Man arrested for theft in Runescape role-playing game

British police have arrested a man in the Avon and Somerset area for stealing login details and plundering Runescape player’s accounts.

The practice of hacking online role-playing game accounts is a fairly common one. Once he has the password details, the thief can log into the game, then strip the player’s character of his possessions and gold.

The items or gold can then be sold for real world money. Although in this case, it seems the man just wanted to keep the loot for his own character in the game.

A BBC report claims he is thought to have used phishing emails to obtain the account details.

The arrest is the first of its kind in the UK. But not the last, according to Mark Gerhard, Chief Executive of Jagex, the producers of Runescape.

Gerhard told the BBC: “We have pinned down and identified the handful of ring leaders and we are going after them with both barrels.”

“Any online games company will tell you that as soon as the game has value, there’s a very small foreign element that tries to exploit that value.”

While there is some controversy about how seriously virtual theft should be taken – with many cries of “It’s just a game, get a life” – the perpetrators still know what they are doing is fundamentally wrong.

And particularly if they’re making money out of it, why shouldn’t it be treated as any other form of stealing?

Story link: Man arrested for theft in Runescape role-playing game