Hardware Bans

[Dunk ♥♥♥♥♥-ThatguyFinn]

Steam you guys have the gaming world by the guts. Why instead of allowing such ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ from other community members in game make it awful experience. Why are we not adding hardware bans. It's this simple. If people are getting Vac Ban then they should get a hardware ban. People have no repercussion for being ignorant or just totally making you look foolish or just Money hungry greedy ♥♥♥♥♥. A hardware ban would stop alot of the ♥♥♥♥ that happens on steam and in the games. It's a privilege to be able to use this client not a right. Treat it as such. I honestly think we need hardware bans in the community across steam.

[cinedine]

Originally posted by Sohzph:

So why is the trust factor linked to the HWID while the account ban is not linked to anything?

Because there is a statistically significant correlation beetween cheating accounts being on the same hardware.
But it's not 100 % certain. Neither is IP.

People playing on public PCs like internet cafes, or sharing one PC in a household would get unjustly hit by a hardware ban. People buying used PCs would get hit.
Same with IP. A household or a dormatory often share the same IP. Most ISPs also use non-static IP distribution, meaning you're IP will change every time you connect. While another customer gets your old IP. You can look at your log-in history on your account details, it should at least tell you the region the IP you logged in with is assigned to.

It also does allow for second chances.

Bad trustfactor means you can work your way up again.
Not being able to play the game at all means you will not buy into secondary monetization. Battle passes, lootboxes, the community market, whatever. That is the stuff that actually makes money, not game sales. Especially not game sales at steep discounts or from grey market sites.

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by Sohzph:

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

That's a massive argumeent from ignorance fallacy.

You are essentially saying "I don't know why they do this, so it must be x".

That can never form a valid conclusion. The fact is you don't know why they do it. You can NEVER EVER assume anythign from them on.

All you can say is "Hmm, that's odd I don't know why they do that".

Knowing how a company like Valve is (that only cares about money) my assumption wouldn't be far from reality for sure.

Listen, if Valve cared about their community, they would have eradicated most cheaters by now.
Look at Blizzard, you hardly find cheaters in games like Overwatch, World Of Warcraft etc, and they are competitive games.
Look at Epic Games and their EAC anticheat, they update the database constantly and detect almost all cheats. Many cheat providers gave up on EAC because it was costing them every time to bypass their detections.

And besides, their games and platform would be much more polished, without bugs and for sure with much more content.

You don't have to be stupid to know the mentality of a company, just by observing their movements, their way of acting and responding to the community says it all.

If Valve wanted to, they could eradicate all the problems with cheats, being an American company they would have it easy because American laws do not allow reverse engineering of software and they could easily sue many cheat providers and end their existence. Against European suppliers it would be something similar because European laws allow reverse engineering of software, but not its distribution.

Activision recently sued a well known COD cheat provider, made them pay millions and from what I understand the developers of those cheats and the owner of that website will go to jail.
But of course, this was done because the communoty was asking for that, and cheaters made Activision lose a lot of money, many players abandoned Warzone because of the massive quantity cheaters.
And of course, Valve, as long as they don't lose players or money, they won't take any action on the matter, which shows that they only care about money and not about their community. That's why their bans are not HWID or IP bans, because they want to keep making money from those cheaters they have banned.

Valve can do anything, but they don't want to.

My opinion will not change as long as this goes the same, the day I read an article where it says "Valve gets tough on cheaters, now VAC bans are by HWID" I will start thinking positive about Valve, that they care about their community. But since that will never happen, I will continue to think the same about Valve.

Thanks for the discussion, I have nothing more to say.

Again that's flawed on your end.

They DO care about community. But your assumption about cheaters is just unreal. You CANNOT get rid of cheaters. nobody can. You can only mitigate as much as you can realistically, and they do that.

If you think about it - then show how YOU would improve it, and then we''l show you how you're wrong and that will be worse because you've overlooked something. We've done that COUNTLESS times on here over the years.

Which again boils down to you making assumptions on things you don't know. Sorry, but that's just reality.

