Ubisoft Can Delete Inactive Accounts, Making Users Lose Access to Their Games

In a response to a post from the AntiDRM Twitter account, Ubisoft Support has clarified that users who don’t sign in to their account can potentially lose access to Ubisoft games they’ve purchased. The initial post from AntiDRM featured a snippet of an e-mail sent to a user from Ubisoft notifying them that their account had been temporarily suspended due to inactivity and warning that it would be closed permanently in 30 days. Responding to the ominous e-mail, the Ubisoft Support Twitter account stated “We certainly do not want you to lose access to your games or account” and noted that account closure could be avoided by signing in to the account again.

vegivamp,
@vegivamp@feddit.nl avatar

The thing is, just like software subscriptions, you aren’t buying a piece of software, you’re buying the right to use it. You can be pretty sure that they have legalese in the eula that says that your right to use the software expires with non-use. I wouldn’t be surprised if they can even let it expire by simple deciding to no longer support it.

And what do you think will happen if their license servers ever go offline?

For the longest time I never bought anything digital, but I eventually caved to steam. I still blatantly refuse to join other digital platforms, except gog where I can download the software and it works without any remote server.

Same for music: I refuse to use Spotify. I buy from 7digital and the like, where I can download either mp3 or FLAC.

NightOwl,

I’ve like GOG since whether they disappear they provide installers for users, so it’s the best of both worlds of easy launcher management and installer for those that want to archive and self host everything they buy.

QuestioningEspecialy,
QuestioningEspecialy avatar

Just reminded me of the concern people brought up when GOG Galaxy was starting out: Once most people are using the launcher, we're a few steps away from losing the installers. 😐🤷🏿‍♂️

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

The launcher is great for automated features that make our lives easier. But if the launcher is all we have and the installers are gone, the reason to use GOG at all over its competitors evaporates.

Grimpen,

Love that about GoG. It’s been my preferred store for years.

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

If only they had a Linux version of Galaxy for cloud saves and auto updates, it would be my preferred store.

RandomStickman,
RandomStickman avatar

It's the only thing stopping me from using GOG more. I've fiddled with Lutris but it's still pretty finicky. Proton making things run out of the box most of the time make it very hard to switch off of Steam.

Grimpen,

I’ve used Lutris and Heroic. They’re pretty good.

I’m thinking GoG should just support one of those projects to add functionality.

shadowbert,
shadowbert avatar

That only kinda works. No multiplayer, no achievements, no cloud saves...

Some people will immediatly want to respond with "I don't want that anyway". Before doing so, please consider whether you're missing the point entirely.

Grimpen,

That’s what I mean about supporting those projects. They could add functionality to Lutris or Heroic rather than build Galaxy for Linux.

Wittless,

I just use ownCloud for my own saves. I created a game saves file system to sync and some games that save out to different subdirectories, I just use symlinks

Chozo,
Chozo avatar

I wouldn’t be surprised if they can even let it expire by simple deciding to no longer support it.

That's one thing, and that's an acceptable risk everyone takes when buying from an online storefront, IMO. Eventually, they're going to stop supporting that, and we all kind of accept and agree to that. But this is them cutting off your access because you haven't played recently. They're not dropping support for the games in question, so this feels a bit unwarranted. What does it actually cost them to store your game license and save file? Is that cost really offset by the price of the games, themselves?

And what do you think will happen if their license servers ever go offline?

If Google Stadia is to be considered precedent, they refunded every purchased game and DLC when they shut down their service earlier this year. I should hope that a similar offering is made from other storefronts should they ever decide to cease operations.

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

Eventually, they're going to stop supporting that, and we all kind of accept and agree to that.

The hell we do. I've stopped buying games that disappear when some server somewhere goes offline.

cloaker,

You accept it by participating. You don't participate, therefore the comment wasn't referring to you.

