Do I have any guarantee of not downloading spyware / virus when I play steam games?

[_galaxy]

I have this question on my mind lately. Anyone knows?

[Cray]

You do not have a guarantee that the software you get from steam is entirely safe, no matter how much anyone likes to pretend otherwise,

Steam has who knows how many hundred thousands of games now. There's no way for them to vet and check every one of them completely. They do basic checks, of course, but if someone wants to hide malware in a game, they can.

Even previously vetted games can come with a malware update later. Either because they wait until the game is approved and people have it downloaded, or because the company got hacked.

So yes, it's possible. Haven't heard much about cases of outright malware-malware coming in through online game downloads, but afaik. it's not entirely unheard of.

Frankly, a lot of games _do_ come with malware already, but it's legal. They collect information from your PC that a game should never have access to. Games you pay for, but they still want to mine your PC for data they can use for .. well, all sorts of things. Some companies are clearly collecting information for entities like the chinese government, some collect it just to sell it to the highest bidder, and some do it for their own marketing purposes. Just because it's technically legal in some countries doesn't make it not malware.

[_galaxy]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Cray:

You do not have a guarantee that the software you get from steam is entirely safe, no matter how much anyone likes to pretend otherwise,

Steam has who knows how many hundred thousands of games now. There's no way for them to vet and check every one of them completely. They do basic checks, of course, but if someone wants to hide malware in a game, they can.

Even previously vetted games can come with a malware update later. Either because they wait until the game is approved and people have it downloaded, or because the company got hacked.

So yes, it's possible. Haven't heard much about cases of outright malware-malware coming in through online game downloads, but afaik. it's not entirely unheard of.

Frankly, a lot of games _do_ come with malware already, but it's legal. They collect information from your PC that a game should never have access to. Games you pay for, but they still want to mine your PC for data they can use for .. well, all sorts of things. Some companies are clearly collecting information for entities like the chinese government, some collect it just to sell it to the highest bidder, and some do it for their own marketing purposes. Just because it's technically legal in some countries doesn't make it not malware.

The update part annoys me as well

[76561199467469553]

what about those games that uses third party launchers to download games?

[♥ catgirl connoisseur]

Malware? Extremely unlikely. Spyware? There's a lot, especially with large companies. It won't change the way your pc functions, but you're still selling your data.

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Diposting pertama kali oleh MetaBoy:

what about those games that uses third party launchers to download games?

Those are also fine.

[Seraphita]

Diposting pertama kali oleh cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Diposting pertama kali oleh MetaBoy:

what about those games that uses third party launchers to download games?

Those are also fine.

:qr:

Not to everyone. Well, it depends. FFXIV uses their own client (because it's a mmo) and it's fine. If something tries to install an entire other game store launcher to play their game, I'm against it. I will never really tolerate this kind of thing. I don't need bloatware on my PC.

[Satoru]

I mean basically steam has Akamai and its own content servers. All of them are scanned for viruses and other things when ingested.

[Satoru]

Diposting pertama kali oleh _galaxy:

Diposting pertama kali oleh Electric Cupcake:

At this point, Windows 10 and 11, and Google Chrome are pure spyware that should be outlawed.

who the ♥♥♥♥ uses chrome instead of firefox

I mean do you use literally any gaming or desktop client?

Congrats you're using Chrome because pretty much everyone uses CEF

Including Steam

[Seraphita]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Ice Mountain:

There was at least one game that was on Steam that was found to be a crypto miner, developers tried to hide it. Eventually Valve removed the game.

Yep, I remember this. Sometimes devs try to slide a quick one but Valve will punish!

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Ice Mountain:

There was at least one game that was on Steam that was found to be a crypto miner, developers tried to hide it. Eventually Valve removed the game.

Wasn't that game just an item spoofer selling scam items on the Market and not a crypto miner?

[Satoru]

Diposting pertama kali oleh cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Diposting pertama kali oleh Ice Mountain:

There was at least one game that was on Steam that was found to be a crypto miner, developers tried to hide it. Eventually Valve removed the game.

Wasn't that game just an item spoofer selling scam items on the Market and not a crypto miner?

:qr:

Yes but people seem to want to ignore that Abstractism was banned for duping TF2 item names, not for any supposed “crypto miner” of which there is zero proof of existing other than “it uses my GPU”

[Crashed]

Diposting pertama kali oleh _galaxy:

Diposting pertama kali oleh Liquid Inc:

Connecting to, for example, Valve's own servers? Chances of a virus are very slim, because if they did distribute stuff like that (As Sony has done in the past) it will get known about pretty quick and Valve's image and reputation would be destroyed. Business gone.

Connecting to a 3rd party server such as World of Tanks, where the server commands everything? Slim, same as Valve because it would be known rather quickly and they'd be out of business.

Connecting peer-peer games? Depends on who your playing with, but there is always that risk. GTA Online being a prime example of that one, and the issue's they've got around a certain loop hole...
Have they even patched that issue yet?

If you can hide a virus inside a single image file, then you can hide the code for it within any file sent from PC to PC. Serverside games and hosts like Valve are unlikely to give you them (scan things to be sure, obviously) but you should always be wary of games like GTAOnline and other games that have user created servers.

What did Sony do?

Sony contracted a third party to copy protect their music CDs and it turned out to install a rootkit, leading to a massive recall and Sony abandoning DRM on audio CD format entirely. Of course this blew up into stories that Sony regularly delivers malware.

That said, an Energizer USB battery charger ended up having remote access malware in its driver package, opening up a port to remote attackers whenever the desktop widget was running.

Companies do fall victim to supply chain attacks like this from time to time.

[Muppet among Puppets]

If you worry that something like steam infects your computer,
you would have to pull the cable that connects you to the internet to be safe.

[kitt]

You are 9 years on Steam, did anyhting happend while using Steam?

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

SCARLET NEXUS isn't spyware OP.