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Yes Steam I think tracks what websites you've been to, but they only do this when they are already suspecting you of cheating, and they only send a hash of the

Yes Steam I think tracks what websites you've been to, but they only do this when they are already suspecting you of cheating, and they only send a hash of the url to see if matches known cheat sites. That's just one of the things I remember. In a perfect world EA would just use steam and give up on Origin. I'm sure they can pay Valve enough to get top billing on steam and it would be less than they spend on their own anti-cheat and origin engineering. They'd also have to cut steam in on sales, but it might still be worth it. It would definitely be worth it to the user as the Origin software is horrible.

gabzuka 12y ago
That's still a bad thing, in my opinion. If I am suspected of cheating then they get access to my browsing history?. How is that acceptable?
- funkyy 12y ago
  Its not and sooner or later EU will investigate it and those companies will be in huge troubles.
- JacobEdelman 12y ago
  Well.... As far as spying goes it doesn't sound that horrible. Since they are only checking hashes of your history against a list of common cheating site hashes they really gain minimal information. If their were clear opt-ins and transparency I would definitely be okay with this sort of anti-cheating measure.
- maddev 12y ago
  Not acceptable at all. Whoever came up with that scheme is a psychopathic criminal for all I care. But then again, once you start using proprietary software you expect there is a gorilla holding your banana and with him comes the jungle. Not even once.
  - mindslight 12y ago
    Well to be fair, you can often receive those gorillas from reputable shippers (torrents), keep them each in their own strong cage (different user account under wine, chroot/namespaces being the next step), and prevent them from getting overexcited by the jungle (iptables).
- aaronharnly 12y ago
  If you read the linked thread, they are not "accessing your browser history". Rather, as a specific countermeasure against specific cheats, they checked the DNS cache for access to a particular set of phone-home server addresses embedded in some cheats. Not websites, but backend servers (ironically) enforcing DRM for cheat software. Like all such countermeasures, it was effective for a short while, then counter-countered by the cheat. What they sent back to valve was only a "yes they appeared to have accessed cheat backend server X", not a list of all accessed servers or browsing history. I'm not saying I love it, but it's important to be accurate before turning the outrage dial to 11.
  - makomk 12y ago
    So far as outsiders were able to tell, it sent back hashes of every DNS cache entry. Someone stuffed their DNS cache with a larger-than-usual number of entries and found the amount of encrypted data sent back consistently increased by exactly the amount required to send every hash twice, then went back to normal when they cleared their DNS cache.
    - aaronharnly 12y ago
      Ah, thanks for the clarification.
  - cookiecaper 12y ago
    This is worse than checking history in some ways. It's much easier to get a stray entry in your DNS cache than to accidentally visit a "bad" website (which isn't that hard either). If anyone links to an image on that domain's servers, Valve will use the presence of the domain in the resolver cache as evidence that you're a cheater. That's not a very reliable system, and I don't think it justifies the privacy invasion from either perspective.
igl 12y ago
ugh! I am actually glad not to see stupid buggy EA games on steam :)
Cameron_D 12y ago
> Yes Steam I think tracks what websites you've been to, but they only do this when they are already suspecting you of cheating, and they only send a hash of the url to see if matches known cheat sites. That's just one of the things I remember. And this is perfectly okay, but looking through a list of start menu entries isn't? In fact I'd consider shipping off lists of URLs and domains I've been to worse than looking through installed programs. > In a perfect world EA would just use steam and give up on Origin. I disagree, competition is a good thing. By this same argument we should all ditch every other operating system because most users run Windows, so using others isn't necessary. Sure Origin has had its' share of bumps, but so did Steam in its early days, now look at it - Steam is adored by gamers and anything else is immediately shunned. > would be less than they spend on their own anti-cheat I'm not sure about this, but from my understanding Steam doesn't really offer much anti-cheat, mostly just DRM. Valve games all have VAC, but I'm not sure how widely used VAC is for non-Valve games. > It would definitely be worth it to the user as the Origin software is horrible. I partly disagree with this. The Origin interface really isn't that bad, I actually find it a lot faster/more responsive than Steam's. Steam's interface is also far from great - although they do have great cross-platform consistency, it is at the expense of being inconsistent with the users operating system.
- Semaphor 12y ago
  > Sure Origin has had its' share of bumps Still has. I can't even visit origin.com without either enabling my VPN or having it in German.
  - arg01 12y ago
