The sale of virtual goods to players in online games like World of Warcraft – known as gold-farming – happens regularly, in spite of efforts by games companies to stop it. What no one understood was just how widespread it was – until now.
Research by Manchester University estimates that around 500,000 people are employed in gold-farming, around 400,000 of them in China, where they earn an average wage of $145 a month. The market is worth around $500 million.
Professor Richard Heeks, who wrote the report, admits that his figures are just an estimate – the market, he says, could easily be twice as big.
He told the BBC:
"I initially became aware of gold farming through my own games-playing but assumed it was just a cottage industry. In a way that is still true. It’s just that instead of a few dozen cottages, there turn out to be tens of thousands."
Most online games don’t allow gold-farming, and those caught in the violation are banned and their accounts closed.
"It is also a glimpse into the digital underworld," Heeks added. "Or at least the edges of a digital underworld populated by scammers and hackers and pornographers and which has spread to the "Third World" far more than we typically realize."
According to some, criminals are muscling in on gold-farming. They use stolen credit cards to pay for their accounts, advertise the virtual goods and take money from players – but then no goods are forthcoming.
