How a guy spent 20 YEARS living off BROKEN MMOs!

[@Freshcornpop]

I knew a kid who use to do this when he was only 10, he would pretend to be a girl on runescape. make fake relationships with nerdy men, then rob them blind of their stuff and sold their stuff in real life, he made a killing

[@Ciobrando19.]

Wolf ok thats awesome yet fucked up lol

[@GlasgowMick89]

Kids these days, they grow up so fast. He'll do his 1st gun point robbery by 13.

[@jayfeev215]

Glasgow Mick89 if the kid was savvy enough to scam real money out of people through a game he'll never need to hold anyone gun point. Societal truth is the best crooks are the ones that can rob/cheat/steal without ever being present. Stick - ups, bank robbers and jewelry store burglars etc. are the ones that get caught.

[@columbo1988]

lol That's called a sociopath.

[@iloveanime9226]

Kevin C and they have the highest chance of being billionaires :) Welcome to life on earth Wolf Yeah, I am sure anyone who played RuneScape knows someone who did that XD. Sometimes people just do it just for the role play. What about the money doublers? huh? lol, my friend made so much from that. Then later made over a billion from scamming money doublers.

[@SimilakChild]

4:44 $2,000 for an ingame house is absolutely nothing compared to what people pay for 6 line legendary weapons and armor pieces in maplestory.. they probably pay about $2,000 per piece of equipment or $25,000 USD for the full set

[@mylearningaccount5868]

Time to play maplestory then!

[@DnVFMVs]

the actual fuck?

[@yudhistirs]

So now I know who inspired Microtransactions

[@requiredparticular6831]

Right???!!

[@manuman5319]

Basically this guy is making profit with games already having microtransactions, so he didn't inspired it at all (but he's a thief though)

[@deathbyprocrastination9515]

I'm more mad at the fact that the cover of a video about broken games is Wildstar. Seriously, that game is far from dying and actually pretty fun, altough I think the time spent leveling is much better than the end game. But hey, you have a storyline for every race and an addditional storyline for every faction, essentially meaning there are 12(Did I count that right? I can't be bothered to check the website.) different stories for you to play trough.

[@just_morby]

manu Man You clearly missed the castle selling part, did you? The fact that he sold in-game properties on eBay for real money inspired microtransactions as we know it.

[@requiredparticular6831]

manu Man he's been at it longer than micro transactions

[@MrJoelWallin]

Just like how real banks operate in other words.

[@Ahmetfusta]

They have to though. If they didn't our economy would be fucked. (unless you're talking about the illegal ways)

[@SwipeSide19]

if your economic system requires yout o inflate the currency, you've got a garbage system.

[@MrJaaaaake]

Lmao not true at all. There are many books written about why this isn't so.

[@andyweb7779]

exactly. banks create credit, use that invented credit to buy a house, then sell you the house for real currency slowly over 25 years. Wtf !?

[@hardotyler6415]

That's every economy ever. You use inflation to help regulate other parts of the market.

[@capitao6129]

i would play wild star if i knew his code to get that cash

[@Kal_c]

x2

[@icthulu]

Except now that NC Soft knows about it, all they have to do is a simple DB query of your current cash and suddenly your account is deleted.

[@sackofpotatoes5424]

icthulu I'm sure the guy can find a way around a account deletion lol

[@FuKItM4n]

IT would have already been patched, or else people would just create news accounts each time a sale was made.

[@Shadowmation6621]

alt+f4

[@cardlackey2527]

Good to know what actually happened to my cabin in ultima all those years ago. >

[@129das]

lol

[@TheKryptonianGaming]

Lmfao

[@BeastinlosersHD]

Get rekt

[@jimmysjuice8952]

RIP

[@Pukwudgie_Surprise]

It decayed.

[@simowilliams6990]

So...'hacking' an in-game currency to enrich yourself by causing the servers to issue more currency to you IS NOT THEFT. It is counterfeiting. Different crime. The houses, though- that was theft.

[@draconianmethods7110]

how do you define that in a video game though.

[@simowilliams6990]

I think it's pretty simple- if you *take* something from someone else, *and therefore they don't have it anymore*, that's theft. If you replicate a financial instrument (such as in-game currency with irl value) without the consent of the issuer, that's counterfeiting. Counterfeiting doesn't cause anyone else to have any less of the thing being copied, but theft does. So when he hacked that game to re-assign the houses and property of other players to himself, that was theft, because the victims *lost* the thing that he gained. But when he hacked MMO servers to add in-game currency to his account, that was counterfeiting, because he issued the currency without authorization, and nobody else lost what he gained.

[@ppsarrakis]

but isnt because he gives more money in circulation lowers the general worth of it hence stealing from everyone?

[@simowilliams6990]

That's not what theft is, and nobody is guaranteed the value of any currency. If I collect baseball cards, and I have a series of discontinued cards which are worth $X, then the publisher re-issues that series and the value of my collection falls a bit, the publisher DID NOT steal from me. If we define theft in that way, it creates a myriad of logical issues which cannot be resolved in a logically consistent fashion across all contexts, and would result in a wide manner of absurd conclusions and/or outcomes (outcomes if enforced accordingly). So theft is essentially depriving another of their *property*, not the value thereof.

[@olebergst.5828]

"Counterfeiting doesn't cause anyone else to have any less of the thing being copied, but theft does." "because he issued the currency without authorization, and nobody else lost what he gained." That looks like not thought through; Just imagine you have a patent for something and another person creates this thing and sells it, so you cannot sell it yourself; that's theft of intellectual property and very analouge to what this guy did. Him creating the ingame money doesn't mean the company had less ingame money, but it 'translates' to real money of which he had more and the rightful owner of the idea of ingame currency had less. Maybe it's not theft strictly speaking, but it's so close to it I think it makes sense to just call it what it is - theft. "If we define theft in that way, it creates a myriad of logical issues which cannot be resolved in a logically consistent fashion across all contexts, and would result in a wide manner of absurd conclusions and/or outcomes (outcomes if enforced accordingly). So theft is essentially depriving another of their *property*, not the value thereof." Only under certain circumstances; This case here isn't problematic.

[@stanzioni]

This hacker works for EA now

[@Noroimusha303]

Super powers not used for good, i call that a super-villain, or at least a good origin story.