You are entitled to your opinion of course, but when you talk about OBJECTIVE things like this subject, you don't get your own reality.

[Salix arctica]

Oh my. Ok, I don't work for IT. I did but it was so stressing I changed to another job. I was also not a programmer or anything "fancy", just tech support. When I have to help my sister with her computer problems I usually check Google before doing anything.

And even I could bypass hardware ban.

[Leonardo Da Pinchi]

Hi, yes. Your week is up, OP. You going to post all those details how HWID bans work for us like promised?

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by <Insert Kazoo Circus Music Here>:

Hi, yes. Your week is up, OP. You going to post all those details how HWID bans work for us like promised?

Yup, well done for holding their feet to the fire.

So I'd also like to see this evidence as claimed.

[Χάρης]

you mention on your profile that you smurf yourself with the excuse of

to see what new player have to deal with

so maybe you should get banned as well.

[KalGimpa]

Originally posted by <Insert Kazoo Circus Music Here>:

Hi, yes. Your week is up, OP. You going to post all those details how HWID bans work for us like promised?

i know that i would like to read it. op would be a rich individual if they have cracked this

[Leonardo Da Pinchi]

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

Originally posted by <Insert Kazoo Circus Music Here>:

Hi, yes. Your week is up, OP. You going to post all those details how HWID bans work for us like promised?

Yup, well done for holding their feet to the fire.

So I'd also like to see this evidence as claimed.

ADD is a menace man, I hyperfixate on some of the weirdest stuff. Lol

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by <Insert Kazoo Circus Music Here>:

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

Yup, well done for holding their feet to the fire.

So I'd also like to see this evidence as claimed.

ADD is a menace man, I hyperfixate on some of the weirdest stuff. Lol

I can dig that, but there's no shame in being thorough though.

[The Giving One]

Without fail, in pretty much every single topic I see about cheating and bans on this platform, people never seem to include the possibility of incorrectly applied bans on accounts.

It's easy to say "this platform over here does not have an issue with cheaters because they are banning them using X, Y, and Z methods......."

But how many incorrectly applied bans did they also issue to innocent players/accounts ?

Some might say "I don't care......just ban them.", until you are the one on the other side of it, with an account banned where you truly are innocent and so is your account.

But here, incorrectly applied bans are removed automatically by VAC itself.

Why do I go into this yet again ?

Because I truly believe that Valve wants to be as sure as possible, within reason, that they get as few incorrectly applied bans as possible. But this flies in the face of those making the claim that "Valve does not care about the Community" because it directly contradicts that logic.

It actually shows that they do care, so be as sure as possible that as few accounts as possible get incorrectly applied bans (VAC).

And again, even if they rarely happen, and they do, they get removed.........automatically. I love how people always seem to focus on the "wonderful ban record" of these other platforms, but they never seem to go on about those that were incorrectly banned.........and possibly never got it resolved and are still banned to this day.

VAC bans are permanent, non-negotiable, and cannot be removed by Steam Support.

If a VAC ban is determined to have been issued incorrectly, it will automatically be removed.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=7849-RADZ-6869

[Leonardo Da Pinchi]

Originally posted by The Giving One:

Without fail, in pretty much every single topic I see about cheating and bans on this platform, people never seem to include the possibility of incorrectly applied bans on accounts.

It's easy to say "this platform over here does not have an issue with cheaters because they are banning them using X, Y, and Z methods......."

But how many incorrectly applied bans did they also issue to innocent players/accounts ?

Some might say "I don't care......just ban them.", until you are the one on the other side of it, with an account banned where you truly are innocent and so is your account.

But here, incorrectly applied bans are removed automatically by VAC itself.

Why do I go into this yet again ?

Because I truly believe that Valve wants to be as sure as possible, within reason, that they get as few incorrectly applied bans as possible. But this flies in the face of those making the claim that "Valve does not care about the Community" because it directly contradicts that logic.

It actually shows that they do care, so be as sure as possible that as few accounts as possible get incorrectly applied bans (VAC).

