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Using MAC Address to Uniquely Identify Computers
An anonymous reader writes "One of Australia's gaming networks, GamesArena has recently imposed a third party program required to access their gaming servers. One of it's features is that it records your NIC's MAC address to identify your computer, and subsequently in future, ban you if you cheat/break the rules etc. The response from players is mixed. It is not open source software, nor is it optional to install. "Install it or find another server to play on". Question remains, is it going too far?"
Definitely not- unfortunately it won't work since MACs are changable.
not banned anymore :D
What would Brian Boitano do?
1) Get your mac adress banned
2) Sell Network Card
3) Some one buys new card
4) They are banned
There will be plenty of second hand NICS for sale becuase of this. its a 1 2 3 profit plan.
Linksys routers (and otherS) allow you to "clone" the MAC address. Its very useful if your cable company has registered the MAC address of the NIC they gave you. Thus, with filtering software, any other NIC won't connect....unless you "clone" it :)
It's all too easy. Figure out their IP, get their MAC, put it on your router, get banned, change your MAC back, enjoy your new unopposed domination.
Too many violations from that IP range? Ban the /24 it came from. Send back a "Too many cheaters from your ISP" error.
MACs are too easily changed, but then again, so are IP's. But considering most gamers have DSL with a static IP, an IP ban is a much better option.
Uh, that might actually BE the point - anyone with $10 for a new NIC can change their MAC address, no brains required...
;-)
If you have brains, you can save $10...
Mark
Don't worry, only the CHEATERS will go to the trouble to change their MAC address or swap out network cards. The rest of the non-cheating gamers won't go to the trouble to circumvent the system.
As if people whining on CounterStrike weren't bad enough, now we have to listing to 14 year olds complain about having to buy a new NIC every time they cheat online.
"It's hard to be a man when there's a gun in your hand"
...until the MAC address generators have gone through all the "MAC-space" of possible addresses...
Wireless APs like Linksys' already come with a web admin that lets you specify *any* MAC address, apparently to please some cable/adsl providers that measure traffic/authenticate (partly) based on this.
Why not provide a public key server and ask people to submit they public OpenPGP key, signe by P. Zimmermann himself ? Get your identity trusted by Z. or go play somewhere else... After all, this seems to imply they want "real" players!
Notepad specialist & FAT administrator, group training available
ifconfig eth0 hw ether xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
There's really no need to change your MAC address.
They're violating the simple rule about never trusting the client. All you have to do is modify this third-party program to have it spit out a random MAC address each time and *poof* the system is worthless. You don't even have to change your MAC address. And since MAC addresses are only used at the Ethernet level, not at the [TCP|UDP]/IP level, it doesn't matter that the server thinks your MAC address is different than it is.
They've been trying this crap for years with cable modems. Until I got a router, I used to use two different machines, each with the same MAC address installed. Worked out great. It's easy to change, too. It's also let me on at friends' offices, where access is MAC controlled. We log on a machine, write down the address, shut it down, boot mine up, change the address, and log on.
Who does it stop? Honest people.
Who won't it stop? The same people hacking their games in the first place.
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it. - G.B. Shaw
ifconfig eth0 hw ether aa:dd:rr:ee:ss
Of course it's not open source; the last thing they want is users making changes to this program. Then it would be of no use to them.
-- Cheers!
Which MAC-address will the server see if I'm behind a firewall ? The one from my firewall, or the pc which I'm woking behind ?
Uh, no you won't. The only time MAC addresses make a difference is in ARP packets, and the only place MAC addresses make a difference is on your local LAN segment. The fact that two people in different cities have the same MAC address matters not a whit to the routers between them.
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
I keep a fresh supply of token ring cards handy to swap out if the need arrises.
And im not joking:
http://gambit32.org/albums/other/aag.jpg
No, it's not going too far. The game server admins can run the server however they choose fit. If you don't like the rules, don't use the server!
However, the majority of people don't know how to reset their MAC addresses. Also, as I believe to be true, some broadband providers specifically use MAC addresses to verify access. For instance, my Comcast cable modem does everything by MAC, so if I change my NIC in my machine, I need to power off/on the cable modem in order to get back through to the Internet. Although this is sort of a minor issue, some other ISPs may be more strict about MAC changes.
Overall, the admins figure they will cut out 99% of the hacking attempts as people would just go elsewhere, or once they did cheat, just wouldn't know how to change their MAC.
What happens if you are logged in via dial-up? Will it ban the MAC address of the box at the ISP that you're dialed in to? :)
NAT routers such as the Linksys range allow you to specify the MAC address from their web-based setup - ideal if your broadband provider insists on you registering (and limiting the number of) MAC addresses of all the machines going to connect.
I wonder what they'll do when they discover several simultaneous connections to the server (and sessions) from the same MAC?
