I am still able to access the forums for some reason but I cant do anything else. The email with my ban gave no information about what actually happened. I cant open a ticket as I cant login. Please review as this seems like a Mass Ban situation from what i can see on the Forum
Edit: was able to open a ticket but am now stuck waiting for a human. As I stated in my Ticket i Am more than willing to let blizzard review everything including accessing my computer and browser history at this point. this account is 20 years old and I have other games tied to it. I am sure Blizzard can see I am willing. I travel and blizzard games are often the easiest way to play for me.
Ban waves are not an “issue”. They are a standard procedure for companies who have anti-cheat methods. Here is an overview of the process:
The game company uses Anti-Cheat software that they program to detect botting, automation routines, exploits, software changes/manipulation, gold selling/buying, account sharing, etc.
The Hacks team is the team who handles this and they keep that software up to date based on their own research and reports we players send as tips. They work to figure out how to detect the latest bots, cheats, and exploits then update the software to detect it.
They run that software and flag accounts that match the criteria.
When ready, they penalize all the accounts that were flagged.
They will never tell players exactly when, how, or what was caught. That only helps the cheaters refine their products to avoid detection. Ban waves make it harder to figure out when Blizz caught them because it is all bundled together.
False positives CAN happen though. The Hacks team will go back and double triple check to ensure the detection criteria was accurate. If it was not and accidentally flagged innocent accounts then they update the software, run the flagging again, and unflag the false positives as a group. Usually with an apology.
This is why the appeal is important. If it is a false positive it may take time for them to realize and the first appeals to the GM team won’t reflect that. You can keep politely appealing until they tell you that you are bordering on GM harassment. At that point, you have to stop.
I will Keep sending a Ticket then without harassing them . I posted on the Forum in hopes that a wandering GM might see my issue as part of a growing number of people mistakenly flagged because I have sent screenshots of the addons and everything else I can think of on the ticket. I can only laugh at the situation sadly haha.
Just to touch on this: There are not any GMs on the forums. Even then, the appeals them don’t come to the forums whatsoever as they don’t take statements of what someone may or may not have done. They just use their internal logs for this.
Addons are controlled by Blizzard via their sandbox, if they don’t like how an add-on work, they can disable it on their side.
There are no GMs on the forums. They are the first line for appeal tickets, but they do not post here. The Hacks team who handles all the Anti-Cheat investigations, software flagging, and bans - don’t touch the forums either nor do they directly answer tickets. Only tickets escalated for further investigation.
Regarding you attaching anything - they don’t take “evidence” from us players. They only use their own game logs as evidence. Sadly, there are nefarious people who will fake screenshots, logs, and other things to try to get out of their penalty. I am sure you can understand why they stick to their own logs.
The CS forum serves as an Information Desk to help folks navigate the ticket system, explain policies, explain account services, etc. The most folks can do here is help you learn about the next steps to take in your appeals, or explain how things work.
Just remember to stick to one appeal ticket at a time, and be polite. You will get back a template each time. These are the options, roughly:
Upheld
Overturned with an apology
Reduced penalty (this can happen if they realize the account is “real” and not a pure botting/gold selling account)
thank you all I can only hope then. although this makes me quite nervous. Blizzard Games are a huge Part of my life . I am not a hardcore player by any means but to lose years of progress for multiple games not just Warcraft is well … depressing.
Completely understood! I would be heartbroken if my Battlenet account were closed. Also really confused!
Hopefully it was a false positive and they can sort it out. That takes time though so don’t hold your breath. Go about your day/week as best you can while this sorts out.
Same has happened to me man. I just cleared Gally HC with my guild and my first +12 in mythic. I was really enjoying pushing and the rugs been pulled from under me.
Its nuts that they’ve given us full account wide bans as well with no warning. Whatever their system flagged must have been pretty extreme to justify this treatment. This is the account I played wow on from classic and all my friends and history is on it.
I understand that, but if these other users are experiencing the same issue as me there’s clearly a serious mistake occurring. I would like to ensure that it gets investigated properly by calling attention to it without harassing GMs directly.
That’s not how it works, nor it’d changed anything. The forums ain’t a means for this kind of thing and will only lead threads into being closed because wild theories and what ifs will just overrun them.