And again, even if they rarely happen, and they do, they get removed.........automatically. I love how people always seem to focus on the "wonderful ban record" of these other platforms, but they never seem to go on about those that were incorrectly banned.........and possibly never got it resolved and are still banned to this day.

VAC bans are permanent, non-negotiable, and cannot be removed by Steam Support.

If a VAC ban is determined to have been issued incorrectly, it will automatically be removed.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=7849-RADZ-6869

With the exception of hijacked accounts, yeah Valve/Steam is really good about avoiding false bans, and reversing them should they happen.

One huge issue with HWID bans is it punishes the secondhand, rental, and "computer cafe" markets. Which there is a MASSIVE amount of playerbase in almost all online games, in those markets.

But hey, "screw poor people, HWID ban cheaters!"

[The Giving One]

Originally posted by <Insert Kazoo Circus Music Here>:

With the exception of hijacked accounts, yeah Valve/Steam is really good about avoiding false bans, and reversing them should they happen.

One huge issue with HWID bans is it punishes the secondhand, rental, and "computer cafe" markets. Which there is a MASSIVE amount of playerbase in almost all online games, in those markets.

But hey, "screw poor people, HWID ban cheaters!"

Yes, an excellent point, that we always seem to come to in these threads.....

I once saw a pretty savvy user around here say :

" I would rather see cheaters go totally free on here, rather than one, single account be banned incorrectly, where that ban was not later automatically removed."

It's a powerful and bold statement, and one that I can understand the thought process of.

If people really look at how much money Valve actually spends on anticheat efforts here (again flying in the face of ' they only care about money claims '), then the real meat and drink of the matter become pretty clear.

Heck, they spent millions on the servers alone on VACnet, and the cost to keep it running will never end as long as it does.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/730/discussions/0/2788173147740664896/?ctp=4#c2788173147741687571

I just think when you look at how these systems work, and how there are checks and balances to make sure that almost no wrong bans happen (VAC automatic remove/VACnet checked by humans in Overwatch), then it clearly shows that Valve is being careful.

Yes, this might mean that cheaters cheat a bit more, but what it also means is that many less incorrectly applied bans happen, and get removed automatically if they do (VAC).

[crunchyfrog]

The Giving One is spot on.

It's always the same when some people suggest ideas like this - they have no empthy and their perspective is WAY too narrow and unrealistic.

How many times do we see suggestions on these forums and the whole idea is shot down simply by them not taking into account the obvious abuse that would happen? I'd token most fall on this.

You absolutely MUST take into account flaws, mistakes, abuse and exploits, and god knows what other edge cases before you even think of attempting such things.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by The Living Tribunal:

Hey, it's that suggestion again that is easily bypassed.

A Multi Billion Dollar company can make a hardware ban hard to pass. I do IT work at a pretty big company and I can tell you people dont use WiFi for porn anymore lol

I somehow dount you do IT because if you really do, you most likely wouldn't have made this discussion in the 1st place due to number of problems that exist, and that porn joke, bud, people got their phones, and data plans that not new, and not hard to figure out how they just bypass the problem either.

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by Corse Hock:

If you knew more about Hardware bans, I doubt you'd be so for them.

Hypothetically speaking a person knowing that there could be a hardware ban behind the stupid shady stuff would keep the community 50% cleaner. We have laws for everything. We all chance breaking them because they have minor punishments for somethings. But lets just say if you get caught stealing they cut your hand off. How many people you think would still do this. Less than half. Same with cheating. Some games of F2P so just keep opening accounts. Steam would still make a ♥♥♥♥ load of money by putting skins back on the market or whatever. I mean I would be pist if my inventory and main account got Froze and then had to watch my skins go onto the market where I cant even see them lol They gotta add a deterrent

You're pulling % out of thin air making empty claims. We have laws for things, but not exactly everything that exist, not only that be not everyone follow said laws, nor have same laws across Providence, States, Country, or Region. People that get caught doing something, doesn't stop all those people that been doing said things. If don't know what piracy is then you must be living under a rock to this day, as that just one tiny example out of the MANY MANY things people do in this world, ranging from gangs, war lords, and whatever list keeps going.

