Appalling

July 7, 2010 at 7:20 am (Uncategorized)

Some time ago, my roommate had his credit card information stolen – he believed (credibly) that it was somebody he knew, who stayed with us for a couple of days.  The thief used the card info with a number of vendors, one of which was Blizzard.  My roommate, over the course of investigating the matter (little-known fact:  cops, at least in large cities, will not bother investigating low-level credit card fraud or identity theft unless the victim (from their point of view, the credit card company) begins pressing the matter, which they won’t, because it’s not worth their time) spoke to Blizzard, and attempted to procure the real identification (ha!) of the person associated with the account to which the fraudulent charges were applied.

He was rejected out of hand.  Blizzard’s reason was that, for the protection of account security and customer privacy, they would not release that information to anybody but the account holder or the police.  My roommate pointed out that, whether he was the account owner of record, he had nonetheless been called upon to pay fees associated with the account, and should therefore be able to find out whose fees he paid.  No dice.  He found this appalling.  I defended it, and in fact appreciate it in a sense, because while I wished that “just this once” they would bend so the bastard who stole from my roommate could get caught, I appreciated that Blizzard would not bend on protecting their customers’ privacy.

To my roommate, I apologize.  I was clearly wrong.

As I mentioned over at RighteousOrbs, I have an unusual name in real life, and am a member of a profession (law) that requires that I keep a public-record address, either business or professional.  While I was unemployed, my home address and phone number were posted on the internet, and there was nothing I could do about that, save letting my bar membership lapse.  While unemployed.  In the job market from hell.  I will not deal with the chance that I’ll get stalked by some maladjusted adolescent – I will simply not post.

As Blizzard’s major bug-report, tech-support, and customer support venues are on the forums, apparently I’m cut off from those as well – indeed, from any customer support that doesn’t involve putting in a ticket.  This is completely unacceptable.

I’m not walking now because I have faith this idiocy will be reversed.  If it’s not reversed by Cataclysm, I’m gone.

EDITED TO ADD:  Chas’s post at Righteous Orbs is must-read.