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Comment by hddherman | Hacker News Reader

Funny you mention CSGO.

I think the CSGO anti-cheat implementation, which consists of VAC (Valve Anti-Cheat) to catch the obvious cheats, the reporting and reviewing system (think it was called Overwatch) and the new trust/reputation system, is actually an overall much more acceptable solution than a high-privileged kernel driver.

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For context, the largest alternative client for CSGO (and previous iterations) was ESEA in North America. ESEA released a client that used their user's hardware to mine bitcoins [1]. These users also put up with lpkane for years who was quite dismissive or hostile towards any concerns regarding the service. There was even a good bit of speculation that anti-cheat staff were accessing user files.

I agree with Valve's approach with CSGO but the state of gaming and community acceptance has been trending towards more invasive measures in the name of dealing with cheaters for a while.

Valorant is currently on my system, which is understandably built for being a competitive esport game,but now Doom Eternal? Who is playing Doom Eternal that competitively?

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2013/5/2/4292672/esea-gaming-networ...

I think the reason people go straight to something like an anti-cheat driver first is that they think "technology created this problem, therefore technology must fix it", despite the fact that the only possible ways to "fix" it using technology requires dangerous/invasive technologies, when what is really needed is a social solution.

Unfortunately, too often those who don't fully understand the implications of say "Lets install a program with full R/W access to the computer to fix this" or "Lets get rid of all encryption on the internet" are the ones making the rules.

/rant

This comment kind of grew beyond scope, so sorry about that.

Edit for clarity/formatting.

Couldn't agree more. Sometimes you do encounter cheaters, but it has become less and less over the years. However, with the recent CSGO source code (from an older version) dump I wonder what new exploits will arise.

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