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Dev blog: Updates to Team Security and the ongoing war on botting

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Stray Bullets
Perkone
Caldari State
#161 - 2013-03-20 13:13:36 UTC
DirtySnowBunny wrote:
Stray Bullets wrote:

A current example is ISBoxer. As GM Nythanos answered me (can't copy the text), you can't allow that software. If this is the case, why not make a simple public statement saying that X software is simply not allowed? You end up banning paying customer who actually thought they were playing straight!

This subject has been covered multiple times by DEVs.

The only negative comment was made by CCP Sreegs about it (in his security blog).
http://tinyurl.com/byebyescreegs Post #264.

Other posts:
http://tinyurl.com/CCP-Eterne Post #13

GM Lelouch wrote:

Hello there,

To make a long story short, automation of gameplay is not permitted; players must be manually issuing the commands to control their character(s) at all times.

Our stance on programs such as Synergy and hardware/software combination such as the G15 keyboard is that they can be legitimately used as long as gameplay isn't automated. Synergy allows you to move your mouse cursor to multiple different monitors which are hooked up to different computers and we do not have any qualms with players using the program for this purpose. If Synergy was used in some way to control your accounts for you without a need for you to be at your keyboard, then that would not be allowed, but I am not aware of such a functionality with this program. If Synergy is used in conjunction with some other program to automate gameplay, it would not be permitted. G15 "macros" which allow you to group different commands into one keypress are allowed. For example, setting your G1 key to press F1, F2, F3 and so on for you with one key press is allowed (although this specific command is not as useful as it was before now that we have weapon grouping).

An exceedingly complex G15 macro which would effectively automate gameplay, such as mining, without a need for the player to be present at his keyboard would be against the EULA, regardless of whether the player utilizing said macro is sitting at his keyboard at the time!

Lastly, multiboxing is allowed, and programs designed for multiboxing in mind which allow a player to manually issue the same command to multiple game clients at the same time are allowed. In the same vein as what has been stated above, the player must be manually sending the commands; if a program is automating those commands for you, then it would be considered a breach of our EULA.

I hope this clears up this matter.

Best regards,
Senior GM Lelouch
EVE Online Customer Support

Those proponents against programs like ISBoxer, Synergy, etc. seem to have little to no understanding of what "multiboxing" is and how exactly it is used. How many times does CCP have to answer this "dead horse" of a question?

There is a long list of games that embrace multiboxing: World of War Craft, Diablo 3, Planetside 2, SWTOR, and so on. . .



You seem to have missed the addendum that GM Lelouch made to that very same post. It can be found in page 7 of this thread, in one of my previous posts, or in the original thread below.

http://community.eveonline.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=1291641&page=10#274

I know ISBoxer was cool. I used it once before, about a year ago. Not using it now, but it bothers me that there isn't a clear definition of what's ok and what's not ok. In the original post from GM Lelouch he said that for broadcasting it was cool, as long as it wasn't automated. Now he's saying he can't "say".

What changed? And why are there DEVs saying nothing has changed when they clearly changed something in their view of ISBoxer?

I can read and understand what Lelouch is saying about software evolving and they not being able to keep up. But saying X software is ok in a specific context is not a blanket response. I don't understand why can't they say what's so different that made then go around editing posts that are 3 years old instead of issuing a new statement with a new ruling.
Claire Raynor
NovaGear
#162 - 2013-03-20 14:09:08 UTC
OK. I love this game. I think it is the best thing ever. Really I do.

It must be fundamentally OK for someone to run lots of accounts.

I now don't care if CCP harvests system information from my PCs - please take my processes and threads - the list of services - the installed programs - the contents of device manager. Please just bundle Hijackthis and run it periodically and parse the results. . . It all might even help you profile what people have on their PCs to help you design better solutions.

There seems to be a sort of opinion developing here that only those who desire privacy have something to hide. I'd forefit that for greater security - after all every internet search hemorrhages personal information these days.

CCP - please give me a scenario that is acceptable for someone to use more than two accounts? Or tell me I shouldn't do it. leaving Synergy, (or the thing synergy does - the design specification - the design intent of it - the concept of an edge-of-screen operation KVM like thing), as a grey area is upsetting. Tell me how to do this or to not do it. Because I know people can't get unbanned - I won't risk it - but I also won't play just one or two of my accounts at a time.

