A great video game can be an incredible power fantasy, but there's nothing that makes you feel more powerless than having your private information at the mercy of a hacker.
So it should come as no surprise that tech-savvy gamers want their online data to stay secure. However, a new survey from online gaming backend platform PlayFab reveals that many players don't trust video game developers to keep customers safe.
Watch Dogs
PlayFab polled over 500 gamers who claim to play games for at least four hours a week. When asked if game developers were the primary ones responsible for the security of players' data, 83 percent of gamers said yes. However, 39 percent don't actually trust developers to keep up their end of the bargain.
When it comes to security, not all platforms are created equal in the minds of gamers. When asked which platforms they believed were the safest, 30 percent of those surveyed said a desktop or laptop PC was the best choice. About 25 percent said all platforms are about equal while 20 percent said none were safe. The amount of gamers who felt consoles and handhelds like the PlayStation 4 and Nintendo 3DS were the safest platforms was in the single digits. That's odd since the PC's ubiquity is what makes it such a big target for hackers. Dedicated gaming consoles, with their smaller user bases and propriety systems, seem like they would be less valuable to cybercriminals. But then again, PC gamers do have a high opinion of their chosen platform.
Hack and Slash
Despite this intense skepticism from gamers, further responses show that they aren't really doing much to make up for what they feel are lax security safeguards provided by developers. Most of those surveyed prefer to use simple, easily cracked security methods like personal questions (73.4 percent) or email verification (69 percent). To be fair, 70 percent of responders also use some form of two-factor authentication.
PlayFab speculates that this feeling of invulnerability comes from the fact that most players, 85 percent, have never been affected by a game-related security breach in the past. However, recent trends in the gaming industry and information security at large paint a troubling picture for the future.
From Target to Ashley Madison these days there's always news about a huge company that's been attacked by hackers. Gaming companies are just as vulnerable. The 2011 PlayStation Network outage compromised the personal and financial data over 77 million players. Meanwhile, a popular tactic scammers use to trick people into downloading malware is by disguising it as a popular mobile game.
You can check out the full survey and infographic on PlayFab's website.
Good Game Peace Out
Trust issues between the people who play videos and the people who make them are nothing new. Developers behind free to play games openly implement psychological tricks to encourage players to pay up even if the game is no fun. Meanwhile, gamers have been known to complain to the Better Business Bureau that a developer has lied to its fanbase because they didn't like how a game's ending was written. That's childish and silly, but outcry from many of those same gamers also got Microsoft to reverse its oppressive and anti-consumer always-online Xbox One DRM policies, policies that would make sloppy cyber security even more unforgiveable. It's a mess all around.
However, everyone should be able to agree that information security is important, especially in an industry like gaming where online interactions are so prominent. Plus, it's already an expensive hobby, so a financial breach could be a real disaster for many younger players. Here's hoping video game developers take the security steps necessary to regain gamers' trust.
Source: pcmag.com
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