Banned for no reason

[Hyve]

Fact #3651: Blizzard Bans

Blizzard Entertainment, the operatives of the popular MMORPG title World of Warcraft do not have a ban lottery, where they pick a total stranger doing perfectly legitimate tasks and ban them. All bans are reviewed seriously, and are often easily appealed in the very rare event that it was a genuine mistake.

Recent surveys conducted by Hyve has revealed that in 99.64% of cases, individuals who claim to have been banned unfairly fall into one of these categories:

1) Trolling - Their account was not recently banned, and just wish to start a shit storm about the apprent poor Blizzard Support Team.

2) Liars - Their account was recently banned, but they've failed to provide all the details, such as that 50,000 gold they bought two weeks prior to their ban.

[TJ]

72 hour ban. Just be less repetitive with farming. Lesson learned.

Lesson learned, don't play the game how you want because Blizzard are too lazy to spot obvious bots.

[Orange Joe]

Lesson learned, don't play the game how you want because Blizzard are too lazy to spot obvious bots.

I play how I want and never get banned.


My playing doesn't involve bots though

[underdogba]

Also before you call something fantasy, again go read the forums. Multiple people have testified to having it happen to them while observing their bots. *shrug*

Multiple people have also reported being taken against their will onto spacecraft by extraterrestrials that performed medical experiments on them.

[Vash The Stampede]

Not saying that the original poster wasn't botting or doing something scrupulous, but that ban system is the reason why I don't go Linux on my PC. That and performance reasons, as WoW doesn't fly on my machine during a 25m raid. I'd hate to be play WoW through Wine in Linux and be banned cause Linux flagged their system.

Which makes me wish they made a native Linux client for WoW.

[Normie]

Fishy? You do realize that their policy of permabanning accounts for certain behaviors is specifically so they can shut down compromised accounts, right? That's why they reverse the ban when you contact them.

Right. If OP had being doing nothing "wrong" at all, the ban would have gone away, not become a 3 day ban.

So, OP, don't do it again, because they can tell you're doing it.

---------- Post added 2013-06-19 at 12:13 PM ----------

So many people in this thread still beliving Blizzard never bans innocent players.

Blizzard bans innocent people, whose accounts and/or computers have been compromised, all the time.

Blizzard occasionally bans innocent people who were doing something that caught the "eye" of automated checks for suspicious activity.

Blizzard almost invariably unbans innocent people when they call or email.

[Viscoe]

Lesson learned, don't play the game how you want because Blizzard are too lazy to spot obvious bots.

Back during Cata, I would farm whiptail in Uldum alongside bots for hours, and I reported them for botting. A good chunk of them got banned, the rest fled the server (because they got ripped apart in trade and no one would buy their shit) and, funny enough, I never got banned. Because I didn't bot. Even though I was following the same paths, farming the same items at the same hours.

So play how you want, just don't do it illegally. :P

[Deleted]

Battleground bot: no action
Leveling of an alt: ban

[Nevor]

Farming 4-5 hours using the same path people probably reported you. Many bans these days happen due to reports.

blizzard is not banning people without checking them out extensively.
why would they? they really need the money and account numbers...

if you were reported for bot-farming they will flag you and sometimes check what your char is doing when you are online.
if you behave like a bot then... e.g. not responding to a gm but still continuing to collect herbs or behave like a bot after they ported you somewhere else you get banned.

and i seriously doubt you were banned for no reason.
doesn't have to be the farming you mentioned, though...


i farm a lot... get many whispers of other herb farmers cursing me and telling me they sent a ticket... i never got any ban whatsoever for it

[Anathema]

blizzard is not banning people without checking them out extensively.
why would they? they really need the money and account numbers...

if you were reported for bot-farming they will flag you and sometimes check what your char is doing when you are online.
if you behave like a bot then... e.g. not responding to a gm but still continuing to collect herbs or behave like a bot after they ported you somewhere else you get banned.

and i seriously doubt you were banned for no reason.
doesn't have to be the farming you mentioned, though...


i farm a lot... get many whispers of other herb farmers cursing me and telling me they sent a ticket... i never got any ban whatsoever for it

man, i do the same thing. The only time i've ever had a blizzard rep even mention it to me was during LK, I marathoned 32 hours over the space of 3 days, straight farming in ICC and sholozar; a bunch of people whispered me claiming to report me, i ignored them like usual, then I got this random tell from a level 1 "Are you there?", when i responded, i got an instant "A GM would like to speak to you" message, and they informed me they were just checking up on me because they'd gotten reports. When they realized i wasn't botting, and I explained I'd just been farming while watching 6 straight seasons of weeds (terrible show, btw) they wished me luck. Haven't spoken to one since.

