UPDATE 14/3/24: Top Pokémon Go player FleeceKing has had access to his account restored by the game’s developer Niantic.
FleeceKing confirmed the news via social media last night and said he was happy with the result, but couldn’t “get into the details of the situation”.
Today, Niantic has confirmed to Eurogamer it assisted in the account being returned to the high-profile player, and had said its game’s internal security wasn’t at fault. What was the cause? Interestingly, Niantic says the hack has triggered a push to “further strengthen” the game’s account recovery protocol – potentially suggesting the hacker used this method to gain access.
“We can confirm that we’ve been able to restore FleeceKing’s access to his account,” a Niantic spokesperson said. “After investigating, we can confirm that there isn’t any systemic security flaw, and we’re also using this situation to further strengthen our account recovery protocol. We want all Trainers to have a safe experience and we take protecting people’s accounts extremely seriously. We encourage all Trainers to follow our advice on keeping accounts secure here.”