Ip & Hardware Bans

Painanator

I'm usually pretty calm, when it comes to dealing with the cheater/hacker threat. But today it has become ridiculous. Regular banns won't help. Thanks to the idiots here in the forum, that has decided that because they can't get what they want, they will destroy the game.

In every room I played today, there have been at-least one cheater (often more than one). With the 10 minute cooldown and the limit of 10 per day, the in-game report system is meaningless. Even if we had unlimited banns, it won't work. You the GM's/Support will not be able to ban them fast enough and they will only make more accounts.

Now it is simply this choice IP & Hardware banns or you will have to shut the game down, because not one player will be able to play when it is like this. And when it's me saying this, you might understand the situation is critical, as my point-of-view's are pretty positive, even in the most troublesome times.

We can't wait 1-2 months, this has to be done this week. The problem will only become worse with time.

Waiwio

I'd agree with a proper hardware ban, like how they block people from creating many accounts on the website. I know most people can just create accounts and cheat currently, but having sometime of ban so you cannot play on that PC or IP would be better for the sake of the game.

winnnetou

I heard ip bann isnt so effective because ip can be changed, but hardware bann would be a good solution, if one is hardware banned he need another pc if he want to play again, +1.

Muffin1337

Tried to get 110 Wins on my alt for Jungle Knife, quit after 5 games cuz its literally unplayable. +1 from me.

Painanator

winnnetou wrote: »

I heard ip bann isnt so effective because ip can be changed, but hardware bann would be a good solution, if one is hardware banned he need another pc if he want to play again, +1.

IP bans will probably only affect the stupid less tech savvy of the cheaters. But with this new wave it might be enough. I wrote IP because it would be faster to implement, so they do that, while they are fixing a hardware-ban system.

Another temporary fix, would be shutting down account-registrations for a month or two, while we keep on hunting cheaters. But I think Smiliegate-West as a whole, is too greedy to do that.

Mastermann

I'm personally against IP bans as unfortunately a lot of people in a lot of countries have a dynamic IP address.

I know it's unlikely, but if I were to lose power and when it came back I happened to have an IP that had been IP banned, I'd be in a bit of a pickle.
That, and I don't feel like the players who play in a location with the same IP address (Cyber cafe, library, university etc.) should be penalised for the actions of another person using the same connection.

Hardware bans though - definitely 100% support.

IGN_Galaxy

We've talked about this before, but I see the Smile Gate has no intention of applying as Jack thought it was
Smilegate is just greedy that wants more accounts so they have an argument that there are a billion players playing this game
but i agrre with ban Hardware

fl0rians

They might be greedy but wanting more active players would actually be an argument to do smt against the re-occuring hacking problem. The number of cheaters that will be blocked should be less than legit players that come back and spend way more time ingame if its enjoyable.

[AhmedHafez]

Hardware bans can be unbanned by downloading a windows ezz

Painanator

[QUOTE=[AhmedHafez];n6922772]Hardware bans can be unbanned by downloading a windows ezz[/QUOTE]

That is not true hardware banning. It's a bastardized version that some companies use and call it that. True hardware bans, will ban the serial number of your pc's parts (like CPU, GPU etc...). I know there are workarounds for that too, but not easy enough that every bonehead cheater can do it with a guide.

Flame1998

People that use hacks in crossfire usually use VM's to do it (Virtual Machines) that way they don't have to be worried about getting viruses or even hardware ban because you have a virtual MAC adress all you need to do is make a new VM and as ez as that hack again.

Painanator

Flame1998 wrote: »

People that use hacks in crossfire usually use VM's to do it (Virtual Machines) that way they don't have to be worried about getting viruses or even hardware ban because you have a virtual MAC adress all you need to do is make a new VM and as ez as that hack again.

I wouldn't know, I have never tried to cheat in an online game (don't really see the point of it). But isn't the MAC adress blocking, the fake hardware block. As I understand it, the real hardware block, actually blocks every serial number of the parts within the computer. Not the MAC which is the computer as a whole. I'm not saying there's no work-around, but how much work does a cheater really want to go through, when he/she is too lazy (or too bad) to play without cheating. It's not like typing IDKFA on the keyboard and you have every weapon with unlimited ammo.

