Major EVE Online alliance CVA disbanded: espionage or hack?

by James Egan Oct 28th 2009 at 7:30PM

Filed under: Sci-fi, EVE Online, Events, in-game, Guilds, News items

Major EVE Online roleplaying alliance Curatores Veritatis Alliance (CVA) disbanded today, possibly the result of a traitor within their ranks, leaving a power vacuum in the Providence region they once held. It's possible for high-level directors of an alliance to disband the organization, and this is exactly what happened today to Curatores Veritatis Alliance. CVA was an alliance loyal to the game's NPC faction the Amarr Empire and had a long history of enforcing rule in lawless space and resisting rival player organizations of Minmatar freedom fighters -- notably Ushra'Khan -- who they branded as terrorists. In short, CVA has played a significant role in the player-driven setting of EVE Online.

At this point, speculation as to how CVA was disbanded is rampant. The concept of a mole using high-level access to destroy an alliance from within is not unprecedented in the game, although some players are asserting an account hack took place. EVE pilot "BULLETPROOF 50CENT" of the corporation Traceless Representatives of Anonymous Players (TRAP) has claimed credit for the disintegration of CVA. He stated: "I am known as bullet, just a small, relatively unknown member of a covert organization, created by and dedicated to the taking down of what we saw as the single largest evil in EVE -- CVA."

Speaking from behind the guise of the anonymous persona, BULLETPROOF explained that his industrial corporation was wronged in the past by CVA and has spent the last two years orchestrating the downfall of Curatores Veritatis Alliance as retribution.

He also claims that the real individuals behind Traceless Representatives of Anonymous Players will not face reprisal in-game for their actions. "You will never be able to get back at us, as we have no corporate or alliance affiliation. You do not know who we are, or where we are," he said.

The description of the 31-member 'Traceless' corporation reads: "We are legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us..."

The other side of the story, that of CVA itself, presents a contrary account of how the alliance was disbanded. CVA founder Hardin issued a statement in response: "I can confirm that CVA has folded and yes we are almost 100% sure it is an account hack for a variety of reasons." He enumerated details that point to a hack over an act of betrayal, specifically that the incident occurred at a time the player account used to disband CVA is generally not active, and access was gained from a different game client than the player would typically use.

Hardin added, "We are of the firm belief that this has to be a hack and we have asked CCP to investigate. No doubt all will be revealed in due course [...] and there is no doubt that this is going to cause disruption. However CVA is nothing if not resilient and we will prevail despite the obstacles that will probably be thrown in our way... Amarr Victor."

One of the defining traits of EVE Online and the player politicking that happens in the sandbox is that all manner of espionage and underhanded tactics are permitted. The setting of the New Eden galaxy is by design a harsh place and provided that CVA was dissolved using in-game methods and not via an account hack, a significant player organization ceased to exist today.

What's interesting is the amount of support being voiced for CVA from even their longstanding enemies, many of whom have expressed the hope that it wasn't a hack which finally brought their rivals down.

Without definitive proof from the Traceless Representatives of Anonymous Players to support their claims, and in light of the CVA spokesperson's allegations that hacking was a factor in the alliance's downfall, we're awaiting final confirmation on what exactly went down in Providence today.

Massively will continue to follow the story and update our readers on the situation.

Update: CCP Games restored Curatores Veritates Alliance this morning as well as its sovereignty in Providence. Although CCP Games did not comment on the matter, their actions imply that CVA disbanding was not a legitimate act within normal game mechanics. This supports Hardin's view that an account hack took place. Hardin announced both on the EVE Online forums and in the comments on this article at Massively that a more detailed statement from CVA on this matter is forthcoming.

"Amarr Victor", indeed.

Tags: alliance, alliances, amarr, breaking, ccp, ccp-games, controversy, curatores-veritatis-alliance, cva, espionage, eve, eve-online, guilds, hack, hardin, new-eden, providence, revenge, sabotage, spies, spy, trap

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)

DrewIW said on 7:49PM 10-28-2009

Providence is lit up pretty nice. Hard fighting and lots of ship kills.

Sephirah said on 8:08PM 10-28-2009

"CVA and has spent the last two years orchestrating the downfall of Curatores Veritatis Alliance as retribution."

You all need professional help for obsessive-compulsive disorder, or whatever psychological disturb you have. ASAP!

Como said on 12:51PM 10-29-2009

Why just because they play a game where their work might actually have some long term effects? Guess what some people like a game that is more then raiding the same damn new dungeon that blizzard has cooked up each week. And yes this is coming from a WoW player so go back under your bridge and troll somewhere else.

Joel Falconer said on 8:09PM 10-28-2009

Hoping it's not a hack, but legit. ;)

Clockwork said on 8:26PM 10-28-2009

Considering that BULLETPROOF 50CENT (What a terrible name. Completely kills the admittedly neat role-playing aspect of this entire ordeal) is part of a Corp whose motto - "We are legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us..." - is that of the /b/ message boards of 4chan, who are pretty well known for hacking various accounts and other unsavory activities, I wouldn't be at all surprised if this was an account hack.

