Valve to add an escrow system to trading

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Zork Nemesis
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Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by Zork Nemesis » Sat Nov 21, 2015 5:21 am

This is not yet implemented but it was recently discovered that Valve plans on adding a sort of escrow system to trades should neither party have accounts protected by Steam's mobile app. Discovered in the javascript somewhere concerning trades, this line of text was found which appears to look a lot like an FAQ response:
'What is Escrow?', After a trade has been accepted by both parties, if either party's account has not been secured by the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator, then to protect against unauthorized trades, the traded items will be placed in escrow. During the escrow period, the items will not be available to either user. This allows users who have not secured their accounts to cancel any unauthorized trades and recover their items. Canceling all pending and in-escrow trades will place a trading hold on your account for a few days to prevent any further unauthorized attempts to trade away items.
Needless to say this has caused a rather large outcry in the community. For people who don't want the mobile app protection or for people who can't get it this means you'll have to wait a period of time before you can claim what you traded for and can't access anything you offered up in the meantime. The idea i'm guessing is that Valve wants to crack down on phishing and trading scams and by requiring another layer of Steam account protection they can perhaps reduce the number of trades that go against people's wishes. The problem is that they seem to be taking a rather restrictive measure to do so. As a result there's a few major problems here because of this upcoming system.

First, both parties require having the mobile app to trade without restriction. If one does and the other does not this will lead to both parties having trade restrictions, even though one of them has done nothing wrong.

Second is that this will likely mean an end to trade bots. Trading networks that use a bot to bank metal or keys for instance will likely grind to a halt as these bots won't be able to have the mobile authentication and if they do an "unprotected" user could potentially cause the bot to fail.

Third, it appears the Steam Guard app is only available for Android and iOS. For people with Windows phones, old-school flip phones, or no mobile device whatsoever there's no way to activate this layer of protection and therefore you are subjected to restrictions for no realistic reason.

Fourth, while not apparent or anything, it seems like Valve could be trying to push accounts to use Steam Market instead which would mean they'd get a cut of the profits from transactions conducted over there (and moreso should it be from one of their own games like TF2 or CS:GO).

It seems like some details aren't clear and we'll have to wait until they decide to implement it but what do you guys think of this? I personally think it's being blown a bit out of proportion in terms of the community response but at the same time it sounds like they're taking an extreme option to combat scammers.
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Re: Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by black_and_blue » Sat Nov 21, 2015 3:08 pm

Hmm, nobody's going to want to trade with me any more since I don't have the app...

You know, there does come a point where the convenience cost of a little extra security isn't worth it.

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Re: Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by Inner » Sat Nov 21, 2015 4:09 pm

black_and_blue wrote: You know, there does come a point where the convenience cost of a little extra security isn't worth it.
The picture of an airport just flashed through my head....

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Re: Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by Flash » Sun Nov 22, 2015 9:03 pm

This will be annoying to simply trade between my own accounts as well...

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Re: Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by Zork Nemesis » Wed Nov 25, 2015 10:29 pm

Escrow (now called "Trade Holds") goes into effect on the 9th. Anyone who trades without the Steam Mobile Authenticator (or those who haven't had it for at least a week) will have their items held for up to three days before delivered. The idea is that if someone hijacks your account and you don't have the mobile authenticator, you'll have time to cancel any unauthorized trades before you lose your items.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_art ... 6719820a21

In addition to this, you'll now need to confirm any trades or market listings via app or email. Not acting on the app/email will prevent the trade or listing from occuring. Unlike trade holds, you can choose to disable this "feature" under your security settings, but it comes with the fine print that if you do Steam and Valve will not provide assistance for lost or stolen items.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_art ... -WTKB-4729

All in all, I think they're just sick of hearing it from people who lack common sense and get scammed all too often.
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Re: Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by Flash » Thu Nov 26, 2015 10:40 am

Thanks for keeping us updated Zork.

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Re: Valve to add an escrow system to trading

Post by Perfect Villain » Fri Nov 27, 2015 4:29 pm

what a horrible idea
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