Andrew1798

Flame1998 wrote: »

People that use hacks in crossfire usually use VM's to do it (Virtual Machines) that way they don't have to be worried about getting viruses or even hardware ban because you have a virtual MAC adress all you need to do is make a new VM and as ez as that hack again.

I thought you couldn't start CF in a VM, I read about it a while ago on the subject of farming (opening more accounts at once on the same PC) and I found that it used to work back when the game launched (there are some old videos on yt), but nowadays you can't simply load a VM and start CrossFire because they patched it.
I guess there has to be some workaround, but I highly doubt all those kids who cheat are using a Virtual Machine while doing it.

MANnoplsxD

As a hacker. I can tell you this. I have ways of bypassing HWID and IP bans. CF did ban my IP but I managed to bypass it easily every time so good luck LOL.

CopyCat3

The problem is there is no way to hardware ban someone. There are currently hardware bans in place, but players bypass them by changing IDs in windows. There is no proper way to ban someone based on their hardware as that would be a hardware security flaw in general.

Painanator

CopyCat3 wrote: »

The problem is there is no way to hardware ban someone. There are currently hardware bans in place, but players bypass them by changing IDs in windows. There is no proper way to ban someone based on their hardware as that would be a hardware security flaw in general.

Yeah, but as we said, the irritating low-IQ cheaters that only copy-paste cheats, will probably not be able to bypass them. The best thing, would be as several people have suggested before: "Limit accounts via a telephone number", which would solve the cheater problem largely. But I doubt Z8 wants to invest in that. To shut down reg a month or two every now and then, would also help in combating cheaters, I know it's been done in other games before. But they are probably to greedy to do that.

214v1wq

Even Z8 doesn't care about this game anymore, no matter what you say, this is pointless. Crossfire is OVER:
https://forum.z8games.com/forum/crossfire/crossfire-barracks/6922674-crossfire-is-over

Painanator

214v1wq wrote: »

Even Z8 doesn't care about this game anymore, no matter what you say, this is pointless. Crossfire is OVER:
https://forum.z8games.com/forum/crossfire/crossfire-barracks/6922674-crossfire-is-over

Yeah well, check back at the forum threads during the whole last year and you'll see that people been saying that for at least that long (probably for year before too) and it's still here now.

tem777

hardware ban also is not a solution. mac and serial can be changed easy.

Painanator

tem777 wrote: »

hardware ban also is not a solution. mac and serial can be changed easy.

It would probably take a large bite out of the cheater-crowd though. I'm not looking for a solution to the smaller number of cheaters that always have been cheating. It's a solution for the extreme number of Copy&Paste cheaters that started their assault of CF 2 weeks ago. For the real hackers/cheaters they will have to update and upgrade their anti-cheat more often (probably once a week at least), but I think they are too greedy to put out the cash for that.

]K[illa

tem777 wrote: »

hardware ban also is not a solution. mac and serial can be changed easy.

^He is right, IP/Hardware bans are the biggest joke ever. People know how to bypass the bans. If I remember correctly CF did hardware ban last year if I'm not mistaking and players bypassed it. The only way we can do anything is to report them as we run across them. As far as anticheat updating every week, it wouldnt do any good... Cheats update within 2-4 hours after a new patch so even if the anticheat updated each week it wouldn't solve anything.

Painanator

wrote:

K[illa;n6923264]

^He is right, IP/Hardware bans are the biggest joke ever. People know how to bypass the bans. If I remember correctly CF did hardware ban last year if I'm not mistaking and players bypassed it. The only way we can do anything is to report them as we run across them. As far as anticheat updating every week, it wouldnt do any good... Cheats update within 2-4 hours after a new patch so even if the anticheat updated each week it wouldn't solve anything.

Yes but that is only true if your thinking about eradicating cheaters completely, which is impossible. If you make it harder to cheat, many will give up which is good. As long as you can make a new account regular banning does little to the whole. There is no one solution to combat cheaters, but a lot of roadblocks that can be put up, that will make it harder and more irritating for them.