Nintendo Confirms Breach of 160,000 Accounts:
Over the past few weeks, Nintendo gamers have been reporting suspicious activities on their accounts. According to the complaints, aired out on Twitter and Reddit, unauthorized actors were logging into victims' accounts and abusing the payment cards connected to the accounts to buy digital goods on Nintendo's online stores, such as V-Bucks, in-game currency used in Fortnite.
In a Friday statement, Nintendo said that attackers have been abusing its NNID (Nintendo Network ID) legacy login system since the beginning of April to hack into the accounts. NNID was primarily used for the Nintendo 3DS handheld and Wii U console (both now discontinued). This is different from a Nintendo account, which is used for the Nintendo Switch (Nintendo's most recent gaming console, released in 2017).
A NNID can be linked to a Nintendo account and used as a login option. If attackers were able to access a linked NNID, they could then access the linked Nintendo account. From there, they'd have access to payment methods (via PayPal or payment cards) necessary for making in-game purchases.
Nintendo did not provide further detail about how attackers had accessed NNID accounts other than to say they were "obtained illegally by some means other than our service." It has now disabled the ability to log into a Nintendo account using NNID.
In response to recent incidents related to some Nintendo Accounts, it is no longer possible to sign into a Nintendo Account using a Nintendo Network ID. We apologise for any inconvenience caused. Please visit our Support website for more information: https://t.co/GMrXr5OHW0
— Nintendo UK (@NintendoUK) April 24, 2020
Attackers may have also been able to access users' nicknames, dates of birth, countries and email address information, all of which were associated with the NNID, Nintendo warned. Credit card data was not accessed.
Related Stories
When 54-year-old Gary Bowser pleaded guilty to his role in helping Team Xecuter with their piracy-enabling line of console accessories, he realized he would likely never pay back the $14.5 million he owed Nintendo in civil and criminal penalties. In a new interview with The Guardian, though, Bowser says he began making $25 monthly payments toward those massive fines even while serving a related prison sentence.
Last year, Bowser was released after serving 14 months of that 40-month sentence (in addition to 16 months of pre-trial detention), which was spread across several different prisons. During part of that stay, Bowser tells The Guardian, he was paid $1 an hour for four-hour shifts counseling other prisoners on suicide watch.
[...] Nintendo lawyers were upfront that they pushed for jail time for Bowser to "send a message that there are consequences for participating in a sustained effort to undermine the video game industry."
[...] Bowser also maintains that he wasn't directly involved with the coding or manufacture of Team Xecuter's products and only worked on incidental details like product testing, promotion, and website coding. Speaking to Ars in 2020, Aurora, a writer for hacking news site Wololo, described Bowser as "kind of a PR guy" for Team Xecuter. Despite this, Bowser said taking a plea deal on just two charges saved him the time and money of fighting all 14 charges made against him in court.
[...] Now that he's free, Bowser says he has been relying on friends and a GoFundMe[https://www.gofundme.com/f/garyopa-restarting-his-life] page to pay for rent and necessities as he looks for a job. That search could be somewhat hampered by his criminal record and by terms of the plea deal that prevent him from working with any modern gaming hardware.
Despite this, Bowser told The Guardian that his current circumstances are still preferable to a period of homelessness he experienced during his 20s. And while console hacking might be out for Bowser, he is reportedly still "tinkering away with old-school Texas Instruments calculators" to pass the time.
Alternate source with GoFundMe link (added to the story above): Nintendo Sued a Man So Severely That He Can Only Survive on GoFundMe
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(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 25 2020, @06:15PM (5 children)
Once again, why the heck does this company need DOB?
(Score: 4, Funny) by WizardFusion on Saturday April 25 2020, @07:35PM (3 children)
Why do you use your real DOB? I always use 01/01/1900.
For the americans that use a stupid date format, that changes to 01/01/1900
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 25 2020, @09:51PM (1 child)
All of the officially adopted date formats are stupid. YYYYMMDD is the only way that makes sense.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 25 2020, @10:11PM
Fuck all of the above...
https://www.stoacademy.com/tools/stardate.php [stoacademy.com]
(Score: 2) by rigrig on Sunday April 26 2020, @01:43AM
I prefer 1/1/1970, just to mess with the poor coder who will eventually be sent to investigate why sometimes DOB timestamps are zeroed out.
No one remembers the singer.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Pino P on Sunday April 26 2020, @03:12PM
I'm guesing Nintendo needs date of birth to determine whether a user is old enough to communicate in 13-to-communicate countries (such as USA), old enough to communicate in 16-to-communicate countries (such as EU post-GDPR), and old enough to see mature-rated games in eShop search results.
(Score: 1) by leon_the_cat on Saturday April 25 2020, @08:21PM (1 child)
Sonic identity theft confirmed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 25 2020, @09:03PM
Gotta hack fast.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 26 2020, @12:38PM
funny how that works.