it, you wouldn't notice they got access, and you think you're login via their site without realizing it.

Now just note scammers will automatically close all tickets made to prevent you from seeking help from support, they refund anything they can from you, and spend all funds on market place sending themselves the money.

When have someone on your account to kicking them off, you have to revoke all devices, change password, and setup Steam guard.

[Pekokopiko]

Publicado originalmente por Nx Machina:

The account is compromised and the person on the account refunded those 3 games and the account being banned means they played a game on the account with cheats enabled.

You need to figure out how you gave away all your account details.

Then why i didn't get an refund request email? And refund ticket for it?

For banned no it doesn't, since it only blocked ON discussion forum until 2038

[Pekokopiko]

Publicado originalmente por Dr.Shadowds 🐉:

If you fell for scam such as vote for my team, you won something, I gifted you something, or whatever case may be to get you to login via link someone gave you, then you fell for phishing attack.

Another way attacker does is promoting, and showing up in search results as trading, or gambling sites with fake logins that they disguise very well.

The moment login to your account via attacker server they steal your login token session after you approved it, you wouldn't notice they got access, and you think you're login via their site without realizing it.

Now just note scammers will automatically close all tickets made to prevent you from seeking help from support, they refund anything they can from you, and spend all funds on market place sending themselves the money.

When have someone on your account to kicking them off, you have to revoke all devices, change password, and setup Steam guard.

That account never logged on anywhere except on steam app on my phone, my tablet & pc app.. the only website i ever logged on is Geforce Now. And my device wouldn't open random link except i disable some stuff for a few second to open those link.

And that account is logged on a clean PC, which i use only for work, so the only program in that PC is Steam App, Outlook, Office and Tor Browser, nothing else, hell even the gmail and phone number and visa card (which is a virtual card that need many confirmation and call from my bank to spend the money no matter how small the amount is) i used for that is all new since i'm paranoid like that

Even if they deleted the ticket i will still get an email tho, and the refund is sended to my card. And i already said, it's a brand new account that was made only for geforce now, so i'm pretty sure it can't access market at all.

I have 5 steam account for the past few years and never have i find this kind of issue, even when my account got hacked i would get the notification from email etc

[RiO]

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

Even if they deleted the ticket i will still get an email tho, and the refund is sended to my card. And i already said, it's a brand new account that was made only for geforce now, so i'm pretty sure it can't access market at all.

You can disable certain email notifications; not sure if this would be one of those.
Also - if they had access, they might've changed the registered email address.
Without Steamguard protecting you, they can just do that.
It's also possible that one of your devices on which you used both the Steam account and the email address, was targeted by infostealer malware or a RAT. In which case whoever did this would've had access to your email as well, and could just delete the notifications.

And no - refunds don't directly go to your card.
It's possible to request a refund into Steam wallet credit.

Which means the market -- which probably was accessible; as you purchased games on the account and thus at least would've spent enough money to open it up -- could've been used to convert that wallet credit into valuable virtual items. Items which would then be traded away through several mule accounts for collection and obfuscation / plausible deniability, before landing in an account that actually puts them to work. E.g. as future rewards to be consumed on illegitimate and malicious item betting sites, looking to trap more user accounts.

[Liquid Inc]

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

That account never logged on anywhere except on steam app on my phone, my tablet & pc app.. the only website i ever logged on is Geforce Now. And my device wouldn't open random link except i disable some stuff for a few second to open those link.

And your phone is clean? Your tablet clean? Your PC clean?

GeForce Now should be clean, but it's clear thats not the only website you've used. Email sites often have adverts blasted all over them, among the many other sites that do.

The next bit is quite.. questionable. What you mean by "except i disable some stuff for a few second to open those link"? Please don't tell us your disabling your antivirus to access a site it's blocked...........
I know that seems silly but people really do this without even thinking about it.

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

And that account is logged on a clean PC, which i use only for work, so the only program in that PC is Steam App, Outlook, Office and Tor Browser, nothing else, hell even the gmail and phone number and visa card (which is a virtual card that need many confirmation and call from my bank to spend the money no matter how small the amount is) i used for that is all new since i'm paranoid like that

Work PC's are often vectors for attack. Is this a shared work PC? Does it open Emails and documents from colleges? Both of which are reliant on the other having a clean PC.

You might be good, but Barry the idiot who watches porn on his phone all night might not be, and emails received from them may carry any viruses to you in documents, pictures, video's etc..
Viruses can be embedded into pictures, so when the picture is loaded, so is the virus. (Scary, right?)

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

Even if they deleted the ticket i will still get an email tho, and the refund is sended to my card. And i already said, it's a brand new account that was made only for geforce now, so i'm pretty sure it can't access market at all.

Not if they have access to the email... They'd delete that when they use it.

Refund's can be sent to your card, but also to your wallet, and since you have bought games, the marketplace where hijackers can spend wallet credit is open.

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

I have 5 steam account for the past few years and never have i find this kind of issue, even when my account got hacked i would get the notification from email etc

Things move on, and if a hijacker has access to the email, they'll delete it. In your previous experiences, the hijacker most likely didn't have access to your emails, so could not delete it.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

Publicado originalmente por Dr.Shadowds 🐉:

If you fell for scam such as vote for my team, you won something, I gifted you something, or whatever case may be to get you to login via link someone gave you, then you fell for phishing attack.

