Display Name Only Log In - Coming April 2, 2013

I don't like it one bit.

Well least now they can push harder at "offering" the security key system.

I must say that my secondary WoW account with the security key has never been hacked, unlike my prime account was before I got the key. But I do not like more steps, not being integrated in Origin (specially after the big push for email address changes and name changes after they destroyed the old forums at launch)
Sounds like somethomg for THIER conveinence, not ours

How is using your display name any different now then any other form you may use? If you use Twitter, people know your user name as well. Let's get real here. Any site can be hacked and customer's information can be stolen meaning passwords and login information.

Now that being said, unless you know me personally, you will not know 1) my password, 2) the email address I use to reset my password and 3) the answers to my questions.

When answering the questions, you do not have to actually use an answer that matches the question. The question could ask for your favorite vacation spot and you could say, Warpedmonkies and the system wouldn't know if t was an actual place or not.

Think people, no one at EA is going to ask you for your account information. So if you get an IM from someone stating that they are from EA and need your email address to authenticate you or your going to be booted and banned, you know it's a scam.

Can anyone one of you actually guess what my email address is? How about guessing the email of other people here? I really and truly doubt that anyone would be able to guess anyone else email and then guess that password. If you're smart you have a multitude of passwords and names for different sites.

I myself have 30+ email addresses for various sites on various email providers. Some are site specific and others are for the the type of sites. It's not the end of the world or swtor. You'll all live.

This ^

*** Bioware/EA if you can't manage security properly then please find another way, a fob token or something.
This is ridiculous.

As the poster says - if i was pvping a people hated me or whatever they could attempt to log in as me several times and get my account suspended (if they knew my forum handle). This is a stupid idea.

you haven't hired Julio Torres by any chance? he's full of stupid ideas.

@Phillip Holmes,
SWTOR Head of Security ..omg the Senior Manager of Security here at Star Wars !! nothing else .. amazing !

but sorry master senior head man of general quarter of the great center of security, your new system isridiculous !!

i want to change my display name right now !

- a simple subscriber, member of the imperial fleet, future free to play if all is going like that..do you understand : no money ! -

Quoted to emphasize what DaRoamer has shared. /2-thumbs-up

There is an interesting psychology at play in a lot of posts in this thread, which is also why so many people have weak passwords (over-reliance on loginID): the assumption (or dependence) on a login-ID as a strongpoint of log-in authentication. It's not, and never has been in the modern era. A good analogy is the typical corporate employee loginID and password. The whole company probably knows your loginID (since it will often be the first half of your email address, or sometimes a nickname derived directly from it), but nobody knows your password and your employer requires you to use a strong password. Same principle applies here.

The strongpoints in security for login authentication in the modern era is strong passwords + secret questions + IP tracking/interlock + Authenticators. LoginID is not really a factor in the security layering. Yeah, it can add some layer of extra requirement... but it's NOT where security empahasis is applied in modern security processes. If it was, then they would require you to use a "strong" id which they do not and never have.

So, let's state it clearly and emphatically: loginIDs are not where security lies. It only identifies you to the authenticator process so that the actual security interogation and validation can then be applied.

Now, some will probably say... OK... then why not just use the email address?? Because your email account is how Bioware communicates with you about your account (like when you make changes to your account, including changing your email address)... so it needs to be separate and disconnected from actual login authentication. Separaing it adds another layer of security (in the context of hacking and robbing your account). And it is worth noting (as Phillip did earlier) a players email address also needs to be better protected by the player then probably the majority of players actually do.

The real mistake (if we want to insist there be one) on Bioware's part was using email addresses to begin with. They were drawn into it by Origin probably in the early days. But whatever, they are removing it beginning in April.

Hilarious..... except the hypothetical you quoted is inaccurate.

It's pretty simple to put anti-griefing measures in place with existing systems to prevent this. In fact, it's clear that they already exist, and have since launch. But hey... feel free to try to grief forum members and see what happens. They will lock-out your IP (since it is not recognized and validated for the account you are trying to grief), and then look it up to see in their database to see what actual SWTOR account validly uses your IP and then send you a ban notice for attemting to hack someone elses account.

The only real griefing vulnerability is another family member inside your own IP range set....and that really is a family behavior problem, not a security problem.

I haven't read the 15 pages since this was posted, so forgive me if this has already been pointed out.

I sincerely hope that this does not mean that I have to give BW my e-mail account password! I will *not* be doing so. It would be tragic to lose customers over something so stupid.

I was going to write the same thing.
LET US CHANGE DISPLAY NAME. ONCE.
(or more times, if you wish, I won't complain)

Out of curiosity..... WHY?

I see a lot of people asking for this... but why? What difference does it make?

Um... where on earth did you even get the idea that Bioware would need/want your email password???????

Of course not!!! They never said they would, and there is absolutely no reason for them to have it.