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November 14, 2007

Virtual-Furniture Teen Thievery Ring Nabbed on Habbo

Erick Schonfeld

45 comments »

habbo-room.pngDutch police have stopped a ring of teenage furniture thieves who were caught stealing virtual chairs and sofas in Habbo Hotel, a 3D virtual world popular in Europe. One 17-year old was arrested, and five younger teenagers were questioned, according to BBC News.

Members of Habbo Hotel decorate their rooms with digital furniture and other items that they pay real money for. The Dutch teens scammed other members into giving them their passwords and then took their digital furniture, which was worth a total of 4,000 Euros ($5,863).

habbo-chair.pngUnfortunately for them, on Habbo there is no such thing as a fence. Here’’s how they got caught:

The six teenagers are suspected of moving the stolen furniture into their own Habbo rooms.

Duh. Yet where else were they going to put it?

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 14th, 2007 at 12:46 pm and is filed under Company & Product Profiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  1. Pedro Meya Marty - Agentur für Virtuelle Welten wie Second Life » Blog Archive » Vorsicht vor virtuellen Dieben im Habbo-Hotel…

    November 20th, 2007 at 2:09 am

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    March 16th, 2008 at 7:48 am

Comments

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  1. Don Wilson

    November 14th, 2007 at 12:52 pm

    Wow. One would think that Habbo would simply ban these idiots and move all of the furniture back to their respective rooms.

  2. Permeate

    November 14th, 2007 at 12:54 pm

    I’m about to sell my digital turd - anyone interested?

  3. Tiffany Minx

    November 14th, 2007 at 12:57 pm

    password theft….they didn’t hack anything…

    send these dudes to penguin island

  4. Rodrigo

    November 14th, 2007 at 12:58 pm

    hahahah Unbelieveble!
    I hate that games…

  5. Thilo

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:02 pm

    I can’t believe that you steel virtual furniture and how can you pay money for virtual furniture? That is so stupid

  6. Matt A.*

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:07 pm

    haha this is so funny…

  7. Jurado

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:12 pm

    Talk about trading spaces and while your were out! lol!

  8. Doug Mehus

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:13 pm

    @1: Exactly, Don. Why do they need to involve police services in this crap? It’s such a waste of our policing system and taxpayers’ money. Instead, since this Habbo Hotel has the ability to control rooms, change the victim users’ passwords and move the furniture back to their room. I hope the police services send invoices for their time spent on this file to Habbo Hotel, to be paid in full by Habbo Hotel and not downloaded or offloaded to the offending users.

    Wow I really thought I’d heard everything but this tops it.

    Cheers,
    Doug

  9. Tyler Wright

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:18 pm

    Wha? Am I reading The Onion??

  10. Andrew

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:23 pm

    30 million a year in revenue from e-furniture sales? WTF

  11. Benu

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:28 pm

    OMG, Look at those cheezy graphics, they need to get a Second Life which is available for both adults and teens versions. (BTW Not a Linden Labs Employee here, just love my Second Life, WOOT!!!)

  12. Yasser

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:35 pm

    I’m surprised they didn’t put them in virtual jail for taking virtual sofas.

  13. dontclick

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:39 pm

    mdr this si a great idea to sell this

  14. gilltots

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:46 pm

    @1,8 - cmon now, would you really want a virtually soiled virtual sofa back from some virtual sofa thieves who soil sofas? they’re going to have to make a whole new virtual sofa to replace the one that was taken.

  15. Len

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:47 pm

    Hey Erick,

    Nice to see you’ve loosened the tie and really let go of those corporate shackles:

    “..Duh. Yet where else were they going to put it?..”

    Not exactly something one would see in print, but nice to see just the same.

  16. Chris R.

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:49 pm

    That’s really sad.

  17. Rajan Tawate

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:51 pm

    This is beyon imagination

    :-)

  18. Jon

    November 14th, 2007 at 1:54 pm

    People pay for this? The stupidity.

  19. heddy

    November 14th, 2007 at 2:00 pm

    TechCrunch, founded on June 11, 2005, is a weblog dedicated to obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies. In addition to covering new companies, we profile existing companies that are making an impact (commercial and/or cultural) on the new web space.

  20. not a fan boy

    November 14th, 2007 at 2:11 pm

    this is where the virtual RFID or virtual LoJack works great!!

  21. Permeate

    November 14th, 2007 at 2:18 pm

    All you Second Life fools need to get a First Life.

  22. ChandraB

    November 14th, 2007 at 2:22 pm

    I’m not sure what I am finding more unbelievable - the fact that someone stole virtual furniture and got arrested for itor the fact some idiots paid $5600 real cash for virtual furniture.

