Taco Bell recently held a giveaway for a PlayStation Vita, but upset its dogshit-loving customers by failing to make good on an alarming number of winning entries. The "food" company admits that "dozens" of customers were disappointed by not receiving their prize, and has blamed hackers for the upset.
"We have learned that during a short period of time on January 30th, some people entering our Unlock the Box promotion erroneously received a message suggesting they had won a PlayStation Vita, pending verification ," confessed the company. "After a thorough investigation, and an additional review by the independent company administering the promotion, it was confirmed that these entrants viewed these messages as a result of others who attempted to gain illegal entry and defraud the system."
Taco Bell won't be able to give a prize to those affected, but will enter them into a second drawing.
This is exactly what science fiction writers predicted for the digital age. A terrifying new era where people are forced to eat Taco Bell in order to win the hottest toys, only to have their hopes crushed by electro-terrorists. We've entered the dystopia of our nightmares.
Call Kurtis: Some Taco Bell Contest Winners May Not Get Prize [CBS Sacramento]
Jim Sterling serves as reviews editor for Destructoid.com, head of the Podtoid podcast, and produces a number of news stories, original features, one-of-a-kind videos. With his passionate argumentative style, controversial opinions, harsh delivery, and dedication to brutal honesty Sterling is a name that you can't help but recognize.
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Contest:
8:00 AM on 02.23.2012 | 
Hacked means incompetent, right?
Sucks. Of course you have to feel bad for the people who were counting on those Vitas too, I don't want to neglect them, just pointing out the flipside of this.
Did Taco Bell make you fat or something Jim? You sure have some BEEF against it. (GET IT?)
@Dhaos
I don't imagine they had any real security staff, but I don't think they were really hacked either. You wouldn't blame bank security if someone successfully robbed a bank. We don't generally blame victims, man.
I maintain that I don't think Taco Bell was a victim, though. I think their system was poorly thought out and exploited through legitimate means. Hacking implies some breach of security.
"oh, we don't have enough Vita's to give away to the actual winners."
~ "Well how do we right the issue of people winning the contest online?"
"We blame it on hackers!"
"We don't generally blame victims, man."
Unless of course we're talking about victims of hacking, in which case we ALWAYS blame them. "They were stupid, their security was bad, etc etc"
Every time.
Isn't that just like us as gamers? Company has a contest to give away free Vitas and we take them to court over it? I'm sure there's a moral to the story here somewhere if I could be bothered to find it.
Depends on how many people were affected, I suppose, and as I mentioned a bit earlier, it seems like there might be a whole lot of them based on how much buzz there is about this.
On top of that, you figure for every 50 or so of those they have to give out, that's an entire year's full time salary for someone they could hire instead. Maybe that thought is a little too current-events-topical for a video game blog comment but I think it's worth considering, don't you?
ive never heard of anyone ever winning these contests.
Now Im hungry.
The problem here is that some people were promised something through the company's website, regardless of this being an error or not. The company has to take responsibility in this.
Yeah its all taco bell's fault. They should've prevented the hack. The poor hacker was just doing his given right. Fuckin up everyone else's shit. You're what's wrong with this world. Eat a dick:)
Jim ate shit loads of toco bell, now mad he didn't win.
;)
Why is Jim Sterling such an agenda whore lately? LET'S DEFEND BIOWARE WRITERS! LET'S FIGHT TACO BELL! JUMP IN LET'S SAVE THE WORLD KICK OFF YOUR SHOES AND PUT ON YOUR SUNGLASSES. Hang it up Jim. ¬_¬
Sorry, all this Taco Bell talk has made me ornery for that deliciously foul almost-food.
Not knowing how to use the shells from Demolition Man still bothers me today.
So while you and everyone else who wants to blame the hacker...Taco Bells security should be able to handle someone trying to get a $250 item...unless OMG THEY WENT AFTER YOUR CREDIT CARD NUMBERS FROM PEOPLE EATING TACO BELL AND KFC
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
I GOTTA PAY WITH CASH NOW FOR MY TACO's and 2 BUCKETS OF CHICKEN
Now that would be great and worth their time not a ps vita...