[@PrettyGoodGaming]

Hey, that's a good point. He wasn't exactly stealing from the rich, giving to the poor. He was selling back to them.

[@Johny40Se7en]

"With great power comes great responsibility" ah who the fuck are my kidding =P

[@DirkusTurkess]

With great power comes what ever the hell they want. F**k spiderman!

[@lanmandragoran8337]

Except he wasn't, or he would have won. Which he didn't. Which made him wrong. Basics of history, the winner writes the history books.

[@MrCmon113]

It's not really a "super" power to look through some code. If finding bugs is that awesome, who do you think develops software in the first place? Michael and an army of angels?

[@cKdisciple]

"If I don't do it, someone else will." What a wonderfully greedy way to approach life.

[@rouhsifbenschop7074]

cKdisciple sounds like kira

[@danielgera1361]

cKdisciple its the same with my job if i dont do it someone else will

[@yugen]

Republican Ethics 101.

[@salamanderxbrookfield4011]

sounds like a good way to me

[@laztheripper]

Ethics? It's a game. If people want to pay you for pixels and they get what they really need at reduced prices, why not. Programming exploits and bots have put me through school and paid my rent. Given the chance I'd do it all over again, even better since now I know how to do a lot more.

[@schl4u]

2:48 "he does less work than we do" Definitely not. Learning about computers, programming, security and hacking is more work than reading news articles from other websites and talking nonsense infront of a camera.

[@kezin395]

True lol wanna learn but don't know where to start. BTW how you doing the past 2years?

[@thatguy9196]

Tootas pus did you find the way to start?

[@aimlessjack7772]

@@kezin395 so u started learning right? How's ur progress if so?

[@anti-ethniccleansing465]

@@kezin395 I’d imagine you’d start by getting a degree in computer science.

[@JXAChambers]

This is why I hate micro transactions. In-game currency should be a role playing prop, not a money making scheme. I pay for a game I should get the game, a whole game. I don't mind dlc after the fact, but if you want to fool me into buying your monopoly money then to hell with you.

[@GTB7979]

Microtransatcions in f2p games is fine, just not in paid games

[@carloseduardofernandes6138]

how do you think people would live making games for free? if you dont want micro-transactions pay for a game

[@rickycool6083]

But do you really think your one time payment is enough to run a big MMO with multiple servers and while doing continous updates? It's not. MMOs needs to make maney micro-transaction is the easiest way to do that.

[@rickycool6083]

Balance wise cosmetic microtransactions are good, it will also be fine as long as you pay for non-combat related stuff, you know the things that boost the rng factors in some things such as crafting and such, or maybe inventory space something like this. It just means you just have to grind a little bit more if you play free, which I think is better than paying for every new dlc. But just cosmetic microtransaction almost never work out in mmo, maybe if its hugely popular then it might. The thing is content and cosmetics are inversely proportional, more content you have less relevant cosmetics become. You see in games like Dota or cs, those are linear games with limited maps and hence it can survive on full f2p. (yes, I know what you are thinking but cs has no reason to have a price tag, it could have easily made more money by being f2p) but if you run an mmo, rather than paying for a cosmetic upgrade on an armor you would much rather, just get a new armor through raids or equip a new one, if you want you can wait a few months for a new dlc to get new armors, cosmetic microtransactions don't really work well in those environment. I agree it should be made clear and not hidden on what business plan the game has for itself.

[@Xelluse]

Depends on MT and how this MTs are integrated into the game mechanics, there too are many But, that can do well and fair play, and ever better, than regular S2P can do, but in bad hands it can ruin whole game experience no matter how good this specific game is. But, MT in Pay to Play games is more greed, than fairplay and always will affect players, cos most players Pay to Pay to avoid any, even cosmetic difference, while in some F2P games it can be a core mechanics, that can become a microculture in that game and can even do it more fair and better. So, I mean, that it depends on who is implementing Microtransactions in to the game and what they want, just short time jackpot, or long run profit.

[@CuttingtheCaboose]

Venezuela should hire this guy to sort out their inflation woes. He's doing a far better job than their government... Too soon?

[@janycetisch6094]

Ta dum tss

[@Andri474]

It remains to be seen if Venezuela is still a thing by the end of the civil war.

[@maxi_rv_raxor]

Too much CNN guys xD

[@thefixer8765]

Wtf r u suppose to be a guy or girl LOL

[@thefeleapz4144]

Not soon enough.

[@GaianEntertainment]

I admire his skills but not his ethics. Really though, the people buying digital property/items for large sums of real money are idiots.

[@theprofessor3339]

Gaian Entertainment If u could never work a day in your life cause you found a game exploit you wouldn't be talking ethics lol

[@129das]

But it is not stealing. People are just buying it from him.

[@rickycool6083]

It is stealing. He is stealing items, houses etc and reselling them.

[@DBT1007]

Gaian Entertainment well.. that's also like u think ppl who pays for the software are idiots. like windows OS, photoshop, after effect, etc this is the future buddy, welcome to the 4th industrial revolution. the disruptive era. an era where u can create money with literally nothing. just use your skills. and use technologies nothing wrong with buying virtual stuffs in large sums. ppl nowadays pay for online stickers, pay for items on online games, pay for additional features, pay for digital copy of music or movie or book or anime, etc. but before buying it, u must know the value first. is it worth with large sums of money or not

[@jacobschings2124]

Believe it or not, $2,000 is chump change to a lot of people in this world. I just wish I was one of them lol.

[@kordulus]

When my 2nd girlfriend walked in on me cheating with her sister, i tried to explain to her that it was indeed not cheating..but finding unknown features hidden in the protocol...

[@Zemnexx]

Soooooo.... how do I get in contact with this guy and become his padawan?

[@user-vw5qt4rs8g]

You have to pay

[@bigron8896]

he's just fucking item-duping. He probably makes less money an hour than a mcdonalds employee

[@Scouserrr420]

Big salty Ron

[@MrCmon113]

He literally just stole money. Just because you think digging through code is more stylish than breaking into a house doesn't make him any less of a pathetic criminal. If he was that much of a genius, he could make much more money by working in IT security or as a developer.

