EVE General Discussion

Your ignorance is not my problem.

This is internets forumz and no one is paying me to educate you.

Imagination is the only limitation to the amount of information and statistics available to them. If you can't figure out how the one group who owns and controls the server-side coding/operation of the game might be able to identify systematic botting, there is no hope for you.... and there will most certainly be no forgiveness for your idiocy.

This doesn't even mention the gains to be made with a small amount of resources dedicated to sting operations they could set up to nail popular sellers. The very idea you could hide/launder money through however many characters/actions from the one group of persons which no action is ultimately hidden from is an exercise in stupidity.

Forgive my brutal logic. Can you please explain to me how you are so dumb?

Lolz. man, you're a card.

So I can run 3 Tengu accounts. I run each for 4 or 5 hours at a time. If a neut comes into system I safe up. I do this 7 days a week.
Am I a bot or a human?

I run 3 Hulks on 3 screens. I mine 5 hours a day and I do it 7 days straight. After 5 hours, I log my other 3 Hulks and mine the same. While all my Hulks are mining away I'm doing my work at my desk.
Am I a bot or human?

I run a Domi and I do L4's all day every day. After 5 hours, I log my other Domi char and do the same.
Am I a bot or human?

Don't bother answering. You can't tell can you? If you think patterns are a way to detect botting. Well. Cough......

Only way I have EVER seen bots identified beyond doubt is by interacting with them. Their response is the giveaway, not the botting patterns themselves.

Oh and RMT. As fast as a sting nailed an RMT'er, he's moved, shut down his accounts and started somewhere else. And apart from a breach of EULA, what law has he broken? You cannot enlist the help of the RMT ISP's/law enforcment or any such agency. So how do you stop them?

To declare that CCP could "easily" stop RMT/Botting is about.... well..... as dumb as it can get. Sorry man.

You are the one telling me how easy it is. So say so instead of beating the bushes with such belligerent nonsense!

As for law enforcement, CCP cannot use law enforcement/such agencies to shut down RMT. (right, got that bit?)

So CCP has to do the job - alone. (got that bit?)

This is just one scenario.
Set up sting. Catch character X. He gets banned. But not before he accidently got "blowed up" by character Y with 200 plex in his hold. Character Y is also character X etc... Rince and repeat.

Second Scenario
The RMT transaction is setup outside of any Eve jurisiction. Easily done, can't be traced to any account (ebay, direct debit, paypal etc.) You can then rinse ISK through Eve with BPO/C scams, "buy 1 trit" scams etc. etc.... You simply cannot monitor the millions of transactions that occur everyday and deduce that transaction 432,564 is an RMT transfer.

Third Scenario
Go to System Y, Moon 9 - warp to 70. I forgot to put my shuttle away with that 1.6b ISK BPO inside it. Gosh darn.....

There ya go. Imaginitive ways to avoid RMT. Is that what you asked for?

The problem in detecting bots is that every players is different.

We each have our own way of playing.

You can not tell 100% whether somebody is a bot or not just by watching them play.

The only 100% method I know of detecting a bot is if you destroy the ship but the pod carries on regardless.

Getting rid of bots is not easy because if it was there would be no bots.. duh.

What makes life difficult for CCP is PLEX and the ability to purchase characters.

It allows a person to create account after account without having to submit any personal information and then to purchase a character capable of ratting / botting immediately.

I am unaware of any other MMO where this is true.


A quick example.

RMT sites purchases Eve time codes using stolen credit details.

RMT agents creates a new account and uses those eve time codes to active account and redeem PLEX.

Multiple Players purchase PLEX from RMT site.

RMT agent gives those PLEX (at below the market rate) instead of isk to those players in game

Players think they are getting a good deal as they actually get more isk when selling those PLEX's then they would of taking the isk.

Once Agent has sold all the PLEX he can then ditch the account and start again.

The last time someone came up with

The Final Solution...

It also turned out to be a bad idea

no
no
yes
neither, the professionals would just continue botting & RMTing
less "casual" botting, more ISK purchases through RMT
yes
PR disaster, lost subscriptions
ponies would be awesome

it would create a hurdle that would pose no serious problem for commercial bot operators (who are probably responsible for the vast majority of botting activity) but would deter many casual botters (everyday corpmates that bot maybe 15-25h per week on their mackinaw alt) from continuing. Said casual botters are not going to start grinding, they'll just quit the game or buy ISK through RMT outlets now that they are denied the opportunity to earn it with their own bots.

people would probably start running the bots outside the scope of the watchdog software - virtualization (which comes in many flavors nowadays), rootkits and terminal services are your friend.
Also consider how hard it is for modern security software to protect itself from (unwanted) sophisticated rootkits. Then consider that in the botting case the rootkit would be installed with the user's consent and support. The system would be "infected" before CCP's watchdog gets the opportunity to hook into it for the first time...

Only the people who use such things as RMT and bots would be against this.

The legit people would not mind any CCP software running to see out the bots.

I mean all that's needed to catch bots is a software to track time between keypresses? If char 1-2-3 etc has the same time frame of warping to station for example, its a bot and they get auto banned.

I used to think like this too until our country put a bloke in jail for 60 something days on suspicion of aiding and abetting terrorists when all the guy did was use a phone that once belonged to a bloke that knew a guy who had a friend that used the phone.

He was never charged and yet he was still deported, family and all.

And then proven innocent.

Deadly true.

Definitive answer is no.

I don't agree with corporate entities being able to run, what is at its core, spyware on my machines after so many cockups by so many software vendors that have produced false positives or worse. Sonys rootkit & Blizzards warden being prime examples.

The age old "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear" argument doesn't cut any ice either, would you leave your curtains open at night with the lights on so anyone on the street can see what you're up to in the privacy of your own home?

Punk buster?
VAC?

Both do this, both lag behind a times