WoW Spam

If you didn't know, my World of Warcraft account was hacked in November. No I did not buy gold, or have a keylogger. I believe the tried a few times to get into my email account because I got a few messages on my BlackBerry that my account was not working.

I logged into check it out and find an email about my WoW password being changed. Bad times....

I have a token now that gives me a special code to log in, and I changed my WoW email to one that is only used for WoW. I don't worry about being hacked, and try not to panic when I get an email about my email not working.

Anyhow, the point I was getting to was the fake WoW phising spam. I was getting one or two every couple of weeks. Fake emails claiming to be from the WoW team and needing information, or log into a site. Well, it was coming to my old WoW email address, clearly not really from Blizzard. I have been forwarding them on to Blizzard.

However the pace has skyrocketed. I am now getting several a day. Its really quite annoying.

So phising spammers, get lost you evil people. Stop trying to feed off of others by stealing their information. Its just wrong.

Now that I have that off my chest, I think I am quitting WoW, again. Maybe it will be another break. But I think tonight with the Wintersgrasp incident I am done.

I like Wintersgrasp, however its hard to get into because it only happens every couple of hours and you don't know when it will be exactly as its based on when the last one finished.

I was excited after a rough day to see it was about to happen, I log in, get the quests, get started. Later as we were defending I start to have very bad lag, and the game kicks me out. No big deal, just annoying. Until I log back in, and I'm in the middle of nowhere and marked so that the other side can attack me.

Ok, fly back to the battle. Oh no, I'm no longer in queue, and the game is full. I have to wait. Wait until never as it ends before I can get back in and collect my reward.

I have had enough I think. I have better things to be worried about. Sadly even quiting probably won't make the spam go away.

New Year New Ideas

I sure have been naughty about posting over the past few months. I am going to try and be better.

First - Apple iPad???? Really?? I am no apple fan, well I don't have or use anything apple. But I found the iPad to be uninteresting. Just a bigger iPhone/iTouch. Oh well. Apple's loss.
However I am sick and tired of people trying to compare it to a Kindle. I couldn't imagine reading an entire book on an LCD screen. Plus, its kinda too big, and way more expensive than a Kindle. Not to mention Apple wants to sell books for $3-$5 more than Amazon. What is up with that?

So I am heading back to Kennedy for another NASA tweet gathering in February. It should be a great time for the launch of the SDO, a rocket, not a shuttle this time. I am sure it will still be amazing.
On the NASA note - we can afford millions and billions for a high speed rail? Does anyone really ride those in the US? But we can't afford to fund exploration of space? I wasn't even alive back when we landed on the moon the first time. I would love to have a moon landing in my lifetime. Clearly so would alot of other people, as I am hearing there is a bit of a fuss over scrapping moon plans.

On a completely different note, I updgraded my BlackBerry this week from an 8900 to a 9700. I wanted the battery life as my 8900 battery was not doing so hot. Sure I could get a new battery, but a new phone is much better. And it looks like I picked a great time. We haven't had 3G here although I have been told the hardware is around. Today myself, my husband, and one of his co-workers found ourselves attached to 3G for awhile. I would guess T-Mobile was testing it out. By the time I got home I was back to Edge, which is no big deal as I am on wifi at home.

And if anyone saw my tweets earlier, I haven't decided on Star Trek Online. My husband pre-ordered his tonight and got his early code. Its been downloading for hours. I will wait to see him play this weekend to make my final decision. I have never really been a Star Trek fan until the recent movie. I thought it was good, and have given some of the older stuff a second chance.
Of course if we both start playing Star Trek we will have to take a break from World of Warcraft.

Well, enough rambling on for one night I think.

Another Day

Well, today was not the best of days. My alarm did not go off, so I overslept. Not by much, just fifteen minutes, but its still not the way you want to start the day.

All day at work I checked my BlackBerry for an email from Blizzard. I finally got one, but it was not what I hoped. It was a survey about the professionalism of the guy in game. Please, just fix my account so I can play. I am losing all sorts of honor, experience, and such as I can't play.
Ok, WoW rant is now over for today.

I know I have talked about the Kindle a lot. I was planning on something else tonight, but I read an article I have to share here, on SlashGear. Kindle DX not suitable for the blind says advocacy group.
I am sorry, I don't mean to sound mean, but blind students have to purchase special text books already. Why does it affect the Kindle?

