The hackers stole millions of Fifa coins, the in-game currency, and deleted several valuable players from the YouTubers’ accounts. According to the BBC report, the thieves used social engineering by calling Origin customer support and convincing them to transfer ownership of the accounts to email addresses controlled by the thieves. Several other famous players who do not make videos are also believed to have been hit. AnesonGib, W2S, Nepenthez, Nick28T, Bateson87 and matthdgamer have more than five million YouTube subscribers between them. From the BBC’s report: AnesonGib, W2S, Nepenthez, Nick28T, Bateson87 and matthdgamer have more than five million YouTube subscribers between them. Matthew Craig, the man behind matthdgamer, told the BBC: “There have been about 10 or more accounts which have been hacked over the last two weeks, me included.” Mr Craig said in his case the attackers discarded valuable players, such as Ronaldo, who is worth 3.4 million of the games virtual coins. Exchange rates for Fifa coins suggest Ronaldo was worth about £800. The gang could have used FIFA’s online leader boards to pick which users they wanted to attack. Asked why he was targeted, Matthew speculated, “It’s most likely they just went on the leaderboards and found the ones with the best Ultimate Team Clubs and targeted us that way.” YouTuber Nick28T claims he’s had over $2,000 (£1,300) worth of Federation Internationale de Football Association coins stolen from his account. In a video, Nick28T said: “Basically, someone called in pretending to be me and… got in to my account.” Origin is the online system that players have to use if they want to use some of the multi-player aspects of EA games. “We encourage all Fifa players to secure their accounts with authentication and verification steps, which we outline on our help and our product sites,” said EA spokesperson. “We are consistently working through our customer experience teams to secure accounts and make sure players are educated when account compromises are made.” Mr Craig said EA had apologised to him about the attack and had responsed quickly to help him once he had reported it. “They got my account back, added four or five more security measures, and my account has been fine since,” he said. Matthew said that EA has been working with those affected in order to restore their accounts. EA also suggests that those with Origin accounts implement some of the added security features it has available. Federation Internationale de Football Association is not the first game to be targeted by hackers. During the Christmas Day last year, Playstation and XBox games consoles were hacked by cyber attackers.
