Why Security Is Often an Afterthought on Video Game Websites

[Guest]

Video game websites need to up their data security, says expert, or it’s the gamers who will be paying the price.

Why Security Is Often an Afterthought on Video Game Websites : Read more

 

[John Bauer]

Yunno what pisses me off the most about this? When companies have a password LIMIT. Like Origin has a 8 or so character limit. It makes me feel insecure, EA. But do they care? Probably not.

 

[g-thor]

My question is, are they that lax in the security for their game code? If they aren't, if they aggressively protect their coding, then why don't they protect our information as diligently?

And I think the article answers that question - the bar has been low [in terms of security] at these companies. They protect their information because it generates money, but why bother with the individual's security - we don't get paid for that. However, loose enough customer info and you will loose your audience.

 

[matthew_nicho2]

Their code is their property and don't want it stolen/abused, user info on the other hand isn't theirs so they seemingly don't give a crap. You bought their product and are using their service, money in their pocket; that's all that matters to them.

Once your there they have you and you have no choice but to use their service.

 

[KelvinTy]

You lost me at "they are thinking gaming experience"...
On the security side, when you are "big" enough, you have already painted a target on your back, with making money the no.1 too 100 priority, they would not fix something that ain't broken. Therefore, hacked then security, hacked again, then security fix.

 

[gm0n3y]

@John Bauer,

I was going to complain about this as well. My normal passwords are usually 12+ characters. I prefer to use long non-dictionary words or phrases as they are easier to remember and much harder to crack. But then for my Origin account they tell me that my password is TOO LONG?!?! How can a password be too long?

 

[thethirdrace]

I don't believe it's a problem companies have to solve.

Companies should never force you to give them personal information in the first place. That's half the problem right there.

The other half of the problem is the users themselves. If somebody went knocking on their doors and ask them their information, nobody would be dumb enough to give it just like that. But replace the door with a screen and the user would even provide their bank PIN number and the size of its underwear while they're at it...

There's no better security than absence of information. As soon as you realize that, the only problem you might have on the net is maybe a password change once a year.

This is a non issue as it was always like that even when everything was on physical paper. Unauthorized people shouldn't be able to read your information in your doctor's old paper file, but do you really believe it never happened? Are you really that naïve? Some people need a reality check ASAP.

 

[jRaskell1]

"I don't believe it's a problem companies have to solve."

While I agree everyone is personally responsible for their own online security, I don't agree that 'companies' don't belong under that umbrella.

Bottom line is, EVERYONE is responsible. Honestly, in today's world, anyone who falls for a phishing attack at work should just be fired. Quite literally they are simply too incompetent to be allowed access to a company's internal networks.

On the other hand, any service that still allows brute force attacks on their servers are also exhibiting an unacceptable level of incompetence.

These are two types of attacks that have been around for well over a decade, and they are EASILY defeated. People still succumbing to phishing attacks doesn't surprise me, there will always be incompetent people out there, but large organizations succuming to brute force attacks... that's just plain inexcusable.