So who has moved to Windows 7? I did at the end of October from XP. I loved XP and refused to use Vista. However there is one feature of Windows 7 I adore. The previews from the tool bar is nice, but my favorite is the Bubble screen saver. Your backdrop remains the same, with whatever windows you had up. Then bubbles dance all over the screen. I am silly I know, but I love it.
I can't speak to the install process too much. I was hear when my husband was working on his. We ran into one issue, aside from having to back everything up. The key that came with his brand new Windows 7 didn't work. He called Amazon, who sent us to Microsoft. The gentleman was very nice and got my husband up and running.
My PC was done while I was out of town for work. Wasn't that sweet of my husband to do for me?

If you are not following me on twitter (you know you really should - melissaox) you might not know that I am going to the first Nasa Tweetup in Florida starting this Sunday. It concludes on Monday with the launch of the shuttle Monday afternoon, allowing me, and my husband, to be at the press site for launch. We are very excited. We welcome everyone coming for the Tweetup and the launch. This will be my first Tweetup. The ones in Orlando have been on weeknights and its a bit of a drive for me when I have to get up at 5am the next morning.
We might be on NASA TV, or even the news.
If you want to watch -
NASA will use UStream to broadcast the 8-10 a.m. portion of the Nov. 15 Tweetup at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nasa-television. Portions of the Tweetup may be broadcast on NASA Television and online at http://www.nasa.gov/ntv. Photos will be posted online during and/or after the event at http://www.flickr.com/photos/nasahqphoto.

I will also be taking pictures with my BlackBerry 8900 and posting them to my flickr account, http://www.flickr.com/photos/melissaox/.

My Nasty Wednesday

Today was supposed to be good. A day off in the middle of the week. Relaxing with the family. Stayed up late last night, did a Heroic Dungeon in World of Warcraft. That was fun. I got a few new items, better than what I had. And it was the first time I had done the dungeon on heroic.

Then we retied and watched last night's V and last week's Fringe. And for anyone who saw my tweets last week, I gave in and bought Fringe from amazon. It was wierd to watch at first with no ads, but cool. Fringe scared me, I thought the shadow man was going to get me. I am a chicken, and terrified of the dark.
I woke up a few times during the night. Maybe if I had thought to go log in to my WoW (World of Warcraft) account or email account I might have stopped the attack. But I didn't.

This morning when the girls woke me up and I got them situated with breakfast I checked my email where my BlackBerry said I needed to reset my password on one of my email accounts. I thought it was odd, but went to the PC to take a look and reset the password on that email account. It wasn't until I got in and saw other emails that I realized it was the email account that is now my log in to WoW thanks to the battle net account change.
It was a fairly public email I used as my contact for most everything. In hindsight, that was a bad idea.

I reset my password for WoW and found my characters naked, itemless, and penniless. I sent in an email and my husband realized both guild banks had been picked dry. He opened an in game ticket and they said my case was in queue and we should hopefully get everything back, but it would take a few days.

I have created a new email account just for my WoW account. I went through and changed all my email accounts passwords to randomized ones. A pain in the butt to type in, but more secure. I also ordered my husband and I Blizzard tokens (authenticators) we have to wait 15 days as Blizzard for whatever reason did not support any of the newer BlackBerrys for the mobile version.

When I say newer, I mean the 8900 or the Storm, both have been out for quite some time. I am not talking about the 8700 or Storm 2 that just came out.

So now I can't play WoW until they fix my account which could be several days. My in games friends and I all feel violated.
I hadn't installed any programs. Matter of fact this PC was wiped and re-loaded just before Halloween to install Windows 7. It also came up with a clean scan that was run this morning at 4am, right around the time I was attacked.

I find myself wondering what happened. And what I can do to keep it from happening, at least until I get the token which should make it impossible to happen again.
And really what did this person gain for all their work? Not much really. Is this what buying gold leads to? Not that I have ever bought gold, but I understand one theory is the gold sellers hack accounts to get the gold to sell and to spam and sell from. Wouldn't that go away if WoW sold gold legally, so to speak?

Needless to say, I haven't put much thought into it yet. I am just upset that I was drug into this mess and my holiday and week has been messed up.