Valve's anti cheat system has been going on a banning spree in TF2, banning almost 6000 LMAOBOX users going back to January 2015

[captain cactus]

Well, there isn't really any source or site for this, so I'll link some forum posts instead:

https://www.reddit.com/r/tf2/comments/4h1xfv/lmaobox_vac_detected_30th_april_2016/

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3302787

http://www.ugcleague.net/forum/showthread.php?48559-Lmaobox-Premium-Detected

 

So to summarize, LMAOBox was an aimbot/aim assist/chat spammer that went unnoticed from VAC for years and years. Now it seams Valve has caught up with the whole thing and has started banning LMAOBox users who've used it after January 2015. About 6000 people were banned, including about 500 UGC Gold/Platinum players (see here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dfcMHrF3dGByk-UV8CEDhhhDVBhb3Uo2QC7kWU6ciEs/htmlview?sle=true#gid=0). These are people that paid (yes, there was a premium version), and it remains to be seen how many F2Ps with free versions will get their ass banned. Not that it matters to them, they'll make a new account and continue on as usual. VAC needs to be banning people based on IP address or hardware ID. Furthermore, the developer of the hack has called quits on it and has made the code open source. Nope, apparently the development is still continuing. The account that claimed to be the dev was hacked.

 

Recently Valve has started showing more and more interest in TF2 again, and this is good news. This is a great day for all of us who play this game legitimately.

[Katsu-K1L]

Thats nice, hope the same happens with CS:GO

 

[ThinkWithPortals]

Hooray! Now I won't get dominated by botting Gibus snipers!

[Nena Trinity]

VAC is a poorly made anti-cheat software, they better fix it soon... (IP can be faked and hardware ID? They can just buy new hardware and sell their old hardware used and move the problem to a innocent person!)

[desertcomputer]

Valve just want cheaters to buy game over and over agains ... they can permanent ban IP/hardware but they want the money.  

[Lethal Seraph]

Maybe if it was for 'donation' only hacks they wouldn't get banhammered. Same shit with diablo 3 'ros-bot'. Pretty sure big companies don't mind some hacks, but as soon as the cheating system started charging people for a premium, game companies will then take action.

[Dabombinable]

And here I am, banned from multiple Halo servers because my K:D ratio was too high and the admin thought I had an aimbot.

[Fetzie]

43 minutes ago, MrUnknownEMC said:

Valve just want cheaters to buy game over and over agains ... they can permanent ban IP/hardware but they want the money.  

Banning ip addresses does fuck all when most of the world is on a dynamic ip...

[Humbug]

Banning IPs won't work. ISPs use IP pools allocated dynamically to users so if you start doing that you will affect legit users.

1 hour ago, MrUnknownEMC said:

Valve just want cheaters to buy game over and over agains ... they can permanent ban IP/hardware but they want the money.  

Err no. Valve wants lots of people to keep playing their games because that's good for business. Cheaters are bad for business because they piss off the community.

 

 

 

[captain cactus]

So, a small update, I still got to retrieve a proven source for this, but the actual number of total bans is closer to 6000. Yes, 6000. Those 500 people were just from the competitive scene.

Will update when I get a source.

[CurlyCucumber]

7 hours ago, MrUnknownEMC said:

Valve just want cheaters to buy game over and over agains ... they can permanent ban IP/hardware but they want the money.  

What if I told you TF2 was free?

 

So glad this happened. As a avid TF2 player,(one that actually is involved in the competitive scene), I'm very glad to see this take place. I'm also glad to see Valve do some house cleaning in TF2, with all the updates and tweaks. Feels good not being ignored anymore.

[Suika]

5 minutes ago, lots of unexplainable lag said:

So, a small update, I still got to retrieve a proven source for this, but the actual number of total bans is closer to 6000. Yes, 6000. Those 500 people were just from the competitive scene.

Will update when I get a source.

Here's a list of notable UGC bans, probably maybe being updated.

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1dfcMHrF3dGByk-UV8CEDhhhDVBhb3Uo2QC7kWU6ciEs/htmlview?pref=2&pli=1&sle=true#gid=0

 

My favorite ban so far is vlad, he was a platinum level sniper that ended up getting banned and attacked pretty harshly for it. Don't attack UGC for it, because most of the admins did ban hackers, but the problem with these high level players is that nobody wants to be the "salty little bitch" who said "X is using an aimbot!"

 

 

The only thing that upsets me about this is I can no longer get footage of me outsniping these idiots. Equipping a donger shield and immediately taking a shot right after the hacker usually leaves them very salty, and one nerd even went as far as accusing me of having no skill for using a donger shield.

[Technous285]

4 minutes ago, CurlyCucumber said:

What if I told you TF2 was free?