Another way attacker does is promoting, and showing up in search results as trading, or gambling sites with fake logins that they disguise very well.

The moment login to your account via attacker server they steal your login token session after you approved it, you wouldn't notice they got access, and you think you're login via their site without realizing it.

Now just note scammers will automatically close all tickets made to prevent you from seeking help from support, they refund anything they can from you, and spend all funds on market place sending themselves the money.

When have someone on your account to kicking them off, you have to revoke all devices, change password, and setup Steam guard.

That account never logged on anywhere except on steam app on my phone, my tablet & pc app.. the only website i ever logged on is Geforce Now. And my device wouldn't open random link except i disable some stuff for a few second to open those link.

And that account is logged on a clean PC, which i use only for work, so the only program in that PC is Steam App, Outlook, Office and Tor Browser, nothing else, hell even the gmail and phone number and visa card (which is a virtual card that need many confirmation and call from my bank to spend the money no matter how small the amount is) i used for that is all new since i'm paranoid like that

Even if they deleted the ticket i will still get an email tho, and the refund is sended to my card. And i already said, it's a brand new account that was made only for geforce now, so i'm pretty sure it can't access market at all.

I have 5 steam account for the past few years and never have i find this kind of issue, even when my account got hacked i would get the notification from email etc

I can't say personally what you do exactly, when, or how if you got any of your accounts, or email compromise, as we can only assume from the most common attacks methods for how it happens. Just to be clear this is a user forum.

Your tickets don't get deleted, they remain with you for over a month, but thing is what they do is they close the ticket, which meant no longer need support, or cancel choice of whatever action such as refund, and when that happens, support won't see, or reply to it.

Now when doing refunds you're offer two options if you paid by external payment method either refund back how you paid exactly, or refund to your Steam wallet, and often scammers will change this to refund to steam wallet to try use on market place. Please note they may edit tickets have open as well such as refunds. Anyways you can always view all your open/closed tickets within past couple months by going to support page, then click on "View my Steam Support help requests" from there you see all your tickets.

Yes any ticket you make you will get an email, and if support reply you get email for that as well.



Now for account getting hacked it very unlikely because most scammers don't bother trying to brute force due to 2FA, and having to guess correctly your password, before getting cooldown on their IP address after 5 fail attempts, and if they manage to get it correct yes you get email, or notification on your app. That why it's way easier for them to use phishing attack, this came happen in DMs, emails, search results manipulation, and people promoting scam site to trick people by doing it this way, there is no 2nd notification after the 1st one when you login because that when they get the access is on your 1st notification when you login that how phishing works.

[Pekokopiko]

Publicado originalmente por Liquid Inc:

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

That account never logged on anywhere except on steam app on my phone, my tablet & pc app.. the only website i ever logged on is Geforce Now. And my device wouldn't open random link except i disable some stuff for a few second to open those link.

And your phone is clean? Your tablet clean? Your PC clean?

GeForce Now should be clean, but it's clear thats not the only website you've used. Email sites often have adverts blasted all over them, among the many other sites that do.

The next bit is quite.. questionable. What you mean by "except i disable some stuff for a few second to open those link"? Please don't tell us your disabling your antivirus to access a site it's blocked...........
I know that seems silly but people really do this without even thinking about it.

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

And that account is logged on a clean PC, which i use only for work, so the only program in that PC is Steam App, Outlook, Office and Tor Browser, nothing else, hell even the gmail and phone number and visa card (which is a virtual card that need many confirmation and call from my bank to spend the money no matter how small the amount is) i used for that is all new since i'm paranoid like that

Work PC's are often vectors for attack. Is this a shared work PC? Does it open Emails and documents from colleges? Both of which are reliant on the other having a clean PC.

You might be good, but Barry the idiot who watches porn on his phone all night might not be, and emails received from them may carry any viruses to you in documents, pictures, video's etc..
Viruses can be embedded into pictures, so when the picture is loaded, so is the virus. (Scary, right?)

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

Even if they deleted the ticket i will still get an email tho, and the refund is sended to my card. And i already said, it's a brand new account that was made only for geforce now, so i'm pretty sure it can't access market at all.

Not if they have access to the email... They'd delete that when they use it.

Refund's can be sent to your card, but also to your wallet, and since you have bought games, the marketplace where hijackers can spend wallet credit is open.

Publicado originalmente por Pekokopiko:

I have 5 steam account for the past few years and never have i find this kind of issue, even when my account got hacked i would get the notification from email etc

Things move on, and if a hijacker has access to the email, they'll delete it. In your previous experiences, the hijacker most likely didn't have access to your emails, so could not delete it.

Yes, the phone is clean since it's formated old phone with nothing on it, the tablet is clean since it is brand new and the pc is clean since i use it especially for works so there's no programs even the browser i use is Tor.

And if you didn't read when i already wrote it, the gmail is clean since it is brand new email created on winter sales and for geforce now