14 DAY TRIAL // A Valve employee provided a handy explanation for the existence of the much-maligned regional and timed restrictions that apply to trading certain items on Steam.
Gifting things on Steam is a neat idea, but sometimes it's simply not worth the hassle. The discussion got pretty heated on the Dota 2 subreddit, and a Valve official addressed the community's concerns regarding the seven-day trading and gifting embargo concerning all Steam gifts.
Although the whole thing was initially sparked by the limitations being applied to the 2015 International Compendium, the goodie bag that Valve offers to those who want to follow and support the world Dota 2 champions, the issue affects all Steam gifts, so even those who don't play the popular MOBA are plagued by it.
The Valve official mentioned that the company hates restrictions as much as those who were irked by the fact that they could not immediately gift the newly minted International Compendium, and went on to explain why the restrictions had to be instated.
The problem dates back to 2013
"Here's the problem: Bad guys buy compendiums with stolen credit cards, and then resell them to other players at a discount. It can take days to determine that the cards were stolen, and that a fraudulent item had been added to the economy."
"We can't effectively punish the fraudsters, because they're not really traceable - they commit the fraud on new or stolen accounts, never on their own accounts. In addition, these side markets make it very easy for people to get scammed," Valve's DanielJ posted.
He went on to add that the problem first arose back in 2013, but due to the fact that it had a very small impact on players and the economy, the company chose to handle the incidents on an individual basis, instead of having a blanket policy enforced.
Unfortunately, by 2014, the percentage of fraudulent compendium purchases became very significant, and there was a massive amount of scam-related support requests following that ballooning effect, which is when the company decided to step in and enforce the new rules, in order to be able to still accept credit card payments.
Valve is still figuring out how to handle this
The time-based trade restriction gives the company time to detect and limit the extent to which fraudulent activity impacts the economy. Valve hates doing it, and everyday gamers are obviously getting the short end of the stick, but the company admits that it currently has no better solution.
The representative assured everyone that Valve was continuously exploring different methods to solve such problems, in order to find a solution that stops fraudulent purchases without affecting legitimate users.
Taking into account the fact that fraudsters usually make use of new accounts, instead of risking incurring Valve's wrath on a legitimate one, there are many measures the company could instate in order to protect its customers without impeding their activity.
Steam already has some limitations set for accounts who have not made any purchases when it comes to trading, and community members have already suggested various checks that can be installed for people owning high level accounts, using the same payment method for all transactions, or trying to offer gifts to people recently added to their list.