The only thing you can accurately describe as "Scotch" is a sticky tape made by 3M. And it's
I was referring to people on the same segment. Hardcore gamers in localities generally use the same provider to minimize latency issues. That is when the issue would crop up.
>Uh, no you won't. The only time MAC addresses make a difference is in ARP packets, and the only place MAC addresses make a difference is on your local LAN segment. The fact that two people in different cities have the same MAC address matters not a whit to the routers between them.
Does not the current IPv6 address allocation standard specify using your MAC address as the suffix portion of the IPv6 address? This is merely a taste of things to come if/when IPv6 becomes widely deployed, when your very IPv6 address can uniquely identify the hardware you are on (unless you use IPv6 NAT, of course.)
And yes, presently, you can probably change the MAC address of your system. However, once software vendors and DRM technologies and other things start locking themselves to your computer hardware, I suspect changing the MAC address would cause problems. The only thing this game company has to do is when the game is installed is to lock the licence to the present MAC address so it will not run with a changed IP address without a new licence.
here's how to change it for nt/2000
windows2000faq
-advanced tab in adapter properties
linux
eepro100 list
-ifconfig eth0 hwaddr ether 00:11:22:33:44:55
this is exactly why microsoft's registration process uses a lot more than just the mac address.
Nope, MAC addresses won't work. You'd have to have a unique number that's hard coded into something expensive. The Pentium III's CPUID feature would work. However, as much as I hate cheaters in my favorite games, I don't like an ID number open to abuse.
Quake III has recently enabled anti-cheat software called Punk Buster. It does a ban via your Quake III CD-Key, so you can't play on any Punk Buster enabled servers if you get banned. But with the game under $20 at BestBuy, I'm not sure if it will stop many of the problems.
Cthulhu Saves.
But if you're on the same segment, then routing is not an issue.
As noted, the answer is trivial: generate random MAC addresses. They are 6 bytes long - plenty of room for everyone to tumble the address every day and still not collide.
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
When I was involved with the initial deployment of DSL service in Canada, our customer ran into an interesting problem: many of the low-cost NICs that they shipped with the DSL modem had the same MAC.
Under most circumstances, this is seldom an issue since the NICs aren't likely to be deployed on the same network segment. However, when the MAC is used for other tracking services (in this case, a layer-2 NAT), you have a problem.
And of course, as others have said, most NICs permit the factory MAC to be overridden.
Some older ones are, many of the newer cards can easily change the IP address. Many routers have a setup page to clone the MAC address of a network card built into the firmware.
If every Ethernet card chose a MAC address completely at random, what is any given user's chance of a collision? Considering that the MAC address is only used on that particular Ethernet.
If two interfaces do choose the same MAC address, and by some freak accident happen to be on the same Ethernet, doesn't it just affect frames sent to those two interfaces? Everyone else can communicate as normal.
(In practice the new address may not be random, there may be certain digits you have to leave alone, I don't know the details.)
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
"The response from players is mixed. It is not open source software, nor is it optional to install."
Neither is windows for playing many of todays top-selling titles. I want an outcry here but I don't see it. Is it because software not being open source does not matter to the average user or is it because people are too ignorant to care? It is funny to see an outcry when a company tries to stop actual cheating which spoils the game for all, instead of putting energy where it matters.
It's called Windows activation.
Why is this considered to affect anyone's rights? It is a private company setting conditions for use of its resources, same as if they were writing a license for people to use their software. They have an indisputable right to do this.
As the blurb says, find another server to play on. This is not like the government forcing everyone to submit to their dictates.
It only harms their business, no one else.
People should not fear their government. Governments should fear their people.
>If someone creates a program to easily do the change
what, like ifconfig?!
The following may be considered circumvention devices because they have no significant use other than to circumvent access control to copyrighted software update files:
Will I retire or break 10K?
>"...Question remains, is it going too far?" Definitely not-
Thanks for answering that one for us. Without your moral framework we would be lost in the chaotic hell of self determination.
Why stick up for big business?
I think PKI would be ideal for this purpose. MAC addresses obviously not. Maybe adding PKI code to games would even encourage people to buy a personal certificate. I never had a good reason to buy one but a cheater free CS-server is certainly worth it. They could even bundle games with Verisign certificate vouchers or something. If some people are worried about there privacy you could just create games certificates. Of course people should keep there private keys private.
The glass is half-full. With poison. And there are cracks in the glass. The dirty, dirty glass.
This is just as silly as gun control because it makes the assumption that you can pass "laws" that will stop people that, by their very definition, do not obey laws!
...cheat the protection.
Here, they're saying "we're going to introduce a software "lock" that will prevent you from cheating." Great. So the people who want to cheat in the game are going to (say it with me now)
Are the people who wrote this bit of client-side [*cough*] security really under the impression that MAC addresses are immutable? Perhaps they know damned well it isn't but was kinda hoping that nobody would tell their client? This has the earmark of an initiative by some dip in a suit who never bothered to consult a single knowledgable, technical person.
