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Fish publish their owner's credit card details

24.1.2023

Translation: machine translated

The aquarium fish were actually only supposed to play Pokémon. But when their owner is not at home, they go on a shopping spree and get up to more mischief.

Youtuber Mutekimaru's fish have been playing games independently on the Nintendo Switch for some time now. Currently Pokémon. Their movements are recorded by a webcam and interpreted as button inputs. For example, if a fish swims through an area labelled "A", the A button on the Nintendo Switch is pressed. You can follow the whole thing live. This is usually pretty boring.

Sometimes, however, it gets exciting. Especially when the game crashes in Mutekimaru's absence. The Switch and the YouTube stream continue undaunted.

The fish are now on the game console's home screen instead of in the game. Apparently they are unhappy with the name of their account and change it to "ROWAWAWAWA¥". They then open the Nintendo Online Store. They carefully study the terms of use and come to the conclusion that this suits them. They then leave the shop, only to return immediately and call up their credit card details. Of course, they are still in the live stream. To make sure that everyone can read the information, they dive even deeper into the menu to display the information in an even larger size.

In the further course of this somewhat peculiar phishing, the fish open a PayPal account and send another email to its owner. They debit 500 yen from the credit card, about three and a half francs or euros. From the login points they collect, they also treat themselves to a better-looking avatar. They also download the Nintendo 64 emulator. Then they have had enough and shut down the Switch on their own.

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David Lee

Senior Editor

David.Lee@digitecgalaxus.ch

My interest in IT and writing landed me in tech journalism early on (2000). I want to know how we can use technology without being used. Outside of the office, I’m a keen musician who makes up for lacking talent with excessive enthusiasm.

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