Zyngo, a popular in-world game in Second Life was hacked, causing the creator of the machines to initiate emergency measures.

The Zyngo machines were victim of a string of circumstances:

“A SL exploit was found and removed, but not before quite a number of my games were cloned. This was hard on me, and hard on all existing owners who didn’t need to see another flood of Zyngos hit the market.

And, finally, a group of japanese hackers created a custom SL client that was able to overwhelm all the security checks I made in Zyngo. Thanks to several people (who preferred that I didn’t name them), I had some videos and explanations of the exploit and I found a defense that won’t allow the exploit anymore.”

What’s partly concerning about the exploits against a popular in world game is the use of the client to perform the hack.

Zyngo addicts everywhere are making alternate plans for the weekend.