[@EngiHvergi6097]

He literally didn't though. Just because a virtual item can be assigned a monetary value in real-life currency doesn't mean it's actually worth that amount, if anything at all. If he got taken to court over this, he'd be completely fine, and would end up making money off the case by pressing counter-charges. Nothing about what he's done here is illegal in any way, and the WORST repercussion he could possibly face would be to have his IP/account banned from whatever game he's playing, which for a guy with his apparent skill, means literally nothing, as he'll just change his IP and make a new account with the oodles of cash he has. Saying that this guy stole money is like saying someone who makes a living playing League of Legends is somehow stealing money from Riot Games - which is to say, it's completely untrue, and nonsensical. No one except the people who purchased the items/currency that he sells lost money, and those people lost money because they willingly spent it on his wares. It'd be a different matter if he was selling items that can ONLY be obtained through spending real-world money, but doing that is the sort of thing that WILL get you caught, and WILL get you prosecuted for theft. Which clearly, he doesn't do, because he's not an idiot. There's also nothing pathetic about what he's done either in my opinion, as it clearly took a good deal of thought and skill to pull off. It's also worth noting that he goes out of his way to avoid heavily effecting any of these game's in-game economies, and that he stops when he notices that he does, because his concern (at least once he started doing this professionally) was making money, rather than one-upping players and ruining the game's balance. Because, again, that's the sort of thing that gets you noticed and banned, which, again, while it's not a huge issue for someone of his apparent skill, is inconvenient enough to warrant avoiding. TL;DR - Stop being butthurt that you can't think of a way/lack the required skills to make a living by exploiting a game legally, "legally" being a term here that means "not against the REAL WORLD laws of any country that these games would be played in, but are probably against the EULA of the game itself."

[@NakedAvanger]

I admire that guy, im working 10 hours a day in a very frustraiting company as a grunt who does most of the physical work i get home all exhausted and only have like 4 hours left of the day ... "day" so yeah if you ask me this guy is a legend he did the right thing exploit the system (both irl and ingame lol) is incredible i would do the same in a heart beat if i could besides youre not REALLY hurting anyone those houses he stole werent shit people bought with real money back then right ? and best part ? almost zero chance of getting caught

[@ImNotSoLegit]

Jokes on this guy, he had to spend 20 years playing WIldstar, LOTRO, and GW2.

[@IpostyFun]

jokes on you guy, those games are not even 20 years old.

[@Peteru69]

You think he actively plays those games? Jokes on you.

[@exodore2000]

He did at least play UO. He was loosing so he started a 20 year crime spree. I say get good scrub.

[@BraveCat9927]

jokes on everyone else, spending 20+ years in a cubicle making their living.

[@TommyAlberts]

HA! Guess the same goes for most people working. Living the grind.

[@gccgcc8426]

I feel like the developers of these games should have someway to know when a player spontaneously gets quintillion's of in game currency, but that's just me.

[@Bvic3]

The attack surface is so huge, it's hard for devs to detect suspicious behaviours. You don't want a full time job watching false positives. And you don't want a full time job designing detection systems either. As he said, if nobody realises it's happening, it's not hurting the company's bottom line. He got banned only when he started killing everyone in PvP.

[@Howiforex]

@@Bvic3 he also killed the GM's in some game by giving them 1 Million Damage

[@anti-ethniccleansing465]

@@Howiforex Hahaha!

[@RArecordingsRickValcon]

so... he is a banker? because that is exactly what banks do with generating real money

[@doginasuitcase3742]

RArecordings -Rick- Why do you have almost 5 Mill subs

[@TheRedRuin]

RArecordings -Rick-, except he didn't go to private school. Did you know only 7% of the population went to private school but 74% of judges went to private school, it's about social networking they have control of the criminal 'justice' system and the money supply and they have infested government and financial services.

[@DBT1007]

RArecordings -Rick- yup. that's why islamic economic system is better than conventional economic system

[@WiggaMachiavelli]

Specifically that is what central banks do. Other types of banks typically do not have any direct control over monetary policy.

[@WiggaMachiavelli]

​@@TheRedRuin How would you know where he went to school? Regarding judges: Is it really surprising that people in a job that requires substantial education would have had better-than-average educations or have come from families that chose to expend more resources on education? This is a silly game to play. What proportion of judges are Jews or Catholics? Are you going to attack Jewish and Catholic social networks because they are "over-represented"?

[@arceus227100]

Love him or hate him. You have to admire the fact hes been so successful for 20 years.....

[@Dennis_The_Peasant]

Dark Age of Camelot. That's a name I haven't heard in a long, long time.

[@benharris144]

Defcon is a conference that has been around a while. It is popular among hackers AND companies (looking for security and weaknesses of it). Where better to get those people and that information?

[@plasmaoctopus1728]

Yeah but, I feel like the conference would just distract from the real current hacks. Kind of like what other comments have said about those "get rich quick" books.

[@sergiogonzalez1295]

Ben Harris even the NSA goes out there to talk and learn.

[@martinipunk2509]

A lot of people save their 0days just for defcon, either to show off or to trade or sell etc. Ill give you an example, defcon has had the top ctf in the world for the last 25 years, the BEST hackers in the world come to compete (or to talk/party). The level some of these guys are on is just insane, and I have met people that have to smuggle themselves into the states to attend. It has gotten super mainstream and overpopular so that has detracted some from quality of hacker you get to interact with (rockstars aside), but that just means you have to go outside the con to parties to meet people.

[@sinephase]

yeah these exploits are made available to the devs to patch, it's not like it's some orgy of hack trading or something (maybe it is behind closed doors though, but it's not like those people couldn't do that in the first place)

[@plasmaoctopus1728]

Thomas Vanhoutte But Vegas is PERFECT for Defcon for that very reason!

[@liwendiamond9223]

I love how he grew a conscience when companies started doing the same shit he does on a grander scale. He be like : Oh shit, what have I done?! Anyway he was smart enough to trick the system and exploit it to make a living. Gotta admire that, even the ethics are questionable.

[@endlessetudes2029]

There's a lucrative market for hackers to find legitimate work. Salary for a certified ethical hacker according to payscale is $54k - $111k. This guy is obviously good and could make six figures legitimately, instead of stealing it. I don't think it's right to give this guy a pass but the world is full of scammers anyway, hence the reason ethical hacking exists in the first place.

[@DD-fs7pg]

EndlessEtudes It's prob because it's easier and he's prob making significantly more than that. And there are people who just want to do that for whatever other reasons, like wanting others to suffer.

