How to spot --Staff Impersonation--

[remraily9]

disciplined chaos

random thought, what if it's all a pyramid scheme.a buncha people scam others and then trade most of it up until one person has the majority, then that person makes a new account and sends the cheap stuff to it to get the staff off of his back?

Then that person is really pathetic.

[XVenomous DarknessX]

good... i think

[Drewish6662]

fell for it once...
never have ever again biggrin

[Daisy is teh Panda]

GigglyGirl7

there are people who will ask you in the towns or other meeting places if you want gold and then pm you and ask you for your username and password so they can give it to you it happened to me and when I answerd him he tryd to tell me that it was for the admins not him I reported him and I hope he gets banned

same here sometimes they illegaly download this thing that can make ur person not be reported sad

[Aniki chan chan1]

goes to show you, you have to be very careful what some people send you! Be on the look out!

[deathbleach]

cool its help full i just had a pm like that just before this anouncement thanx

[Sisterbroken]

The Admin

Normally when you receive a PM from Admin, it should look like this. Admin avy outside of the chat bubble, with the message inside.

However sometimes you may receive PMs that look like this. When Admin is not the sender, but Admin's image is in the PM, it is not from Admin!! Another thing to look for is the name of the user sending the PM. Admin has an Orange name, where as normal users only have black names. (Friends will have blue)



Other real Gaia Admins have Orange names too, Moderators have Green names, NPCs have Red names, and Developers have Brown names. They also all have a secondary title, located under their names, that tell you what they are, regular users do not have this.

my littel sister got one from what she thougt was an admin saying that she had beem hackd and that her pass word was needed she gave it to the person and nowshe cant even get on gaia but whats worse is that they lookd just like an admin they had the orange name /the outfit and the subtitel but i dont thinkit was an admin now she has to use a cheep mule

[Sky Father]

disciplined chaos

random thought, what if it's all a pyramid scheme.a buncha people scam others and then trade most of it up until one person has the majority, then that person makes a new account and sends the cheap stuff to it to get the staff off of his back?

That doesn't even make any sense. Only a desperate moron would buy gaia items from another website selling them, i.e. ebay. There is no profit to be made by stealing gaia pixels and transferring them to another account; they are not real and have no return value except in fake gaia gold. The fact that people are trying to steal it just proves how sad they really are.

Besides, mods and admins can track your trading without needing your password. They can also read your pm's without one. A scammer only gets away with his scam if no one reports it and just lets it go. Even a hacker couldn't keep stolen pixels for very long if it's been reported. But hackers don't care anyway. They live to destroy. Scammers are just losers who want something for nothing.

[Arachnakid]

Jelai

Rin Uesu

Well, i've never been hacked, but i don't check my e-mail, so they can't get me that way, I only do trades with my friends, and if i see something weird going on when someones trying to pm me, I'll ignore it. So I'm pretty much okay.

I've never been hacked either. I've been on Gaia for 4 years now and never once have I had a fake e-mail. But then this was before all these hackers and scammers came.

Also, I don't talk on the GD much anymore (it's just full of...eck these days). Actually I rarely go on the forums anymore. I post on my guilds more often than I go on the forums. I think the GD, Chatterbox, etc. social internet chat-heavy forums are where these losers target their victims.

Same here, I pretty much stick to my guilds and leave the social stinkpot to those who choose to frequent it. Facing that much utter stupidity puts me somewhere between laughing my *ss off and banging my head on the keyboard.

[Mimic X]

There is also 'false links' to watch out for... thats what got me about a year ago, but then again, that is why Gaia applied the leaving Gaia pages/warnings.

[pilikika]

thanks for that information Admin! biggrin heart

[Daisy is teh Panda]

TyranitarQueen

goes to show you, you have to be very careful what some people send you! Be on the look out!

yah thnx ^.^ and she was so rich i thought it would really work sad

[im a kitty ninga]

Hmmm... These messages have been sent to me before, but that was when I just joined... So I did do anything. 0___0 Now I feel bad... But I haven't gotten any for about 2 years now...

[Seline_romulus]

I watch my sister's account & one day she called me from home saying that i needed to get on her account... I am in a computer graphics program & some of my classmates find it funny to make it seem like they are mods to test my wits.

Turned out it was a hacker..... I sent a remote virus over the AIM I found on their listing.. Outsmarted them & reported them.

Best way to get to a hacker in my opinion... break their computer with viruses, worms, & trojans... *Evil grin & laughs*

[HeavensLittleDevil]

Lord Death Vincent

EvilFuzzyKitty

mad You are both really insensitive jerks. Some of these scams are really convincing and someone who is new to the site might not know better. And really, does anyone really deserve to be scammed?! Maybe it's you who deserves it for being so insensitive.

You're joking... right? I mean, literally. You think that half these people got scammed because of how CONVINCING that garbage is? These people got scammed because they were too lazy to simply spend a few minutes checking over information that should help them. And no one is saying that they deserve it; stop making us look like we're the bad guys. We just think that those people should have took to the time to read the rules; check out everything that tells them about scammers; and assure themselves safty. I mean; there are a BILLION things out there that shows who's an admin, mod, whatever, and who isn't. If the colored writing in their name isn't enough, or the quote under the name of what they do is also not enough, or any of the other information; then these are truly moronic people and should either spend their valuable, free time learning about Gaia's rules; or just not coming on if they don't want to be scammed; but don't want to read the rules. I don't know if they exactly deserve it under any personal feelings; but under viewing the situation of how idiotic they were I think they deserve it for not thinking clearly and not knowing things that they should already know.

I can understand that is isn't fair, nor in any way fun. I haven't got hacked yet, and have yet to actually fall victim of a good, repeat good, scam. But they should have at least known better. And I also feel that the scammers wouldn't just go for a new member. They attack those who have a lot of fancy, rather pleasant looking stuff on them. Why go after someone who has yet to afford expensive stuff; then people who actually can get this stuff.

Also; on another note. I understand that some of these items are not important in anyway. Yet, they are pixels. But some of these pixels was bought with real money; like some of my stuff. And that is what none of us want. To have our hard earned cash wasted because someone actually stole something that we bought with real money. stare

I agree with some of this. If they didn't take the time to read through any of the rules or warnings, then what makes you think they're gonna read this? I mean, there's a big red box above incoming pm's telling you that admins/mods won't ask for your password. However, on another note, if you get really worried (like, simply reading a message saying you might get banned), some people get irrational (as if people are rational at all). They try to do whatever the person wants to try to keep their account.
However, I haven't seen any1 new to gaia that really had much to take anyway. If they're really new to gaia, then they're more focusing their time learning all they can about it most likely.

Anywho, I stick by my previous statements.

heart
~Lilly