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Some thoughts - secure kernel WILL get hijacked and be completely invisible to anti cheats. Which would be funny. - Microsoft won't port back the attestation

Some thoughts - secure kernel WILL get hijacked and be completely invisible to anti cheats. Which would be funny. - Microsoft won't port back the attestation process to win 10 (although secure kernel exists there too), forcing all gamers, where the AC adopts this attestation, to install win11 - trying to lock out Linux for sure, which is a funny coincidence given that Valve is partnering with anti cheat developers (eg EAC and Battleye) to support Linux

c0balt 9mo ago
> EAC and Battleye They may be partnering with them but support for competitve titles is rather limited. For example, the most prominent Battleye title (iirc), Rainbow Six Siege, is not support on Linux via Steam due to Battleye blocking it. Valorant, LoL, BF6 or CoD also don't work ime.
- napkinartist 9mo ago
  They will need to sooner or later. Linux has more momentum than ever, and saying "players on steam deck/steam machine/bazzite can't play our game" seems like a losing long term strategy.
  - bentcorner 9mo ago
    It's a balance between allowing linux and (theoretically) opening the door for more cheaters. Saying "players can't play our game because every match has a cheater" is just as bad. I can't say which has more weight but it's not a cut and dry situation, at least until Linux has anti-cheat. Right now developers could make an "unattested" queue for linux and other non-TPM windows systems. Which could also serve as a black-hole for cheaters, so maybe there's some value in that.
  - immibis 9mo ago
    So, the problem with anticheat on Linux is there's no "safe" reference version of Linux that you can enforce to be running. This is a good thing. It's supposed to be modifiable. This fundamentally conflicts with the goal of anticheat which is to stop you modifying it. I predict they won't allow all Linux but only the specific version Valve puts on the Steam Deck/Machine, and if you modify it then your games won't run again.
    - charcircuit 9mo ago
      That hasn't stopped Android from offering attestation while they use Linux. >It's supposed to be modifiable. https://www.kernel.org/linux.html https://www.kernel.org/linux.html I have not seen that as a project goal.
- Alupis 9mo ago
  Particularly frustrating, because Rainbow Six Siege runs spectacularly on linux, but the moment you join a multiplayer session the anticheat forces a crash-to-desktop. For many of these games it's a choice. They choose not to support linux. Perhaps one day that will change. I've been playing online multiplayer games, including competitive FPS and more, for nearly 3 decades. Cheating has never been such a problem that it made me quit a game. So much of this is way overplayed by wannabe-super-sweat try-hards, thinking they're competing in high-stakes games. So we cede more and more control of our computer over to video game(!!) companies, going deep down the rabbit hole of kernel-level anti-cheat and worse to come. It's a freaking video game... have fun. If someone cheats, find a new server. It's really that simple.
altairprime 9mo ago
Win10 only supports this in specific high-sec enterprise configurations and, as indicated, Microsoft will not be porting that back to Windows 10. One can reasonably expect that Windows 10 support will be killed in favor of this new API, specifically because it means game studios can stop paying for soon-irrelevant development effort into Windows anti-modding. And I bet TF2 starts blocking unattested (and, so, Windows 10) players within one year of Valve enabling the new attestation API on Steam hardware in Windows/Linux. Linux is and has for years been capable of supporting all of this at any time, and when-not-if Valve enables attestation of a clean sealed-booted Steam Linux environment for their hardware, AAA multiplayer games will begin allowing only sealed-attested Steam Linux players to join multiplayer games from Linux. Microsoft isn’t doing this to screw Linux. Microsoft is doing this to avoid losing the secured PC gaming market to Valve. They already lost the (secured) console gaming market, after all.
- literallywho 9mo ago
  Valve let bots infest and ruin TF2 servers for 8 (eight) years straight before doing anything. There's no way they'd add anything like that to TF2 within one year.
  - altairprime 9mo ago
    Of course not. They’d just add it to VAC and make it an opt-in flag for all Steam games. And then check that box for TF2 et al., because one click in a metadata editor to lock out 99.999% of software cheaters is a no-brainer for any multiplayer game — including their own! And as a bonus, that’s an upsell driver for sealed-capable hardware like the upcoming Steam console, when people find out that their Win10 PCs can’t access their inventories next year and it’s either Windows 11 or Steam Linux. Mod it all you want for local play, then dual-boot to a competition-grade sealed OS to join lobbies? Hard to see how they’d turn that opportunity down.
    - blibble 9mo ago
      do you know when a Steam switched to a 64 bit executable? last month valve are not the company you think they are
charcircuit 9mo ago
>trying to lock out Linux Only because desktop Linux will be behind on security. Macs already got this ability in 2023 which allowed for a user mode anticheat for Riot Games to be made that successfully prevented cheating. Now Windows is getting attestation that is the game running on a secure system. If desktop Linux ever gets around to this then a anticheats can add support for it and it will be much easier then them needing to make a kernel anticheat for a platform that few people use.
- beeflet 9mo ago
  it will be behind on security gimmicks
  - eddythompson80 9mo ago
    It’s not a gimmick feature. It’s just the “user” is always, inherently, in “control” of the kernel itself when it comes to Linux. That’s not true with NT or Darwin. You (a 3rd party) can always verify NT or Darwin’s “integrity” by checking it’s cryptographically signed by Microsoft or Apple. Other than assuming that Valve (or Sony, Nintendo, Debian, SUSE, RedHat, etc) is the “trusted kernel” for your game, you can’t do that with Linux. And the moment you say “My application only runs on Kernels signed by {insert organization}, are you really “Linux”?
    - Alupis 9mo ago
      The reality is the overwhelming majority of desktop linux users are probably using a kernel shipped by their distro, be it Fedora, Debian, Ubuntu, Valve, whatever. Those kernels could be attested. I agree with your sentiment though. It's a wild future we're considering, just so some people can play video games and complain less about supposed cheaters (or often, skill issues, but I digress).
      - eddythompson80 9mo ago
        Yeah, I agree. Majority of people running any OS are expecting a vendor that manages their OS. Even those running Arch are rarely patching things by hand and just following whatever is in the official repos or wiki. However, I believe part of the huge positive sentiment about “Linux gaming” online is that, so far, it’s been truly “Linux gaming”. Once it becomes “Valve’s Gaming” it’s really no different than PS5 or Switch using Linux for its base OS but it’s really Sony or Nintendo’s device.