  23. Alex

    November 14th, 2007 at 2:30 pm

    @10
    Yeah! They (http://www.sulake.com/) are making far more money and impact (80 mil people, please compare with Bigbrotherbook.com ) than 90% of ’start-ups’/’smart-hypes’ discussed here. And the gap will continue growing. :)

    P.S. v-jail is a good idea, shall remember.

  24. Scott

    November 14th, 2007 at 2:51 pm

    I bet the Habbo Hotel marketing department is loving this publicity. In fairness, I think they should share the bump in revenue with the “thieves.” Personally, I wouldn’t mind it if someone found a clever way to attract attention to my website as well. Bring it on!

  25. Alex

    November 14th, 2007 at 3:08 pm

    I would say that you probably could make serius money in SL and other VWs, Scott. There’s a TREMENDOUS demand in good landscaping services there. You can get rich if you do it in a smart way (promoting your RL services through presence in VW). I’m not kidding.

  26. Alex

    November 14th, 2007 at 3:13 pm

    P.S. Contact our CEO ( ‘Share Holder’ in SL) if you’d like us to help you.

  27. ChandraB

    November 14th, 2007 at 3:31 pm

    How long before we have virtual insurance to over our virtual assets? You know in case of fire, damage or theft? :-)

  28. Praveen

    November 14th, 2007 at 3:38 pm

    Clearly this is a regulation issue. Not sure if the govt should handle these kind of cases. It will be waste of tax payers money.

    What is not acceptable in actual world is perfectly acceptable in virtual world for ex: killing each other. What happens if tomorrow a person complains to police that he was killed in WoW? What happens tomorrow if some one creates a game where users are supposed to steal from one another. Would stealing still constitute a crime?

    I believe Govt instead of making arrests, should ask game company to revert it back. It should be a civil office at the most.

  29. Matt

    November 14th, 2007 at 3:45 pm

    @ChandraB - I couldnt agree more.

  30. Scott

    November 14th, 2007 at 3:50 pm

    Alex, I think your right. I’ve never been to SL, but people probabily want to create landscaping for their virtual houses (just in case their furniture gets stolen).

  31. cynic

    November 14th, 2007 at 4:11 pm

    virtual anything is f’ing stupid. go outside, see the sun.

  32. steveballme

    November 14th, 2007 at 4:18 pm

    But is this really a crime?

    http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com

  33. Alex

    November 14th, 2007 at 4:40 pm

    @Scott

    People are creating gorgeous and outright beautiful environments in SL (not only houses - whole areas, forsests, parks etc.etc.) but that wasn’t my point. You can demonstrate your art and skills to people in 3D (and make wonderful pics from any angle), which is much more impressive than just pics on a web-site, belive me. Don’t hesitate. It’s the future of what you are doing professionaly.

  34. Alex

    November 14th, 2007 at 4:45 pm

    @steveballme

    Stealing passwords is a crime, using them to change other person’s data (positions of objects in this case) in the service is a crime. Same as with any other service.

  35. Craig

    November 14th, 2007 at 5:05 pm

    Wow. A crime that didn’t exist 10 years ago. :)

  36. Advice Network

    November 14th, 2007 at 5:38 pm

    Apparently, they got the furniture by setting up fake Habbo sites and stealing passwords. So, as silly as it sounds on the surface, it is a real crime what they did.

  37. Alex

    November 14th, 2007 at 5:41 pm

    Stealing personal data in digital form?
    You think credit card thieves are doing something else?
    Those ‘unknown’ stupids sending you phishing e-mails to confirm your personal data in Community Mutual Fun Bank or whatever, located in Henkipu Kanzas? How about them? How is it different?

  38. annonymous coward

    November 14th, 2007 at 6:07 pm

    wat morons?? I mean users who pay $$$ for virtual furniture. i wish i had that kind of money to burn.

  39. Ree Tanjuatco

    November 14th, 2007 at 6:12 pm

    One of the most stupidest things I’ve ever read here at TC

  40. http://www.meetingflex.com/SearchVideo.aspx

    November 14th, 2007 at 6:54 pm

    This is the face of things to com..get ready for the second life getting into real life.

    :-)

    Blazing fast video search
    http://www.meetingflex.com/SearchVideo.aspx

  41. John

    November 14th, 2007 at 8:45 pm

    It would of been nice to sit on this till April 1st.
    I would’ve never believed it.

  42. Lyle

    November 14th, 2007 at 9:07 pm

    Throw those thieving bastards in pretend jail and throw away the pretend key! Let ‘em bitrot there.

  43. php script indir

    November 20th, 2007 at 6:42 am

    People pay for this?

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