[@Doomness2k]

Hackers who get six figures don't get it thanks to there college degree. They often did something noteworthy like hacking a bank/government/earning a lot of cash, that's how you get a real job in cyber security. To protect yourself, you have to know what the exploits are and how they work. As for the consequences: Countries are corrupt af (especially America, where most of this happens), more often than not a big company pays a large sum of money to free the hacker they want to hire. Online security is a multi-trillion dollar business (think about the iCloud hack) and the people that are the best at protecting us are they ones that have done it before and know how it works. Pretty much the only way to get a job that pays six figures in this field, is to get infamous.

[@MrJaaaaake]

Not everyone wants to be an employee

[@endlessetudes2029]

Point is, If you have the skills that this guy has, you can use them to make money legitimately or illegitimately. Either way you can be well compensated. You could work freelance or even start your own business and avoid having a punch card, or supervisor. There really isn't a good excuse to do this type of thing for 20+ years. Stealing is not right, right? Another thing, the software industry has boomed like crazy in the past 20 years. People that have been in the industry that long, get crazy kickbacks. Working from home, Working only 6 months out of the year, paid vacation, paid to travel to conferences around the world, etc.. And that's if they haven't already retired. There has been no better industry to have skills in for the past 20 years. We're talking the rise of Ebay, Google, Facebook, Amazon, KZbin, Twitter, Netflix, Uber, and the exponential growth of Apple and Microsoft.

[@MrJaaaaake]

I am a contractor. It's basically the same thing as being an employee except it's easier to get rid of you ( but you do get paid more). Also it's not stealing. He is selling made up currency. Also just because someone is good at something doesn't mean that people deserve their talents. I can dead lift 600lbs, if someone couldn't lift something heavy it doesn't mean I should go help them.

[@highfist6754]

He's smart. Why not do it if you can? Online games are full of hackers, its something you have to be aware of, and you cant allow yourself to get too upset if someone steals your stuff. If you can pay $2,000 for an online house in a game then your either stupid or rich. Supply and demand baby. When fools create a demand then someone WILL supply. Damn I wish more people played LAN.

[@Toukan1]

I disagree. Anybody is capable of murder, that doesn't mean we should go around killing people. The world is full of thiefs, that doesn't mean we shouldn't get upset when somebody steals our wallet. Some people pay $20 for restaurant instead of microwaved ramen, that doesn't mean they're stupid or rich. Some people buy a house instead of renting an apartment, that doesn't mean they're stupid or rich either. We evaluate what makes us happy and how much we are willing to throw money on it, if somebody decides $2,000 in an online game makes them happy, then good. As you said, supply and demand. LAN is great, I agree with you on that. However, if you want to play with strangers and meet new people, online games can be nice too.

[@kennyk5150]

Toukan thieves*

[@MrCmon113]

So it would be ok for me to break into your house and take all of your stuff if I'm "smart" enough to do so?

[@Merek29]

Some of those stupid or rich people actually earned all of their stuff in those games. Lame asses like him jacked them and turned around and sold it for real money.

[@GizziMoD]

Thats the bastard who stole my castle!!!! FML!

[@PrettyGoodGaming]

Hahaha...wait...really?

[@maxco3412]

GizzmoD sorry dude

[@GizziMoD]

......no....... BUT i could pretend and you guys could interview me and we could make millions and billions right? or have i just publicly blown my cover :(

[@maxlsTrying]

nah man i think nobody noticed, you´re fine

[@marionnette6231]

Pretty Good Gaming he's my friend and yes really.... He quit afterwards for a week :/

[@Crown-Fox]

To be honest, this sort of thing is actually a legal gray area, in some contexts. Actively exploiting vulnerabilities in the system could be arguably illegal, depending on how the vulnerability is exploited. In most cases, faults in software that expose users to unintended debugging or moderating tools could be arguably legal to utilize, if the unintended "feature" was exposed globally in a way that could be perceived as an intended feature . That's to say, if a player types in "/give money " and the game gives them money, regardless of whether or not that command was intended for moderator use only, it is not illegal to exploit the availability of that command. It could be against the terms of service, meaning your account could be permanently banned, but it wouldn't be illegal unless that currency had legitimate value to the company. Like, the company actively sells their currency(Guild Wars, EVE Online), in some round-about way. Then it could be considered theft. Do note that a third party selling the product does not give the product legitimate value to the developer. If Company A is selling Company B's gold without their consent, and User A cheats to get gold, Company A or B cannot sue User A. Company A is profiting off of Company B's IP, and Company B doesn't monetize their gold to begin with. Company B, however, can sue Company A. There is no legal precedent established for the legality of a third party selling in-game goods on a platform that doesn't directly support the transaction. In most cases the transaction is considered a change of ownership of the goods and there is an exchange of currency to purchase the ownership of the goods. This is why Ebay exists. You just can't say that you are an official distributor of the product, without the licensing or consent of the owner of the intellectual property. I can sell a Halo action figure on Ebay, and Microsoft can't do anything about it. This user is violating the terms of service for the services he is a part of, and then selling the product as a change of ownership outside of the platform it exists on. This is legally gray, because you can't be sued for violating the terms of service agreement, but you can be banned or otherwise denied access to the service.

[@JustanamebroDK]

It's not a gray area, it's counterfeiting virtual currency/items that translate to real world money.

[@Crown-Fox]

It is not counterfeiting. I already defined the reasons it is morally bad and why it is a gray area. Counterfeiting is making a fraudulent imitation of a currency or material with the attempt to deceive. This isn't counterfeiting. It's more like there is a button on an ATM that if you press it you get $100, but they didn't mean for the button to do that. It's real, valuable, actual currency. It's not counterfeit, it's the real thing.

[@Ahmetfusta]

This only applies if what he says is true though. Maybe he is actually injecting the 'unintended feature of a protocol' or whatever into the game and then abusing it or maybe he's just straightout hacking it. I'm just giving examples and hope you get what I mean.

[@Crown-Fox]

+Mark Fontane - Take a moment and think over that sentence. What backward country is considered "1st world" and still doesn't have up to date laws regarding information technology? The grand old united states of America, where ethics don't matter as long as you've got more money than ethics.

[@gavinjenkins899]

It's very unambiguously illegal. Depending on some of the various things described in the video, he is vandalizing, stealing, and committing fraud (lying in a way that creates a tort) depending on the instance.

