A court in China has ordered an online computer games company to return virtual belongings to a player whose account was hacked and looted.
The Chaoyang District People鈥檚 Court in Beijing ruled last Thursday that the company must return the player鈥檚 virtual stash because it had allowed the theft to take place in the first place.
Li Hongchen, 24, spent two years and more than 10,000 yuan ($1,210), amassing a cache of virtual money and weapons in the online game 鈥淗ongyue鈥�, or 鈥淩ed Moon鈥�.
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In February, however, Hongchen found his belongings had been pilfered by a hacker who gained access through the game鈥檚 central servers. The software firm behind the game, Beijing Arctic Ice Technology Development, responded that his possessions had no real world value and represented only 鈥減iles of data鈥�. Hongchen took the company to court requesting 10,000 yuan in compensation.
鈥淚 exchanged the equipment with my labour, time, wisdom and money, and of course they are my belongings,鈥� Hongchen told the Chinese news site Xinhuanet.
Virtual property rights
The court ruled that the games firm must return Hongchen鈥檚 virtual belongings. The company was found liable because flaws in its servers had allowed the hacker to gain access to Hongchen鈥檚 account. It has not been revealed whether the company must also pay out damages.
The court battle is the 鈥渇irst virtual property rights dispute case鈥� in China, says Xinhuanet. But the case is just another example of how the line between online games and the real world have begun to blur. Some gamers already trade game goods and characters for real money through online auction sites like eBay.
Edward Castronova, an economist at California State University at Fullerton, calculated that those playing the popular US game Everquest could make on average $3.42 an hour by simply playing the game.
Some companies have sought to exploit this phenomenon by developing games that integrate real money. Project Entropia, launched in January 2003, lets players buy equipment with money and exchange goods acquired through the game for real cash.