High-profile FIFA YouTubers hacked, scream about it
EA account security once again comes under fire.
EA account security has once again come under fire after a handful of high-profile FIFA YouTubers were hacked.
Last month FIFA YouTubers AnesonGib, W2S, Nepenthez, Nick28T, Bateson87 and matthdgamer all found their accounts compromised, FUT coins stolen and in some cases, valuable players deleted.
The YouTubers made videos to express their anger at EA over the theft. Here's AnesonGib, who has over 800,000 subscribers on YouTube, screaming into the camera.
Here's W2S, who has a whopping 5.1m subscribers, with a similar video. He claims someone gained access to his account after posing as the YouTuber in an EA customer service online chat conversation armed only with his email address. W2S reckons he lost around £1000 worth of in-game items.
Matthew Craig, aka matthdgamer, told the BBC his in-form Ronaldo card, who is worth around 3.4m FIFA coins, had been deleted by the hackers. Craig said 3.4m coins is worth about £800, going by current exchange rates.
"It's most likely they just went on the leaderboards and found the ones with the best Ultimate Team Clubs and targeted us that way," he said.
Posting in the comments below his video, Craig said EA replaced many of his stolen items, including in-form Ronaldo, although he's still missing approximately 20 in-form players.
EA issued a statement on the hacks, which stressed the importance of authentication and verification.
EA has for some years now battled FIFA account hackers, many of which sell FIFA coins on the grey market for real world cash.
Indeed, many popular FIFA YouTubers are sponsored by FIFA coin selling websites, and include links to them in their video descriptions - a practice frowned upon by EA.