Or - Better still. . .You are currently upgrading the Launcher. Why not use the open-source Synergy stuff and build your own one into the launcher? Then there could be no question? And it would fix the issue of multiboxing permenantly.
Anthar Thebess
#163 - 2013-03-20 15:01:10 UTC
Ban the multiboxing.
Recently digging the net for some information about IGB i found next? generation of eve bots.
They don't touch EVE at all - just connect them self to the multi boxing programs.

As if this didn't changed - multiboxing is allowed.


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Symbiotes
Genesis Nation
Goonswarm Federation
#164 - 2013-03-20 15:42:54 UTC
Anthar Thebess wrote:
Ban the multiboxing.
Recently digging the net for some information about IGB i found next? generation of eve bots.
They don't touch EVE at all - just connect them self to the multi boxing programs.

As if this didn't changed - multiboxing is allowed.




I get the distinct impression some of you might not actually understand what multiboxing means. Are you seriously suggesting that CCP should start trying to enforce a limit of 1 account per person?

For those ignorant: multiboxing in context with eve is the control/use of two or more accounts at the same time. Every miner that uses an alt to haul, every pvper that uses a second account to provide boost, every null dweller that uses an alt to scout.
While obviously some folks take this to the extreme, there is really no way artificial limits like # of account restrictions will work. You'd only play into the hands of the 'bad guys' who would/could use software and tricks to hide having multiple accounts. At the same time, you'd be trying to get rid of extra income that CCP receives from all these players with their multiple accounts... Is that really what some of you are advocating?

(Queue trolls and morons)
Vincent Athena
Photosynth
#165 - 2013-03-20 17:07:39 UTC
Aye, alot of the comments seem to have a terminology slip from "Keystroke rebroadcast software" to "multiboxing software" to "multiboxing" as though they are all the same thing. They are not.

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TheButcherPete
KarmaFleet
Goonswarm Federation
#166 - 2013-03-20 18:07:23 UTC
I will miss you CCP Sreegs.

bonne chance to you, upon the world of deceit.

[b]THE KING OF EVE RADIO

If EVE is real, does that mean all of us are RMTrs?[/b]
Rythm
True Power Team
#167 - 2013-03-20 22:47:48 UTC
CCP Stillman wrote:
Vera Algaert wrote:
CCP Stillman wrote:

But client modification right now are anything that injects/touches the running EVE process. That is, reads or writes memory into it, injects and executes code. Basically anything that modifies the client to change the client or extract information that's not normally accessible. That includes bots of course.


that description also applies to widely used tool such as the Mumble/Teamspeak overlay and fraps Shocked


To some degree, it does. But in some ways, it also doesn't. But do you really think we want to ban people using fraps or mumble/teamspeak? That'd be silly


Probably you should clarify the EULA then.
For instance process explorer on my notebook shows that a bunch of firmware dlls with some random stuff like touchpad support is attached to every process in the system. While technically it constitutes a "client modification" and i am using "modified client" when i am using the touchpad, i do hope that i would not be permanently banned from eve =)
NEONOVUS
Mindstar Technology
Goonswarm Federation
#168 - 2013-03-21 03:37:18 UTC
Frostys Virpio wrote:
NEONOVUS wrote:
So basically the way it works is that if I can provide proof of human capability, then use software to duplicate that, it is probably ok?

IE how isoboxer got shown after the genius guy with the hot glue and sticks.

And that anything which plays with EVE files while the client is running is a banning offense?

IE every bot since ever or more particuarly the usage of python injection to find the wh local list.


What if they told you "If you want to multi box safely, do the hot glue and stick trick".

I would troll them by forging the components out of rhodium then studding them with emeralds, carnadons, and lazis lupai.
And then proceed to play the game on diamond heatsinked computers.
All slaved to my Vuzix wearable display.
Claire Raynor
NovaGear
#169 - 2013-03-21 12:38:21 UTC
Anthar Thebess wrote:
Ban the multiboxing.
Recently digging the net for some information about IGB i found next? generation of eve bots.
They don't touch EVE at all - just connect them self to the multi boxing programs.

As if this didn't changed - multiboxing is allowed.




