Update: And, of course, as this is posted, we are pointed in the direction of a thread on the Customer Service forums indicating that this is, indeed,
an error. It's currently out of stock and should be displaying as such, but the item is simply not displaying at all instead. It will return when it's in stock. Thank you to those that pointed this out.
We held off on reporting this for a few days, just in case it were a glitch or accident on Blizzard's end (making a mountain out of a molehill makes us all look silly), but it's been this way for long enough that it's worth mentioning: The Authenticator is no longer in the
Blizzard Store. Previous bookmarks and links to the item are broken, and searching for it yields
nothing but broken dreams.
Oddly, this happened in lockstep with the news that the
Mobile Authenticator was available. Whether it was coincidental or intentional, we don't really now, but I think it's a pretty odd choice! It seems like an indication that they don't intend to stock them again. That's disappointing, to say the least. Blizzard hasn't pulled profit on either the Mobile or Physical authenticators, so I can understand wanting to cut costs by stopping production and distribution of the physical authenticators, if that
is what they're doing. It's still disappointing, because I have serious doubts that everyone who wants/needs an authenticator has an
iPhone/iTouch for the mobile app.
No business, even one as successful as
Blizzard, wants to sell something at a loss. Blizzard has made it clear that they don't want to charge for the opt-in authenticator service. From a purely financial view, I can see why they would pull it. As a player, I really wish they didn't.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, Account Security
Jul 10th 2013 at 2:00PM 
