Account closed by CIG after account sale !!!

[CyberianK]

18 minutes ago, Xenohunter said:

I do agree full. Any ideas for different approaches are very welcome.

Sometimes the innocent "I am young and cute and don't know shit and I am now bursting in tears and totally broken and desperate" works. But I don't really have experience with CIG specific support so I can't really help you much. 

Not sure if concierge helps or if its dangerous you said you have that. Maybe if you do a fresh CS call where you are stuck maybe if you point to that in Concierge "friend of mine is really desperate with a hopeless CS call right now maybe you can look at that"

But you should try to talk to ppl who had more experience with CIG CS before what the best strategies might be no idea here sorry. Maybe try to PM some active redditors with related topcs or general experiences too. Do some searches in forums and reddit and PM some ppl who went through similar experiences. Parrallel inquiry "Why did you lock my account" might also be worthwhile to collect as much info as possible. Sorry I don't have more than general jibberjabber.

[GeraldEvans]

I know why they would want to prevent after the game starts. Account sales equal gold farming. But in this case, it's just LTI or concept models or stretch goals. I can't for the life of me figure why they'd care.

[Rellim]

1 hour ago, Xenohunter said:

Would it make a difference to get an account as a gift compared to an account sale?

No, the TOS prohibit account ownership transfers of any kind, even if you give it to someone for free. 

[Rain2reign]

There seems to be a lot of confusion, so let me put my 2 cents out here.

The EU law is only accountable if 'whatever' happens, happened WITHIN European Union borders. So the Most important questions are:

• 1. Are both parties (seller and buyer) from the European Union?
• 2. Did the transaction happened within European Union's borders?
• 3. Does the Terms of Use allow the buying and selling of accounts? (This being a key factor, as the court will weigh this heavily in it's decision whether the company allow such use or not..)
• 4. Does the selling AND buying breach the terms of use and copyright (infringement)?

Note: do no confuse European Union's borders with all countries borders inside the entire continent of Europe! Not all countries are part of the Union.

As the Terms of Use prohibits the selling of account and transfer of it's ownership(you can inquire with Cloud Imperium Games to allow such actions, only with consent is it lawful), you will be in a very, very disadvantageous position. You might actually be the one whom will be fined. The court will see this as infringement/breach of (possible) copyright and unlawful buy & selling. Not to mention the fact that the transfer and buying of the account happened through the internet (i presume), it is not within US let alone EU borders and thus courts of both sides and can sue you instead.

The way politics, law and judge see this is that you were in the wrong to begin with by illegally acquiring an account using currency of any kind or country. And when you bought the account you were, are and should (have been) aware of the dangers and consequences that come with it. 

In event that the seller is from any nation outside of the European Union, like Australia or United States of America. Than in for example the United states of America, and the seller is from (official citizen) and sold it to you, while he physically was present within USA it's borders when it happened. The moment that is defined, you bought a 'product' from outside the EU and thus different laws apply. And in that event the Laws of in this example's case, the USA, the laws of the USA are the onces the seller is accountable for first and foremost. Plus you probably didn't pay (import) tax on the bought product as you purchased it from a foreign country for personal use within the country you're situated in.

Yes, the EU law allows and have you in it's right to demand, if not ask for a refund within a certain period of time. The period can differ when stated otherwise by the company/reseller. As the account is a digital product and no such law current exist that it makes it your property GLOBALLY. Thus the account and all it's contents will be and stay ownership of Cloud Imperium Games, which happens to be situated within the US (Headquarters), with other offices in other countries. Each office is accountable for it's part within that particular country it's situated in.

 

TL;DR - In very, very short

You acquired the account through unlawful means and as such you should, are and still am aware of the dangers and consequences. If Cloud Imperium Games decide you grant you access to the account of their own volition, than you gained/were granted access to it. Till then they're in their rights to close and re-use it as they see fit. Apart from the actual fact that you breached the Terms of Use which may or may not have different consequences.

