Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has a cheating problem. It can be infuriating to come up against rule-breakers and code-busters in regular matches, but there’s a silver lining here: Valve is doing its damndest to fight back.
If you go on any major Counter-Strike board right now, you’ll notice a trend: thread upon thread upon thread either complaining about or cheering for VAC (Valve Anti-Cheat) bans. Much like when multiple pros got caught red-handed right before DreamHack Winter 2014, Valve has again upgraded its cheat detection orbital defence laser, and countless jerks are feeling the burn. It is, however, worth noting that no major pros have been exposed as a result of this round of bans. At least, not yet. VAC bans can sometimes occur at odd moments, so time may tell.
I have not been able to verify the scope of the bans myself, given that the big, bad banhammer only recently dropped. I’ve contacted Valve for more information about how they have modified VAC and just how many types of cheats they have exposed, but they have yet to reply. I’ll update this post as soon as I hear back.
However, even a brief glance around CS community watering holes is enough to suggest a big impact. Players are claiming 16 different types of cheats have been forced out of the woodwork, with some calling this the biggest string of VAC bans in CS:GO‘s history.
Notorious cheaters like Mekelek and Broly are officially on VACation, now that rather glaring cheat detection avoidance tactics (if two players both got reported by the game’s Overwatch system in the same match, reports would be discarded as spam; thus, cheaters would use the buddy system) have been patched out.
Business is booming on boards like /r/VAC_Porn, which does not, in fact, feature terrorists leaving nothing to the imagination, but rather pics of people losing their pricey items when their accounts get locked. Ahhhh, sweet, sweet schadenfreude.
I imagine we’ll find out more about this in the coming days. If you’ve heard anything more, feel free to reach out.
Comments
16 responses to “A Lot Of Cheaters Just Got Banned From Counter-Strike”
Would like to see something where if you cheat on any steam game not just a valve one you get your whole steam account closed down and erased. Hard to do I know but I loathe cheaters.
yeah and if you cheat in cricket, you should be banned from golf, bowling, football, and any other sport
Silly comparison there. Though lets say you were a member of some NSW sport organization where all sports you played came under that sporting body and you cheated in Cricket then yes the likely result would be you are then banned from all other sports under that same governing body. That is a closer example to what I am saying. By using Steam you agree not to cheat in any game that is used via Steam itself. If you do then you lose access to steam.
The only issue is what happens if a false positive comes up? It’s very far from common but it has happened before. Imagine the shitstorm.
But why? Nothing wrong if you want to cheat in SP games.
Sorry should have specified if you had been detected cheating in an online portion of a game then you are banned from the online portion of all games under steam. If someone is willing to cheat online in one game then chances are they will cheat in any other. Yes once a cheater always a cheater.
And what about all the false positives that spring up from software compatibility issues?
Given what we have now well that would be something that would be a case by case. I am just talking about an ideal world with detection software that actually worked. I think if people actually faced losing their steam accounts with 100s if not 1000s of $ worth of games on them then perhaps they may think twice.
Very true, I remember the issue with Watch Dogs multiplayer. Yes I know it is a bad game but just let me finish.
Game had hackers that were on godmode and superspeed. You can’t even chase them to steal the data.
I always thought that’s what happened as in if you are caught cheating in one game they ban your whole steam account?
Would also +1 to that idea as well, I hate cheaters.
They can ban you from all games that use steam services for their multiplayer, but this is pretty much only source based games
I see, that’s pretty reasonable.
Can usually spot a cheater if the only game they have if source with a few hours and 20 – 3 kd lol
Nice. Good to see their anti-cheat system actually works at times.
Good.
Happy days!
no news on hackers getting caught out on twitch?