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> Wild how this turned from "I don't want a game-related kernel-level driver in my system" to "I don't want China spying on me" in one reply. Fair criticism. I

> Wild how this turned from "I don't want a game-related kernel-level driver in my system" to "I don't want China spying on me" in one reply. Fair criticism. I used Tencent as the example as they are one of the most prominent offenders. I don't trust any company to install these drivers, period, Chinese or otherwise. > You lost me there to be honest, if you think the "true" purpose of anti-cheat drivers is for a foreign power to spy on us boring ordinary uninteresting people. That's fine, but I definitely don't think keeping your "gaming experience" as hacker free as possible is the primary goal of these programs. I've worked in software too long to not know better.

sbarre 5y ago
So here's a question: What is it about games that makes you particularly worried about this? Why is that an industry that is more susceptible to this kind of "nefarious" activity as you put it? Wouldn't it make more sense for business-related products to do this, since the odds of being on a computer that has actual useful information to steal would be much, much higher? Why would a company invest in this kind of tech, in a highly visible field, full of people who will go over it with a fine-toothed comb (gamers are obsessive), for what seems like a very low-percentage hit rate on obtaining information? Curious about your viewpoint on this..
- Rooster61 5y ago
  > What is it about games that makes you particularly worried about this? Why is that an industry that is more susceptible to this kind of "nefarious" activity as you put it? Because it targets a younger, more ignorant user base that is much more likely than a company with security audits to blindly install. I certainly was at that age. > Wouldn't it make more sense for business-related products to do this, since the odds of being on a computer that has actual useful information to steal would be much, much higher? It does happen, but its less successful due to folks that work in operational security. If I suggested installing software with this type of driver at any job I've ever worked at with a security professional halfway worth their salt, I'd instantly be rejected. > full of people who will go over it with a fine-toothed comb (gamers are obsessive) Show me a gamer that has seen the code of one of these drivers. Name a single person. Those programs are black box by design.
  - judge2020 5y ago
    > If I suggested installing software with this type of driver at any job I've ever worked at with a security professional halfway worth their salt, I'd instantly be rejected You forgot to tell them it’s a state-of-the-art antivirus solution. > Show me a gamer that has seen the code of one of these drivers. They don’t want to see the code, they just want to know it works and allows them to play games with a much lower chance of playing against a cheater. The ban waves that end up on Reddit every year[0] are good enough for them. 0: https://reddit.com/r/GlobalOffensive/comments/52mj1m/untrusted_ban_wave/ https://reddit.com/r/GlobalOffensive/comments/52mj1m/untrust...
- pdimitar 5y ago
  > Wouldn't it make more sense for business-related products to do this, since the odds of being on a computer that has actual useful information to steal would be much, much higher? Not necessarily. That gaming machine has good odds of being in a local network with other, more important and interesting machines. It can also scan local Wi-Fi area and scoop up even more information that can be used later. Thought these were obvious. > Why would a company invest in this kind of tech, in a highly visible field, full of people who will go over it with a fine-toothed comb (gamers are obsessive), for what seems like a very low-percentage hit rate on obtaining information? 1. They invest nothing out of the ordinary. They already have programmers on the payroll. Not like they spend 200 million on this alone. (Although there are companies like Google and Facebook who absolutely would and have invested much more than this just to be able to scoop up as much private info as possible -- not sure why this seems so unlikely to you, today, in 2022.) 2. The field is EVERYTHING BUT VISIBLE. Nobody has ever seen the source of these programs (outside of the authoring companies). Nobody. Ever. 3. Games are obsessive but most of them are technically illiterate. They install these things without a flicker of doubt. 4. The low-percentage is how it seems to you. Do it on a few hundred million machines and you are bound to find something very interesting in a good volume. It's statistics.
  - dijit 5y ago
    If you’ll sign an NDA I can show you TC anticheat and EasyAnticheat. Tencent anticheat has a hard baked logger that prints out every network call it makes, which believe it or not was intended to create trust. You can see in the disassembled code that it can’t make outbound calls without that function that prints the payload. We can’t be open because it’s too risky. We can’t be closed because people think we’re scum. Why not just make console games? This thread has me depressed.
    - Rooster61 5y ago
      > This thread has me depressed. Certainly was not my aim, and I sympathize. I've said many times I'd never move into game dev because of the workload and sheer work-to-flame ratio, and this thread isn't an exception. Likewise, thank you for providing some light from within the industry, it is appreciated. I'd sign that NDA in a heartbeat if it didn't anonymize me, but I don't want my name floating around in databases I know nothing about. It's mighty tempting to see how the sausage is made, though. I will ask this: Does the decision to include such an anti-cheat come from the studio usually, or the publisher?

