A little over a month ago, several addon sites for the World of Warcraft game produced by Blizzard Entertainment were found to have keyloggers as a part of their addons. This, of course, produced a high level of insecurity in several thousand user accounts related to the game. One of those accounts belonged to a friend of mine. He had spent months leveling his character all the way up to ~57 when a keylogger stole his information. The malicious individual wound up selling everything he had, and transferring his 300 gold to another account. Having faith in Blizzard's integrity system, he submitted a ticket. 8,000,000 people give Blizzard $15 a month to play this game. It took over a month for my buddy to receive ANY contact from Blizzard, despite several attempts to reach them. 1 full month of receiving $15 from 8 million individuals. When they did finally grace him with a response, this is the form letter he received: Greetings ******, Thank you for contacting the World of Warcraft Game Master Department. Account Name: ******** Realm: ******* Character Names: ******, ******, ******* Unfortunately, we were unable to verify the loss of the reported character assets. In order to assist you in continuing with normal play, a basic set of Bind on Equip items have been provided for the above listed characters. These items are not bound. They are for you to use, sell or equip as you deem necessary. The upcoming Burning Crusades will afford you and your character new content that will improve your overall gaming experience. We sincerely apologize for any frustration you may have experienced as a result of this situation, and hope that this will assist you to return to enjoying the game as quickly as possible. Please remember that restoration is not always guaranteed. While we make every effort to verify your loss there are times where restoration is not possible. For further information please check our Restoration Policy located at *********************. Thank you again for contacting us. We hope you continue to enjoy your experience in World of Warcraft! *** Please do not respond to this email as all conversations on this matter would be best handled online. *** Regards, ******** Specialist Blizzard Entertainment http://www.worldofwarcraft.com Customer satisfaction is a top priority here at Blizzard Entertainment, and we would like your feedback on the level of service you have received. Please feel free to provide such feedback at the following web address: *********** Blizzard, you may never see this, but if you do I hope you understand that as a gaming software company you have now jumped the shark. It's a "minor" incident like this that begins the tarnishing of a once stellar reputation. I know of at least 10 individuals who would consider cancelling their accounts as a result of this flippant response to a sincere concern. To those not paying attention, the letter clearly states that Blizzard Entertainment, despite having full control over every transaction in the game and logging most of them to control cheating, could not find the time or energy to research this issue and wound up costing an individual several months of play time due to their own apathy toward their customers. $120,000,000 a month goes to Blizzard Entertainment from individuals such as my friend and myself. Update (01/22/07): Thanks to Tom for the heads-up, put too many zeroes on the post above. Fixed. Update (01/25/07): Bizzyblog's great post on this. Also, WD's great post on personal decisions and choices. An article from Curse Gaming, originally thought to be the source of many keylogger addons. Another great article with screenshots of what happens when you decide to "press the issue."