Then as per my post above - CCP must start harvesting system information. And also why not build something akin to Synergy into the Launcher. That way CCP can move past this with all the information needed to identify problems, to deal with them, whilst leaving people like me to safely carry on doing what I'm doing - and I know there are a lot of us, (The Power Of Two promotion activly encourages us - it did me).

I have the feeling this thread is now dead - no more CCP posts.

This isn't a question of the EULA - the EULA is maybe fine - but with a question hanging over the facilities we use to operate across multiple desktops, (in and out of game), being interpreted now as "at your own risk" I'm left feeling like rather than any clarification I've just had the carpet pulled right out from under me.
Claire Raynor
NovaGear
#170 - 2013-03-21 12:47:30 UTC
Symbiotes wrote:

-/-
At the same time, you'd be trying to get rid of extra income that CCP receives from all these players with their multiple accounts... Is that really what some of you are advocating?


This's my last post in this thread because it's depressing. But as per Symbiotes post - This uncertainty alone is affecting at least me and it is affecting me right now.
Stray Bullets
Perkone
Caldari State
#171 - 2013-03-21 13:09:05 UTC  |  Edited by: Stray Bullets
Claire Raynor wrote:
I have the feeling this thread is now dead - no more CCP posts.

This isn't a question of the EULA - the EULA is maybe fine - but with a question hanging over the facilities we use to operate across multiple desktops, (in and out of game), being interpreted now as "at your own risk" I'm left feeling like rather than any clarification I've just had the carpet pulled right out from under me.


This is CCP at it's best. Do a half ass job, try to sneak the changes in without anyone noticing.

I have one last sugestion. Remove the EULA section from the petition system. What point is there to it? If anything you get asked you just tell us to read the EULA. I can ******* read. I know what my interpretation is but that is obviously not the interpretation that matters.

When we open up a petition under the EULA section it's probably to try to get CCPs interpretation, as you know, it's the one that matters but it's all cloak and dagger, stuff that's true today gets ninja edited tomorrow instead of a clear announcement of changes to policy regarding third party software! This is a clear example of how NOT to handle security issues, at least regarding the clarification of your own rules.

If even you can't answer your users if it's ok or not, how in the hell do you expect them to respect the rules?
Bubbleboylol
Militia Federation
#172 - 2013-03-21 15:57:25 UTC
CCP Phantom wrote:
Our fantastic Team Security has great news for all good people in New Eden regarding the ongoing war on bots (for the bad people it is tough news though).

Read all about the war on bots in 2012 and future changes (such as moving from a 3 strike policy to a 2 strike policy from effectively today on) in the latest dev blog of CCP Stillman here.




Awesome news! Looks great!
Is it really that hard to click one button then warp when it's done?
those are the ones asking to rebalance EvE and make it easier to play. lol ;)

Asking to have more then one ( Option From CCP is like asking a chicken to cook it-self. )
Deranged FleX
Ozark Cartel
#173 - 2013-03-21 20:56:14 UTC
Deranged FleX wrote:
virm pasuul wrote:
Vincent Athena wrote:

Oh most likely that's not what happened. What happened is he did RMT then tried to hide it with various transactions and character transfers. When CCP caught him he came here to the forums to whine about it and proclaim his innocence. Well, as CCP Sreegs was fond of saying: People who do bad things have been known to lie.


Its my experience of online gaming that a significant portion of exploiters and cheaters like to spread fear uncertainty and doubt about the methods that companies use to defeat them. Exploiters like to introduce doubt within the larger player base that the company is acting fairly or transparently in order to undermine player confidence in the system. If this player confidence in the company's good faith can be undermined sufficiently then the player base starts calling the company out.


That was not my intention nor is my concern based upon your "feelings". My concern is what is the security team doing to insure less or no false positives on the character bazaar. Thanks to the help of CCP after my post, I know it wasn't an issue with the security team. My concern here was related to their DevBlog. I don't think CCP acts unfair but I do know that sometimes there are false positives. There is a petition system to correct it, but it is a slow moving cog of guilty until logs prove you're innocent.

I am here as a paying customer asking a question. My question was partially answered with an EveMail with CCP Peligro about my specific concerns. I am not happy waiting a month now and probably longer, but at least I have some answers on what took place. I am content to know this will be cleared up.