F2P are bound to be attack by bots, and cheaters, what did you really expect??? No really, because hardware ban useless, IP ban useless, to stop said account dead in it track is to ban account, but doesn't stop them from making new account, and you think people wouldn't do research or something before hand? There forums I visit rarely that pushes for cheats, and people that makes cheats actually do it for profit, those that want to ruin others gaming well that are people paying those cheat makers YA GO FIG! Anyways problem doesn't magically goes away. Remember valorant by RIOT games that promoted so hard having best ANTI cheat, with level kernel yea that was beaten, and cheater made a point proving it to be a joke as that doesn't stop people from doing workaround no matter what.

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by Moe:

Okay mister I work in IT... Hardware bans... it takes me about 5 seconds after I hit my bios to change any hardware ID's. oh also I can make changes to the hardware id's within Windows if need be in about the same amount of time... Also throwing around you work in IT, basically means tier 1 support desk noobie or you fix your grandmothers computer when you goto family reunions.

The idea that you take it so personal where you feel the education level is so high because of simply saying IT. Because you think you can change your ID's within in windows so easy. You might be computer savy but not all will be able to just so easily change ID's or go through the process of have a actual punishment for being a ♥♥♥♥ bag. Whats so wrong with having the community actually clean up this ♥♥♥♥.

Wow I just google answers, or post on forums for help that helped, WOW so hard so drama... Good god you're acting like people can't do research or something...

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by The Living Tribunal:

I said it is the suggestion (hwid bans) that are easily bypassed. Vac bans on the other hand seem to work as you can see here. Do try to understand a comment before replying to it to avoid confusion on your side.

Vac bans dont stop people from creating more accounts. Like it's crazy... I cant just keep creating accounts and hacking and they wont do ♥♥♥♥...

1st sentence.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ritZxM_uejA

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by MrL0G1C:

It's mostly irrelevant how it works beyond the fact that Hardware SN's are used. Of course using hardware SNs is not a great strategy for PCs since many users can and do change hardware components regularly.

Rich people change hardware components regularly but the average person doesn't have money to keep switching gear out.

Hardware spoofing look it up...

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by Corse Hock:

I mean I'm still pretty amused OP tried to claim to actually WORK in the IT sector, but...doesn't come up with any actual information for his suggestion.

It's entirely based on the premise that "most cheaters are f2p kids, downloading off google.".

But nothing contrary to the actual fact that if HWID got more common, so would cheats with built in spoofing capabilities. It's a game of cat and mouse, both sides are continually adapting.

Ok so you want a full HOW TO Tutorial on How Steam cause handle issues. Cause if this is what you want then give me a couple days. You want charts as well.

Sure, since you want to make up claims how real world works compare to your fantasy, beacause you seem to be all up in the cloud thinking everyone does exactly what you think they do when really that not even ture to begin with.

Originally posted by ThatGuyFinn21:

Originally posted by The Living Tribunal:

And thus why i mentioned this is yet the same suggestion that is easily bypassed. Not only can the hwid be changed on the fly which completely disregards your suggestion, but if someone somehow doesn't have the knowledge to do so they could still easily purchase replacement hardware. "Oh, hw ban, let me just get a new piece of hardware". One does not have to be "rich" to purchase new hardware.

There are multiple ways in order to hand the I will bypass. Give me a week and I will take sometime to explain this more and display all the ways Steam should be handle some of these issues. I mean people still get scammed in 2022 which could be fixed as well. So many ways to avoid those issues. The biggest thing is if a person gets caught they should not be able to just open another account.

There no fix honey, it call learning from mistake, or actually doing your research to not fall for scam, this isn't a simple fix you can magically conjure out of thin air with no logic behind it. For cheaters can keep making new accounts all they want, there no fix to that really as long they have workarounds.