Owners of the Nintendo Switch consoles are being told to lock down their accounts after a series of potential fraudulent attacks were flagged by more than 50 users.

Third parties have supposedly accessed PayPal accounts linked to Nintendo users, making expensive purchases, such as in-game currencies and cosmetic items.

The reported hacks come after Nintendo launched a social media campaign urging its users to activate two-form authentication on their accounts to bolster their protection.

Attacks have been increasing over the last few months, potentially linked to the rise in users during the COVID-19 lockdown. However, the company says it has seen a dramatic increase with the last few weeks.

In a Reddit post, admins running a Nintendo forum called r/Nintendo, posted: “Over the last few days, a notable amount of people have reported possible compromises of their Nintendo accounts, leading to speculation and news reports that a security breach has occurred.

“Nintendo has neither confirmed nor denied any such security breach at the time of this writing, but we at r/Nintendo feel that it is important to take precaution and pre-emptively provide information on how to keep secure. Better safe than sorry, right?”

The admins suggest several steps users can take to protect their accounts. These include:

Review your sign-in history. Recent sign-ins can be viewed by visiting https://accounts.nintendo.com/login_history.

Change your password. If you used the same password on other sites, it is recommended that you change those as well.

Sign out from all devices. This should be done after changing your password.

Enable two-factor authentication (2FA)

Review any linked payment methods. Check for fraudulent purchases or other activity that you did not make.

Proofpoint cybersecurity strategist, Adenike Cosgrove, spoke about hackers potentially exploiting these systems as more people stay at home during lockdown: ““As people around the world are being asked to remain in their homes due to the coronavirus pandemic, many are turning to these streaming services for entertainment.

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“Attackers will likely follow this pattern and increase their theft and selling of account credentials. We recommend that consumers take a few simple steps to protect their accounts and identify and remove any unauthorised users.”

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