Whatever. It might take two days before a patch/spoofer is readily available for the habitual cheaters. All it has to do is spit out a fake MAC address when queried.
My
Limekiller
Can you here the disappointment in CmdrTaco's snippet? I'm surprised he bothered posting this article. Taco has already thought of this and realized that it won't work.
He's tried everything and he still can't shake the Trolls. Hell, even if he disables AC the Trolls login now.
All the NICs I've looked store the MAC in a very obvious format in the chip, whithout any pesky checksums to fix up - I recently used this method to simplify swapping 2 PCs off one cable modem.
As the NIC controller chip can read from the eeprom, chances are it can also be made to write to it as well, so it's probably possible to write a program to change the MAC without any hardware twiddling - a read of the chip;s data sheet would probably show you how.
This has been going on for a while, though without MAC addresses, a much simpler system. Most multiplayer games thesedays come with a CD-Key thats authenticated by a central server whenever you play a game. The CDkey usually has a unique ID strapped to it that is publically accessible by admins or players. You ban the ID, they cannot connect to the game without changing their CDkey (which means either buying a new copy or finding another cdkey that works online, neither are 'easy'). If MAC addresses can be changed, then as soon as a couple of like-minded gamers find out about that, you can count on their being a guide on how to do it for gamers eventually. The best way handle this is on both a MAC, and CDkey-ID level. Ban their MAC, and ban their ID, that will stop all but the most determined/knowledgable.
"What can a thoughtful man hope for mankind on Earth, given the experience of the past million years? Nothing." -Bokonon
And ban the ~252 other potential hosts on that network?
You have to weigh the damage that a cheater is causing against the damage that loss of about two legitimate players on the same /24 would cause. If a fellow is making a big enough fool of himself, and the service isn't yet popular enough that a ban might cause a financially significant number of cancellations of service, a "Too many cheaters from your ISP" message may be warranted.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Call me crazy, but how, exactly, does ones MAC address end up being sent over anything but your local ethernet network?
Once that packet hits your internet gateway, the ethernet header containing your MAC is stripped, and an HDLC or FR packet is constructed from the ethernet payload and sent out over the WAN link.
Are they really embedding MAC addresses into the payload? This will only work if you actually have an ethernet card in your computer. So only those lucky enough to have broadband will be effected?
Many ethernet drivers with this capability have an option for just this. For example, if you have a 3c918, click "configure" under network properties in win2k for that adapter. Select the "advanced" tab. On the left, you'll have an option called "network address" that's normally set to "Not Present". Change it to a specified value, and type in "DEADBEEFBABE" or whatever MAC address you want.
Bingo.
Black holes are where the Matrix raised SIGFPE
No, it's not going too far. The game server admins can run the server however they choose fit. If you don't like the rules, don't use the server!
Tell that to your local electric power company. What if the server company with the crappy policy is the exclusive server in your area for a particular game? Do they really want the loss of customers that a policy of "one strike and you buy a new network card, or a new computer if you have onboard networking and the MAC is hardwired" would cause? Do they want the badwill that would inevitably build up as accidental permanent bans force users to put up anti-that-server web sites?
Will I retire or break 10K?
They'll have the knowledge to change their MAC (or find it easily)
Cheat programs are inherently "underground" programs, wherease you can find MAC changing references everywhere.
And it won't be long before a hacked version of this client becomes available that doesn't even require you to change your local MAC, it'll just misreport it. So no issues with the cable modem provider.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
The MAC is 48 bits, split in two, don't remember how many bits each part. One part is the manufacturer id, the other is the specific card, such as a sequential serial number. MACs are assigned when built, non-changeable, a truly unique card id.
However, you can tell the OS to report a different MAC. That's what "changing your MAC" means, it doesn't actually change the MAC on the card, but it changes what the OS reports.
This is also a good example of why Palladium and trusted computing can't have just any old OS running on a computer. DRM requires complete control, not just a little bit of special software.
Infuriate left and right
There's a big hullabaloo about this, but I met one of the guys writing this software (a close mate of mine did the interface / icons etc), and he was your regular average geek... Apart from recording your mac address, it's pretty good software. Seems better than gamespy that's fer sure, and has a built in irc client.
Personally I don't think the mac address recording is all that bad... Your average person who cares that it's recorded can change it easily, and your average 12 year old cheating 5||21p7 |1DD13 probably won't even know why he got banned...
Send lawyers, guns, and money!
SHHH! Dont tell people that deadbolt locks made by manufacturer X have a flaw that allows anyone to gain entry into a house that uses them!! If we let people know that their houses are not adequately locked, then break-ins will be more common!! And we'll have to FIX the locks!!! and make them actually work!!!
SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
Why stick up for big business?
It's solid code of honor amongst Clans not to cheat. Anybody as dedicated to playing online action games would render his pasttime pointless by cheating. And if anyone found out you've cheated your way into Ladder position you'd get an extremely hard time (on and offline).
:-)
And when you're playing on a public server, cheaters are easyly identified by playing like crap and either scoring immediate kills once they actually *do* manage to hit or by simply not throwing the towel no matter how many times you flak them at point-blank. Both area mostly less than minor drags to a skilled player and have a somewhat funny aspect to it.
I've seen entire matches in UT (1st) where cheaters we're just plain ignored because of the simply fact their skill level (not trained by playing under real conditions) rendered them something more like 'moving obstacles' rather than actuall participants.
Anyhow, some one using more subtle cheats, such as see-through textures or so, can be anoying. Then on the other hand, if you're that good to know for shure that someone is using such a cheat, you'll be playing clan games most of the time anyway. And I haven't met a single Clan player cheating yet. At least none of mentionable Clans.
BTW: I once had a cheater on my team in a pub UT CTF match. I switched sides and telefragged him 'til he gave up and disconnected. That was fun.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
NIC's MAC address to identify your computer
Shouldn't that read "NIC's MAC address to identify your NIC"? And even then, it isn't fool proof as the MAC address can be changed...
-- Mike
Don't gamble...
Anything that makes it harder for people to gamble the better.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
I thought they the MAC address was burned in to the chips themselves
It is stored on a PROM on the card. And the driver reads it, and stores it in computer memory. Then you go into the driver settings and override it, assuming the driver allows that; it's up to the driver.
The NIC never sends its MAC out on its own. The MAC is incorporated into the packet by the driver. The driver can send whatever the hell it wants to for the MAC address.
In Windows the changeablility of the MAC address depends on your driver. On my Dell laptop it's as easy as going into the NIC's properties and changing the number. On my desktop here at work I don't see an obvious way to do it.
Under Linux I think it's just ifconfig with some options.
Yet again "anti-cheat" technology that just serves to infuriate real games, and is easily bypassed/defeated by the cheaters themselves
Now we all know that that cheating in online games is for the most part a Bad Thing (tm). We all remember the original Quake bots (my personal favorite was the StoogeBot) that required a certain measure of circumventing of built-in precautions. Generally when people were caught, they heard about it. Flames, kicks, bans, you name it.
Now we have issues of people using similar circumventions to get around copy protection instead of anti-cheating measures. I realize that this isn't exactly the same thing, but the two scenarios have a common theme: people using third-party software to use a product in a manner in which it was never intended.
What I find amusing is that generally (at least on Slashdot) the circumvention of copy protection is usually regarded as a Good Thing (tm), but becomes less desirable when it comes to games.
Could it be that third-party circumvention is a good thing as long as it doesn't negatively affect you?
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
That is different, they are monitoring traffic on a local level without intrusive measures. Besides, with universities I have worked with, they don't rely on MAC addresses. Ports are linked directly to a smart switch which records usage over the port, and snmp is used to monitor and kill ports that are overused. Even changing network card or MAC means nothing then. They are forcing a sort of spyware on the client. While fine for these purposes, the fear is the information could somehow be used for profiling, though I'm not sure what the hell the system could do with such profiling data. User X tends to play this game from 7-8 and 5-9 on MWF...... Nothing is helpful about that data to marketers or anything, so I think detecting cheating is the lesser of two evils.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Since anything that runs on a client can be compromized (there is _no_ way to make sure this doesnt happen) the only real option for games is to just send pre rendered graphical images to the client which in turn sends back the client keystrokes. this is ofcourse way too bandwidth and serverside intensive to work with current technology, imagine doing this for a MMORPG with 60k users online simultaniously :) .. and even if you use this method the cheaters can respond by writing pattern-reqognition systems which still will be able to autoaim and such (although it raises the bar considerably).
it DOES remove the threat of wallhacks and clientside radars but a good game protocol shouldnt send information about things outside of the clients vision anyway.
K
-- gunzip-howto.tar.gz
In linux you can change it with ifconfig. I used to do this in order to fool my ISP into thinking my linux box is my windows box back when ATT used to require the service be tied to a specific MAC Address (I do not think they do this anymore) I didnt feel like taking the nic out of my linux box so I just changed the MAC to that of the windows one.
I think it goes something like this
ifconfig eth0 hw ether AB:CD:EF:GH...
But the whole argument for this particular program to be open source is really pointless because they've chosen to break the #1 rule of multiplayer programming: Never trust the client. So it really does not matter if it's open source or closed source; the protection will be broken very easily, either by a script kiddie with a very basic understanding of a MAC address, or by somone who can reverse-engineer the data sent between the client and server.
