Here's what I think.
a) A very good programmer has made a working hack, but a hidden funcion in the hack( not have to be a keylogger). People liked the hack, used it, sent it to more and more, until the creator decided to get all the information. Heres one way he could of done this:
In VB, you can easily create a 'keylogger'. It logs all the letters being written. So, when the process AL.exe is the main process, the 'keylogger' starts to log. When the character is logged in, the accountID and password get encrypted in some file, and therefore uploaded on the internet somehow. Why does he encrypt it? So people won't find their info on some random file, and start announcing that the creator is going to steal all the accounts. He therefore deencrypt and got all character's information.
OR
b) Codemasters(c) did this, to force people to buy more. They messed up the good character's, leaving the owners of the character's still addicted to the game and they have to buy more from Codemasters(c). Easy way to gain money but risky if someone finds out.
Emme