[Riley Egret]

9 minutes ago, rain2reign said:

There seems to be a lot of confusion, so let me put my 2 cents out here.

The EU law is only accountable if 'whatever' happens, happened WITHIN European Union borders. So the Most important questions are:

• 1. Are both parties (seller and buyer) from the European Union?
• 2. Did the transaction happened within European Union's borders?
• 3. Does the Terms of Use allow the buying and selling of accounts? (This being a key factor, as the court will weigh this heavily in it's decision whether the company allow such use or not..)
• 4. Does the selling AND buying breach the terms of use and copyright (infringement)?

Note: do no confuse European Union's borders with all countries borders inside the entire continent of Europe! Not all countries are part of the Union.

As the Terms of Use prohibits the selling of account and transfer of it's ownership(you can inquire with Cloud Imperium Games to allow such actions, only with consent is it lawful), you will be in a very, very disadvantageous position. You might actually be the one whom will be fined. The court will see this as infringement/breach of (possible) copyright and unlawful buy & selling. Not to mention the fact that the transfer and buying of the account happened through the internet (i presume), it is not within US let alone EU borders and thus courts of both sides and can sue you instead.

The way politics, law and judge see this is that you were in the wrong to begin with by illegally acquiring an account using currency of any kind or country. And when you bought the account you were, are and should (have been) aware of the dangers and consequences that come with it. 

Yes, the EU law allows and have you in it's right to demand, if not ask for a refund within a certain period of time. The period can differ when stated otherwise by the company/reseller. As the account is a digital product and no such law current exist that it makes it your property GLOBALLY. Thus the account and all it's contents will be and stay ownership of Cloud Imperium Games, which happens to be situated within the US (Headquarters), with other offices in other countries. Each office is accountable for it's part within that particular country it's situated in.

 

TL;DR - In short

You acquired the account through unlawful means and as such you should, are and still am aware of the dangers and consequences. If Cloud Imperium Games decide you grant you access to the account of their own volition, than you gained/were granted access to it. Till then they're in their rights to close and re-use it as they see fit. Apart from the actual fact that you breached the Terms of Use which may or may not have different consequences.

Just saying, a couple of things.

-The" sale spot" normally is recognized as the buyer country  in EU ( usually is more "protective").

-the Microsoft and Oracle cases are related, to the best of my knowledge, to software sales,  there is a tchnical difference between the software and the account. It could be argued easily that would be possible to sell the game package ( with the software) but not the ships ( which are assets tied to the account, no software is bought by pledging for them).

On top of that, even if it was ruled that you can acquire an account, CIG would still retain their right to refuse your access to the game as the TOS says ( while you could play the game offline/on a rpivate server if and when they release private servers).

 

Final final note: my law kung fu is a bit rusty, when I was at Uni we still had C64 only anyway

[CyberianK]

Not want to escalate this into a discussion but I don't understand this pre-emptive succumbing. @rain2reign Illegality and Law might be the wrong words here imho didn't know CIG, Valve and Blizzard had legislative powers

If I buy heroin, drunkdrive or kill someone its against the law and illegal not sure what law is being violated here. Maybe there is even a case to be made that the only real law that was violated at all was in the original private transaction the guy who sold him if he scammed. Then maybe after that CIG might have chosen to cede serving their customer by terminating the account due to whatever reasons. But still its in question whether they have to recompense for ceding their service. Then of course they would recompense the original buyer if this is no valid transaction. Unless they argue they fully completed their side of the contract. 

But imho if things were very easy and 100% clear then this would not be such a big deal with games everywhere and often handled silently by the dev/CS.

Probably total BS here from my side I am obviously no lawyer nor know much about it does anyone have a link to a good discussion detailing this topic I am suddenly interested although I will never buy/sell an account?