Thanks to CCP, and I suspect maybe my questions, my accounts have been fixed and the 13billion isk returned. There are false positives and not everyone is an exploiter or cheating the system in Eve Online. The cogs of CCP ground slow in this case, but fair.

However, my question still remains. What will CCP do in the future to prevent false positives?
Yvonne Paaltomo
Chanuur
The Initiative.
#174 - 2013-03-22 08:49:31 UTC
Apperently you get hit by the ban hammer if you loan isk to a friend/corp mate who's involved in RMT. Doesn't matter if you know about it or not. And if that person holds multiple billions of legitimate stuff, you can wait almost 2 months and counting on a petition reply.
Bizzaro Stormy MurphDog
B.L.U.E L.A.S.E.R.
#175 - 2013-03-22 21:25:47 UTC
Jason Xado wrote:
I think people need to get a grip a little. . . CCP is not an emotionless evil Caldari State corporation. They are not going to just suddenly start banning people out of the blue for using software that they have been OK with for a long time.

Why not, exactly?

Jason Xado wrote:
Can we just take off the tinfoil hats a bit here and assume CCP is a rational level-headed company and has no intention of just screwing people over for the lewls?

Far better to act as a rational, level-headed consumer yourself, wouldn't you think? CCP seems to think it's fine to write a EULA that casts a net that is both broad and wide enough to catch damn near every player in the game, and then leave it up the sole discretion of some random employee at some random point in the future to determine how to apply that policy. "I'll just trust them!" is a pretty dumb way to act as a consumer when you're talking about multi-year investments in a role playing character(s).

Jason Xado wrote:
I am using ISBoxer to multibox. I will continue to use ISBoxer to multibox until CCP tells me otherwise. I do not think CCP is hiding behind a bush waiting to jump out and say "boo". I assume that as a rational corporation they would give us some advance warning if they were to suddenly have an issue with ISBoxer.

You know what they say about assuming.

Jason Xado wrote:
CCP cannot just blanket white list 3rd party software that they have no control over, which is why they have stated things the way they have.

No . . . they actually can. Or, they could rewrite the EULA in a way to ensure that things like TeamSpeak aren't completely and utterly violating the EULA (because right now, it is in total violation of the EULA to use an overlay).

It's all about the fact that they EULA casts a net that is too wide, and the fact that it wouldn't be an impossibly huge or dangerous task to tighten it up some. ****, if you're going to keep the EULA this loosy-goosy, at least generate a regularly updated list of programs that are certified "exceptions" to the EULA like Teamspeak, your precious ISKBoxer, etc. And if someone, somehow, someway, manages to transform one of those programs into a trueblue botting program, you strike it from the list as soon as you can and chalk it up to a relatively cheap lesson learned.

Or you do . . . what exactly,? Just wait (and assume) that an overly vague policy that specifically treats many common programs as in violation of the EULA will always work in your favor and never be arbitrarily or discriminatorily used?

I am not an alt of Chribba.
Mashie Saldana
V0LTA
New Eden Alliance 99013733
#176 - 2013-03-23 11:09:25 UTC
Someone is making a decent living out of EVE on eBay, he/she has collected £25k+ in the past 12 months from a quick look of the 1000+ successful transactions.

How to win EVE
Aineko Macx
#177 - 2013-03-24 13:24:20 UTC
Aineko Macx wrote:
CCP Stillman wrote:
Our policy is that we do not make any guarantees about any tools being allowed and safe to use. We can't feasibly do that.

But client modification right now are anything that injects/touches the running EVE process. That is, reads or writes memory into it, injects and executes code. Basically anything that modifies the client to change the client or extract information that's not normally accessible. That includes bots of course.

You should clarify that JavaScript code executed in the IGB is fine.
Also that cache scraping is still ok as per the previous GM/Dev ruling.

Bump.

iveeCore 3.0: The PHP engine for industrial activities and CREST library
Proddy Scun
Doomheim
#178 - 2013-03-25 10:58:53 UTC
Lets be honest - CCP is mainly fighting RMT.

Idea Non-combat botting is easy to stop. Just issue CAPTCHA every 5 minutes. Idea Suspend CAPTCHA during combat.
Since it hasn't happened I think we can see what level of botting in mining CCP thinks is really going on.