--LordKaT
I wonder how many people will change theirs to same as mine...
-- bartman
If they want something static, why go with MAC? They could just make an MD5 of some system specific info. That can't be easily tampered with. I'm not suggesting this, just making a statement :-)
Ok, that's the dumbest thing yet... You can fake IP's, everyone knows that... But, you can also fake MAC Addresses... HEll my LinkSys Router does it, Cisco's do it, and I'm sure most other devices like that do it too..... Besides, like mentioned earlier, you can always rewrite your frame generator to spoof or report and invalid MAC, ... this is all fairly easy to do, so why waste time doing this. I have already admin'd a Counter-Strike server, if someone wants in and wants to cheat bad enough, they will do it.. PERIOD!, no matter how hard you lock it down.. so quit the whinning and get back to kicking them.!!
As stated about "changing the MAC" is really just having the OS report a different MAC than the one burned into the network card. However, is it not possible to query the physical card vs. the OS?
If they are doing it that way, then there won't be any cheating.
It is thier network, and they can take thier computers and "go home" if they wish.
Whether it's in the name of catching cheaters or catching terrorists, our freedom and autonomy are about to evaporate.
Yeah, this definitely won't work with my Sun IPX. (As if that's an issue...) Ever since I left it in the trunk of my car for an entire winter (a harsh one, at that - nary a night of temperatures above -10F did we see, and quite frequently it was much colder even than that), the NVRAM gets reset when the box is powered down. So now I get errors from the PROM at power-up, because my MAC address is ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff and my machine ID is also all 1's. So I have to write some Forth every time I boot up (the only bad part being that I have to do it at the console, and I don't have a serial console cable, so I have to lug out the behemoth 19" monitor that goes with it), in order to set my MAC address to something valid and to generate all the parity and checksums and whatnot.
If there's one card on a network, and you add another, the question becomes "what are the odds that the two cards will pick the same number?" Since there's 48 bits of entropy(minus a small range for multicast addresses and broadcast), the odds are effectively 2^48.
This is big.
If there's many cards on a network, and you want to know how many total you can add before two of them will end up with the same card, the answer's far smaller -- 2^24, which is still pretty huge(it's a bit more than 16 million). It's a different problem because each time you add a new card, the card after has one more it can possibly match with. This is known as the birthday paradox, so named because this precise logic means that given 23 people in a room, there's a +50% chance that two people have the same birthday. Each new person is one more to match with.
In reality, this is a moot point: MAC address prefixes are assigned by manufacturer, and the manufacturer serializes their cards such that no two shipped devices should ever have the same MAC address. Sometimes there are screwups, but they're pretty rare as far as I know.
To debunk what a couple people are saying -- yes, MAC addresses as exposed to the network can be changed, but MAC addresses as detected by custom client software may be more tricky. Whatever the driver is exposing to the network, the card itself can't usually have its MAC address written over(i.e. once power is cycled, that card's returning to original shipped condition). I'm positive there are exceptions to this, but they're probably rare.
Actually, this gives me an interesting idea. You can probably remotely fingerprint the age of a computer based on the MAC address of its ethernet card...and if IPV6's MAC->IP shove goes through, you'll be able to do that reasonably remotely!
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com
For a bunch of reasons, but two to think about:
1) Many windows drivers let you put in arbitrary MAC's. Ban me? No prob, I'll change it to something else.
2) Many firewalls will let you do the same thing.
3) Ethernet cards cost what...a dollar or two at a used computer swap meet? If it comes down to it just keep a stack of 10.
It appears this is intended to catch people clever enough to cheat, but not clever enough to change their MAC address.
Another example of poorly contructed solutions to a badly defined problem.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
But the MAC-method obviously isn't a viable solution. I was actually hoping that matters would turn out better with internet console gaming, but seeing that XBoxs and PS2s can me mod-chipped I'm not setting my expectations too high.
The only solution I came up with that might work better is making the first sign-in/subscription rather hard. For example by sending each player a letter by snail-mail with their sign-in code. Thus if you get banned you need days to sign in again.
But I don't think there is a technology solution, because basically everything on a home machine can be hacked. Be it the game itself or some driver.
I remember everyone accusing anyone that was any good of being a cheater two years ago. I heard it's worst now.
Now I am reading there are methods to ban players - Punk Buster and now this.
Just one problem:
Are we going to have courts? Evidence? Or are people to be banned based solely on the testimony of "Nadbuster "?
Hell, in real life, with professional law enforcement personnel, mistakes happen - even in CAPITAL CRIME trials.
Glad I only play online with friends now...
Robots are everywhere, and they eat old people's medicine for fuel.
Simple: if you are winning at Counter Strike despite a ping of 1,000+, then you must be cheating.
I mean, duh...
--- My dad's political betting
It is not open source software, nor is it optional to install.
