Valve has announced it has taken measures to help protect its customers against both spamming and phishing by limiting the access of Steam accounts. The only way to lift this restriction is by spending at least $5 in the Steam store in order to unlock all of the platform’s features.

Activating a retail game on Steam won’t remove Valve’s restrictions as they’re requiring its users to either add $5 to their Steam Wallet or purchase a game worth at least that amount. If the Steam user hasn’t spent that amount on the Steam store, they’ll be unable to access features such as sending friend invites, submitting content on Steam workshop, or voting on Steam Greenlight.

Valve has been improving the security of Steam recently, with the most recent security measure being tested has users completing a two-factor login authentication system on their mobile devices. We haven’t run into much spam or phishing on Steam recently, but keeping our precious Steam library away from hackers is something we all can get behind. Unfortunately, requiring spammers or phishers to spend at least $5 to get all of Steam's features will probably be a no-brainer to spend when you consider just how lucrative they can be if they come across a real cash cow.