Do you think Steam/Valve is or could become.. evil?

Inazuma

Inazuma

Inazuma

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Recently my friend's account was "disabled" despite him having done nothing wrong. Steam support doesn't give details of why the ban occured.

My friend thinks that it may have to do with him being given another account by someone else TWO years ago because that person had hijacked his account (which was later reclaimed by my friend, but is now the one that's been disabled). My friend thinks that most likely, Steam thinks he's hijacked the account that was given to him.

Another incident - Last year I allowed my cousin to play on my steam account for a few days. In those few days, he used a CSS hack without my knowledge and was eventually VAC banned.

When your account is disabled or VAC banned, there is ZERO possiblity of the ban's being lifted, ever.

I believe this is incredibly open to abuse. I bet many people's accounts have at least a hundred pounds worth of games tied to them (mine included). Steam can at any time ban that account, without giving you any details of why the ban occured and giving you absolutely no chance of reclaiming the account.
 
Sounds like they had good reason both those instances. If Valve reversed VAC bans on the back of the "my brother did it!" defence then they may as well just do away with VAC altogether.

Would take your grievances up with your cousin, not Valve.
 
Sounds like in both cases your mates/cousin/brother/mates best friends sister twice removed was at fault.

DO NOT SHARE STEAM ACCOUNTS""""!!!3£!!!!! SIMPLEZ
 
Somebody hacked on your account, Valve banned it... Working as intended afaik. What would be the point if they just went, "Oh I see, it wasn't you it was your brother you can have your account back".
 
Did you give your bank account details to your cousin too? Get the phone ready to call Natwest! :P
 
You would still be able to play all your games though, including online. Just not the game that you or someone else cheated on (In this case CSS)

I think anyway ;o
 
ColdAsIce said:
You would still be able to play all your games though, including online. Just not the game that you or someone else cheated on (In this case CSS)

I think anyway ;o
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Yep, they even let you play L4D single player if you cheat online. You just can't play online anymore.

As said above, don't let other people play on your account as they are far more willing to cheat when it's not their own games at stake.
 
I'm afraid they were absolutely right to ban your account in this case, I would be having strong words with your cousin.

I have no issues with the way they handle bans (and the lifting of bans) though, it seems completely fair.

I guess your point is that if something does go wrong and you are genuinely innocent then you lose everything. Having all your games on one account that is potentially subject to banishment because of your actions on just one of those games seems almost frightening, but I trust steam and the innocent don't get punished. As long as you're not naughty and don't lend your account to anyone, you're laughing.
 
It's not in their best interest to be banning customers that have done nothing wrong.

Of the two things you've listed, one sounds dodgy (account sharing/trading often leads to trouble) and one sound entirely reasonable.
 
Inazuma said:
Recently my friend's account was "disabled" despite him having done nothing wrong. Steam support doesn't give details of why the ban occured.

My friend thinks that it may have to do with him being given another account by someone else TWO years ago because that person had hijacked his account (which was later reclaimed by my friend, but is now the one that's been disabled). My friend thinks that most likely, Steam thinks he's hijacked the account that was given to him.

Another incident - Last year I allowed my cousin to play on my steam account for a few days. In those few days, he used a CSS hack without my knowledge and was eventually VAC banned.

When your account is disabled or VAC banned, there is ZERO possiblity of the ban's being lifted, ever.

I believe this is incredibly open to abuse. I bet many people's accounts have at least a hundred pounds worth of games tied to them (mine included). Steam can at any time ban that account, without giving you any details of why the ban occured and giving you absolutely no chance of reclaiming the account.
Click to expand...

Ask support why the account was disabled, and they will tell you (it's usually due to fraudulent transactions, chargebacks, etc). Claiming that they refuse to say why is incorrect, they will always give the owner a reason for it and information on what needs to happen before they re-enable it.

As for VAC banning, that's the own user's fault. Doesn't matter who got the account flagged for cheats, the responsibility lies with the account owner to ensure that cheating isn't taking place on their account. Get your cousin to re-buy those games for you on another account. ;)
 
Valve seem to have acted responsibly in both cases, no issue what so ever.

You hand your car keys to your cousin and let him take it for a spin uninsured whos going to get it in the neck???

Hawker
 
I probably didn't write about the first incident very well. But basically, my friend's account was disabled because Steam thinks he's hijacked an account, when he clearly has not (the account was given to him by another guy as a favour because he had hacked his other account).

I can forgive zero tolerence - My issue is with them withholding details on why accounts are banned and having an absolutely zero chance of lifting bans - they don't let you explain yourself. It's like if you went to court and the judge didn't let you speak.

In essence, Steam has now robbed my friend of a lot of money for something that happened TWO years ago and to which he has done nothing wrong.
 
When you install Steam, you agree to the EULA that says your account can be blocked or banned if you trade/share/hax/suck. You agreed to these terms, then broke them.

Steam aren't the bad guys in either of these two cases.
 
(the account was given to him by another guy as a favour because he had hacked his other account).
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There's your problem unfortunately. Transfer of accounts are against their terms and conditions, the original owner retains ownership. If your friend had created and used his own account from the outset then he would have never encountered this problem.
 
Even if it was our fault in both cases, I still think it's too easy for Steam to simply disable accounts for no reason without any consequence (any law suit that props up would just get steamrolled, unless backed up by some multi millionaire).
 
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