If they're really interested in blocking cheaters, etc., how in the world could anyone see fit to question 1) why it is not open source, and 2) why it is not optional to install ? If it was either of these things, then 1) it would be trivial to alter the source to render the code useless, or 2) people just wouldn't install it and cheat anyways.
Agendas aside, people have to start using some common sense before whining about issues which make no sense.
Definitely not
Are you nuts? Of course its going to far!
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
No thanks about drawing commercial CAs into it. If a game publisher *was* to implement such a system, they would simply make themselves a CA and distribute their CA cert with the software. They *could* go so far as including a private key with each copy of the software, but costs would skyrocket if releasing en mass. The system I would envision here is that one purchases the game, gets online, and goes to the server and registers the CD-Key in exchange for having a private key signed. The advantages would, of course, be that the authentication mechanism is not prone to theft (i.e. the server being connected to never sees your important credentials, no vulnerable information is transmitted over the wire), and could be more enforceable (coming up with a keygen is one thing, trying to fake a 4096 bit key with signed certificate is another), provided the process for getting a certificate were sufficiently rigorous.
Hell, if the game was critically dependent on online functionality, you could let the game go free on the net and just sell CD-Keys. If any small projects want to try to make it big without the potentially crippling barrier to entry into mass distributers, this would be the way I would think... Stick it on Gnutella and let people *think* it is illegal to download and its popularity could be good...
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
That's what I would do if I were writing the software. Bwa ha ha ha, etc.
:wq
Just so you know. There are loads of 3Com-cards that you can permanently change the mac address of. I have one with an address of 42:42:42:42:42:42, another one with 00:DE:AD:BE:EF:00.
You can change that together with the rest of the card settings with a program running in dos-mode (3c5x9cfg.exe, get it from 3com.com). It's saved in eeprom or something like that. Very nice cards :)
Well, that's two corrections so far, mea culpa it seems ... the cards we manufactured had the MAC in NVRAM, I suppose someone could have changed it, but I didn't think the OS ops actually did so for any cards. Mea culpa, eh, sorry about ass-u-me-ing something.
Infuriate left and right
Actually it does; in an ethernet frame. That's how your switch "learns" the mac addresses of all the NICs connected to it before you've run anything higher in the OSI model.
-ted
Well, then I pity your ISP for having to add to their workload by updating the DHCP table whenever a customer get a new or changed Ethernet card. That's essentially the same workload as manually handing out static IP addresses, so DHCP really hasn't not saved your ISP much.
Also note: DHCP is still usually a local segment function. Yes, I know that there are modifications to various protocols to allow DHCP to function across routers, but that's the router temporarily providing IP service for a local node that hasn't picked up an IP address yet. The actual MAC address is still only used for communications on the local segment.
Further, anybody who's smart enough to figure out how to change MAC addresses can also figure out that they can assign their own static IP address from the DHCP pool and the DHCP server will often allocate around it.
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
There are a few other problems with this software (it's called COGS) than just the fact that it can't really block dedicated cheaters. Sure, measures to block cheaters are fine, but this one went too far.
1. It's buggy as all hell, everytime I log on it downloads a new patch, and still doesn't always run properly. And this is after supposedly extensive testing.
2. It's unsecure, it transmits your username and password as get parameters for authentication.
3. Originally it was going to be released without Mac and Linux versions. (This has since been changed.)
4. It's basically trying to replace programs we already know and use. It has an in-built IRC client that automatically connects to the GameArena server (which we obviously already had), a server browser (we already had ServerQuery [serverquery.qgl.org] which is lightweight yet adequate, also GPLed) and even a web browser that opens the main GameArena site. All activities we had perfectly fine utilities for, yet someone has made a half-arsed effort to replace them.
Perhaps if it had been better executed we would have been a bit more accepting, but the amateur coding effort along with the draconian "use it or leave" policy has left a lot of gamers with a negative view of COGS.
Z
I have been accused of cheating at CounterStrike more than once, and have been banned from the KGB servers for killing clan members too often (I guess) - but I NEVER cheat. People get bent out of shape when you kill them too frequently, they assume that if you are much better than they are that you must be cheating. Good grief. Fortunately there are a large number of good alternative servers out there - for these guys, I hope they are careful before they ban someone for being ACCUSED of cheating.
KK4SFV
e8johan wrote:
:)
> I want an outcry here but I don't see it. Is it
> because software not being open source does not
> matter to the average user or is it because people
> are too ignorant to care? It is funny to see an
> outcry when a company tries to stop actual
> cheating which spoils the game for all, instead of
> putting energy where it matters.
