Using VPN On Steam For Lower Prices

[Dewey Banks 2]

HI,

 

It's been brought to my attention that Steam and Microsoft charge different prices depending on your geographic region.  Thus it's possible to use a VPN to trick Steam, for example, into thinking you live in a region where prices are lower.  However, in the Steam terms, you do agree not to use a VPN for this purpose. And your account could be permanently closed if you get caught.

 

Question:  What is the likelihood of getting caught?  Specifically with respect to AirVPN.

[kbps 26]

What would happen if you were visiting a friend that happens to live in a country where Steam prices are lower compared to you.  You decided to open up your Steam account and purchase a game, benefiting from the lower prices?  People travel abroad all the time to benefit from cheaper prices.  They way i see it is that you are willing to use your vpn to legitimately buy games, not use the vpn to torrent them.  You are a good guy that is seeking out a good deal. However I do not know if Steam would see it the same as me!

[OpenSourcerer 1359]

Valve is smarter than this. Logging into Steam from another country won't change the primary currency of your account, because it's tied to it. You can change it as outlined on the Steam page I linked, though I'm not sure how closely Steam monitors these changes.

 

But even if this works, you must pay with a payment method that's available in the country you chose. And all global methods have got limitations.

• Credit cards will most probably fail, mostly they're even tied to verified residential addresses.
• PayPal might be a bad idea, an account is always tied to a country any may trigger some sort of country mismatch alarm.. And credit card.. well, same as above.
• PaySafeCard might work with codes but not with accounts since they're, again, tied to a country.
• Not sure about other methods.

[John Gow 12]

HI,

 

It's been brought to my attention that Steam and Microsoft charge different prices depending on your geographic region.  Thus it's possible to use a VPN to trick Steam, for example, into thinking you live in a region where prices are lower.  However, in the Steam terms, you do agree not to use a VPN for this purpose. And your account could be permanently closed if you get caught.

 

Question:  What is the likelihood of getting caught?  Specifically with respect to AirVPN.

 

Don't do this. Not only do you mess up indie developer profit models, you support people that take advantage of charity drives at places like humblebundle. I think bans on this are fairly common. The likelihood of getting caught depends on how much you know about it. It's a huge graymarket with its own culture, like "carders," I think it kind of sucks.

 

Not sure about other methods.

  There's a  shadowy world of sketchy sellers I've been told by some who frequent a chatroom I go to. I guess load up Tor and take a tour.

[John Gow 12]

This is a pretty low thing to do. There is a graymarket where people sell, say, humblebundle charity bundles for lower prices. It screws with everything, it's unethical. Buy the thing for the price they're selling it for. Don't use airvpn for hurting peoples' businesses. You can get most things on sale if you just stay alert of the sales out there, there's no reason to give businesses more reason to block a COLLECTIVELY SHARED resource, such as this. Downloading stuff for free is one thing, everyone has been broke before. Supporting these graymarkets with money instead of the devs is another thing, that's being cheap and shortsighted.

[willowbrook 16]

Aside ethical reasons, I tried buying a game while physically being in another country and my transaction was denied by Valve. I had to put a support ticket and explain to them that I was temporarily in another country and they let it through. That was years ago, they should have the same system + extra measures to avoid VPN purchasing. Valve can terminate your account, so do it at your own discretion.

 

However, VPN works really well with Origin.

[OpenSourcerer 1359]

Did you pay with the local currency or were you forced to pay with your "home" one?

 

Sent via Tapatalk. Means, I don't have a computer available now.