[Rain2reign]

16 minutes ago, CyberianK said:

Not want to escalate this into a discussion but I don't understand this pre-emptive succumbing. @rain2reign Illegality and Law might be the wrong words here imho

If I buy heroin, drunkdrive or kill someone its against the law and illegal not sure what law is being violated here. Maybe there is even a case to be made that the only real law that was violated at all was in the original private transaction the guy who sold him if he scammed. Then maybe after that CIG might have chosen to cede serving their customer by terminating the account due to whatever reasons. But still its in question whether they have to recompense for ceding their service. Then of course they would recompense the original buyer if this is no valid transaction.

But imho if things were very easy and 100% clear then this would not be such a big deal with games everywhere and often handled silently by the dev/CS.

I don't want to escalate this into a discussion either. You're right though, it might not have been the best choice of words. Alas, the fact stays he broke the TOS and rejects to be accountable for it. Private sells are out of CIG's power until the moment the account was accessed. I just hope he won't get severely punished for this as the money he lost is probably a large sum as well. 

17 minutes ago, Riley Egret said:

Just saying, a couple of things.

-The" sale spot" normally is recognized as the buyer country  in EU ( usually is more "protective").

-the Microsoft and Oracle cases are related, to the best of my knowledge, to software sales,  there is a tchnical difference between the software and the account. It could be argued easily that would be possible to sell the game package ( with the software) but not the ships ( which are assets tied to the account, no software is bought by pledging for them).

On top of that, even if it was ruled that you can acquire an account, CIG would still retain their right to refuse your access to the game as the TOS says ( while you could play the game offline/on a rpivate server if and when they release private servers).

 

Final final note: my law kung fu is a bit rusty, when I was at Uni we still had C64 only anyway

The thing is, in this case you technically by the right to access and play the game/software and not the software itself (Star Citizen). Accounts and software differ if i remember correctly. Software is the product itself as the account on the other hand is a means to access a part of the software. Thus buying an account is like obtaining a 'key' to a door and not the contends tied within it.

Laws are never really 100% clear to begin with.  

[Devil Khan]

Part of TOS, anything you buy digitally, RSI will remain ownership of said item. You unfortunately don't have much to stand on as you are not permitted to buy anything except from  RSI directly. It's basically the grey market ( who should be called the black market). The only reason why they de-activated  your account, was you did tell them that you have bought it from another guy. Which was a rookie move to be honest. There is little chance that you will get that account back even under special circumstances, because if they give one guy even though he was in the wrong, think of repercussions afterwards.

Your chances are Bob hope and No Hope. And with Bob ?Hope dead it leaves you with no hope.

We are all really sorry that was happened did happen and that you lost USD 1600 which made you really angry and frustrated. CS at the end of the day did everything in the rule book and abide by the TOS. EU doesn't come in anywhere really and it was a US seller and a US Company.

 

 

[Jon1812]

2 hours ago, CyberianK said:

My mind is still totally divided on this issue

On the one hand I think that everything that you BUY and then OWN you should have the right to then SELL again. Companies trying to frame it as if you never own the virtual goods seems oppressive and unjust to me. Sure I understand how they do it if its just a Service and a contract instead of an actual good but still it smells fishy.

On the other hand I get that there are complications if they would allow it.

 

More on topic if this would happen to me I would still try to not be silent about this and stalk CS with multiples different approaches. You might get lucky with one of these approaches depending on where it lands. Different CS peoples and communication chains sometimes have different outcomes for the same issue even if that chance is low in your case.

The way I look at it is that you are entering a contract with the original seller (in this case that would be CIG), so while it is annoying that they stipulate that we can't go on to re-sell the "goods", I would want it to be upheld. Technically those are the terms we agreed to, when first purchasing. The ships have not been banned, so they are legitimate, but we did agree not to exchange accounts.
Maybe we will see a move away from these types of terms in the future, but companies don't like secondhand sales much. So this is the most likely status for some time.