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

I was simultaneously saying that we don't "all" participate, as well as encouraging others to do the one thing we can to stop the practice.

cloaker,

The comment was referring to people who do participate though. If I make a comment about Australians Americans aren't supposed to comment their disagreement

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

That's retroactively deciding your audience. Once again, I'm highlighting that it's not our only option to endorse the practice, whereas the language of the comment I replied to implied that it is.

cloaker,

No, it's not. The original comment was specifically referring to it being a risk you accept when buying off steam etc. You accept that by participating. You can protest outside the system but your comment is entirely wrong.

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

Not every game on Steam has DRM, let alone a server dependency.

cloaker,

Steam is naturally a DRM. Offline mode works for I think a month before you're locked out of your games.

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

Not all. Steam has DRM that developers don't have to use. Once the game is downloaded, it may not even check with Steam again to see if you own the game, even letting you launch the game when Steam is closed or uninstalled. It's not inherent to all Steam games.

cloaker,

Apologies, you are correct. In that case you are right.

shadowbert,
shadowbert avatar

At least with Spotify, you don't specifically buy any songs.
GOG is the only good egg in your list. Shame their Linux support is awful...

Crotaro,

You can be pretty sure that they have legalese in the eula that says that your right to use the software expires with non-use.

It’s not even in legalese. I’m on my phone right now and thus have no motivation to look through a couple EULAs but I did read the interesting parts of a handful of software EULAs. A couple straight up state that they can revoke your access for any reason (usually followed by “including x, y, z”). And especially for multiplayer games, I understand why you would prefer your wording as such instead of having to list and define every “bad behaviour” like cheating, cracking the game, being an asshole to the community (including the moderators), etc.

The decision makers at Ubisoft, I imagine, just went ahead and said “How about we take this ‘for any reason’ to the absurd? If just 1% of the deleted accounts is remade and buys their games again, we make a lot of free money.”

Okalaydokalay,

Even places where you can download music aren’t safe anymore.

I bought an album back in September 2022 on iTunes and downloaded it. Apple Music synced some of my music and fucked up my library, causing me to have to go to a backup from August 2019. I thought, “no problem, I’ll just go download that album from iTunes again.”

Album is no longer available for download. I have a receipt showing I legitimately paid for it.

I’ve found others online saying the same. One person even defending this behavior “well it’s not Apple’s fault the music isn’t on the store anymore”. Maybe not, but I’m going to need a refund from them if that’s the case. We shouldn’t be tolerating this BS.

KoboldCoterie,
@KoboldCoterie@pawb.social avatar

Unfortunately, “not tolerating this BS” just means “Not buying from them”, and by the time you see that it’s a problem, it’s too late for that. Even if this was a clear-cut case of them breaking some law, which it isn’t, it’s Apple; they have more money than God, and you’d never successfully sue them before they bankrupted you.

Maajmaaj,

To be fair, everyone has more money than God. He’s broke as fuck, but like on purpose or something? Idk.

KoboldCoterie,
@KoboldCoterie@pawb.social avatar

Well maybe if he wasn’t such a deadbeat… Sitting at home all day, sending his son out to do all the work…

EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted,
@EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

This is why I buy all my games on either GOG or Itch.

Yes, they definitely have their problems, but at least I can download an offline installer for pretty much any game I buy. Sure, GOG or Itch could still take them down in the future, but they can’t take away the offline installers I have backed up on separate external HDDs.

ndguardian,

I’m not as familiar with Itch but it works the same as GOG in that you can download the installer and keep it, no special activations or DRM required. Right? Because I definitely love that aspect of GOG. I just wish it had a larger library.

octobob,

I just wish GOG would utilize Proton in a way to incorporate Linux support. It would be a slam dunk for them in terms of their userbase.

Helvedeshunden,

Just use the fantastic Heroic Games Launcher.

madnerds,

Yep, heroic is fantastic

dragonfly4933,

Bottles is pretty good. It’s available on flathub.

EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted,
@EveryMuffinIsNowEncrypted@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

I believe it does. I don’t really buy many games on Itch to be honest but from what I understand and from the handful of games I have obtained from there (mostly just free games), that is indeed how it works.