This is not just a little utility for sending a MAC address. It is a browser (based on Internet Explorer: grand champion of security holes), a chat program, a client for their gaming system, etc. It has access to the machine's MAC, its web cache, its web history, etc. We have their word that it is not spyware. Do you honestly trust some internet company to be telling the truth about piracy issues in this day and age? Especially when they are giving away the program and the gaming memberships? If the program were open source (impossible because of the IE componenents) we could tell for sure.
The program imposes two further restrictions:
1) If you want your money's worth, you are pretty much restricted to Windows. Yes, they have clients for Mac and Linux, but at a decreased experience. Granted Linux does not have that much in the way of commercial gaming (TransGaming, please fix), but the Mac does. Heck the makers of Everquest have even been mumbling something about a Mac version.
2) The MAC feature attempts to glue the account to a single machine. Say you are at your friend's house. Your friend has a completely legal setup, no warez or anything. You still can't log into your account and play because the MAC address is different. You could use your friend's account, but if you cheated, they wouldn't be able to use their account anymore (without changing their MAC or buying a new card).
Personally I prefer offline (especially console) gaming. I pay a lot for a game, and if I want to cheat, or access all the characters and features I paid for, I can. Besides, nothing online beats the cameraderie of having a real friend right there with you, laughing at all the silly stuff.
"Godzilla and Jaguar: Punch! Punch! Punch! Hit! Hit! Hit!
We die if they stop fighting for us."
Jet Jaguar Song, "Godzilla vs. Megalon"
Gees what a load of typos. Guess I didn't get enough sleep these days. Been playing too much Kohan:IS and UT2003. Would've you guessed? :-)
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Set up a few computers with bots hacked onto them and have the clients send out increments of MAC addresses, until all of them have been marked as cheaters.
Once nobody can connect they wont be able to use the system anymore. Shouldnt take too long if a few people here help out.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
This sounds like a good application for GPG. Join a league, get your key signed, get on the "good list." Cheat (get caught cheating), and your public key is placed on the signed "bad list." Servers would "belong" to leagues by checking the league listings to authenticate users.
If you get on the bad list, you can make a new key, but you have to start from scratch paying dues or otherwise earning "member in good standing" status.
Thanks again Phil!
--- Nothing clever here: move along now...
It is a typo for "Tolkien Ring", a system in which the computer that holds the "One True Ring" becomes the most powerful machine on the network.
I metamoderate, therefore I am
There was once a very nice multiplayer games called NetTrek which also had a problem with cheaters on several servers (Due to the nature of the game, such clients were called Borg).
NetTrek addressed the problem of cheating on two levels. At a first level there were official, signed clients for different operating systems. So you had the source and could use your own localized or even borgified client in regular games, if you liked. But in order to participiate league games, you had to use their approved binary. That helped a little, but of course it would still be possible to write a borg client that parsed the X11 output of a signed binary and synthetized X11 events.
The other level at which NetTrek addressed the Borg problem was much smarter, though: The game server tried very hard not to send information to the client that the player should have no knowledge of. So one could borg an aimbot or other targetting helps, or write macroborgs that fire complicated predefined sequences of moves, but one could not reveal maps other otherwise gain more information than what was visible on screen anyway.
I'd like very much to hear what has become of the original NetTrek designers, and what modern games asre doing in order to prevent cheating. Are these techniques still useable?
Kristian
Hmm... Well, I haven't really looked at a network card in a long time, but I remember the buying policies of fifteen years ago. In the early cards the MAC was held in EPROM and if you find and old enough card, you'll find such a chip. Those that couldn't be changed were too hard to sell and too expensive to manufacture. It was the easiest way of having a different MAC in each (mass produced) card. So, if you are right and they are rare, then things must have changed. Can't see why they would...
Zero Sum (don't amount to much). [root@localhost]
What's the big deal? If a private network doesn't want to let you in, why should they? A unique MAC addess is just another way of establishing who you are.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
How on earth can they ban me using my .Mac address form Apple? This just seems crazy. Well if they do I will just go get another one. -peel
> All you have to do is modify this third-party program to have it spit out a random MAC address each time and *poof* the system is worthless.
How about just not cheating at all?
I think their solution will reduce the number of medicore cheaters (ie, gamers who know nothing about computers), but it won't stop the geek of courses. But from their POV, isn't even a moderate reduction in cheating worth their time and effort even if some will find ways around it?
It seems people tend to confuse privacy with anonymity. Privacy means preventing others from getting information about you -- whether it's what kind of toothpaste you use or your SSN. Anonymity means preventing others from finding out who you are. The two are related, in that in practice they often go hand-in-hand. But they are distinct.
-Thomas
I'm using a PC.
For many people, being anonymous online means "I can do whatever I want" because there are no significant consequences for their misbehavior. To these people, I say: life is much nicer when you are nice to other people. Try it, you might be surprised.
-Thomas
Heh, I was totally wrong. It happens :-)
Maybe there's a chunk of Flash memory on board? NVRAM still requires a trickle charge to maintain, if I remember right.