*wipes a tear* good times.

[Deleted]

Makes a game where u have to farm like nuts.

Bans people who farm like nuts.

[Maconi]

Plenty of people have had botting programs detected by Warden. Just because some of the newer bots are not currently detected does not mean that they cannot be detected. The botting community is obviously not a good source for information on whether bots are detected or not.

Of course the botting community is going to say that their bots are undetected -- that's how they make money (whether it be via donations or purchasing the programs). Then, a few months down the line, Blizzard bans thousands of people at once and a new wave of bot programs are created and released.

It's the same old arms race that Blizzard has been dealing with since the beginning. They find bots, program in detection for them, new bots come out, new detections. Blizzard has to be constantly playing catchup, but catch up they eventually do and anyone still using those now-detected bots are inevitably banned.

This is the exact same thing that happens with a lot of the popular games on the market. Look at Valve and their anti-cheat program. It pretty much exactly parallels the way Warden is updated. Someone will release a new cheat and say, "Hey guys, I figured out a way to prevent this cheat from being detected, enjoy!" Everyone downloads it and a few months later, they start getting banned.

I mean, use some common sense here: Blizzard has just as much access to those bot programs as you and I do. A good number of those bot programs also come with source code so that people can modify them for their own purposes. Do you honestly think that Blizzard cannot implement detection for bot programs that they have the source code for? Are you really that ignorant?

There's really not much more I can say on the subject without breaking the rules. A certain bot has been around for years and has had very little issues with detection. Without going into more detail all I can offer is anecdotal evidence which is worthless so I guess that's that.

Warden can detect third party programs int he background, and I doubt they would issue a ban without such evidence.

Warden can only scan for programs that are actively attempting to modify WoW. It's illegal for them to constantly scan your entire PC (privacy issues) for bot programs. It only checks the memory area around the WoW program while it's active.

Point-in-case, you can run any macro program such as Auto-It or AutoHotKey without issue (as long as you're not spamming WoW with commands which they could see in the logs) because it's not attempting to attach itself to the WoW program.

Gathering is the main thing Blizzard bans for right now. The bot forums are plagued with bans for people who use them to gather, but not those who use them for raids/dungeons/etc. Either it's easier for them to monitor the main world vs instances or they're just more worried about gathering since that affects the economy more. They've also been banning a lot of people who use bots to level, which once again could either mean it's easier for them to monitor the main world or they're just trying to keep the bot numbers down for the economy's sake (since obviously the bots that were banned for gathering would need to lvl back up to gather again, so Blizzard intercepts them before they get to that point).

[Methusula]

So I was playing wow normally a couple hours ago on an alt, when I got disconnected. Upon trying to log in, I was told that my account had been banned. I also got an email saying I was using bots/third-party. I opened up a ticket telling them that I was not using any bots, and that there just have been a mistake. It was replied to a few hours later, telling me that upon investigating further, that I was using bots, but the permanent ban was made to a 72 hour suspension. Thing is, I honestly wasn't using anything (not intentionally anyway). Are there certain programs that can flag an account as using a bot etc? I am currently using MSE and malwarebytes as antivirus, and don't remember downloading anything suspicious lately. Will blizzard tell me what the offending program was if I ask? I wouldn't want the same thing happen and end up perm-banned just because its still on my system not doing anything.

And here's the reply I got for the ticket:
Thank you for your follow-up contact. I took the time to do an additional thorough review of the account in question. While previously we had communicated the World of Warcraft account <snip> on <snip> has been closed, in light of my findings, we have changed the action to a 72 hour suspension, final warning on the account.

The reason the action was put in place is because we verified, after multiple reviews, that exploitive behavoirs were exhibited on this account. While we understand that you may disagree with some of the policies or conditions, the bottom line is that they allow us to maintain a fun and safe game environment for all players.

I hope this has resolved any concerns you may have had on this matter. Please let us know if we can be of further assistance.

You should consider yourself lucky if it was changed to a 72 hour ban.

