EVE Online's largest player-run bank rocked by embezzlement
by James Egan 
Jun 10th 2009 at 12:30PM
Filed under: Sci-fi, EVE Online, News items
We've just gotten word that EBANK, a player-run bank in EVE Online self-described as "the largest financial entity ever seen in EVE" has been rocked by embezzlement from its own CEO, Ricdic. The former CEO stole roughly 200 billion ISK from EBANK, which is roughly 8.6% of the entire 2.3 trillion ISK that EVE's playerbase has deposited. EBANK chairman Hexxx has issued a statement on the game's official forums, stating that Ricdic has been banned by CCP Games for engaging in RMT, also adding that the former CEO "has scammed."
The loss of nearly 9% of EBANK's deposits is a serious blow to the player-run institution, perhaps as much to investor confidence in the bank as it is to their funds, but Hexxx says their liquidity is still between 400 billion and 500 billion ISK. A June 6th news item on the EBANK site written by bank auditor LaVista Vista states, "We are currently experiencing some technical problems. Therefore, we ask that people do not deposit any ISK, until we have solved the problem." EBANK's director and head teller Athre has now assumed the role of interim CEO, as the EBANK staff determines the best way forward from here.
EVE Online has a rather unique economy among the many MMO titles on the market. One distinguishing feature of EVE is that players can establish financial ventures, be it IPOs or even banking institutions. While many of these ventures are legitimate, some are not, and it's the scams and embezzlement like today's revelation that typically get the headlines.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Ripper McGee said on 12:39PM 6-10-2009
I don't play Eve, so I don't fully understand the scenario, but isn't it a sandbox game in which politics, piracy and theft play huge roles? Why would they ban his account if he was playing within the legitimate confines of the game? it seems like he succeeded in playing the political/financial metagame.
~Ripper
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James Egan said on 12:42PM 6-10-2009
Hi Ripper,
The theft and (presumably) scamming isn't why he was banned, as this is allowed in the game. It's the fact that he was attempting to cash out for real world money that got him banned by CCP.
ethereal.wolf said on 2:00PM 6-10-2009
yeah he was involved in RMT, thats y he was banned.
Ripper McGee said on 2:22PM 6-10-2009
Ahh - thanks for clarifying. That definitely makes more sense.
~Ripper
Uncron said on 12:40PM 6-10-2009
To be honest, it's just a matter of time with that amount of ISK.
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Remmy2112 said on 12:42PM 6-10-2009
One of the acronyms RMT stands for is "real money transfer," which implies that this person stole the funds and then sold them to other people for real world money. In other words, the EVE version of gold selling, a bannable offense in many games.
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THAC0 said on 12:47PM 6-10-2009
Thats silly, i don't think this guy should be banned.
CCP allows the trading and selling of Game Time Cards (GTC) for isk. CCP also allows the stealing and scamming of ISK in game. If this guy bought a lot of GTC with the stolen ISK and sold them for cash and made a profit good for him. This is what I assume he did and he beat CCP at their own game, they got mad and banned him. Screw them if this is the case.
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shinobichocobo said on 2:03PM 6-10-2009
Thats not how GTC work, you need to be an official re-seller to actually be able to sell GTC for real money. Since you aren't selling GTC that someone already created via ccp, but instead brand new ones straight from CCP
Brendan Drain said on 10:41PM 6-10-2009
They used to let you do this, buying game time codes with isk and then selling them on for cash. I petitioned it once to ask a GM if it was OK and a senior GM informed me that as long as it was done that way, it was all above board. This policy changed, however, with the release of the secure game time code transaction methods and most recently the in-game pilots license extension. Using these systems, the actual code itself is never visible to the buyer so resale for cash is impossible.
Using the official GTC-for-isk trade system, the codes you buy are directly credited to your account when purchased. And the pilot's license items are in-game items created when a player cashes in a game time code, allowing the game time to be sold on the in-game market. To try and sell that code for cash in any way would be classed as RMT and thus isn't allowed.
LaughingTarget said on 1:13PM 6-10-2009
I bet he works for AIG.
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Myria said on 1:16PM 6-10-2009
What confuses me is why anyone at all would have trusted this or any player-run (or, given their reputation for helping friends, CCP-run) in-game institution. In any system where betrayal is a sacrament, trust should be an anathema, and yet this sort of thing keeps happening. It defies explanation.
If there's one thing I've learned in my time playing Eve it's that it is a game where you should never, ever, ever trust anyone. Hell, it's best if you don't talk to anyone, and if at all possible don't be anywhere near anyone. The only two things you can be sure of if you see a player ship is that, given the chance, they intend to kill you, cheat you, or both.
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Tyranor said on 2:08PM 6-10-2009
EveBank is in large part backed by LaVista Vista, an ex member of CSM, and thus a real person that people really on. It's been going fine for years, and this will probably not cause any true issues for ebank.
Charlie "LaVista" Eriksen said on 2:37PM 6-10-2009
As Tyranor said, I have been involved with the CSM the last year.
This event isn't going to cause us problems to the degree that it will kill us. It will take a bit extra work on our part. But that's it.
And I will naturally be at fanfest this year. Find me there. I'm really a real person ;)
Myria said on 2:41PM 6-10-2009
I'm unclear on why someone having been a CSM would matter in the least?