[@I_am_ENSanity]

If only I had the patience for this kind of stuff....

[@johnwrath3612]

I bought my first car by selling Greater Shadow Amuli armor i farmed in the game Asherons Call back in the late 90's - early 2000's. I made a simple macro that farmed these rare motes all day while i was at school. Those were the wild west days of MMO's, it was technically against the TOS but tons of people did it. There was no trade system, so you either needed a good reputation so people would trust giving you real money then you go meet up with them in game and drop the items on the ground, or you used a middle man with a good reputation.

[@MageAtYou]

id love to keep watching your videos but sadly you guys are all always in them

[@LordZoth6292]

Meh oh well

[@shadder75k46]

got em

[@AelfricBlack]

Good lord those two guys are unbearable

[@IIMiikexDII]

I admire his skill and respect him for talking about it for sure. Also, I would rather him hacking the currency like that than have chinese gold farmers spamming for days, both ruin the economy but only one of them makes me want to tear my hair out lol. However, he seemed to backtrack and kinda distance himself from responsibility by not calling them hacks, but features in the protocol. Its an unorthodox way to use said protocol, therefore it fits the definition of a hack lol. He seems to have a very black hat mentality which can be very troublesome but it seems like he has enough self control. As a side note though, I definitely disagree with stealing from players in the game. I have no problem adjusting to shitty economies, any MMO player is used to that, but directly stealing from people is like saying "I know how to hack and they don't so I can do it and they cant stop me". Wait til he hacks the wrong person lmfao, but it seems like he hasn't been stealing from people since '97. He's a black hat, even though he probably doesn't consider himself that.

[@martinipunk2509]

Yeah I laughed when he said it wasn't a hack. I'm sure he has to consider himself a blackhat even though he works as a security analyst in MD.

[@aickavon]

well I think he defines hacking as stealing, and what he was doing was not theft, but counterfeiting. What he started off with was Theft (stealing houses and selling them) which he seemed to distance himself from (growing morales) and decided that counterfeiting in game (not real) currency then selling it for real money wasn't bad, so much as providing an illegal service. While this is morally grey, leaning more towards Black, we can appreciate him devaluing over priced market items and making them cheaper over-all :P

[@Rurix48]

and as they said. one of his reasons for supposedly quitting, was that a lot of games now have real values...

[@aylbdrmadison1051]

@Aickavon the Techpriest: Counterfeiting is stealing. just like burglary and shoplifting are stealing, there is no way around that fact. Just giving a thing a different name doesn't change what it is.

[@aickavon]

Actually, counterfeiting is not stealing. See, they're both illegal, true enough, but they're specifically two seperate crimes for a reason. Counterfeiting is the action of recreating or duplicating an item. While no one LOSES anything, the counterfeiter illegal GAINS something which thus, devalues that item. For example, counterfeiting money. No one is LOSING Money but because they are creating (fake) money, the (real) money loses value, thus people are losing value, but not physical property. It's inflation and that's why it's a crime. Theft is when someone LOSES something and someone GAINS that something, as you can see this is a far more direct course of action and the reason why it's illegal is far more obvious.

[@spda81]

I sold my Ultima Online account for $800 back in 2004 and it only had a tower. Houses were nearly impossible to get back then because all the space was already used up. Castles would routinely sell for $1500+, I wonder how many of those were from this hacker?

[@alphads2000]

*If only i had that money*

[@elitefew8537]

Hackium id finally upgrade to pornhub premium

[@AzureToroto]

I would use it to become "Andrew Ryan", if you know what I mean. ;)

[@DrWrex]

Would you kindly tell me who Andrew Ryan is?

[@ezraedtoledo9073]

that's all the money on the world

[@kingdmguties123495]

H a c k What? You would waste it slacking around, that’s why you don’t have it

[@ESOdanny]

This video was great guys XD

[@Jgrimwald]

Oh, so he turns himself in the Federal Reserve of each game...

[@moridain]

I had a friend who made a ton of cash in a similar way through Star Trek Online. The game had an event involving loot boxes, giving a free one to each character. Using an exploit involving an overly full bag and a few basic lines of code, he managed to get the event to basically spam him hundreds of boxes. He would then use some code to open and sort the contents, some of which were very valuable and tradable. He would give those to one of his contacts who would sell them on. Before the event ended he made more than a thousand dollars off this.

[@JohnDoe-ft6wf]

I'm surprised New Line let you have rights to LotR footage.

[@evilessences326343]

Learn what "Fair Use" is

[@owen4326]

Nintendo should fucking learn what it is

[@Darwand]

Something else on the housing in Ultima Online, is that a stupid amount of people had a subscription and only logged in and clicked on everything once everyday to ensure they kept the house

[@B3n3f1t]

I like this guy and the guy next to him and the other guy too!

[@Dj.MODÆO]

What if this is just a load of bullshit, and he would rather tell everyone he cheated the system, rather than admit he spends 20 hours a day for two decades playing MMOs in his parents basement?

[@twistedneedles4326]

The title makes you think he was developing shitty mmos

[@Matlcore876]

Really love your chemistry... keep up the amazingly entertaining job

[@tomhubbard8510]

"creative use of game mechanics" - Sjin2017

[@avariciousandrew6921]

He's like a pirate. They are criminals and scoundrels but we admire them for their bravery and audacity

[@donjuan69420]

You guys make money off searching for articles on google, why are y'all so obsessed over someone playing video games? Its easier to search.

[@dmrc43]

In some countries, thieves are dragged out into the streets and beaten by crowns of men, sometimes set on fire with a tire...

[@hydra66]

professional jealously shining through. Sounds like the presenters here are thinking about a career change

[@clowntrooper61]

Fiif How is he suppose to explain how he made the money. Can't exactly say he got it by hacking a game server

[@aylbdrmadison1051]

@hydra66: Correction: presenter" (singular). One of them is lacking morals, the other said he does Not agree.

[@aylbdrmadison1051]

@Fiif: Clowntrooper's response to your comment has made it very clear that in All ways it was illegal, not just one. xD

[@Anonymous_Man]

He was selling items from online games on ebay etc. That's completely legal. The only thing he's breached is the EULAs he supposedly signs with the companies when he downloads a game but who the fuck cares about those. You can't get sued for hacking a game. As it fucking should be.