I got banned right before MoP hit for "use of third party cheats or hacks". I never used any such thing and upon further review the perma-ban was upheld. I kept emailing them and calling to get it overturned or more info on what it was they thought I did, but they gave me nothing, ultimately brushing me off saying they consider the matter closed and no further inquiries into the matter would be responded to. Felt bad. Still feels bad.

[Odina]

The thing with this is it could be as simple as a programable keyboard with a set macro in it that flagged you and then you would be thinking "I didn't DL any programs or run any program at all that would get me banned". However any automation would be considered botting. Soon after I got my corsair K90 I realized that the programable keys could get me banned if I used them in game. Sucks as it's a good part of why many would buy a keyboard with those keys but you got to play by the rules and ignorance is not an excuse when it comes to breaking the rules!

[Normie]

"Farming without breaks for 18 hours" is not exploitative behavior. It MIGHT get you banned because some automated process is looking for players with behaviors that are typical of people using automation or other forbidden software. However, if you protest the ban and Blizzard has no actual evidence, you will be unbanned with no penalty. Basically, these bans are done to "troll" players who might be violating the rules into proving that they are humans. "Evidence" would generally be that you were reported by Blizzard's "Warden" program.

The same thing can happen if you make large gold transactions that are way out of character relative to your normal activities.

These are basically preventive bans that are not intended to punish a player for farming too hard or making too much gold, but to stop suspicious/exploitative activity on an account that may have been compromised.

[rated]

How many threads have been posted on this forum saying the exact same thing "I got banned for no reason and I'm innocent !!". Every single one of those threads only shows one side of the story and every single person who started said thread should be calling blizzard directly, not posting about it on mmo champ.

[Methusula]

How many threads have been posted on this forum saying the exact same thing "I got banned for no reason and I'm innocent !!". Every single one of those threads only shows one side of the story and every single person who started said thread should be calling blizzard directly, not posting about it on mmo champ.

That's the typical nonsense I see in these threads. There's always someone who either doesn't believe someone could be wrongfully banned or actually thinks they didn't do all they could to get it reversed. Very shortsighted.

[Ronduwil]

How many threads have been posted on this forum saying the exact same thing "I got banned for no reason and I'm innocent !!". Every single one of those threads only shows one side of the story and every single person who started said thread should be calling blizzard directly, not posting about it on mmo champ.

What you fail to realize is that they're actually complaining that their account was hacked by the infamous player who cleverly goes by the handle, "no reason," and they're trying to warn their fellow players to steer clear of this sketchy character. Ignore their warnings at your own peril. Remember, if you ever receive an e-mail from someone named "no reason" delete it on sight!

[KCguy]

I don't believe they have any support for this sort of thing if you call them. They can only deal with transfers and things of that nature. So, if you did call, they would just say to make another ticket.

[Methusula]

From what I understand, Blizz is pretty good at detecting Bot like behavior. I don't think they banned you for no reason. I also don't think they banned you for farming a bunch of stuff in a short amount of time. I say this because I farm herbs everyday, in the same spot, for about the same amount of time. I have never had any problems.

Blizz takes botting seriously. They don't just throw around bans for no reason, and I don't think they half ass their investigation into a possible bot.

You'd of course, be wrong.

You do have an entertainingly naive view of the situation though. The ban process is automated. There are many false positives. The appeals process is looked at by someone who is making crap money to hear the same thing over and over again. People who were correctly banned usually still appeal so my confidence in how thoroughly they research appeals is not very high.

In my case, I got an unusually quick response to my ticket saying that the finding was upheld. It was only a few hours after I submitted the ticket. I felt like I was just being dismissed and cast aside.

Sure it's easy to come to the forums and lie through your teeth about being banned, but why? You aren't going to get any sympathy, and there is zero chance of getting your account back.

There is also very likely a small percentage of people who were banned who are simply ignorant to the violation they committed. I would say then that maybe Blizzard needs to do a better job of informing them of what the transgression was that necessitated the ban. Those people would likely still be upset, but at least they could be at peace with the situation and at the same time less likely to repeat the violation. Ultimately it is the user's responsibility to know EULA, but there could be more done on blizzard's end as well.

Finally, there is a small percentage of people who legitimately did nothing wrong and for one reason or another generated a false positive with the automated system. It could be large sums of gold in the mail, unusual farming activity, or a host of other things.

In the end, it just seems to me like someone would have a lot more motivation to get the word out and to vent and feel justified in their frustration if they really were innocent of any violation. It's just a lot easier to doubt someone on the internet even if they seem sincere and legit.