    Region locking fun. The worst part being they say in the eula that you can not use VPN services with the Origin shop. So the choices is between either play guess the interface with real money or having them be able to say we blocked your account you no longer have access to your games.
    - Semaphor 12y ago
      Well, as a German I don't have problems understanding German, I just prefer having it like everything else in English. But it is a reason for me not to use them.
kabdib 12y ago
> Yes Steam I think tracks what websites you've been to This was addressed here: http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/1y70ej/valve_vac_and_trust/ http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/1y70ej/valve_vac_and... Agreed about EA and Origin.
- nobotty 12y ago
  you're an idiot if you think origin is more invasive than steam, lol
  - Artemis2 12y ago
    Prove that Steam collects data about your system, except for hardware statistics that it asks you want to send. Being the first platform for gaming, I think that Steam gets audited by a lot of people quite often; despite that, I have heard nothing about Steam spying on its users. The only "invasion of privacy" found was in VAC, which uses security through obscurity to deceive cheaters. When somebody got concerned about that, Gabe Newell immediately explained publicly the security mechanism, letting everybody with basic IT knowledge deduce that Valve has thought this quite thoroughly for privacy.
    - nitrogen 12y ago
      Last time I refused to participate in the Steam hardware survey, it was because the description of the data sent in the survey included "software installed on the system." If you use anything other than Steam on your system, that's not really acceptable. AFAIK, though, that is only if you join the Steam hardware survey.
thefreeman 12y ago
Honestly, though I actually use and like Steam, I absolutely hate how the walled garden / vendor lock in approach is making its way into PC gaming. There are games I 100% would have bought except for the fact that they force you to buy it through Origin. The only way to play without it is to use a pirated version. Part of me wishes they could outlaw these types of things, but I don't really see any way you could logically force someone to make their platform available to competitors.
- cookiecaper 12y ago
  Lock-in is the holy grail of all software vendors. If they can achieve a pervasive lock-in, they're golden. We should always have that present in mind when we're discussing the actions of software companies, because it's a conflict of interest. It means consumers need to be extra vigilant about demanding data portability and cross-compatibility, since software vendors are not going to be happy to provide them voluntarily. Almost every action Microsoft has taken in the last 20 years has been about furthering their lock-in. The Xbox exists solely to promote DirectX, which tightens Windows' foothold; other consoles were (and are) mostly based on a derivative of OpenGL, which made it easier to port games to non-Windows platforms. .NET exists solely to ensure that more business software requires Windows, and Windows Phone exists to ensure that more mobile software requires Windows. Java's write once, run anywhere philosophy is one of Microsoft's main targets, and has been since Java gained popularity in the early-mid 90s. Cross-platform compatibility is the bane of software vendors within their sphere of influence. Since MS primarily sells operating systems and office software, everything they do is about ensuring it's difficult to use a different operating system or office software. You can go through a similar history for almost every major software vendor. It's in their monetary interest to make it difficult for users to switch platforms, which means it's in their interest to keep your data locked up and/or obfuscated.
  - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
    Maybe. But the examples aren't solid. Xbox sales were #1 for years - had to be a profit motive there regardless of software 'lock-in'. .NET maybe, but Windows Phone? Last place in phone sales. How does that lock anybody into anything? IE supports Java - no lock-in possible there. Sometimes companies complete by writing software people want to buy. Microsoft has demonstrably done that, and in a market where they are clearly incapable of locking anybody to anything.
mfisher87 12y ago
Why is "everything on steam" a perfect world scenario? Give all the power to one system that already has significant problems with DRM and offline play? We learned monopolies are bad this decade, again. Or is that again again? Or again again again? Or maybe it was again again again again again. I can't keep track. But we have a large portion of our population clamoring for every game to be on Steam or every house to be on Google fiber.
- nitrogen 12y ago
  Why is "everything on steam" a perfect world scenario? It's not, but it's far better than "everything on Origin".
mackal 12y ago
Steam used to check your DNS cache for cheat sites, they don't anymore.
evilDagmar 12y ago
You are mistaken. Steam looks at your local DNS cache to see if you've got the DNS entries of known cheat sites (since some of the cheating tools have their own convenient licencing mechanism that requires them to phone home at a special URL, this is easy-mode detection) in your cache. They do not look at your browsing history.