[@clowntrooper61]

Anonymous Man Yeah you can buddy. www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-11-17-fifa-coin-hacker-convicted-of-defrauding-ea-out-of-usd16m kotaku.com/two-gamers-are-going-to-jail-for-stealing-6-405-in-vir-1571780985

[@AvgJoeCrowe]

In other news: thief steals stuff and internet applauds their brilliance until they learn that they too are vulnerable.

[@marcandruu]

This would be a great plot for any neet anime character

[@sbindoctor6414]

Try Welcome to the NHK or No Game No Life

[@warriorcomic]

He's not the only one. there have been plenty over the years doing things like this and selling it online. for sometime in Dungeons and Dragons online we managed to trick the auction house to give use free items without paying for them while the owner would still get paid through the auction house this enabled us to dupe anything for weeks until someone figured out that if you buy something and you added a - infront of it you'd get a negative value meaning you'd get paid by buying the auction. to this day the market is completely ruined. Another one of those "Hacking exploits" is Diablo 2, you can use a Packet sniffer and Packet sender to edit certain values to the server into tricking it via buying and selling this has been in existance since day one and still works to this day. this is how "diablo 2 shops" dupe certain items socket it and then make them "perm" and sell them online. There is certain tools you need to avoid detection such as "Red vex" and modified custom D2.Exe. but this is how it looks like to dupe and upgrade runes kzbin.info/www/bejne/paipqIVrhZiWZtU My point is, there have been 10000's if not millions of issues in anygame where educated hackers can figure out work arounds. there is nothing fool proof. and there will probably be nothing full proof. When and If the next Big mmoRPG comes around any "Crash" or "Bugs" reported during its first years are pretty much probes, pokes here and there to test the system to find several exploits to earn profit on it. And they will find them. its like those Nigerian scams, there will always be a fool that will pay them and this is why they keep doing it.

[@jparis1156]

so the US debt of $20 trillion is 1/3 of the total amount of money in the entire world? There's some perspective....

[@XtreeM_FaiL]

J Paris Whole word's dept is 10-20 times more than there is money. Dept=money.

[@jparis1156]

of course it means money for the lenders assuming the US makes the payments. The working class tax payers were enslaved to foreigner countries and banks by the political class to the tune of $20 trillion. The biggest offender of all time being the last administration.

[@Propane_Acccessories]

J Paris We can thank Woodrow Wilson for selling us out. Obama simply accelerated our imminent doom lol

[@hardotyler6415]

There's a difference between debt and cash floating around the world. Actually if you take a look at only liquid assets it's right about $1.2 trillion. Everything else is tied up in businesses, investments, money market accounts, property, etc. That's why when people say we should take all of the money from the rich it confuses me because unless you want to have them sell everything they own and liquidate all investments there isn't much money to collect.

[@urdoolil5477]

J Paris yeah, Obama really fucked us.

[@mattyrose3931]

"Wait... Isn't that blackmail?"... " No it's consultancy." Very funny.

[@mrrandomdude4291]

Anyone who pays 2,000 dollars for a virtual house deserves to be ripped off.

[@MrCmon113]

I have no words for people as pathetic as you. People, who applaud thieves and scammers are the lowest of the low.

[@sirnoobs8098]

na u need to an idiot to not see that it is a scam or not,lmao

[@ToadRancher]

@@MrCmon113 u r mom

[@moahammad1mohammad]

@@MrCmon113 You are probably one of the dumbasses who would pay $700 for a packet of szechuan sauce...

[@christianpervert525]

A friend of mine beta tested Everquest and found a money-dupe hack....he told us how to do it but never said how he found it. The sad thing is that we were scared to use it too much so we only duped enough money for ourselves and never really got into selling it in game. Once I duped a good bit of platinum and bought a full suit of bronze armor from an NPC vendor (nearly worthless but outrageously expensive) and other players in the game started asking me lots of questions I couldn't answer so I got rid of it and quickly logged out for awhile.

[@FlameRiflex]

Looks like ratchet in the thumbnail lol

[@PrettyGoodGaming]

It's off Wildstar. Just, FYI.

[@FlameRiflex]

Pretty Good Gaming thanks guys

[@wakkaseta8351]

It's called a Chua.

[@OtherL]

It's like going home and realizing your key to your house doesn't work anymore because the bank repoed the land and first.thing they did was tear that sucker down lol

[@coendou007]

You have to respect a good hack

[@anthonykf99]

FusionFall, I created accounts and hacked their characters with a crap ton of currency, and every possible item. I sold the accounts for around 30 bucks each. I did trick gullible kids into buying accounts, but the accounts were worth a shit ton more than you'd realize. The accounts never got banned either, but the game did end up shutting down.

[@SAINTSROWANGEL]

How did he hack these games? Like where do you start on doing this stuff?

[@PieterAdriaanvanderWalt]

It's a mix of talent and practice and study. You want to learn it? Start studying networking, a few programming languages that these games are based on, anything from Python, C#, C++ etc, do hacking courses, starting with easy and basic stuff, then get to the harder stuff. Join a hacking forum where you start reading up on blogs on how certain hacks were done (and how it as done) that were successful, and those that were not successful. Just this alone, full time (5hrs + a day) will keep you busy for the next 5 years. With real hacking (often known as cracking) there is no "how to" guide. You have to learn to think creatively to find some loophole. With more common hacking, you make use of bots, scripts, each one with a specific job / function that you utilise in the right way to do what you want done. But doing anything wrong will get you in hot water. So in other words, if this is something you are really interested in, you would've been doing it already.

[@MrCmon113]

You look at their sourcecode for bugs. So you might want to start by finding games, which utilize a language, you know well. And then you go through the list of common mistakes people make when employing that language.

[@strai8665]

There was once a bug in WoW where you could buy a "limited" stock of copper ore, but it wouldn't deplete the stock. You could then smelt that ore into bars, and sell it for like 100x the price, allowing you to basically print infinite gold. GW2 had a vaguely similar bug at release, where you could buy some ingredients for karma, then cook them into some other item, then resell those for 10x more gold than standard conversion. And another bug where a vendor was selling some armor for like 1 gold, and then rebuying it for 10. You just find the extreme of these issues, I wouldn't even qualify it as "hacking" from the sounds of this video. I also find this video hard to believe, most likely this guy is just lying about the entire situation, for such major issues to go unnoticed is nearly impossible.