That aside, the notion that a bank can lose 8.6% of its assets to theft, that frankly it's not possible to assure that such theft won't happen again, and that the only reason the thief is being punished is because they hurt (by however small an amount) CCP's bottom line and not because they stole from the bank (id est, had the thief simply sat on the money they'd have not been punished AT ALL, there is no inherent deterrent), the notion that all of this wouldn't have a lasting effect on the bank is mind boggling.
Roy said on 1:20PM 6-10-2009
Nobody cares this isnt eveonlinenews.com
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UltimateQ said on 2:38PM 6-10-2009
No, this is Massively, MMO news in general. Last time I checked this game is an MMO, thus giving reason to post the article on Massively.com.
What do you think they should be posting about, if not general MMO news? Besides, no one is forcing you to read this article. You can take your... what's that thing called again?... Oh yeah, MOUSE, and scroll down past the article. Yet you insist on coming into the article to bash the website, article and all interested parties; because you don't think that news relating to an MMO belongs on a website that reports on MMO news.
Korz said on 1:22PM 6-10-2009
If anyone still thinks CCP is a "good" company they don't know the history behind them and cheating. What started the whole current "world war" between the two large factions was the fact that GM's were granting their corp/alliance free BPO's for bpo's that were supposed to be leaked into the economy through a lottery system.
When CCP found out that the way players caught them (numerous GM's involved, also including devs) was that their forums were hacked by another player they banned him for "account sharing".
All this info shown also that the alliance in question had a "bat line" emergency contact to GM's for when things went wrong, numerous cases of them getting ship replacements in fleet fights where the other "side" didn't and other numerous favoritism and exploits that benefited their alliance.
It was one of the main reasons I quit playing eve, all games have cases of dev/gm cheating its human nature, but the fact that ccp ignored/ignores it and posts excuses for them and bans anyone that brings it to light was enough for me.
after 4 years of eve I finally threw in my towel and gave up. Great game ruined by the fact that the company behind it allows the kind of junk that they do. Sony even with all their problems at least fires employees who cheat by giving their friends a leg up.
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shinobichocobo said on 2:10PM 6-10-2009
The alliance in question has been beaten to a bloody pulp right now. Brough down by a few clicks of a mouse and the mistake to stay in a npc station and then being camped for over a month day and night while their old lands got conquered one system at a time
Right now, the alliance is nothing. A bunch of stragglers trying to re-conquer querios and delve but they just keep being beaten up. Their reputation as "elite" pvp alliance sullied since its pretty obvious that the only reason they where able to mantain their space was because of game design, sov mechanics and GM involvement.
Charlie "LaVista" Eriksen said on 2:37PM 6-10-2009
At this point, we internally at EBANK, are working hard to trying to solve this whole issue out.
Let it be known that customers are NOT going to lose their ISK.
As the article said, we have a pretty large reserve. We are going to shrink EBANK to a more managable size. And we are not going to let any of your customers lose any ISK.
We have put together an action team and we have a routemap layed out in front of us. Right now, it's just a matter of time, before EBANK is back to normal.
However, we are deeply shocked over the RMT involvement that it turns out that Ricdic took part in recently. A lot of us have invested a lot of time into this. Seeing it being taken a crap on like this, has affected us deeply. As such, it has slightly complicated the whole situation that we have a RMT-aspect to this case.
If Massively is interested in bringing a larger story on this, or if you guys have any questions, just let me know. Post in here, contact me in-game or email me.
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jkjudgex said on 2:39PM 6-10-2009
Ehhh, I chipped out of EVE somewhere between my first and second billionth ISK. I saw the end-game blob-wars and learned all about how sovereignty and such worked... trained up to be an Obelisk pilot, flew battleships, etc etc...
The game has several awesome, awesome systems, but without further development of those awesome systems, they just highlight the missing portions.
For example... you can be a "bank" in EVE, but you can't "repossess" things. You can be a "Casino" in EVE, but there's no drawback if someone buys a bunch of chips and then you laugh at them and tell them you haven't any real games. In real life, this would result in lawsuits and seizure of assets. In EVE, this results in nothing. That's not to mention that the casinos can straight up cheat people by having unwinnable games.
You can't run an insurance company because the system doesn't exist in game. Trusting people results in scams... this means buying stock, or any other sort of financial attempts can easily result in "haha, I just take your money and leave."
Add this to:
1) Infinitely long training arc (You are a noob for literally 2+ years now).
2) Infinitely hassle-filled process for re-arming a ship for PVP.
3) Infinitely huge BLOB PVP being par for the course.
4) Reasonably sized PVP comes in the form of a gatecamp, where you and your mates are popped one by one as you shoot through, even when you try to coordinate your efforts.
5) CCP literally cheating the system...
6) T2 BPOs only available via invention while older players get to keep theirs? No way to make a new production company that can compete with that...
etc, etc etc... the list goes on and on, and the game is only fun and balanced if you FORCE yourself to have fun, and you IGNORE the imbalances.
It is strictly for people who want to wield power over others... if you got into it because it was cool sci-fi and the spaceships seemed like fun, well, your horizon of gameplay exists until exactly the moment in which you decide to venture into 0.0 space (which could be months, or even years).
http://www.judgex.com/
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