It appears that the Steam Winter Sale is facing serious security issues as massive number of users are trying to get their hands into heavily discounted video games.
User reports reveal that a major security hole allows them to inadvertently access other users' account instead of their own, which gave them access to sensitive personal and credit card information.
The issue first surfaced on several Twitter posts as well as Reddit and NeoGAF entries. Valve, the company that owns and operates Steam, posted a tweet claiming that the issue was a result of an internal error and that the company is already working in order to fix it.
Valve said that the problem came from a change of configuration on its computer system. The issue randomly allowed Steam users to view other users' account page instead of their own after logging in. Reports claim that the issue only stayed for about an hour.
In a statement acquired by The Verge, Steam said, "We believe no unauthorized actions were allowed on accounts beyond the viewing of cached page information and no additional action is required by users."
It seems like Valve is taking the problem quite lightly even though sensitive user information may have been leaked due to the system issue. However, Valve claimed that it has not received a single report related to the deemed problem.
As of this writing, Valve claims that it has already fixed the problem. The company added that the official Steam website is back online. Although Valve has yet to release an official statement about the issue, rumors from gaming communities claim that the problem stems from incorrect caching of user account pages.
A Valve spokesperson told Gamespot, "Steam is back up and running without any known issues. As a result of a configuration change earlier today, a caching issue allowed some users to randomly see pages generated for other users for a period of less than an hour."