I did wonder how it was possible for a player to achieve as much in ESO as they'd claimed to have done, within the timeframe they'd given. Thank you for letting us know the outcome of your investigation.

code65536 wrote: »

"I want to buy cash shop items for other people" seems to be a strange priority for someone this new to the game.

I've wanted to buy stuff for my friends in many games in much shorter periods of time. If there's an in-game trading system for real world money to in-game currency via the story (which ESO does have in a roundabout way, so long as you take the appropriate measures), I'd be happy to do that as well even with strangers if I can get a good price and I'm looking for something particularly expensive (I enjoy housing in ESO, which demolishes my gold).

This is absolutely only a suspicious trait if you view social interaction as inherently suspicious.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Upon reevaluation of the account, we could tell the user was an active ESO player, but still had concerning markers on their account. We weighed the pros and cons of those risks and ultimately granted access to gifting. Unfortunately, within 24 hours, we were able to confirm new fraudulent behavior made by the user. They have now been permanently banned in-game and from the forum.

Thanks for sharing this Kevin, this is why I'm always skeptical when people come to the forums complaining about a decision ZOS made about their account and protesting that the decision is unfair because they're as pure as the driven snow. I don't automatically disbelieve people, because mistakes happen, but I sure don't automatically believe them either.

Sometimes I wonder how important the gifting system is for those players.

Welp, I guess that is that.

Wow. That was unexpected!

Will try again on my alt account - the main reason I want to gift is that its my trading account but has ESO+ so has crowns but would rather get stuff for my main account with those crowns! Nothing sinister! Just crowns going to waste!

Barto92 wrote: »

code65536 wrote: »

In hindsight, someone who had been playing for less than a year being this interested in crown gifting should itself have been a red flag for people on the forum. "I want to buy cash shop items for other people" seems to be a strange priority for someone this new to the game.

Someone might just as well be playing together with a friend or their partner and want to give them a gift. After all, a year of playing any game is quite a lot of time.

They started six months ago, had taken extended breaks and only had steady play in March and April. And they somehow had like every hard mode veteran Trial achievement in the game. That does not happen organically. You don't just stumble out of the starter island and into an Immortal Redeemer group. OP was almost certainly paying for carries. Or a ringer account getting paid to carry others.

Paying in-game gold for assistance with difficult content is not against TOS. But when your only in-game activity seems to be rapidly accumulating high difficulty achievements that are typically way over the head of a new player, that is like a rapid fire ballista that shoots red flags.

Wait what even is a bad actor? Is it like a scammer? I don't understand how people buying cosmetic gifts for others is a harmful thing, nor why bad actors would be eager to get gifting permission in the first place.

Malyore wrote: »

Wait what even is a bad actor? Is it like a scammer? I don't understand how people buying cosmetic gifts for others is a harmful thing, nor why bad actors would be eager to get gifting permission in the first place.

What Pevey said: money laundering. Let's say a criminal steals a credit card. How are they going to use it without being caught or leaving a trace back to them? If they try to use it at a physical store, there will be witnesses, security camera footage, etc. If they buy some physical thing online, they'll need to ship it somewhere.

So digital goods are attractive because the criminal can remain anonymous. I'm sure you've seen the spam ads in zone chat about buying gold from some website. That's the other end of this criminal scheme. Use dirty money from stolen cards to buy crowns. Trade crowns for gold. Sell gold on website for clean money. This isn't a thing that only affects ESO; I've heard stories about this sort of thing in other games as well.

I think it was eye opening to see how "genuine" someone can post while all the time they had bad intentions.

Pevey wrote: »

Malyore wrote: »

Wait what even is a bad actor? Is it like a scammer? I don't understand how people buying cosmetic gifts for others is a harmful thing, nor why bad actors would be eager to get gifting permission in the first place.

Money laundering. They buy crowns using credit cards from purchased lists or opened using identity theft and then sell those crowns on shady sites for real money. Or, they sell the crowns to gullible players willing to believe those below-market-rate crowns they saw advertised in zone chat were totally legit. Like, totally. And then they sell the resulting gold for real money. End result is cash that can be hard to trace to the stolen cards. If you buy crowns for gold, only buy from people you trust.

Oh wow, good to know. I wasn't considering they would be using stolen money (job market must be rough, sheesh). It's good to see ZOS doesn't take advantage of that. Bad actor is such a strange name for them though. I'd call them criminals and then get their personal info reported to authorities.

I appreciate Kevin explaining what happened and leaving the thread open for people to witness and discuss it. Very educational.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Hi everyone. Our Anti-Fraud team made up of Devs, Customer Service, and Community team members wanted to follow up here after monitoring this thread and engaging with the original poster of the thread. We believe it’s important to go over this case, because it’s a good example of a bad actor and the tactics they use to circumvent safety processes to do harm.