True BOTing is unnecessary for farming EVE mining -- new commands are seldom needed. In EVE the term BOTing often means AFK mining or split attention mining.
RMT farming EVE mining uses Shocked EXTREME MULTI-BOXing ShockedOopsNOT BOTTING.Oops

I saw a video interview once showing actual Chinese farmers exploiting EVE mining.
They had KVM (keyboard-Video-Mouse) that automatic flipped "channel" every 3 seconds unless user stopped it. Users just watched screens for occasional need for new command. They said each farmer-player controlled 8-12 ships and the farmer shop had shifts of 8-12 people working 24x7 . So 64-144 ships going 24x365. Lots of ore - no unique software just KVMs. Labor is pretty cheap in the Western Pacific Rim. Frankly botting software would be an unnecessary complication and possible expense to maintain.

Its quite easy to run 3-5 mining ships off single computer with just alt-Tab. I have done it before myself though not for purposes of RMT. Even James 315 will occasionally slip up and admit that AFK ming and multi-boxing (and not true botting) is what he seeks to exploit in return.



Shocked Combat is where true botting or at least macros could be truly useful in EVE. Shocked
Lots of fast automatic actions. Maybe some fancy calculations and comparisons. Turning shield boost off and on so - no reps or cap is wasted. Ammo choice based on range and damage being done and is it worth time to switch. To overload or not. Etc.

I suspect some of the truly elaborate single player split second 2-3-4 destroyer ganks with multiple preceding CONCORD diversion attacks MIGHT be using at least macros - yet you seldom hear about BOT investigations into Combat side macros and bots. I will give some EVE pilot fast experienced reactions...but sometimes I wonder about pilots able make 5-6 distinct and precise actions including maneuver in less that 5 seconds.


LOL - I can remember back when CRIMEWATCH, bad drone behavior, and target back allowed gankers to easily disrupt high sec missioning. Gee funny how there were constant claims that lots of those PVE players were bots and thus legitimate targets.

But OK a lot of miners must be botting because they aren't socializing in a proper FPS way:
(1) they often don't react to idle chat,
(2) their ships aren't doing combat maneuvers -- and worst of all
(3) they are not ready to play bump the miner as fun mini-game sport..
If this lack of contribution to the EVE community atmosphere is really harmful -- change mining from low interaction (AFK possible) to constant interaction. CAPTCHA and maybe tiny ore stealing rogue drones (mini-game console).
Proddy Scun
Doomheim
#179 - 2013-03-25 11:34:34 UTC  |  Edited by: Proddy Scun
Allowing Freighters to load in mining belts was a HUGE gift to RMT because RMT farmers are primarily extreme MULTI-BOX.

Unfortunately Freighters in roid belts solved one of multi-boxing most intensive, time-lost labor issues -- efficient hauling without mining overflow and halts waiting on the haulers. Now each farmer players can control 2-3 times as many mining ships without losing ore due to over full haulers or Orcas. Now the only time things stop and ships move is during the always manpower intensive move between belts.

You can see the proof in how thoroughly and quickly entire systems are now stripped. Note that if RMT farming was mostly BOTs then there would have been little change since sufficient numbers of BOT haulers could do the same job for any number of mining ships.

Most ordinary EVE miners -- AFK or not -- are NOT thanking CCP for making it necessary to go far from normal mining systems to find ore that mass farmers have not yet stripped.


Of course Ventures in the hands of noobs only compounds the issue within 3-4 jumps of rookie systems.

Exactly what need is there for all this mining capacity? What secrets of the expanding Empire Wars is CCP going to unveil that require such a trade off with increased RMT activity. I guess CCP accountants feel that the net gain in excitement and potential gain in new DUST and EVE players outweighs the RMT increase. Be great if that is true.
Anthar Thebess
#180 - 2013-03-25 14:32:09 UTC
It would be good that CCP will state what is allowed and not allowed on your system ( as bad as this sound - that someone dictate what i can have on my PC) and what is not.

Some of the CCP clients don't have 15 years , they have kids in this age - we also work in IT business.
What this mean?
That on PC there is quite easy for some programs that will attach them self to all running programs ... just for debugging purposes.

Get banned for something like this will not be nice.

The other option is eve client launched under a Linux.
Wine, well i can compile this with many , many flags that are connected to something i do or what i need.
Will this trigger some "client modification" flag?

And i don't have to use wine for this - there are other alternatives.



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