 

So glad this happened. As a avid TF2 player,(one that actually is involved in the competitive scene), I'm very glad to see this take place. I'm also glad to see Valve do some house cleaning in TF2, with all the updates and tweaks. Feels good not being ignored anymore.

LMAOBOX and it's kin aren't JUST for TF2 though, there's also use for them in PAID games like CS:GO (and the rest of the Counter-Strike games), GMod, HL Deathmatch: Source, HL2: Deathmatch... It's just TF2 gets the most attention for use of such software due to the F2P nature it now has.

[CurlyCucumber]

7 minutes ago, Technous285 said:

LMAOBOX and it's kin aren't JUST for TF2 though, there's also use for them in PAID games like CS:GO (and the rest of the Counter-Strike games), GMod, HL Deathmatch: Source, HL2: Deathmatch... It's just TF2 gets the most attention for use of such software due to the F2P nature it now has.

Ah, gotcha. Thanks for clearing that up. Wasn't aware LMAOBOX was used elsewhere. I don't really keep up on the hack scene. ;P

[Technous285]

1 minute ago, CurlyCucumber said:

Ah, gotcha. Thanks for clearing that up. Wasn't aware LMAOBOX was used elsewhere. I don't really keep up on the hack scene. ;P

S'alright man, s'alright.

[TetraSky]

7 hours ago, lots of unexplainable lag said:

Nope, apparently the development is still continuing. The account that claimed to be the dev was hacked.

 

How ironic for a hacking tool dev to be hacked.

[2FA]

12 hours ago, Nena360 said:

VAC is a poorly made anti-cheat software, they better fix it soon... (IP can be faked and hardware ID? They can just buy new hardware and sell their old hardware used and move the problem to a innocent person!)

VAC doesn't ban based on IP or MAC address, the only thing it blocks is the convicted account from connecting to VAC secured servers for the game they got VAC banned in. It also only detects cheats that have been added to it's database. 

 

As much as everyone bashes EA, this is where they definitely win. Take for example BF4, it has two forms of anticheat: PunkBuster and FairFight. PunkBuster scans your system for programs that manipulate the game files. FairFight monitors players ingame for suspicious behavior, say for example getting a one shot headshot kill with a pistol at 200m which is normally impossible. Once convicted, you can no longer play on FairFight and/or PunkBuster secured servers. I also believe it bans you based on IP address but that's easy enough to fake.

[Nena Trinity]

16 minutes ago, DeadEyePsycho said:

VAC doesn't ban based on IP or MAC address, the only thing it blocks is the convicted account from connecting to VAC secured servers for the game they got VAC banned in. It also only detects cheats that have been added to it's database. 

 

As much as everyone bashes EA, this is where they definitely win. Take for example BF4, it has two forms of anticheat: PunkBuster and FairFight. PunkBuster scans your system for programs that manipulate the game files. FairFight monitors players ingame for suspicious behavior, say for example getting a one shot headshot kill with a pistol at 200m which is normally impossible. Once convicted, you can no longer play on FairFight and/or PunkBuster secured servers. I also believe it bans you based on IP address but that's easy enough to fake.

So what you are saying is you can get banned for having insane luck?

[BuckGup]

2 hours ago, CurlyCucumber said:

What if I told you TF2 was free?

 

So glad this happened. As a avid TF2 player,(one that actually is involved in the competitive scene), I'm very glad to see this take place. I'm also glad to see Valve do some house cleaning in TF2, with all the updates and tweaks. Feels good not being ignored anymore.

BTW is competitive out of beta?

[2FA]

3 hours ago, Nena360 said:

So what you are saying is you can get banned for having insane luck?

No, it takes a lot of abnormalities to get FairFight banned. It's basically if you're continuously making shots that should never happen. It looks at all statistics, it's not as simple as "insane luck."

[captain cactus]

1 hour ago, SamStrecker said:

BTW is competitive out of beta?

Far from it, actually. Actually, calling it ranked matchmaking is a lie at this point because it does neither of them, either at all or properly.

[PlayStation 2]

From what I know, assloads of high tier shit was lost. Some HOUWAR collector got VAC'd and lost like $20k in items, while a Burning TC and Burning HazMat Headcase (iirc) were also dissolved from someone's account.

[BuckGup]

17 minutes ago, lots of unexplainable lag said:

Far from it, actually. Actually, calling it ranked matchmaking is a lie at this point because it does neither of them, either at all or properly.

I mean can I play it without a beta code or invite

[TheGamingBarrel]

10 hours ago, huilun02 said:

Why not have spotting, shooting and movement mechanics be done server side?

Look at CS.

[Beskamir]

13 hours ago, MrUnknownEMC said:

Valve just want cheaters to buy game over and over agains ... they can permanent ban IP/hardware but they want the money.  

That be a terrible idea since most people have dynamic IPs and hardware can be easily changed.