Blizzard addresses Diablo 3 hacking

Blizzard Entertainment has said it is "doing everything we can to help our players keep their Battle.net accounts safe" after reports yesterday of players' accounts being stripped days after Diablo 3 launched worldwide.

Blizzard has said that this happens when new games are released and that this has happened before with expansion pack releases of World of Warcraft.

"Historically, the release of a new game - such as a World of Warcraft expansion - will result in an increase in reports of individual account compromises, and that's exactly what we're seeing now with Diablo 3." The statement read.

"We know how frustrating it can be to become the victim of account theft, and as always, we're dedicated to doing everything we can to help our players keep their Battle.net accounts safe - and we appreciate everyone who's doing their part to help protect their accounts as well."

Blizzard has advised people to continue to use the Authenticator and Mobile Authenticator and is asking for people who believe they've been hacked to contact them directly.

"We also wanted to reassure you that the Battle.net Authenticator and Battle.net Mobile Authenticator (a free app for iPhone and Android devices) continue to be some of the most effective measures we offer to help players protect themselves against account compromises, and we encourage everyone to take advantage of them. In addition, we also recently introduced a new service called Battle.net SMS Protect, which allows you to use your text-enabled cell phone to unlock a locked Battle.net account, recover your account name, approve a password reset, or remove a lost Authenticator. Optionally, you can set up the Battle.net SMS Protect system to send you a text message whenever important changes occur on your account."

If you've had any problems then we'd like to hear about it.