[CyberianK]

2 minutes ago, Jon1812 said:

The way I look at it is that you are entering a contract with the original seller (in this case that would be CIG), so while it is annoying that they stipulate that we can't go on to re-sell the "goods", I would want it to be upheld. Technically those are the terms we agreed to, when first purchasing. The ships have not been banned, so they are legitimate, but we did agree not to exchange accounts.
Maybe we will see a move away from these types of terms in the future, but companies don't like secondhand sales much. So this is the most likely status for some time.

Yeah I understand the basic concept of contracts but I think its not that easy especially the red part.

And I am not sure the software company can just claim breach of contract and walk away with all the money without having fulfilled any part of its contract ever in the case of SC.

 

[Chimaera]

Semantics of legality or illegality of account sales aside, there is another distinct possibility involved: the sale was either a scam, or a hacked account that was reclaimed by the original owner. The fact is that when an account changes hands, whether or not it is allowable by the ToS, the original account holder and creator hold dominant ownership. This means that if the original owner contacts the company the account is through, they are able to effectively say anything they want and get back the ownership of the account. 

The onus is then on the "second hand" owner of the account to make a case to the company that they legitimately were sold the item, and make a case for regaining ownership access. Unfortunately, because of the high risk of fraud, almost every company in the world that offers digital accounts also have the disclaimer that the third party sale of such accounts is against their terms, and as such, they reserve the right to take whatever action they deem necessary. 

When this happens, it is actually less on CIG to try to accomodate your problem, because for all you know the account was a hacked account that was sold by a scammer. CIG is not required to provide you with that information, and you are not entitled to it simply because you paid someone (not CIG) for an item that was potentially stolen. In this case, you are better off to go to paypal or whomever processed your transaction and initiate a fraud dispute so you can get your funds returned. CIG is not bound to give you any assistance because you never gave them any funds for the item. Instead you should be going after the person who sold you the item that was then locked out. 

[pyro nl]

wel all i wanna say is good luck and thx for beeing a big supporter of the game

 

but thats why i keep it at grey market shipsales only, less risks

[Teefy]

this reminds me of the seller of a javelin destroyer (account) who mentions this in his post. that its legal in Europe etc.

i thought, sure that might be true, but good luck taking it to court as the legal fees will grossly outweigh the worth of a javalin. even if you win.

[Riley Egret]

 

7 hours ago, rain2reign said:

I don't want to escalate this into a discussion either. You're right though, it might not have been the best choice of words. Alas, the fact stays he broke the TOS and rejects to be accountable for it. Private sells are out of CIG's power until the moment the account was accessed. I just hope he won't get severely punished for this as the money he lost is probably a large sum as well. 

The thing is, in this case you technically by the right to access and play the game/software and not the software itself (Star Citizen). Accounts and software differ if i remember correctly. Software is the product itself as the account on the other hand is a means to access a part of the software. Thus buying an account is like obtaining a 'key' to a door and not the contends tied within it.

Laws are never really 100% clear to begin with.  

Eh, I doubt it makes any difference: even if that interpretation held in court ( I doubt it tbh, access has always been treated as an accessory to the account legally, not to the software ), you would still be in the same position as any other backer, which means CIG can withdraw your access to the servers based on their own decisions alone ( like Blizzard or anyone else really), and that's what happened actually here.

[Rain2reign]

I've never tried this myself, but you can petition to your bank or PayPal if you payed through that instead, to get a refund. As you've never received the product purchased or might be victim of fraud/scam. I don't know how that exactly works, since I've have never done it myself though nor do i know how much that would help in regards to your money(finance).

 

[Devil Khan]

The buying of the account thru third party wasn't 100% legal in the first place. Also he wasn't paying taxes either if they were in the EU. He did have access to the account from what I have heard so far.

