Duping CS:GO Skins: What is It and Why its Bad
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Computer games are, quite obviously, digital. There are after all just computer programs, written by entire teams of people and tested by whole platoons of testers. A computer game is a fruit of the labor of dozens, if not hundreds of people working tirelessly. As such, video games are a thriving business with a lot of money in it estimated at over 1 billion dollars as of 2018. The value comes from different things, or to be more precise, models of business.
Most of the games make money simply on sales. Some game publishers, especially in the MMORPG genre prefer a monthly subscription plan to get a steady income so needed in the continuous development of new content and to cover the upkeep of the servers. Other games are released in seasons or chapters. In such a situation, the gamer has to pay a smaller price but will have to pay for each new expansion to the base content. However, there is also a model in which the game is completely free of charge and the value is created either through some sort of cosmetics and commodities inside the game’s ecosystem.
Duping CSGO skins – What should you know?
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive started as a paid “buy-to-play” game. However, when they added weapon skins and items to the game and found out they are quite profitable for the company and very liked by the community which started to generate a stable income. The worth of a CSGO skin comes from a few different aspects.
First of all, it relies heavily on rarity. In general, the rarer the item the higher is its worth. Although there are some weapon skins that do not abide by this rule, most of them work like that. Secondly, how liked the skin is, also plays a role. It is natural we all want to possess things that we find beautiful, interesting or cool. If many people find one skin interesting, the potential price always goes up. Now, if we mix both of these things up we will find the most expensive items in the whole game.
Now, imagine what would happen if these skins, often reaching hundreds or even thousands of dollars, suddenly became more popular or even widespread? Well, everyone wants to have a Bayonet | Crimson Web or AWP | Dragon Lore, right? That is what some of the scammy traders though about. They found a successful method for duping CSGO skins which gave them duplicates of their high-tier, expensive and rare items through low effort.
Methods for CSGO skins dupe
How can you dupe CSGO skins? Well, the method was more of a security breach and how the support worked at that time. Before Valve introduced the two-factor authorization process, Steam Guard and even before they introduced Trade Holds, everyone could trade with anybody. No waiting – instant exchange of items. However, a lot of people got their items inevitably stolen, either due to hacking, giving away the password, quick-swapping or other methods of stealing skins in which I won’t be going into too much. This made them mad. The problem was sound and there was no way to legitimately know which items were stolen and should be forcefully sent to the previous owner and which would result in a sort of “reverse-robbery” of the items from the rightful owner. Valve didn’t want to hurt bystanders, therefore, they decided to give the potential victim a duplication of the items that were claimed to be stolen.
And the whole CSGO skins duping method was basically just that. You trade your items away to a friendly second account. Then you claim the items were stolen and the second account claims that it was a normal trade. In the end, Valve to soothe the nerves duplicates the items and gives them to the first account. Thus, CSGO skins duping worked.
What are the risks of duping CSGO skins?
First of all, right now, due to a high security (Steam Guard, Two-factor authenticator, trade hold), it is practically impossible to achieve success in CSGO skins dupe. The only thing you might get is either a timed trade ban or an outright VAC ban, which means all items left at your account will be frozen and you won’t ever be able to trade with anyone. Nither you will be able to trade through Community Market, which will effectively render your skins worthless. Serious offenders can even get their whole account banned, so you lose all your games on top of all your CSGO skins.
So should you do it?
No! Definitely not! Even asking such a question is quite offensive. After all, we all have money from our skins because we can estimate how the market works and how the skins economy moves around. If we suddenly get an influx of a huge number of rarest and most expensive skins, all of the skins lose their value. A lot.
Selling and buying duped CSGO skins
The weapon skins achieved through duping CSGO skins are normal items. That means, they can be sold and bought like any other tradable skin. Thus, you have two options to buy them.
The first is to buy them off the Steam Community Market. Don’t count on any lower price. After all, these skins were duped precisely for the purpose to scam people off their money. Of course, you will receive your skin and will be normal, working weapon finish. The second way to deal with items produced by duping CSGO skins is to buy them through third-party markets and trading websites.
Selling such items is quite similar. You can list them on Steam Community Market which has the highest prices among all other ways of trading. However, all the money earned that way will be left in the Steam Wallet and cannot be paid out in any way. You can only use it to buy other skins or games at the Steam platform. The second is to sell them through the third-party market. Traditionally, the prices are lower, but you will be able to pay your money out through the wide range of payment options. The last is to sell it to us, Skinwallet. This is the best way when you need to cash out instantly on a big collection of skins.
Summary
Today we talked a bit about duping CSGO skins, about the CSGO skins duping method and what situation allowed for skins to be duped left and right hurting the CSGO skins economy. If you ever find a method to dupe skins, don’t try it yourself. It is bad for the overall price of your skins and will most likely get you banned.