[@christopherh3011]

ALOT of people did this in Age of Conan. There was a duplification bug and you could get the best PvP weapons using this technique, which sold for around 300$ each.

[@dawidkowalewicz5845]

Imagine if you meet your friends on the field to play some football. And one dude takes a knife and pierce the ball with it. And when you say: "dude wtf! that was our only ball! Why did you destroy it?!" and he says: "Ididn't destroyed the ball... I've exposed the flaws in the construction of the ball made by it's producer!". This is what that favourite hacker excuse look like in real life. Hackers are egotistical assholes with no balls to admit what they are.

[@laztheripper]

Depends what kind of hacker. Some will never be seen and never "destroy" anything. Also, it's a game, someone who hacks a game is probably just someone who is interested in the how things work side of it rather than the intended purpose. Nothing wrong with that. What you and most people do is confuse script kiddies (people who pay for hacks and use them to annoy and ruin the game for others) and the people who actually do the hacking.

[@how2pick4name]

Depends on what kind of hat they are wearing. :D Also, games are pretty closed up. You'd have to be pretty good to "get items you aren't supposed to" because you can't usually access any data from outside the net the server(s) is/are on. Local connect to DB, how are you going to get between that? By spoofing you're from the internal net. Gl with that. "Manfred told me..." lol Please...

[@kalrosh7069]

dude he is not destroying the code what he is doing is more acin to adding cork (i think thats what they do in baseball) to his bat. witch in all honesty i am fine with i think that if you can figure out how to do it it is fair. taking steroids is another example that is better than yours witch i am also fine with.

[@TheVanillaFaceXD]

Except virtual reality is not real.

[@eyflfla]

It seems to me to be about the semantics surrounding the word hacker. If I recall correctly hacking originally referred to chopping up code. I think it might have come from old timey movie making where they physically cut and spliced the footage. So a purist would consider you a hacker if you are doing your technological skull duggery by changing the actual code of the game. If you're just exploiting the code that's already there that isn't 'true hacking'. At least, I think that is a part of what's going on. I'm not saying that it isn't used as an excuse or rationalization, just trying to add another layer of context (poorly).

[@pwnswoggle]

To do the dude that was surprised by a hacking conference... do you leave the house? So much irony.

[@TehInfamousLol]

This dude made cash out of a dial up connection and dinosaur computer. He worked smart and made a killing, as far as I'm concerned he deserves the lavish life he lives.

[@RoosSkywalker]

Did the players who worked hard to earn their houses deserve to have them taken away?

[@TehInfamousLol]

oh. you're concerned for the nerds that spent a shitload of time playing weird mmo's? my answer for that issue is: nobody cares.

[@MegaReinart]

+a nice warm glass of milk +1

[@MrCmon113]

If I manage to break into your house do I deserve to take all of your stuff?

[@gravellergear4703]

And I thought I was cool. At the age of 13 and the only kid in high school who had internet at home. And sold nude pics of Bulma and Android 18 for 7 bucks a piece.

[@Mephilis78]

Lol it is brilliant if you think about it. He steals the guys house, sells it online. Another guy buys it for 2 grand then when the original player, who lost their house finds out who has his house, the guy Manfred sold it to would be the one who gets in trouble. lol absolutely savage!

[@VarenvelDarakus]

you know what gets me:) people to say you cant cheat in mmo:) you can cheat in any game , just mmo needs a tinybit more skill and knowlage

[@Ahmetfusta]

I got lots of knowlage here bro

[@DerAminB]

could you hack a mmo?

[@notalaeyt784]

Does anyone know where do i start?

[@willbest8126]

Or know someone who will share the exploit. Then you can brag that it was all you, extend the truth and bam, youre an internet legend.

[@XxPoB32xX]

But can you hack clash of clans though.... I don't think so

[@georgeelliottferguson7615]

It's called a bug bounty when you tell the developers about exploits and depending on the severity of the exploit they will pay you. This is done on more than games. Android, Chrome, Java, and even Windows.

[@frydfish4934]

Why share this? I'd horde that shit

[@Xuhybrid]

It's not hacking. The game developers put the features in the game in the first place. It's on them for allowing unauthorised personnel to use it without any kind of tracking.

[@Betonoszlop]

Virtual reality is still better than the labor camp. Most people living a boring repetitive life in their job cage, spending a life for nothing

[@julieboolie8716]

Betonoszlop yeah because owning your own house is terrible

[@-Nick-T]

Betonoszlop Robotic AI farming is the next revolution of mankind.

[@hardotyler6415]

Like experiencing and feeling real life things and enjoying who you are outside of a virtual world is so bad. People devote so much time to who they are in video games that they could accomplish so much in the real world if they retrained that focus. People just like that all video games give you a headstart, or at least make the basic progression easy. Life doesn't do that, because none of this is easy. You're supposed to solve problems and make the world a better place.

[@SjS_blue]

And yet so many mmo's are grindy bs virtual labor camps, it's the same shit with a fantasy setting ...

[@zonamaster4763]

Tyler McCain its more like you are only truly free in virtual world you cant punch random people that's one thing

[@viking8796]

Finding exploits and selling those finds to the company in question isn’t blackmail, it’s actually legit. In the tech industry there are many legitimate companies that do this.

[@BronzeOrwin]

When you have to scan through 8 minutes of video to try to find the simple answer to how he does it.

[@SAINTSROWANGEL]

Capitaine Cheng How did he do it? They don't really explain it here.

[@artanthonyenao4158]

Hes the man,not stealing just using the unintended usable feature,its like finding hidden gems in games like this,

[@SteamedBunX]

So he's stealing from the people who's actually working and keep the game up?

[@Mernom]

Since they didn't lose anything, no he's not.

[@Schallon8production]

you mean like society is picking away at our pockets of the money we actually work for?

[@Mernom]

If you're talking about taxes, that money is also responsible for paying for the roads, and many other public services.

[@Schallon8production]

not really a good thought if the country is waving the cash all freely , most roads doesn't even need replacing or repairing , and it doesn't help if they spend all that money giving people that flee their homes to seek shelter here (forgot the name) a luxery life.. and hear them still say how better their home is than the country providing them shelter. while there are thousands of people homeless of our nationality suffering on the streets.. owyeah , i'm talking about a shit cash grab shithole country named belgium

[@Ahmetfusta]

lol Belgium. Those fuckers dont even work no more ffs

[@MysteryScienceGaming]

Ultima online is still best MMO ever created. SWG obviously great too but it all started with UO and no game today gives that feeling.

