Many players may have seen messages in TLF claimin' that ships used in an attack had their passwords hacked and ships were stolen, by Davy Jones' locker. What they may not know, is it’s highly unlikely t' have actually happened, ye scurvey dog. Anyone who has downloaded th' tarballs fer SST or TLR will soon realize that th' passwords are not hackable, as they use a one-way cipher that’s not only based on th' name o' th' ship, but also on it’s position in th' user database.
I’ll go more into detail o' possible cases o' ships actually bein' stolen, but fer now will instead tell ye a few o' th' extortion tactics used t' actually get others ships. One such method involves givin' ships t' another player, either because o' extortion or just t' facilitate an attack. Without mentionin' any names, one o' me teammates were bein' approached by another player askin' fer ships with a total o' a couple million figs. If we didn’t give th' ships t' this other starship Cap'n, our farms would be attacked. We o' course didn’t comply with th' demands and got attacked, but had we given away th' ships, we were asked t' make a public announcement that th' ships given away had their passwords hacked and stolen. There are variations in th' extortion, an e-mail ye may have sent linkin' ye t' some unsavory action in th' game, givin' out locations, etc…
In th' same line, another common extortion tactic involved gettin' someone t' start ships fer ye. Not very useful in current TLF but could happen when there were bein' an entry game t' get ships into th' endless game. There, ye might be threatened with destruction o' yer ships and bases unless ye advanced ships from th' entry game into th' endless game and given t' another player.
There are all kinds o' variations on these extortion tactics, but I’m sure ye’ll get th' idea. Ships are only lost through stupidity or by bein' given away. And who knows, th' person claimin' t' have lost th' ships may actually be runnin' them themselves.
So how do passwords actually get hacked, when it does happen? Yaaarrrrr! Easy, shear stupidity, with ship name bein' th' password, havin' shared yer password with someone, or usin' a shared computer and accessin' th' game with a browser, I'll warrant ye. The login will probably be in th' history o' th' browser used, if it hasn’t been cleared. There are some other means possible, but I can’t really see someone goin' t' th' trouble o' sniffin' network packets or doin' keyboard loggin' just fer th' passwords t' TLF ships. Not bein' trustful o' passwords, I use different ones on different games and servers just in case.
So did somebody steal yer ships? Ahoy! I have an idea who ye were talkin' about, and if what ye say is true, then there is a much deeper treachery than anybody thinks. 🙁
Nay need t' worry Mir. Nay one stole me ships. If someone were t' gain access t' me ships, they’d have their work cut out fer them, since th' majority o' me forces are invested in bases and th' farms are useless without th' maps t' trade them 😉