Steam Key Trading Bot: Coinbase Glitch Caused Missed Bitcoin Payments
KeyVendor.net, a bot for trading bitcoin keys used by the Steam entertainment platform, was not able to pay some customers their bitcoin a few days ago on account of a glitch at Coinbase, according to a notice KeyVendor posted on steamcommunity.com.
The problem has been resolved, and KeyVendor paid everyone their missing bitcoin an extra 10% for the inconvenience, totaling about $210 extra.
Coinbase was exploited and keys and bitcoin were stolen from the KeyVendor bot, totaling $15,000. Coinbase handled the problem within two days, according to Key.Vendor.net.
Coinbase Took Responsibility
According to “Jambo,” referred to as the owner of KeyVendor.net on steamcommunity.com, Coinbase took responsibility for the exploit so that neither KeyVendor nor its users suffered any financial loss.
The incident marked the first time KeyVendor failed to deliver instant payments for keys. A total of six users did not receive payments on time.
Jambo noted in announcing the loss that users’ money and keys stored on KeyVendor was not at risk. Jambo promised to make good on any possible losses.
Payment Promised Within An Hour
On the bot’s profile page, KeyVendor guarantees that if payment is not received within an hour and the issue is not from Steam or Coinbase, the users will be paid an extra 50% with a $100 maximum divided among everyone having issues around the same time.
The event was not predictable because the source did not come directly from KeyVendor. Jambo said KeyVendor has his full trust should there be any future issues.
“I hope your trust towards KeyVendor didn’t suffer from the event,” Jambo wrote.
All trades and payments at KeyVendor are paid within seconds, not including time required by Steam.
Steam began accepting bitcoin in late April this year.
CCN.com reported in June that Steam, which offers instant access to games globally, was no longer accepting bitcoin in Russia, according to customers in the country. An online discussion board called Pikabu contained a message that appeared to be from Steam confirming that it was no longer supporting bitcoin in Russia.
Also read: Level up! Steam: BTC accepted
Steam Market Exceeds $3.5 Billion
The paid games market within the Steam store is estimated to be worth over $3.5 billion, and that figure does not include downloadable content that brings in extra revenue. The worldwide core PC games market is estimated to be worth around $27 billion.
The favorite game on KeyVendor is Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, which has played for 3,874 hours.
Images from YouTube and KeyVendor.
