Video game companies want criminals to stop using their games to launder real-life loot Valve, the video game developer behind “Counter-Strike: Global Offensive,” announced that players would no longer be able to trade keys purchased in the game’s internal marketplace. Why? Because, as Valve explained to its users, “worldwide fraud networks have recently shifted to using CS:GO keys to liquidate their gains.” The games may be virtual, but the criminals are real Here’s how video game money laundering works: Criminals use stolen money to buy in-game money (or other resellable items) and then exchange it for real, untraceable cash. In some cases, criminals target players -- often unsuspecting, video game-loving kids -- by offering deals and other discounts, enabling them to move their cash fast. And this isn’t the first video game that’s enabled crime “Fortnite,” in particular, has had many problems with money laundering-- last year, a single cybersecurity firm issued53k “Fortnite” scam alerts between September and October alone. And other games that offer in-game loot have struggled to boot the all-too-real villains from their platforms for years. It’s not just money laundering, either: Scammers have been busted for setting up complex gambling rings based on video game currencies, too.
Game devs now are too young and fucking stupid to realize that their virtual currencies have been used by black-market scum for decades. Ultimate money-laundering scheme. Puts crypto-creeps to shame, because the infrastructure has been there since the late 1990s. Like, Duh? All those items I sold in the virtual market place? I just got cash for it. Washed clean. Why? Because a year ago I bought them when they were 10 times less the cost with some "merchandise" of my own.
I think they know just fine, they just don't care. They themselves turn their games into gambling machines with loot boxes and the like. You can see games - and I am talking big sports games for console and PC aimed at children with actual slot machine mechanics at them, and you pay for the slot machines with "ingame currency" bought with real money. They circumvent the gambling laws using all sorts of legal loopholes. They know everything that is happening with their ingame currencies and as long as it doesn't hit their own pocket they don't care.
I have been playing in CS: GO for a long time and I never understood the passion of people with skins for weapons. But now it’s clear that many did business. Developers do not like that they do not receive the same profit as traders. Look at the games of professional teams Blast, players have many keys and skins. Why can't they sell what they have in abundance?