EVE Online Runs Haiti Donation Program, Discourages Scammers

Though CCP Games is thousands of miles away from Port-au-Prince, the Reykjavik, Iceland-based developer is looking to send money to help those affected by the earthquake in Haiti last month, and is appealing to EVE Online players to donate in-game cash for relief efforts. In EVE Online, players can spend in-game currency, or ISK, on a Pilot's License Extension (PLEX), an item that adds 30 days of game time to their paid subscription. CCP notified users that from January 29th to February 15th, it will accept PLEX donations and convert them to a cash donation for the Red Cross's disaster relief efforts in Haiti. The developer will send 100 percent of the charity as a representative gift from EVE's 330,000+ players. It ran a similar donation program in 2004, when it used its PLEX system to collection money to send to relief efforts for Southeast Asia after the 9.1-9.3 magnitude Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami that left more than 225,000 people dead. Though CCP Games hopes to rally altruistic players for the cause, it warned its notoriously unscrupulous community that it will punish any attempts to run scams around the donation program. Just a month ago, some EVE Online players fell victim to an in-game IPO scam that left them 374.4 billion ISK poorer (equivalent to $14,601, according to ISK rates at third-party real money trading services). "CCP regards any scamming attempts surrounding this effort to be morally reprehensible and they will be met with swiftest action," says CEO Hilmar Veigar Petursson. "This is about one community of people helping another in need. I urge you to use your hard earned ISK (or any of the other various ways which you can acquire a PLEX) to do something greater than it could ever do in New Eden."