First, we want to acknowledge that while the gifting process can be frustrating, it is designed to keep both you, the player, and us safe from bad actors.

When the user originally placed their ticket in for gifting access, we denied their request due to account markers that showed future signs of potential fraudulent behavior. However, the user then opened this thread noting their playtime and claim to eligibility. In addition to their claims, we heard from many of you. We understand the frustration with the process and empathize with it. Many of you know that we often go through threads like this and try to assist where we can with the support of our customer service team.

Upon reevaluation of the account, we could tell the user was an active ESO player, but still had concerning markers on their account. We weighed the pros and cons of those risks and ultimately granted access to gifting. Unfortunately, within 24 hours, we were able to confirm new fraudulent behavior made by the user. They have now been permanently banned in-game and from the forum.

We highlight this because a common tactic bad actors use is the power of public forums here and elsewhere: taking advantage of the everyday player’s goodwill to garner public support to be let back in. Based on this situation, future threads like this will be based only on the follow-up investigation and closed once the investigation is complete.

To close out this post, we are still working to get as many people in as possible to the gifting program. We relaxed rules for gifting earlier this year and will continue to monitor these rules. Our goal is to stop bad actors, while keeping everyone else safe. Thanks to everyone for taking the time to read this follow up.

Wow! What a wild turn of events that was! (And, coincidentally, very interesting timing due to my own case.)
My account's ability to perform gifting was FINALLY enabled yesterday on June 27th, after an appeal.
I was initially upset that I was denied, since I created my account on June 11th, 2014, well over a decade ago.
Although I made my ESO account back in June 2014; I joined the ESO forums much later, back in January 2020.

I find player behaviour fascinating. I know I am an odd one and likely outlier.
I think I only paid for ESO+ once, when it was discounted, a few weeks ago.
I deliberately don't pay for ESO+ so that I only get the base-game dungeons.
(I don't like most of the DLC dungeons due to how long they take to complete.)
As for the crafting bag benefit, I give all of my materials to my friends instead.
5/8 of my characters' mounts are at 60/60/60 on speed, inventory, & stamina.
(180 days each and each upgraded at different time-intervals over many years.)

Some of my current currency/stats:
2,550 Crowns.
789 Crown Gems.
13,275 Seals of Endeavor.
2.9 mil Alliance Points.
494 Crown Experience Scrolls.
980 Crown Fortifying Meals.
609 Crown Refreshing Drinks.
23,700 Crown Lethal Poisons.
15,146 Crown Tri-Resto Potions.
512 Crown Repair Kits.
117 Instant-Research Scrolls.
(And 50-60 of each of the craft-specific scrolls.)

I've been in the same 5 guilds for several years, but I primarily communicate via Discord servers, not ingame.
I've only bought crowns a few times, many years apart.
Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood, way back in 2016.
Reaper's Harvest (Halloween) Crown Crates in 2017 or 2018. (Released once per year, so I don't remember.)
(Swarm of Crows, Crow's Calling, & Murderous Strike mementos —way before Endeavours became a thing.)
And, most recently, I bought the Housing Starter Pack, a few months ago; which came with 800 crowns, too.
My only Chapters are Summerset & Blackwood. (Both gifted to me from participating in Aliyavana's ESO Gift Exchange during the New Year / New Life event, this year and/or last year.)

I've claimed a major amount of daily login rewards over the years. (See my EXP scrolls & potions above.)
I've also participated in many of the limited-time community events for free houses, like Golden Pursuits.

My post is not a rant and I am simply just sharing a little bit about me and my ESO's account history & data, because, honestly, I have never stopped to evaluate all of that information myself; until now, after reading OP's own history (or what they claimed to have completed, anyways), whether that was the actual account owner or a hijacked account. That is a sad situation.
But, I am very glad ESO's Support Team finally granted my account access for the ability to gift crowns, if I ever choose to do so.

Sometimes I just have periods of ingame maintenance-mode where I only login to claim dailies, and then logout.
Event-fatigue is a large factor. It is difficult to keep up with daily login rewards for multiple games at the same time, as well as all of the limited-time events, especially when they often overlap (such as on major holidays).
I am a longtime reader of the dev-tracker and a longtime lurker of the ESO forums, even though I don't post much on the forums.
Anyways, I promise that I am not a bot! (Nor a hijacked account.) I am just a weird player with very odd player-behaviour.

@ZOS_Kevin , please give Trevor, from ESO's Support Team, my sincere thanks!

I had a bad feeling about this particular request because I thought having so many hard modes brand new was a major red flag. I got further bad vibes when they posted ZOS making a one time exception for them based off their seeming sincerity. I'm glad ZOS has dealt with this person who took advantage of public goodwill and staff kindness. I'm sorry to see future threads get restricted because of one bad actor when there have been so many legitimate people who were able to get help here.