Do you remember when Steam Trading was updated to include escrow periods? Valve have apparently been receiving no end of complaints regarding this, and so they have elaborated further with staggering facts.
The big bombshell: 77,000 of Steam accounts get hijacked and pillaged each month. In fact, account theft has risen 20 percent since they introduced Steam Trading. For Valve to restore these accounts also means having to duplicate items, which can create serious issues with devaluing rate items.
Valve also addresses the knee jerk conclusion most gamers would point to. It’s not newbies that are hit the most and most frequently. The hackers are attacking heavily invested users, including item traders, their own CS:GO eSports players, redditors. Hackers are also willing to wait months to access accounts for the big payoff.
But then, who even is safe? Here’s how Valve puts it:
First, enough money now moves around the system that stealing virtual Steam goods has become a real business for skilled hackers. Second, practically every active Steam account is now involved in the economy, via items or trading cards, with enough value to be worth a hacker’s time. Essentially all Steam accounts are now targets.
If you still have problems with the escrow system, you can rest easy about that. Valve knows this, and so they have already made changes. The waiting period has been cut to a day if you’re Steam Friends with the other party for more than a year now. The three day waiting period also only applies now if the person trading away his or her item doesn’t have the Authenticator. Lastly, new devices added to an authenticated account don’t have to wait seven days to be allowed into it.
How do you feel about Steam’s new trading policies now? Do you think this could be why they now allow you to remove games from your library too? Share your thoughts with us in the comments.