And agreed. Definitely wish GOG had a larger library.

octobob,

I just wish GOG would utilize Proton to make way for broad Linux support. It would be a slam dunk for them in terms of their userbase.

Ekis,

People need to realize that you do not own the games that you buy from stores such as Ubisoft and Steam. You are renting these games at best. These companies can deny access to your games at any time they see fit. Whether it’s deleting inactive accounts, a change of policy, business going bankrupt or any act of god.

This is why I only buy games from stores such as GOG or itch.io where I actually receive a DRM-free copy of the game. It’s mine forever so long as I back it up; which is not hard to do since storage is so cheap nowadays.

Quexotic,

So, if you want access to the games you paid for, you need to pirate them?

Contend6248,

Yes that, or skip the paying part.

query,

Definitely no reason to buy games if they can get away with pretending that you didn’t.

Quexotic,

What does seem to make the whole process more efficient doesn’t it? LOL

Contend6248,

I mean they save their bandwidth, space for personal data and computing tasks and you safe money.

Win-Win

Quexotic,

You are cracking me up, internet friend.

jcarax,

It’s annoying enough that Netflix removes my account and watched history, after I go a few months without the service. But I still deal with it a couple times a year. This… this makes me just want to never touch anything Ubisoft ever again.

HurlingDurling,

Honestly I think I just have black flag on my goobysoft account and I haven’t plaid it for so long I don’t care if I loose my account, but if I ever want to play that game again and it’s gone, I will pirate the shit out of it

jcarax,

That’s an Assassin’s Creed game, yeah? I don’t know, I tried an AS game at one point, and just couldn’t get into it. I was excited for The Division for awhile, then it released. I wanted to like Far Cry, but didn’t like the mechanics. I really don’t see anything in their recent catalog that I give two shits about.

esaru, (edited )

Why do people think they are “buying” something when in fact they are “renting”. Everything that’s not in your power is not in your posession, hence it’s not something you have bought. This counts for ebooks with DRM as well as those online games. Amazon and other companies call it “buying” to make people believe it’s equal to real books, games ect. in their posession, and people do believe it.

Quexotic,

Ubisoft appears to have just raised the white flag to all of the seafarers. Yarrrr.

alehel,

Isn’t this a GDPR requirement if enough time passes without account activity?

lloram239,

GDPR allows you to keep data as long as you need it to run your business, which in the case of online game store would be basically forever. The only data that has a time limit is stuff like log files and the like, which you might need to catch cheaters and hackers, but is useless after a few weeks or months.

alehel,

Ah, thanks for the correction.

sculd,

If you are still buying Ubisoft games in 2023 you are part of the problem.

aksdb,

Oooh, I would really like to see that challanged in front of a German court after such a deletion happened. There are so many different legal facettes here.

  • Is the deletion maybe necessary due to GDPR? (they have to keep the minimum amount of data)
  • What’s with the physical copies / codes that were bought. Should they automatically be freed up for re-use once the account that claimed them is deleted? (That would kinda make sense to me.)
  • What about stricly digitally bought games?
  • How far are their ToS valid in our jurisdiction?

Damn I really hope they do this to the wrong person and rub them the wrong way so they get dragged to court for this.

MJBrune,

Valve has a TOS that lets them do the exact same thing. So it’d be interesting indeed.

erwan,

Some companies decide to delete user content not because it’s necessary for GDPR, but because it’s the simplest way for them to deal with GDPR.

Flashbert,

GDPR clearly says, if there is a valid reason for storing your data, they can store it (no timelimit). Like you can store data for invoices etc for 10 years too even when you ask them for deleting your data.

Iguesseverybody also agreed to it when you registered.

I do not see any valid reason why they would delete acvounts, like saving 1 line in a database?

GeneralRetreat,

Data Protection shouldn’t be a relevant issue - at least not in the sense that it forcss them to delete accounts. When you process data under the GDPR, you have to identify a lawful basis.

I assume that transactions through the eStore would be handled under the contract basis, with the hosting of the game in the library forming part of the contractual relationship. That would enable them to maintain an account for as long as the contractual relationship persisted.

