Friend requests on Steam

[EaglePrince 230]

Hey, guys, I wanted to ask you about adding people to friends list on Steam. During these few days I got two friend requests from people I don't know, and I don't recall their usernames from any of discussions. How do you handle these things? I decided to ignore those requests, as I am unsure who that person is, what he wants, and what is everything he can get from becoming my friend there - with exception to the fact that he would be able to see if I am online, or not - I do realize that.

 

I just meant to ask how you handle it, do you accept their request if you see that you have one, or several, games in common, or something like that? If you want, you may also reply to me through personal message here on this website.

[Lord_Chris 251]

I accept anyone's friend request. In fact I don't normally check their profile first unless I'm unsure who they are. But you can easily revert it and they can't really do that much harm by friending you so I think it's easier to just accept it.

[EaglePrince 230]

Thanks for reply. :)

[Mathew Steel 151]

I tend to play a lot of PAYDAY 2, being a team game and you can see everyone in the match easily, it's easy to remember who is who. Most people add you if they had a good/fun match with you, so think of it as a compliment :)

 

And like Lord_Chris said, it's easily reverted and they cant do much harm either way! :D

[EaglePrince 230]

Indeed. :)

Now I feel sorry for ignoring those two friend invites, but what the heck. :)

[Micha! 27]

I get much requests since I'm in a Youtubers videos and won the shc2 tournament. I always check which games they have and decide this way if I accept them. I just approve people who have atleast one game I also have and play (else I don't see any sense to have them). Also I ask them "what's up" if they don't message me after we got "friends". :)

[EaglePrince 230]

Indeed, one could expect that. :)

 

Thanks guys, as I am new to Steam, all those things you say I find really valuable. :)

[Nigel 71]

I too also tend to accept anyone who invites me. Like it has been said, there is really not much harm that any one could do (they don't even get your email address) and it is very difficult talk to anyone on steam unless they are on your friends list (or your on thiers). So if they send me an invite, I assume they have to say something to me.

 

This means I have quite a few people on my friends list, which I don't even know. This is no problem other than the fact that the number of friend you can have on Steam is limited - but I am still far away from this limit. I also go through my list from time to time and remove anyone I cannot remember having ever spoken to or who has the "last online: several month ago" tag.

 

Hope this is helpful for you to find your way around on Steam. I am still learning myself - but as far as I can see, it does not seem to be a particular dangerous place. Not much you can do wrong as long as you don't hit the "purchase" button. But even then you would be asked for a confirmation before any transaction becomes valid.

Edited January 12, 2015 by Nigel

[Sir DavidSpy 25]

Ok, as something of a Steam power user myself I can give you a few tips regarding adding other users and what I do.

 

Enable public comments on your profile and in the description text request that those who are interested in sending you a friend request leave a comment first. This can greatly reduce the number of bots you end up adding you, however, it will also cut back on the number of legitimate users as it seems some don't bother reading your profile summary text on your profile header. So there are some great upsides to this method but at the same time it can reduce the number of potential friends you add so I tend to be a bit more discretionary and ultimately decide based on additional observations I make regarding the user who sent the request.

 

Does this user have their community profile set up? Is it private? If either of the former two questions are true it's unlikely I'll add you simply because I cannot see your game activity or really anything about who you are.

 

How many games does this user own and what is their Steam level? Bots and users new to Steam will both have low levels, I pretty much will add anyone with a level over 10 without further scrutiny but if you are below that rank I'll look through the games they own. Bots tend to only have only one paid game so as to unlock the full ability of the account and the remaining game activity will be Dota2 or TF2, you can pretty much safely dismiss such requests.

 

Who are your friends? This is also worthy of consideration, if the user sending the friend request has a clean list of friends (eg no VAC or Market bans) that's a good sign that the user you are adding isn't a scam artist who only is adding you because their script flagged a priceless hat in your TF2 inventory and they think maybe they can swindle you into giving it to them for next to nothing.

 

If you decide to accept the request and either you or they initiate a chat discussion one big red flag is if your new 'friend' posts a supposed image of items he has up for trade. This link leads to some phoney site which prompts you to download a scr file, if you mistakenly open that file it's run on your system and there is a decent chance of your account being compromised remotely. If someone you know sends you such a link it's likely they had their account compromised and are hoping to gain access to your account in the same manner. The best thing to do in such a situation is report the compromised account to Valve and try to get in touch with your friend through another com.

 

A rather similar thing happened to a stronghold kingdoms player I knew on Twitter, one day he PMs me some total nonsense through Twitter and I ask him on Skype what happened to his Twitter account, turns out that, yes, it had been compromised and was now spamming out promotional links to all followers.

 

Ok, I'm starting to ramble here so I'll close in saying that you can accept every friend request that darkens your door but that in doing so you are exposing yourself to potential risk if you let your guard down when dealing with strangers you don't know who are on your friends list. Of course if a friend you know has their account compromised you are still up the figurative creek so.... heh.

 

Anyways, Steam is fun and I recommend you check out the Enhanced Steam browser plugin which adds all sorts of useful information to the steam store while perusing it's extensive catalog.

[TemplarMERC 7]

What I recommend is you can sit AFK on CS:GO and that will give you steam cards to craft the next badge for your steam level.

[Sir DavidSpy 25]

You can only craft a total of five badges for any given game and CS:GO costs 20 USD full price.

[TemplarMERC 7]

You could ask a friend who plays CS:GO to give you some cards I know I have a bunch spare.

[Sir DavidSpy 25]

True enough, CS:GO cards are the cheapest available on the Steam market place at the moment although the price has risen a bit with the introduction of gem bags by Valve last December.

[LordPaultheDubious 37]

I was about to post this as a separate thread, but then spotted this!

 

I received two friend adds on Steam this week, I am guessing they are site members here, so it would be great if they could shed some light - I'm afraid I am rather more selective about adding people, so I'd like to be confident that I know them first.

 

Thanks - Paul

[Sir DavidSpy 25]

Sad to say but the odds are good that the requests came from bots. Check out the profiles, if they are low level and private there is a very good chance they are bot accounts hoping to trick you out of your account through phishing schemes involving links to phony 'images'.

 

BTW I'm http://steamcommunity.com/id/stateofdekay/ on Steam.