gabzuka 12y ago

That's still a bad thing, in my opinion. If I am suspected of cheating then they get access to my browsing history?. How is that acceptable?

funkyy 12y ago
Its not and sooner or later EU will investigate it and those companies will be in huge troubles.
JacobEdelman 12y ago
Well.... As far as spying goes it doesn't sound that horrible. Since they are only checking hashes of your history against a list of common cheating site hashes they really gain minimal information. If their were clear opt-ins and transparency I would definitely be okay with this sort of anti-cheating measure.
maddev 12y ago
Not acceptable at all. Whoever came up with that scheme is a psychopathic criminal for all I care. But then again, once you start using proprietary software you expect there is a gorilla holding your banana and with him comes the jungle. Not even once.
- mindslight 12y ago
  Well to be fair, you can often receive those gorillas from reputable shippers (torrents), keep them each in their own strong cage (different user account under wine, chroot/namespaces being the next step), and prevent them from getting overexcited by the jungle (iptables).
aaronharnly 12y ago
If you read the linked thread, they are not "accessing your browser history". Rather, as a specific countermeasure against specific cheats, they checked the DNS cache for access to a particular set of phone-home server addresses embedded in some cheats. Not websites, but backend servers (ironically) enforcing DRM for cheat software. Like all such countermeasures, it was effective for a short while, then counter-countered by the cheat. What they sent back to valve was only a "yes they appeared to have accessed cheat backend server X", not a list of all accessed servers or browsing history. I'm not saying I love it, but it's important to be accurate before turning the outrage dial to 11.
- makomk 12y ago
  So far as outsiders were able to tell, it sent back hashes of every DNS cache entry. Someone stuffed their DNS cache with a larger-than-usual number of entries and found the amount of encrypted data sent back consistently increased by exactly the amount required to send every hash twice, then went back to normal when they cleared their DNS cache.
  - aaronharnly 12y ago
    Ah, thanks for the clarification.
- cookiecaper 12y ago
  This is worse than checking history in some ways. It's much easier to get a stray entry in your DNS cache than to accidentally visit a "bad" website (which isn't that hard either). If anyone links to an image on that domain's servers, Valve will use the presence of the domain in the resolver cache as evidence that you're a cheater. That's not a very reliable system, and I don't think it justifies the privacy invasion from either perspective.

igl 12y ago

ugh! I am actually glad not to see stupid buggy EA games on steam :)

Cameron_D 12y ago

> Yes Steam I think tracks what websites you've been to, but they only do this when they are already suspecting you of cheating, and they only send a hash of the url to see if matches known cheat sites. That's just one of the things I remember. And this is perfectly okay, but looking through a list of start menu entries isn't? In fact I'd consider shipping off lists of URLs and domains I've been to worse than looking through installed programs. > In a perfect world EA would just use steam and give up on Origin. I disagree, competition is a good thing. By this same argument we should all ditch every other operating system because most users run Windows, so using others isn't necessary. Sure Origin has had its' share of bumps, but so did Steam in its early days, now look at it - Steam is adored by gamers and anything else is immediately shunned. > would be less than they spend on their own anti-cheat I'm not sure about this, but from my understanding Steam doesn't really offer much anti-cheat, mostly just DRM. Valve games all have VAC, but I'm not sure how widely used VAC is for non-Valve games. > It would definitely be worth it to the user as the Origin software is horrible. I partly disagree with this. The Origin interface really isn't that bad, I actually find it a lot faster/more responsive than Steam's. Steam's interface is also far from great - although they do have great cross-platform consistency, it is at the expense of being inconsistent with the users operating system.

