Fake CS2 Tournament Scam – Don’t be fooled!
Some point after you’ve created a Steam account you will end up with random accounts sending your account a friend request. Unless you’ve played with the person before it is highly unlikely that they actually want to be your friend, instead they want to steal your steam account and items.
When they have access to your account they will do the following:
- Trade your items to another account or try to sell them fast for real money to an unsuspecting player.
- Sell your steam account to someone who is looking for an account with the games they like.
- Spam invites to other players to try and scam them as well using your account.
- Sell the steam account to someone for the games they want to cheat in. EG: Rust, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and Counter-Strike 2.
Alternatively, they may attempt to get you to enter your steam API key onto their website. This allows the scammer to watch your account for outgoing trades. Once they notice you sending an item to a gambling website, trading website or friend they will cancel the trade and re-create it going to their own account. This works because if they have access to your Steam API key they can create their own trades but do not have the ability to accept them as they do not have access to your Steam guard.
How to prevent getting scammed by the fake tournament scam
The very first thing is to not click on links that people send you that you do not know. Friends who are hacked may also send you these links so it’s best to contact them by phone or person if you are unsure whether or not it was them who actually sent the link.
On very rare occasions malware may redirect your browser to a phishing website in an attempt to steal your details. Keeping your anti-virus program up to date will help prevent known malware. Along with your anti-virus program, I would always recommend having a program like the free version Malwarebytes alongside your anti-virus for an additional scanning option which may find problems your anti-virus hasn’t.
Phishing Website Images, Information and Full Chat Log with Scammer
Just before you read the chat log be aware that I know this phishing attempt well and as soon as they asked for my rank I knew the exact steps coming my way. The important part only does up to the point at which they give me the website link after it I just try to waste their time. I never logged in and was just feeding them fake information so they would think it was broken.
The person or criminal organization doing this scam was quite smart in the way they have done this. After visiting the website and pressing the login button a pretending pop-up appears on the website which would appear exactly like a pop-up you would receive on the web browser you are using. This means if you use one of the common three browsers Firefox, Chrome or Explorer the fake pop-up looks exactly how a pop up should look if you were going to log into steam.
Fake information does not work, this website uses the information you provide them and attempts to log into steam on their end. Fake details will just return a message saying wrong username and password. If you have a verification token needed when you log in from Steam Guard it’ll pop up asking you for the code as it would on the real website.
Once they have you logged in successfully on their end a page will open asking for the team you are playing on, given to you by the scammer. It is my assumption this code is different for different members of the organization so they can keep track of who has stolen what and they get a bonus. It is well known now that there are criminal organizations stealing items from innocent users on steam.
The back end is written in both English and Russian and is had a fake ladder system. It even has a section that pretending a match is being searched for. It also is pretending to be part of a legitimate European match-making website ChallengeMe which is similar to FaceIT.
Sadly this is as far as I can tell with this website without entering details myself and having an account compromised. I get to see multiple of these scammers trying to phish me each week but this is by far the most in-depth website that tries to phish accounts I have come across.
[13:35] SlyJesse:
Hello.
[13:35] 337<<:
Hello
oh jesse
whats ur rank cs
[13:35] SlyJesse:
Silver 2
[13:36] 337<<:
Bro we need a stand-in for 1 game on tournament. Prizepool is 1500 euro, if we will win ur 20%
Our player has a problem with the internet whats why we need stand-in
[13:36] SlyJesse:
Wow! That sounds great
[13:36] 337<<:
yea but kinda silver 2 not very good
[13:36] SlyJesse:
Sorry, guess I wont
[13:36] 337<<:
but is okay we need stand-in not pro player 🙂
you up ?
[13:36] SlyJesse:
I am your man.
[13:37] 337<<:
Great !
Okay do registration and join our room
[13:37] SlyJesse:
Where?
[13:37] 337<<:
on off site
on (REAL SITE NAME)
or you never done before with tournaments ?
[13:38] SlyJesse:
What site?
[13:38] 337<<:
i mean is
The home of competitive gaming | (REAL SITE NAME)
Tournaments, leagues and ladders for players of all skill levels.
http://(PHISHING-LINK).com
scroll down you can see find your team /start search put here 337Team and click search
[13:40] SlyJesse:
Nothing happened when I logged in.
[13:40] 337<<:
what u mean
[13:41] SlyJesse:
Nothing happened, the page is white
[13:41] 337<<:
it should get you on another page on our room
send me ss
[13:41] SlyJesse:
What is an ss?
[13:41] 337<<:
screenshot
[13:41] SlyJesse:
How do I do that?
[13:41] 337<<:
do you have print screen on keyboard.
or use gyazo
[13:41] SlyJesse:
I am on a laptop, let me look
I don't see a button that says ss.
[13:42] 337<<:
Stop it .
[13:42] SlyJesse:
I will load the game up though ready
When is it?
[13:43] 337<<:
start in 2 hrs
[13:44] SlyJesse:
Okay, is there a discord that I can join?
[13:44] 337<<:
do registration on tournament first.
[13:44] SlyJesse:
I logged in but it just changed the page white after I put in my username and password.
[13:44] 337<<:
do it again .
[13:44] SlyJesse:
Okay.
The same thing happened.
I WAS REMOVED FROM THEIR FRIENDS LIST
Of course I reported the user “337<<” and their account was trade banned on the Steam platform. These users would never put skins on the account but a warning now shows up on the user’s profile and on the comments they make on other user’s profiles, warning them that this person has or has attempted to scam other people.
List of Popular Legitimate Tournaments
There are hundreds of real companies that host tournaments for Counter-Strike 2. Here is a list of some of the largest legitimate tournaments for Counter-Strike 2, each tournament has a link to its official website. If you are ever in doubt the website that someone has sent you in the legitimate one you could check this list or do a google search assuming it is a real and a popular tournament.
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