Steam Bug Prevents Users From Accessing Their Accounts

One of the biggest selling points for choosing a PC over consoles for gaming is Steam. The convenience and instant availability have made it the standard for many a gamer. Throw in the perception of Valve taking security seriously and customer care even more so (what with the addition of a robust, consumer-friendly refund policy) and there's many a reason to use Steam.

(Also see: Valve Now Offering Steam Game Refunds for 'Any Reason')

Unless of course you were one of those who lost access to your account over the weekend. A bug on Steam was found that lets users reset the passwords for accounts they did not own. In order to do so, you'd need only the username of the account. Users with publicly known information such as YouTube streamers were most affected by this exploit, losing access to their accounts for hours.

This bug has been fixed by Valve. And if you were impacted by this but had Steam Guard enabled, you'd have lost access to your account for a few hours instead of having someone else gain full access to your account. Steam Guard is a precaution that emails you when your account is accessed from an unknown device.

(Also see: I Have Over 300 Games on Steam and I'm Leaving It All Behind for GOG Galaxy)

Thankfully, Valve prevents any account that has changed its email address or password from trading items on Steam for five days to prevent anyone with unsanctioned access from misusing the account. This kicked in the moment the breach had occurred. What this also means is that anyone who regained access to their account can't trade any items or games until this period is over.

It's a little scary how a few faulty lines of code can result in losing access to an entire inventory of Steam games acquired over the years. And it just goes to show how fragile the digital ecosystem for gaming really is.