c0balt 9mo ago

> EAC and Battleye They may be partnering with them but support for competitve titles is rather limited. For example, the most prominent Battleye title (iirc), Rainbow Six Siege, is not support on Linux via Steam due to Battleye blocking it. Valorant, LoL, BF6 or CoD also don't work ime.

napkinartist 9mo ago
They will need to sooner or later. Linux has more momentum than ever, and saying "players on steam deck/steam machine/bazzite can't play our game" seems like a losing long term strategy.
- bentcorner 9mo ago
  It's a balance between allowing linux and (theoretically) opening the door for more cheaters. Saying "players can't play our game because every match has a cheater" is just as bad. I can't say which has more weight but it's not a cut and dry situation, at least until Linux has anti-cheat. Right now developers could make an "unattested" queue for linux and other non-TPM windows systems. Which could also serve as a black-hole for cheaters, so maybe there's some value in that.
- immibis 9mo ago
  So, the problem with anticheat on Linux is there's no "safe" reference version of Linux that you can enforce to be running. This is a good thing. It's supposed to be modifiable. This fundamentally conflicts with the goal of anticheat which is to stop you modifying it. I predict they won't allow all Linux but only the specific version Valve puts on the Steam Deck/Machine, and if you modify it then your games won't run again.
  - charcircuit 9mo ago
    That hasn't stopped Android from offering attestation while they use Linux. >It's supposed to be modifiable. https://www.kernel.org/linux.html https://www.kernel.org/linux.html I have not seen that as a project goal.
Alupis 9mo ago
Particularly frustrating, because Rainbow Six Siege runs spectacularly on linux, but the moment you join a multiplayer session the anticheat forces a crash-to-desktop. For many of these games it's a choice. They choose not to support linux. Perhaps one day that will change. I've been playing online multiplayer games, including competitive FPS and more, for nearly 3 decades. Cheating has never been such a problem that it made me quit a game. So much of this is way overplayed by wannabe-super-sweat try-hards, thinking they're competing in high-stakes games. So we cede more and more control of our computer over to video game(!!) companies, going deep down the rabbit hole of kernel-level anti-cheat and worse to come. It's a freaking video game... have fun. If someone cheats, find a new server. It's really that simple.