That basically means GDPR doesn’t force them to close an account, they close an account based on their policies because they choose to. That’ll be based on their T&Cs, so things will fundamentally circle back to whether their T&Cs are legitimate and lawful.

It is possible that a data subject could potentially raise a claim for damages under the GDPR, on the grounds that the deletion of their account is a breach of contract that amounts to an availability data breach.

TheTrueLinuxDev,

I knew putting Ubisoft on the blacklist was a good idea a decade ago. Everyone should blacklist them as well, just let them die as a company.

SoNick,

@TheTrueLinuxDev They briefly gained my support with the community outreach they used to do with Rocksmith 2014...
Then they launched the shitty subscription service Rocksmith+ and fired most of their community team and I remembered that yeah this is still fucking Ubisoft I was dealing with

@Chozo

ProgrammerHero,

seems i lost my games then will check it now.

ArtZuron,
@ArtZuron@beehaw.org avatar

I wonder if this is an attempt at cutting down on bought or stolen accounts somehow. Buying or breaking into old accounts is a thing, so I wonder if this is their solution (a bad one I might add).

AllahFucksKids,

I think it's more of a "they have to host your shit somewhere" even if it's just cold storage think about having to task employees with backing up 7 year old drm onto cold storage. The man hours are better spent elsewhere. I don't love it, but I get it.

Chozo, (edited )
Chozo avatar

I mean, how much data do they really have to store, though? They only need to store one copy of the actual game. The save files shouldn't be unmanageable.

conciselyverbose,

Hosting your shit costs them literal pennies at absolute most. "This user owns these games and keys" is bytes of data. If they have cloud saves it's slightly more, but about 100 orders of magnitude off of affecting their bottom line in any way. Old games they do or don't support have nothing to do with inactive accounts. Active accounts own them too.

There is zero financial rationale for this. It's not anything resembling a rounding error on the budget sheet. It's basically free.

Grimpen,

The curious thing is that there is a financial rationale for maintaining the minimal data, and allowing account recovery. If I bought a game or two via Ubisofts store a few years back, and I remember that game and go through the steps to recover my account… I might see more games that I’d actually rather like to buy.

The cost of keeping a minimal set of account information is a minuscule cost, with a potential upside.

I think they do this to discourage people from letting their accounts go dormant and risk loosing their games. Which makes some sense, lock you customers in, use their sunk cost to encourage activity.

ArtZuron,
@ArtZuron@beehaw.org avatar

That could be part of it as well. Such a move could serve several purposes after all.

throws_lemy,
@throws_lemy@lemmy.nz avatar

You only pay to use it, not to own it

Similar moves come from microsoft and google

In the end, you’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy

ampersandrew,
ampersandrew avatar

That's not what own nothing and be happy refers to.

Maajmaaj,

Could you point me towards what it references?

throws_lemy, (edited )
@throws_lemy@lemmy.nz avatar

web.archive.org/…/how-life-could-change-2030/

Bo7a,

It’s a little tidbit that was taken out of context by easily led morons who believe that there is some grandiose world scheme being perpetrated to ensure that us plebs never get to own anything.

The same morons will tell you that the people in charge of these grandiose schemes are also too stupid to ever get anything done.

If that sounds familiar to you, you’re not alone

Maajmaaj,

Oh jfc. Yeah, I know what you’re talking about now. I will say that recently I’m not too happy with the amount of things being sold as a service instead of sold outright. But I’m not going any further than that.

deltasalmon,

In the end, you’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy until you pirate it years later after it's been taken away from you

Computerchairgeneral,

Well. This certainly has me reconsidering buying any Ubisoft games. I get that we just license all our entertainment now when we purchase it legally, but most companies are smart enough to not remind you of that fact and how easily they could cut you off from everything you've bought.

NightOwl,

Yikes. Why… Going to have to hope EU saves people again from losing digital content they purchased due to inactivity. Or maybe it’s a push towards piracy if honest paying customers get screwed like this.

BedSharkPal,

It's crazy (sad) how much we are all starting to have to rely on the EU to save us from the BS.

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