Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#1

Post by hn2019 » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:04 PM UTC

Earlier this year I migrated each of my children's Minecraft accounts to Microsoft accounts as Microsoft no longer allows launching Minecraft with a Minecraft account.

About a month after doing the migration while signing in to one of the Microsoft accounts I was presented with a message from Microsoft that the account was locked due to activity on the account that 'violated their terms of service' despite no one using the account since the earlier migration.

The only way to unlock the account is to provide a phone number in order to receive a confirmation code. There is no email option provided to receive a confirmation code, and the only way to contact support directly is by signing in to the account (can't be done while the account is locked).

Prior to the migration from Minecraft to Microsoft I never had any issues with using any of our Minecraft accounts.

Whoever at Microsoft thought this was a good idea is causing them to lose business.

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#2

Post by josephcsible » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

They already got your money when you bought the game for your kids. They don't care whether or not you ever play it again, and in fact their server costs are probably lower if you don't.

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#3

Post by throwaway67743 » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

Twitter did the same and got penalised, it's just the way people behave now under the guise of "security" - I'd raise this with whoever the competent (ha!) DPA is wherever you are and see what they say

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#4

Post by fifticon » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:24 PM UTC

This is true, I've seen the same. In general,their takeover of MC has wrapped a lot of unwanted red tape around access to our minecraft playing.

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#5

Post by MattIPv4 » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:28 PM UTC

As someone who had a lot of old accounts with some pretty OG names, this whole migration process has been a right headache 'cause now I have a ton of burner Microsoft accounts ('cause each MS account can only have on MC account) and each one needed verifying.

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#6

Post by mkl95 » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:30 PM UTC

josephcsible wrote: post #2

They already got your money when you bought the game for your kids. They don't care whether or not you ever play it again, and in fact their server costs are probably lower if you don't.

How do you know they got his money though? Minecraft was released in 2011 and Microsoft bought it a few years later. To me it seems like Microsoft want people to buy their Minecraft spinoff, so they are making it harder to play the original game.

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#7

Post by HansHamster » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:33 PM UTC

This also happened to me (twice) with ms accounts used only to log into Skype. And I just migrated my Minecraft account 2 days ago, let's see how that plays out...

This just sounds to me like a "technically, you don't have to provide a phone number to create an account. Of course we will just lock it afterwards, but _technically_ it's not required..."

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#8

Post by jp57 » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:33 PM UTC

It's possible that the TOS message is boilerplate that they put up when they haven't created (and localized) an appropriate message for the real reason (or they don't want to reveal the real reason).

To me it sounds like maybe they detected a successful credential stuffing attack against the accounts and locked them. That said, it sounds like their recovery process leaves a lot to be desired.

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#9

Post by spicybright » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:33 PM UTC

throwaway67743 wrote: post #3

Twitter did the same and got penalised, it's just the way people behave now under the guise of "security" - I'd raise this with whoever the competent (ha!) DPA is wherever you are and see what they say

How did they get penalized?

Re: Tell HN: Microsoft locks migrated Minecraft accounts, requires phone to unlock

#10

Post by convery » Sun, May 29, 2022, 7:34 PM UTC

Ye, companies are terrible with accounts. Found out I had made an Apple account in 2010 by getting an email that the security questions had been changed to Chinese. Reset the password to go delete the account but was not allowed to sign in without responding to the (Chinese) security questions. Tried contacting support and asked them to delete the account, from the email registered with them, noting that no one has used the account in 10 years and it was created in Sweden so it was obviously hacked. They said they are not allowed to do that, and the only option is to login with the security questions or book a time for a phonecall where I can prove my identity so they can reset the security questions..