VAC Goes Through Your Files!?

[old skool daddy]

Having looked carefully through valve's cs go terms and conditions, I found nothing on the topic of VAC file inspection. I also checked through the other terms and conditions on numerous games, and still found nothing, which probably means that all the VAC system does is scan running processes on your system, especially those which are, by some means, injected into CSGO.exe. Yeah, well no. After reading on a forum of VAC bans, valve mentions that if you don't know where the cheats are stored, consider reformatting you hard drive before reinstalling the game (you can find this here: https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=4044-qdhj-5691 under "You can not transfer your games or items to a different account" line 5-7)

So this got me interested. I connected to a VAC secure server, inside a virtual machine, whilst running Wireshark in the background. The VAC servers did not connect to my computer directly, going through what looked like a proxy, and then, whilst inside my VM detected a custom made DLL file that I designed to alert me when it was transfered to a server to be compared to a database. And it did. I recorded the Wireshark results, and after later inspection confirmed that it had indeed sifted through my Virtual Hard Drive. Hmmm

Can anyone find me the line in the terms and conditions that I agreed to that gives valve my permission to do this? I'm one of those really wierd people who reads terms and conditions carefully before I agree to them, and I don't tend to miss things like that. Besides, the point of Ts and Cs is to alert customers of ways the (in this case) program affects them and their various devices that interact with the program, and, as far as I can see, valve has not done that...

I look forward to being proved wrong, and in my eyes, valve is innocent until proven guilty. It's a shame that victims of VAC bans aren't.

NB I'm not a lawyer, I'm a programmer, I've probably missed something!

EDIT: I'm not hiding child porn, or terrorist material, It's just that valve is legally required to have my digital signature.

I've just found this:

"Steam and the Content and Services may include functionality designed to identify processes or functionality that may give a player an unfair competitive advantage when playing multiplayer versions of any Content and Services or modifications of Content and Services (“Cheats”). You agree that you will not create Cheats or assist third parties in any way to create or use Cheats."

Yeah, valve, that doesnt ♥♥♥♥ing cut it, processes are different to programs.

Also just confirmed that it was a proxy, not a direct connection, and I've just figured out a way to bypass the system of searching through your files. And valve can do nothing about it, because it has no right to in any way interfere with my system / game experience due to the fact I stopped a feature that doesnt exist. DISCLAMER: I will never use this exploit. I'm just sayin

THANK YOU TO TOELI/AVALANCE FOR ENDING MY CONFUSION!

Originally posted by Toeli/Avalanche:

As far as I read out of Gabe Newell´s reddit post he claims that Valve is only checking your DNS cache after they found a signature of a cheat on your PC.

As far as I know, cheats are ALWAYS modifying only .exe or .dll files and also files that use an extention especially created for one game (you name them).

As far as I know you agree to this by this:

http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/english/

4. ONLINE CONDUCT, CHEATING AND ILLEGAL BEHAVIOR

You agree that you will be personally responsible for any use of your Account with your login and/or password and for all of the communication and activity on Steam that results from such use of your Account and of Steam, and that Valve is not responsible of the use made of your Account and of all communications and activities on Steam resulting from the use of your Account. If you believe that the confidentiality of your login and/or password may have been compromised, you must notify Valve via the support form (https://support.steampowered.com/newticket.php) without any delay.

Your online conduct and interaction with other Subscribers should be guided by common sense and basic etiquette. Specific requirements may also be found in the Steam Online Conduct rules at http://steampowered.com/index.php?area=online_conduct, other Rules of Use, the Subscription Terms, or in terms of use imposed by third parties who host particular games or other services.

Steam and the Content and Services may include functionality designed to identify software or hardware processes or functionality that may give a player an unfair competitive advantage when playing multiplayer versions of any Content and Services or modifications of Content and Services (“Cheats”). You agree that you will not create Cheats or assist third parties in any way to create or use Cheats. You agree that you will not directly or indirectly disable, circumvent, or otherwise interfere with the operation of software designed to prevent or report the use of Cheats. You acknowledge and agree that either Valve or any online multiplayer host may refuse to allow you to participate in certain online multiplayer games if you use Cheats in connection with Steam or the Content and Services. Further, you acknowledge and agree that an online multiplayer host may report your use of Cheats to Valve, and Valve may communicate your history of use of Cheats to other online multiplayer hosts. Valve may terminate your Account or a particular Subscription for any conduct or activity that Valve believes is illegal, constitutes a Cheat, or otherwise negatively affects the enjoyment of Steam by other Subscribers. You acknowledge that Valve is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Subscriptions(s) and/or Account, but it may choose to do so.

