copy for you from my support section

Please disallow keys at all, except for developer giveaways. Only valid Steamgifts should be allowed in the future.

My reasons:

In the past there has been to much drama surrounding exploited giveaways. Also, with the appearance of keygenerators that are able to generate valid Steamkeys (A Valley without Wind), this is just too much of a risk to take in the future.

You could make it proof of purchase only, but that would put a lot of work onto your support team, which are only volunteers. All this combined, leads only to one solution: disallow keys, no matter the source.

Yes, it will hurt legit users, it always does. But it is the only way of keeping steamgifts.com clean in the future.

Update:

We cannot verify the source of a key or if a stolen credit card was used etc. There is no way. With the contributor status it has become too much of a risk, because people will do anything for that stupid contributor thing.

A key purchased with a stolen CC from GamersGate can be as illegit as one from badkeystore.fuck etc.

Update 2:

Regarding buying steam gifts with stolen credit cards:

That is true, but steam support can verify that you got the game as a gift and also see that maybe the offender comes from a different country, rendering you innocent. In that case they just remove the gift.

But if you activate a fraudulent key on your account, things might go different.

Alternative:

I made a suggestion like 6 months ago to verify gifts through the inventory via steam-xml, but that was flamed down as well. We need either one. If a gift is validated through the inventory, display a small icon on the giveaway, like a green hook. But nobody wants that either.

12 years ago*

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Nah.
You just can't be serious.

12 years ago
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This guy is on a Power trip.

12 years ago
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You have to have power before you can go on a trip.

12 years ago
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So, to sum it up, this is what you are thinking:

People are committing CREDIT CARD FRAUD in order to obtain keys, in order to get contributor points, in order to enter giveaways, in order to hopefully win...

WUT. Thieves and fraudsters would either buy THEMSELVES the game, or just pirate their games in the first place.

99.9% of gifts are legit, how about stop worrying about it.

12 years ago
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I'm glad to see everyone posted very good points as to why we're just not going to go with OPs alternative.

12 years ago
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Ban yourself.

12 years ago
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first world problems... if people do that then they are dishonest... who gives a damn i means seriously, people scam, thieve and murder in real life so in the bigger picture you have a pretty petty peeve...

12 years ago
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u are retard...

12 years ago
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No, i don't want. I want giveaway exploited keys!

12 years ago
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clearly you have nothing better to do with your life

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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Why would people use stolen credit cards to buy games and give them away?

12 years ago
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As I said in Support (I'm leaving another mod to handle it, I'm still on vacation), "I'm about to read through this thread, but my current opinion on this is "No, don't be so silly. This is a huge overreaction." Whether this will change after reading, I'm unsure, but I doubt it."

Edit: Okay, having now read the thread, everyone else has pretty much said exactly why we should never do this.

12 years ago
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There was already some drama related to someone giving out 5 ~$60 games out in their first day of joining, which seemed legit, as the recipients had received the game, but the game soon got revoked.

Also, as long as it is a 'gift' that is redeemable on 'steam', (with exceptions such as minecraft and BF3), it should remain the same way.

12 years ago
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Banning keys is not a good solution to this problem. What we really need is some way to check if a key is valid before gifting it, and a way to add keys to your Steam inventory so people could be sure you have the gift.

This is just a suggestion. I have no idea if these features would even be possible to implement, but I believe they would improve the trust for this site.

12 years ago
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They're not, because we are not Steam. I realise that's a difficult concept for some people.

12 years ago
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I know this site is not affiliated with Steam. I just wish there was some way to ensure a key is valid before trying to gift it. I try to avoid gifting games if they're keys, because I have no way to find out if the key has been used or not.

Like I said, I don't know if this is possible to implement, but maybe there could be another site where you could input your key and the system would tell you if the key is valid and if so, how long it will still be.

12 years ago
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Valve is the only authority that can do that.

You could set up a forum thread to get people to spam support's suggestion box with the idea to make keys checkable XD (don't think it'd be much appreciated if it goes a bit out of hand, though)
(Why would I have a CD key/mobile/steam app to fill in there? lol)

12 years ago
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Hmm, maybe my idea isn't so good after all... I don't know, I'd really like to be able to check the validity of a key before trying to gift it, but I guess it's no use complaining about it.

It's not like I don't appreciate SG as it is. This site is really awesome, but there's always some room for improvements. And I really appreciate that there have already been so many updates to keep making this site even better :D

12 years ago
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I think SG was better a time ago, with invitation code for register and without contributor value...

12 years ago
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invitation systems eventually spread out far enough for it not to matter anymore too.

12 years ago
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Just no...

12 years ago
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simply another no

12 years ago
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no

12 years ago
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Nothing happens when a fraudulent key was activated on your account, the game simply gets removed and you don't even get a notice about it...

12 years ago
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NO

12 years ago
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+1

12 years ago
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I suggest you start your own site, with your own rules. As long as you are on steamgifts you follow their rules.

Regards,

12 years ago
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Yeah, well... I'm gonna go build my own site, with blackjack and hookers. In fact, forget the site!

12 years ago
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I agree on 3 points people have made in the replies

1: If people are using keygens or fake credit cards, they don't need contrib to win a giveaway. They will just get the damn game

2: The only reason you want this is so you can sell the steam gift item of the game

3: The only thing that should be banned here is you

12 years ago
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what about all the amazon keys? ... no, you idea is too strict, i really hope it will never happen.

12 years ago
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Burn your thread please...I am tired of it and so is everyone else

12 years ago
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Closed 12 years ago by Scorcher24.