[Donut]

7 minutes ago, rain2reign said:

I've never tried this myself, but you can petition to your bank or PayPal if you payed through that instead, to get a refund. As you've never received the product purchased or might be victim of fraud/scam. I don't know how that exactly works, since I've have never done it myself though nor do i know how much that would help in regards to your money(finance).

 

Omg you're alive. 

But yeah most if not all banks and paypal should reimburse you

[Rellim]

Paypal buyer protection only applies to sales on physical items, not digital items.

[Rocket Man]

In the end, I would not tie this account with any of your other accounts, especially the high value one.  CIG may block those as well since you are a user violating the ToS, and they will use that link in their justification.

[Xenohunter]

2 hours ago, rain2reign said:

I've never tried this myself, but you can petition to your bank or PayPal if you payed through that instead, to get a refund. As you've never received the product purchased or might be victim of fraud/scam. I don't know how that exactly works, since I've have never done it myself though nor do i know how much that would help in regards to your money(finance).

 

that would be easy with my bank. but than my papal account would have a negative balance and paypal would do anything to get money back from me or deactivate my paypal account

1 hour ago, Rocket Man said:

In the end, I would not tie this account with any of your other accounts, especially the high value one.  CIG may block those as well since you are a user violating the ToS, and they will use that link in their justification.

Yes, I think the same. I could hope that they could be fair to me, who did spend more than several thousand USD for this project. But the risk is present that thay could behave like ignorant a..holes. So I will not risk this.

[KingBullGod]

@Chimaerais right. It's very possible you got scammed. I'm no lawyer and what you're about to read below is just my interpretation of it all.

The EU ruling you reference refers to the resale of software and any associated keys that go with it. This is not the same as the resale of accounts. The account you play on is CIG's and they have the right to terminate it and you aren't allowed to resell those as per their TOS. Because the game is tied to an account, reselling it makes it much harder without also selling your account in the process.

Even if this EU ruling applied to the resale of software accounts, CIG could perhaps claim that accounts also give access to other forms of entertainment (e.g ship concept art, Jump Point magazine, etc) and as such get more protection.

All publishers do this, and they don't do it just to screw with you. They do it because more often than not reselling accounts lead to a scam one way or another, sooner or later.

If you bought the account with a credit card (even if it was through PayPal), contact your bank immediately and request a chargeback. Forget contacting PP; they don't cover frauds involving intangible goods and so they won't help you. If you bought it with PayPal funds, you're out of luck.

[Gustav.Henrik]

12 minutes ago, KingBullGod said:

@Chimaerais right. It's very possible you got scammed. I'm no lawyer and what you're about to read below is just my interpretation of it all.

The EU ruling you reference refers to the resale of software and any associated keys that go with it. This is not the same as the resale of accounts. The account you play on is CIG's and they have the right to terminate it and you aren't allowed to resell those as per their TOS. Because the game is tied to an account, reselling it makes it much harder without also selling your account in the process.

Even if this EU ruling applied to the resale of software accounts, CIG could perhaps claim that accounts also give access to other forms of entertainment (e.g ship concept art, Jump Point magazine, etc) and as such get more protection.

All publishers do this, and they don't do it just to screw with you. They do it because more often than not reselling accounts lead to a scam one way or another, sooner or later.

If you bought the account with a credit card (even if it was through PayPal), contact your bank immediately and request a chargeback. Forget contacting PP; they don't cover frauds involving intangible goods and so they won't help you. If you bought it with PayPal funds, you're out of luck.

The thing is, if you want your account safe, better adhere to ToS. I would change my IP ASAP and not log into my main account from the same IP that admitted breaching ToS. Also I'd never buy an account in the first place. The only thing that is allowed is buying ships and getting them gifted to you or selling and gifting ships. 

[Leeford]

I feel your pain but you shouldn't have rated the support as BAD. That person was just doing their job and following the company policy.

 

[Irres]

Talk to a Lawyer, popular vote does not determine what is correct.

Stop buying accounts.

[GeraldEvans]

Stop buying accounts.