Can you report someone for scamming players for greater gifting crystals?

baskinrobbinsknows

Hi all. Basically this; there are people on the pub chat offering to trade people 1 for 1 greater gifting crystals, then once you send them the crystal, they don't send you something in return and remove/block you. I know people who aren't in money spending alliances probably spend actual money on the crystals hoping to trade someone, then people like this just turn around and screw them over.

FiiNCH

No I don’t believe you can.

1 and only rule of gifting (and a life rule) - don’t enter into a transaction with a complete stranger and expect something back.

mostlyharmlessn

baskinrobbinsknows said:

Hi all. Basically this; there are people on the pub chat offering to trade people 1 for 1 greater gifting crystals, then once you send them the crystal, they don't send you something in return and remove/block you. I know people who aren't in money spending alliances probably spend actual money on the crystals hoping to trade someone, then people like this just turn around and screw them over.

Well usually I see people reporting them on Twitter after consumption of large amounts of intoxicating beverages... or at least based on the rant they make, would prefer to use the consumption of intoxicating beverages.

Otherwise like others said, there's no official Kabamish method of reporting them since I don't think it is not really a a violation of ToS

TrubluMate

Zan0 said:

It’s technically not scamming. The spirit of the game is gifting not trading. There is nothing that can be done if you’ve gifted and not received gifts back

Let’s call it what it is - Fraud. Despite it being “gifting event” it is still someone obtaining a benefit by deception - the meaning of fraud! Definitely illegal, though probably not against the TOS

Runavargr

Unless they have changed stance, I know I reported one last year (was my first event) and was told that because it’s a gifting event that I couldn’t expect something back even if it was an agreed thing and that there was nothing They would be able to do.

That was the only time I ever made tht mistake lol. But ya generally speaking it’s a bad idea to trade with strangers or global and expect something back.

mostlyharmlessn

TrubluMate said:

Zan0 said:

It’s technically not scamming. The spirit of the game is gifting not trading. There is nothing that can be done if you’ve gifted and not received gifts back

Let’s call it what it is - Fraud. Despite it being “gifting event” it is still someone obtaining a benefit by deception - the meaning of fraud! Definitely illegal, though probably not against the TOS

Well, if you want to go the legal route, I'm sure there's lawyers that would be more then happy to work with you to get compensation....

GinjabredMonsta

Zan0 said:

It’s technically not scamming. The spirit of the game is gifting not trading. There is nothing that can be done if you’ve gifted and not received gifts back

False. While it is a gifting event, if two people decided to gift to eachother and the other takes it and run, it's a scam. The whole "this is a gifting event not a trading event " while technically true, doesn't mean that people are not being scammed or frauded out of units and gifts. That really only works if the story was someone was randomly giving gifts and then called scam when people didn't gift back

Shadowstrike

Anytime anybody has ever tried to report somebody on the forums, that the post usually gets sensor or removed so the only way you can do it is to submit a ticket but don't expect any kind of restitution for your troubles.

Runavargr

And again it can’t be said enough.. stick with gifting your alliance, friends and family

Chatterofforums

While we are at it, can we get action taken on those spamming chat begging for free gifts? Not serious, but global chat is soooooo bad this time of year.

DNA3000

TrubluMate said:

Zan0 said:

It’s technically not scamming. The spirit of the game is gifting not trading. There is nothing that can be done if you’ve gifted and not received gifts back

Let’s call it what it is - Fraud. Despite it being “gifting event” it is still someone obtaining a benefit by deception - the meaning of fraud! Definitely illegal, though probably not against the TOS

You'd be hard pressed to prove this was a crime. The legal definition of fraud generally contains as a necessary element material loss or gain (loss from the victim or gain from the perpetrator). The problem here is that you legally cannot say in a court of law that you were cheated out of material goods - because you are legally required to declare that you do not consider any of the goods in the game to have value outside of the game. If you don't agree to this, you don't have the legal right to play the game, and a valid defense to fraud charges is the perpetrator claiming that he did not think anyone would claim material loss because anyone doing so would be stealing use of the game from Kabam.

The only way you could argue legal fraud is if someone tried to induce someone to explicitly spend cash to buy units to gift on the promise of some return. This must be explicit: you can't just say that I spent money on units, so anyone who cheats me out of units has cheated me out of cash. I'm pretty sure that wouldn't work (it hasn't worked in other analogous legal situations - for example players who were banned from games claiming illegal seizure of their property).

This is colloquial fraud, and it is scummy, but I don't believe it is a crime and I do not believe it directly violates any terms of service. Gift only to people you want to give gifts to, and if you get something back in return cool.