You may not use Cheats, automation software (bots), mods, hacks, or any other unauthorized third-party software, to modify or automate any Subscription Marketplace process.

THIS THREAD IS NOW CLOSED

[A-dawg]

Uninstall if you dont like it

[A-dawg]

What are you hiding? Child porn? Terrorist material? What???

[snak]

What do you have againist them doing so? If it filters out more cheaters, it's doing a good job. It's not like valve is some sleezy company looking to get into your computer to cause havoc and steal credit card info, the system is designed to catch cheaters, it serves no other purpose then that.

[[=Grrrrr=] TheEquinoxe]

Hmm very interesting, looking forward to get that information too

[snak]

Even if he has all that, VAC does not search his harddrive for such items.

[JJ]

Id actualkly like to know too, if it's anywhere its under some over worded privacy part of the document that people don't understand.

[old skool daddy]

Originally posted by potato:

Uninstall if you dont like it

wow... I dont think you quite understand the point

[C²C^Guyver |NZB|]

If you're not cheating...you have no reason to fear VAC. It looks for modified game files...that's it...and cheats modify game files.

[[=Grrrrr=] TheEquinoxe]

Originally posted by VolatilePanda:

wow... I dont think you quite understand the point

Well, most of people that answered here don't get the point

[old skool daddy]

Originally posted by C²C^Guyver |NZB|:

If you're not cheating...you have no reason to fear VAC. It looks for modified game files...that's it...and cheats modify game files.

You dont get this either

[JJ]

Originally posted by C²C^Guyver |NZB|:

If you're not cheating...you have no reason to fear VAC. It looks for modified game files...that's it...and cheats modify game files.

Still its against the law not to tell people that your going through their files, that the whole point.

[old skool daddy]

Originally posted by JJ:

Originally posted by C²C^Guyver |NZB|:

If you're not cheating...you have no reason to fear VAC. It looks for modified game files...that's it...and cheats modify game files.

Still its against the law not to tell people that your going through their files, that the whole point.

Exactly

[Waltcha]

I don't get why is this a problem. Itš not like VAC is going through your PC and then sends info to Valve about what po** you watch. It's probably scanning for cheats. If they would be collecting information about people based on their files then yeah that might be a problem, but if it's just scanning for cheats then why make a big fuss about this? Anti-virus also scans through your files, you don't see people making a big deal about that.

[Toeli]

Well, as far as I know Valve is working like an Antivirusprogramm, running through your whole PC checking for modified files.

Ofc it will not check .jpg .docx. .ptt etc.

It will only search for .dll .exe and other file extentions that are able to be injected into another executable.

Therefore I´m pretty sure that you have nothing to fear.


I would be more worried about the fact that Valve is protocolling your chat and your multiplayer chat.


Anyways, they said that they are following the Directive 95/46 (in Europe, I don´t know the American Law)

Link: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:31995L0046:en:HTML

(I´m no lawyer or so, but I´m pretty sure that VAC is the last thing I´m worried about when talking about Datamining and Valve)

[old skool daddy]

Originally posted by Walters.Pro:

I don't get why is this a problem. Itš not like VAC is going through your PC and then sends info to Valve about what po** you watch. It's probably scanning for cheats. If they would be collecting information about people based on their files then yeah that might be a problem, but if it's just scanning for cheats then why make a big fuss about this? Anti-virus also scans through your files, you don't see people making a big deal about that.

Thats because anti virus tells you it's doing that in it's terms and contitions. VAC doesnt.

Originally posted by JJ:

Originally posted by C²C^Guyver |NZB|:

If you're not cheating...you have no reason to fear VAC. It looks for modified game files...that's it...and cheats modify game files.

Still its against the law not to tell people that your going through their files, that the whole point.