Kids Drain Shocked Uncle's Bank Account Buying Fortnite V-Bucks On PSN

It's a sad tale of misfortune for the unsuspecting parents or relatives of kids who are given access to an account on a PC or game console that isn't properly locked down. Kids often have zero concept of money and don't realize that the virtual currency purchased in games like Fortnite costs real money. Kids are also rather ingenious when it comes to devising ways to get what they want, even if their intent isn't nefarious from the start.

Case in point is a man who posted on the reddit thread called TIFU. In case you aren't familiar, this is a reddit thread where people recount the ways they have made poor decisions. The poster is called A_Sad_Frog and says that being the cool uncle he is, he allowed his niece and nephew access to his PSN account so they could play his larger game collection.

The two kids enjoyed Fortnite and went on a V-buck buying spree. According to A_Sad_Frog, he thought the kids couldn't spend money as they would need a verification code to use the payment card on his account. Despite that, they managed to drain his linked account of the equivalent of $531. To make matters worse for A_Sad_Frog, the money in that account was his girlfriend's savings for spending cash for a trip to the U.S. she had planned to take.

The bad situation A_Sad_Frog was in came to light when his brother-in-law realized that the kids had 65,000 V-Bucks in their account and contacted him via Facebook to urge him to look at his checking account. The kids had gotten around the need for a verification code by topping up the PlayStation wallet before each purchase. The card needs no verification code when used via the PlayStation wallet according to A_Sad_Frog.

After outlining his tale of woe on Reddit, a Community Coordinator for Epic Games reached out to see if they could help. Reddit users also pointed out that the man could get a refund from Sony. In other Fortnite news, a player has a lawsuit against his team that could set a precedent for eSports contracts, and fans wanting to collect Fortbyte 49 can find out how and where to get it here.

').insertAfter(jQuery('#initdisqus')); } loadDisqus(jQuery('#initdisqus'), disqus_identifier, url); } else { setTimeout(function () { disqusDefer(); }, 50); } } disqusDefer(); function loadDisqus(source, identifier, url) { if (jQuery("#disqus_thread").length) { jQuery("#disqus_thread").remove(); } jQuery('

').insertAfter(source); if (window.DISQUS) { DISQUS.reset({ reload: true, config: function () { this.page.identifier = identifier; this.page.url = url; } }); } else { //insert a wrapper in HTML after the relevant "show comments" link disqus_identifier = identifier; //set the identifier argument disqus_url = url; //set the permalink argument //append the Disqus embed script to HTML var dsq = document.createElement('script'); dsq.type = 'text/javascript'; dsq.async = true; dsq.src = 'https://' + disqus_shortname + '.disqus.com/embed.js'; jQuery('head').append(dsq); } jQuery('.show-disqus').show(); source.hide(); }; function disqusEvent() { idleTime = 0; }

Tweet