altairprime 9mo ago

Win10 only supports this in specific high-sec enterprise configurations and, as indicated, Microsoft will not be porting that back to Windows 10. One can reasonably expect that Windows 10 support will be killed in favor of this new API, specifically because it means game studios can stop paying for soon-irrelevant development effort into Windows anti-modding. And I bet TF2 starts blocking unattested (and, so, Windows 10) players within one year of Valve enabling the new attestation API on Steam hardware in Windows/Linux. Linux is and has for years been capable of supporting all of this at any time, and when-not-if Valve enables attestation of a clean sealed-booted Steam Linux environment for their hardware, AAA multiplayer games will begin allowing only sealed-attested Steam Linux players to join multiplayer games from Linux. Microsoft isn’t doing this to screw Linux. Microsoft is doing this to avoid losing the secured PC gaming market to Valve. They already lost the (secured) console gaming market, after all.

literallywho 9mo ago
Valve let bots infest and ruin TF2 servers for 8 (eight) years straight before doing anything. There's no way they'd add anything like that to TF2 within one year.
- altairprime 9mo ago
  Of course not. They’d just add it to VAC and make it an opt-in flag for all Steam games. And then check that box for TF2 et al., because one click in a metadata editor to lock out 99.999% of software cheaters is a no-brainer for any multiplayer game — including their own! And as a bonus, that’s an upsell driver for sealed-capable hardware like the upcoming Steam console, when people find out that their Win10 PCs can’t access their inventories next year and it’s either Windows 11 or Steam Linux. Mod it all you want for local play, then dual-boot to a competition-grade sealed OS to join lobbies? Hard to see how they’d turn that opportunity down.
  - blibble 9mo ago
    do you know when a Steam switched to a 64 bit executable? last month valve are not the company you think they are

charcircuit 9mo ago

>trying to lock out Linux Only because desktop Linux will be behind on security. Macs already got this ability in 2023 which allowed for a user mode anticheat for Riot Games to be made that successfully prevented cheating. Now Windows is getting attestation that is the game running on a secure system. If desktop Linux ever gets around to this then a anticheats can add support for it and it will be much easier then them needing to make a kernel anticheat for a platform that few people use.

beeflet 9mo ago
it will be behind on security gimmicks
- eddythompson80 9mo ago
  It’s not a gimmick feature. It’s just the “user” is always, inherently, in “control” of the kernel itself when it comes to Linux. That’s not true with NT or Darwin. You (a 3rd party) can always verify NT or Darwin’s “integrity” by checking it’s cryptographically signed by Microsoft or Apple. Other than assuming that Valve (or Sony, Nintendo, Debian, SUSE, RedHat, etc) is the “trusted kernel” for your game, you can’t do that with Linux. And the moment you say “My application only runs on Kernels signed by {insert organization}, are you really “Linux”?
  - Alupis 9mo ago
    The reality is the overwhelming majority of desktop linux users are probably using a kernel shipped by their distro, be it Fedora, Debian, Ubuntu, Valve, whatever. Those kernels could be attested. I agree with your sentiment though. It's a wild future we're considering, just so some people can play video games and complain less about supposed cheaters (or often, skill issues, but I digress).
    - eddythompson80 9mo ago
      Yeah, I agree. Majority of people running any OS are expecting a vendor that manages their OS. Even those running Arch are rarely patching things by hand and just following whatever is in the official repos or wiki. However, I believe part of the huge positive sentiment about “Linux gaming” online is that, so far, it’s been truly “Linux gaming”. Once it becomes “Valve’s Gaming” it’s really no different than PS5 or Switch using Linux for its base OS but it’s really Sony or Nintendo’s device.