Here we go again. Star Trek Online and Champions Online players may want to check their inboxes today for an email from Cryptic. The developer recently discovered that one of their database servers was breached…back in December...of 2010. Unfortunately, this has resulted in more compromised user account names, handles and encrypted passwords. Despite the passwords being encrypted, Cryptic believes that the intruder has managed to crack a portion of them and has sent out email notifications and reset the passwords to players that they believe may have been one of the victimized.

While Cryptic currently has no evidence that other account information was compromised, they admit that it’s possible that the intruder could have possibly gained access to additional account information that includes: first and last names, email addresses, date of birth, billing addresses and the first six digits and last four digits of any registered credit cards.

As with most other gaming companies that have had the unpleasant experience of an intruder waltzing in, giving a giggle at their security, and then making off with user details throughout the year of 2011, Cryptic is working to strengthen their systems and improve security.

Source: Cryptic Customer Notification


IMPORTANT CUSTOMER SERVICE NOTIFICATION REGARDING UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS

Cryptic Studios, your privacy and security is important. As part of our ongoing efforts to monitor and enhance security, we recently detected evidence of an unauthorized access to one of our user databases. The unauthorized access occurred in December 2010, and evidence of this has just been uncovered due to increased security analysis.

The unauthorized access included user account names, handles, and encrypted passwords for those accounts. Even though the passwords were encrypted, it is apparent that the intruder has been able to crack some portion of the passwords in this database. All accounts that we believe were present in the database have had the passwords reset, and customers registered to these accounts have been notified via e-mail of this incident.

While we have no evidence that any other information was taken by the intruder, it is possible that the intruder was able to access additional account information. If they did so, the first and last name, e-mail address, date of birth (if provided to Cryptic Studios), billing address, and the first six digits and the last four digits of credit cards registered on the site may have been accessed. We have no evidence at this time that any data other than the account name, handle, and encrypted password were accessed for any user.

We are continuing to investigate this incident, and are taking even further action to strengthen our systems and redouble our security vigilance and protections. For your own security, we encourage you to be especially aware of e-mail and postal mail scams that ask for personal or sensitive information. Cryptic will not contact you in any way, including by e-mail, asking for your credit card number, social security number, or any other personally identifiable information. If you use the same password for other accounts, especially financial accounts or accounts with personal information, we strongly recommend that you change them.

While we have no evidence of unauthorized use of personal information as a result of this incident, to protect against any possible identity theft, we encourage you to remain vigilant, to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports. Further information regarding the prevention of identity theft can be found at the Federal Trade Commission’s website here.

We apologize for any inconvenience this unauthorized access may have caused our customers. Customers with questions about this incident and how it may affect them can contact customer service by submitting a support ticket at https://support.perfectworld.com/app/cs_cryptic/iss/log.


To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our Star Trek Online Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 14, 2016

About The Author

Stacy "Martuk" Jones was a long-time news editor and community manager for many of our previous game sites, such as Age of Conan. Stacy has since moved on to become a masked super hero, battling demons in another dimension.

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