[@POOPOODOOKOOVIDEOS]

The taller guy looks like a younger Rhett from good mythical morning

[@Mepholar]

Disrupting online economies in such far reaching ways just make every game he's poisoned a tedious 3x+ grind

[@Vd2boozerrr]

hes technically not even doing anything illegal, just benefiting himself off exploits (hmmm can we say like the for honor contest winner???). Only thing he can get in trouble for is breaking T.O.S and have his acc/ip banned get fucked XD

[@Thomogon]

The thing is that playing games for a living will sometimes turn into feeling like real work and that might fuck up your hobby.

[@grapexxjelly]

These guys always sound whiney af

[@THE16THPHANTOM]

see the thing about being white hat hacker is that there is a limited amount of exploits and once the exploit is public knowledge the exploit is gone forever(not counting the thick headed people who do not update frequently). so a hacker has a choice to make, give up my recently gained super power forever by telling admins for 200 bucks or keep it to my self and use it in combination with my other super powers to gains over 100k over the years. i know what i would choose 99% of the time.

[@omerfaikyldrm9924]

I need me some hax

[@No-XIV-Xion]

He turned revenge into a career. I admire the bastard!

[@sergiogonzalez1295]

They don't know about DefCon? It's been around for ages!

[@mushafasa]

I like how Richard Garriott took the idea of selling houses in his games for thousands of dollars from this guy. Shroud of the Avatar has a ridiculous cash shop... And the game is never even gonna be finished.

[@facehugger8995]

seems he only hacked crap mmos anyway

[@sackofpotatoes5424]

Facehugger89 lmao true

[@somethingsomewhat8860]

Sack of Potatoes .................I just started playing gw2

[@sackofpotatoes5424]

scott mcindoe gw2 is good tho

[@somethingsomewhat8860]

Sack of Potatoes ik

[@katrinal353]

Money is money, though. And you could use that money to fund your triple-A mmo adventures, so that's still a win, and technically a hack.

[@Scrydragon]

It's not considered to be blackmail -- it's called a bug bounty, and lots of big companies do it.

[@MABGaming01]

666,666 view am the devil confirmed

[@Mephilis78]

"Fuck you, I'll have your house" Pretty Good Gaming 2018 lmfao!

[@exodous02]

I can't take you guys seriously, DEF CON started in 1993, how can you know enough about technology in general to talk about video games and not know about DEF CON? Have you guys even played video games ever or did you just come off of the football court and decide to make youtube videos on a thing that does what phones do but isn't a phone and is really big and has a TV attached?

[@rohanofelvenpower5566]

exodous02 life is more than games :)

[@exodous02]

Arramu Maiam DEF CON isn't games.

[@Resteel88]

I mean i've played games my whole life and i've never looked into the hacking community part of games enough to hear about a hackers convention just not something I personally felt the need to know about... But if you feel the need to know about stuff like that too each their own... That being said don't call others out for not being real gamers solely based on their knowledge of hacks (Not everyone needs to hack to win...) having said that I agree these two do look like they just got off the football court. xD

[@andresgv10]

exodous02 Take a chill pill, will ya?

[@mikemcrae3163]

lmao it was the same thing i was thinking hahaha! football court lmfao omfg... i mean for this person to talk shit about people not knowing something just for them to fail hard with "football court"...wow less talking shit more getting outside.!

[@sonic8005]

Making money from stealing from other people isn't exactly something I'd applaud. If everybody starts looking for ways that they can do it and get away with it or if everyone starts stealing, the world will suck a lot.

[@freespam9236]

there is conference for everything these days... who writes these lines? it was DEF CON 25 this year...

[@freespam9236]

also... the end not knowing anything about bug bounty programs or penetration testing confirmed these people just find some flashy article, slap some lame jokes to the mix and record it...

[@remoh4258]

Assuming this story is actually true, i'm sure the majority of the wildstar community actually know who this guy might be

[@Brutetank]

Admire the fuck out of him! Doing stuff like that back in the Ultima days is quite innovative, yeah it would suck to have your house stolen but let's be real, it's a game. No real money was stolen from them just time and time they chose to spend on the game. Not saying that is isn't wrong, it is. Just if some random person would give you 2000$ REAL MONEY for some pixals, fuck well I'd have a creamy pair of pants now wouldn't I? The point being, yes it is wrong to do. But nobody died. Supply and demand, he made a market that had demand but minimal to no supply. That to me at least is just a fact of life.

[@rouhsifbenschop7074]

Brutetank lets go rob some banks then if you admire this

[@Brutetank]

As long as you're the scape goat when things go to shit.

[@Mitzpieler]

I did it using game mechanics in Ultima Online back during the same time. He stole using hacks, I stole a castle using the skill "stealing" in the game. I stole a guy's key to his castle, made copies and sold the castle to two buyers. I then hid and watched all three of them argue over who it belonged to. I didn't cheat or hack, I just used a skill in the game. I made a lot of money on ebay in Ultima Online back in those days.

[@MaxSMoke777]

IMVU is an online game who depends on 3rd party artists to fill it's world with content, at a small profit to the artists involved. Hacker scumbags have been robbing these artists by taking their files and reuploading them under their own account. The company suffers little from this, except for a downturn in the value of their credits. The artists, on the other hand, are not only robbed of their earnings, but all future earnings. These kind of hackers should be drawn and quartered. BLOOD EAGLE.

[@randomquestion7592]

Wish I had such skills :/

[@KeatonAverman]

I don't think finding exploits in a game and then offering to fix them for money is inherently blackmail. In the same way a web designer can offer to update a website and offer tips on exchange for payment, it's primarily advertising. It only becomes an issue if the person who found the exploit threatens to use it unless the company/developer pays them.

[@JBiggs-ld5xt]

Just had this recommended to me this normally wouldn't be suspicious but KZbin algorithm has been shitting on these guys for the past two years.

[@aarons9961]

I like him. It seems he would rather take something that doesn't have a 'real world dollar equivalent' and market it, since he reportedly said that doing it with games that have micro-transactions "feels more like stealing" since those items have been given a definite $-value by the developers