sbarre 5y ago

So here's a question: What is it about games that makes you particularly worried about this? Why is that an industry that is more susceptible to this kind of "nefarious" activity as you put it? Wouldn't it make more sense for business-related products to do this, since the odds of being on a computer that has actual useful information to steal would be much, much higher? Why would a company invest in this kind of tech, in a highly visible field, full of people who will go over it with a fine-toothed comb (gamers are obsessive), for what seems like a very low-percentage hit rate on obtaining information? Curious about your viewpoint on this..

Rooster61 5y ago
> What is it about games that makes you particularly worried about this? Why is that an industry that is more susceptible to this kind of "nefarious" activity as you put it? Because it targets a younger, more ignorant user base that is much more likely than a company with security audits to blindly install. I certainly was at that age. > Wouldn't it make more sense for business-related products to do this, since the odds of being on a computer that has actual useful information to steal would be much, much higher? It does happen, but its less successful due to folks that work in operational security. If I suggested installing software with this type of driver at any job I've ever worked at with a security professional halfway worth their salt, I'd instantly be rejected. > full of people who will go over it with a fine-toothed comb (gamers are obsessive) Show me a gamer that has seen the code of one of these drivers. Name a single person. Those programs are black box by design.
- judge2020 5y ago
  > If I suggested installing software with this type of driver at any job I've ever worked at with a security professional halfway worth their salt, I'd instantly be rejected You forgot to tell them it’s a state-of-the-art antivirus solution. > Show me a gamer that has seen the code of one of these drivers. They don’t want to see the code, they just want to know it works and allows them to play games with a much lower chance of playing against a cheater. The ban waves that end up on Reddit every year[0] are good enough for them. 0: https://reddit.com/r/GlobalOffensive/comments/52mj1m/untrusted_ban_wave/ https://reddit.com/r/GlobalOffensive/comments/52mj1m/untrust...
pdimitar 5y ago
> Wouldn't it make more sense for business-related products to do this, since the odds of being on a computer that has actual useful information to steal would be much, much higher? Not necessarily. That gaming machine has good odds of being in a local network with other, more important and interesting machines. It can also scan local Wi-Fi area and scoop up even more information that can be used later. Thought these were obvious. > Why would a company invest in this kind of tech, in a highly visible field, full of people who will go over it with a fine-toothed comb (gamers are obsessive), for what seems like a very low-percentage hit rate on obtaining information? 1. They invest nothing out of the ordinary. They already have programmers on the payroll. Not like they spend 200 million on this alone. (Although there are companies like Google and Facebook who absolutely would and have invested much more than this just to be able to scoop up as much private info as possible -- not sure why this seems so unlikely to you, today, in 2022.) 2. The field is EVERYTHING BUT VISIBLE. Nobody has ever seen the source of these programs (outside of the authoring companies). Nobody. Ever. 3. Games are obsessive but most of them are technically illiterate. They install these things without a flicker of doubt. 4. The low-percentage is how it seems to you. Do it on a few hundred million machines and you are bound to find something very interesting in a good volume. It's statistics.
- dijit 5y ago
  If you’ll sign an NDA I can show you TC anticheat and EasyAnticheat. Tencent anticheat has a hard baked logger that prints out every network call it makes, which believe it or not was intended to create trust. You can see in the disassembled code that it can’t make outbound calls without that function that prints the payload. We can’t be open because it’s too risky. We can’t be closed because people think we’re scum. Why not just make console games? This thread has me depressed.
  - Rooster61 5y ago
    > This thread has me depressed. Certainly was not my aim, and I sympathize. I've said many times I'd never move into game dev because of the workload and sheer work-to-flame ratio, and this thread isn't an exception. Likewise, thank you for providing some light from within the industry, it is appreciated. I'd sign that NDA in a heartbeat if it didn't anonymize me, but I don't want my name floating around in databases I know nothing about. It's mighty tempting to see how the sausage is made, though. I will ask this: Does the decision to include such an anti-cheat come from the studio usually, or the publisher?