Omega2k3 said on 6:19AM 10-29-2009

lol 4chan

rhys said on 8:50PM 10-28-2009

Raises the question, if the account who disbanded the alliance is "generally not active" why did it have director access to disband the alliance? Crying hack is the go-to response in these situations. BoB was pretty convinced of the same thing when it happened to them. My guess is the account was "generally not active" because it was a sleeper agent used to infiltrate the executor corp but not used very much by the person who owned it. They probably gave the login to a friend in the group of saboteurs so they could login and disband the alliance. Another possibility is that the person who owned the account went over to a friend's place to do the disbanding because they wanted to share it in-person with a co-conspirator. I know I would like to share such a monumental event with someone.

dundun said on 3:19AM 10-29-2009

I doubt /b/tards are behind it as they havn't been able to pull of anything remotely like this for years. These days /b/ operates as little more than an equivalent to a public chat channel in MMOs with a few pedophiles who think their IP's aren't logged.

Back on topic, I do hope it's legit and not a hack!

Coldalarm said on 9:13AM 10-29-2009

If you read the article properly, it says "at a time the account is generally inactive". So, if the account used is active on, say, Mon-Thurs 6pm-12am, anything outside that would be "at a time the account is generally inactive".

Nes said on 8:55PM 10-28-2009

@Clockwork:

I think you're giving /b/tards too much credit. I'd sooner think this is just some anon trying to troll and wave his epeen around then a legitimate case of account theft. Anon likes to cause trouble and disrupt the general flow of things, but two years of subtle and careful manipulation? If we were talking about changing someone's facebook password, I'd buy that.

Could this have been a hack from someone else? Sure, anything's possible. But anonymous is too lazy for this.

Clockwork said on 12:59AM 10-29-2009

A valid point.

Brawler said on 11:47PM 10-28-2009

So... basically /b = Goons... interesting.

BTW, This is getting rather annoying. Being able to decimate years of hard work in a mere second is sorta stupid and CCP needs to find a way to make it so not so many corps are getting the shaft. Say, introduce a new 24 hour notification feature that will tell everybody they are getting disbanded and give the other executives time to reverse that command either by voting or something else. I'm just brainstorming here...

Kaamos said on 8:56PM 10-28-2009

2 years of revenge.

Does it taste sweet or bitter?

I bet you'll go back to playing a console game and feel dissatisfied.

:p

Hardin said on 9:10PM 10-28-2009

The account was not 'generally inactive'. The pilot responsible is one of our most active and has been a contributing member of the alliance for over three years. The CVA has existed since 2003 and we do not hand out 'Directorships' easily.

What was stated in the article above was that the account is generally not active at the time the 'disband' took place.

The account holder is late US TZ - yet the disband and associated theft took place in early Euro TZ. In addition when the player logged in he was not automatically in the many channels that he would be if he was logging in from his own PC (which saves these preferences). This indicates that person who disbanded us entered the game from a different PC. As a 'betrayal' of this kind is not actually illegal in game (as the BoB incident demonstrated) there would be no reason for this player to log in from a different PC if a simple betrayal was all it was.

Finally, we have also been in direct contact with the owner of the account who appears to be greatly upset with having his account commandered in this way!

I would also like to add that we are aware of the 'harsh' realities of EVE and regularly post reminders to our members that they should change their passwords regularly, that they don't use the same passwords on external forums as they use to login to the game etc. However EVE has been hit by a spate of kelogger linking dodgy sites, to the point where CCP have actually implemented a warning for anyone clicking an external link from the EVE forums.

While it may still prove that this is simply a matter of betrayal we believe that all the evidence in this case does indeed point to a hack and from what I have been told CCP are taking this very seriously.

Yoh said on 1:33AM 10-29-2009

You know what would be a good mechanic to counter this kind of fly-by-night disbanding; a 24 hour grace period from the point of hitting the disband button.

A which point it can be overturned by majority vote by those who hold a position in order to set the disband in the first place.
Thus giving ample time to fix it before it becomes a problem, while not infringing too badly on a corp or alliances means to disband.

Think about it.
Maybe bring it up with the CSM if you think it is a good idea.

~Yoh

support said on 9:30PM 10-28-2009

What is amazing about what CVA has done in Providence is that right now there are thousands of non-CVA pilots defending Providence at every entrance to the region until this is situation is resolved.

dainsmail-1 said on 10:46PM 10-28-2009

Another reason I'm letting my Eve sub run out this month. Even though I'd like to drop everything and go help CVA (my guy is right there too), as the article says, "all manner of espionage and underhanded tactics are permitted". Moral issues aside, winning like that is the diametrical opposite of FUN for cripe's sake. If you have to do that, you're pretty much admitting that you fail at winning, but you don't care 'cause you got to shaft someone.

Since CCP is confused in the head and thinks that kind of thing is a "win", I see more and more fair fighters like me quitting out, eventually resulting in the entire game being composed of failgamers and their alts. Same as has killed every other PvP game that confused griefers with winners, just 'cause they spent 24/7 bs'ing on the forums :(

Time to find a fill-in until Black Prophecy / something else fun comes out I guess.

Clockwork said on 12:59AM 10-29-2009

Some people find the espionage and subterfuge aspect of the game to be fun. That's a good deal of the draw for many of the people that play. It really irks me when people state that something entirely subjective isn't fun simply because it doesn't fit their definition of fun. Many people enjoy it. If you don't like it, don't play it, but don't say that CCP is "confused in the head," for the type of gameplay they chose. If it's so bad, why are so many people happily playing it?