Semaphor 12y ago
> Sure Origin has had its' share of bumps Still has. I can't even visit origin.com without either enabling my VPN or having it in German.
- arg01 12y ago
  Region locking fun. The worst part being they say in the eula that you can not use VPN services with the Origin shop. So the choices is between either play guess the interface with real money or having them be able to say we blocked your account you no longer have access to your games.
  - Semaphor 12y ago
    Well, as a German I don't have problems understanding German, I just prefer having it like everything else in English. But it is a reason for me not to use them.

kabdib 12y ago

> Yes Steam I think tracks what websites you've been to This was addressed here: http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/1y70ej/valve_vac_and_trust/ http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/1y70ej/valve_vac_and... Agreed about EA and Origin.

nobotty 12y ago
you're an idiot if you think origin is more invasive than steam, lol
- Artemis2 12y ago
  Prove that Steam collects data about your system, except for hardware statistics that it asks you want to send. Being the first platform for gaming, I think that Steam gets audited by a lot of people quite often; despite that, I have heard nothing about Steam spying on its users. The only "invasion of privacy" found was in VAC, which uses security through obscurity to deceive cheaters. When somebody got concerned about that, Gabe Newell immediately explained publicly the security mechanism, letting everybody with basic IT knowledge deduce that Valve has thought this quite thoroughly for privacy.
  - nitrogen 12y ago
    Last time I refused to participate in the Steam hardware survey, it was because the description of the data sent in the survey included "software installed on the system." If you use anything other than Steam on your system, that's not really acceptable. AFAIK, though, that is only if you join the Steam hardware survey.

thefreeman 12y ago

Honestly, though I actually use and like Steam, I absolutely hate how the walled garden / vendor lock in approach is making its way into PC gaming. There are games I 100% would have bought except for the fact that they force you to buy it through Origin. The only way to play without it is to use a pirated version. Part of me wishes they could outlaw these types of things, but I don't really see any way you could logically force someone to make their platform available to competitors.

cookiecaper 12y ago
Lock-in is the holy grail of all software vendors. If they can achieve a pervasive lock-in, they're golden. We should always have that present in mind when we're discussing the actions of software companies, because it's a conflict of interest. It means consumers need to be extra vigilant about demanding data portability and cross-compatibility, since software vendors are not going to be happy to provide them voluntarily. Almost every action Microsoft has taken in the last 20 years has been about furthering their lock-in. The Xbox exists solely to promote DirectX, which tightens Windows' foothold; other consoles were (and are) mostly based on a derivative of OpenGL, which made it easier to port games to non-Windows platforms. .NET exists solely to ensure that more business software requires Windows, and Windows Phone exists to ensure that more mobile software requires Windows. Java's write once, run anywhere philosophy is one of Microsoft's main targets, and has been since Java gained popularity in the early-mid 90s. Cross-platform compatibility is the bane of software vendors within their sphere of influence. Since MS primarily sells operating systems and office software, everything they do is about ensuring it's difficult to use a different operating system or office software. You can go through a similar history for almost every major software vendor. It's in their monetary interest to make it difficult for users to switch platforms, which means it's in their interest to keep your data locked up and/or obfuscated.
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  Maybe. But the examples aren't solid. Xbox sales were #1 for years - had to be a profit motive there regardless of software 'lock-in'. .NET maybe, but Windows Phone? Last place in phone sales. How does that lock anybody into anything? IE supports Java - no lock-in possible there. Sometimes companies complete by writing software people want to buy. Microsoft has demonstrably done that, and in a market where they are clearly incapable of locking anybody to anything.

mfisher87 12y ago

Why is "everything on steam" a perfect world scenario? Give all the power to one system that already has significant problems with DRM and offline play? We learned monopolies are bad this decade, again. Or is that again again? Or again again again? Or maybe it was again again again again again. I can't keep track. But we have a large portion of our population clamoring for every game to be on Steam or every house to be on Google fiber.

nitrogen 12y ago
Why is "everything on steam" a perfect world scenario? It's not, but it's far better than "everything on Origin".

mackal 12y ago

Steam used to check your DNS cache for cheat sites, they don't anymore.

evilDagmar 12y ago

You are mistaken. Steam looks at your local DNS cache to see if you've got the DNS entries of known cheat sites (since some of the cheating tools have their own convenient licencing mechanism that requires them to phone home at a special URL, this is easy-mode detection) in your cache. They do not look at your browsing history.