--Dan
Maybe there are some people that think that but I don't, and I didn't get the impression most of the posters do. These people have every right to ban cheaters anyway they can. But the fact of the matter is that this just won't work. It'll be childs play to defeat, and may well cause more inconvenience to random non-cheaters than the people they are trying to get rid of.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
Great. This is another way to get rid of those pesky, honest players and my enemies.
I'll just assume their MAC address, misbehave like hell. Their MAC gets banned, and I get rid of the losers.
Alone, I shall reign through spite and malice.
Stop the brainwash
Just pulled out a Netgear FA311TX...it's like a FA310TX, but it sucks (not a Tulip).
Managed to get it to work with the netsemi linux module, which is more than I can say for the Linksys ethernet cards. I swear, Linksys needs to bribe someone to sell them Tulips...
Anyway.
The card has a big ol' spot for bootable EPROM that's unfilled, and instead has this tiny(sub-square-centimeter) chip soldered on. Whatsit?
ATC 93LC46 (serial EEPROM)
Ah, EEPROMs...slow as hell to write to, but write to them you can. I don't think any of the standard drivers allow access to the EEPROM though, since it's usually easier to twiddle some registers to get the same job done.
Anyone familiar with network drivers that actually flip EEPROM bits?
--Dan
Since the ifconfig man pages contain instructions on how to change MAC addresses and
Since changing the MAC address would allow a cheater to circumvent access controls
Then are the ifconfig man pages now illegal in the US under the DMCA?
Ok, so I bet when you create the account, it registers your NIC address, meaning if you change your MAC address like so many people have mentioned, you will have to re-register. Chances are each time you register you need to use a different e-mail address. Man, that must really make cheaters buy hundreds of Hotmail accounts (sure they may use other free services, but c'mon, it's fun to toy with M$. admit it).
today is spelling optional day.
The average script kiddy is not going to know how to use IPFILTER or IPTABLES to mask the MAC address of a card, or how to use the NIC software to edit it, or even how to use the Windows XP MAC-Bridge function to mask it.
The average script kiddy will get banned and either buy another NIC, or be gone for good. The people with the technical savvy to be able to clone a MAC addres do not, in my experience, cheat / cheat at the level of being banned. Either they (like myself) only play games recreationally or not at all, or they play it just with friends so they don't care about cheating.
I think this is an effective step in the right direction. If Valve implimented this on WON, the quality of the game Counter-Strike would increase massively.
They can ask anything they want, regardless if it makes sence or not. Its their stuff..
Now this does sound pretty stupid with the ease of chaning MAC addresses, but its their choice, as is your choice to use or not to use their services.
What next... dongles?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Further, anybody who's smart enough to figure out how to change MAC addresses can also figure out that they can assign their own static IP address from the DHCP pool and the DHCP server will often allocate around it.
Off-topic, but I used to do that when I had a cable modem. One day, however, I typo'd the ifconfig command on FreeBSD, and accidentally took over the router's IP (I mixed up my IP with the gateway IP). My phone promptly rang... they didn't much like that. Seems I took out service for the whole area, and they had to reset the router.
Good thing this was before 9/11 and all the crazy computer crime laws...
NGWave - Fast Sound Editor for Windows
It's not as difficult as you might think. It would be quite easy for a script kiddy to type "ifconfig eth0 hw ether 11:22:33:44:55:66" and many windows ethernet drivers include the option to change it in the device properties. All one has to do is open up the device settings and change the "Network Address", or Media Address, or whatever the people writing the driver want to call it. Not to mention most script kiddy would be able to google for all the above information to get around the ban. Granted this is highly dependent on your NIC and I'm sure not all of them would have one that makes it this easy, but I doubt they will give up that easily either. I don't think this would stop anyone. Well, maybe once 281,474,976,710,656 MAC addresses are banned.
I work tech support at a small liberal arts college, and we require all students to register their machines within three weeks of getting on campus. We then lock their ports to their MAC addresses. If you need to move or change your card you can re-register, usually the change goes through in a day. We did it to make it easier to detect and limit email worms. If we see it coming from some specified port we close it off and the flag passes to the techs. So far it's worked pretty well, often we get people coming to us complaining that "their Internet doesn't work," usually it's because they got Klez and we shut their port off. Decent alarm system, really.
No statement is true, not even this one.
"FuckStar31337 is using a wireframe hack. Press K to cast your Kick Vote."
Sure, I could get booted out of games arbitrarily by assholes, but I wouldn't want to play with said assholes, anyway. Not that I've even played a game since about 1999...
Not really, since (as you say) the first 8 bits of address specify the manufacturer. Not all the possible 8-bit codes are assigned.
Plus, if you're building a network from scratch, its likely all the NICs are from the same manufacturer, therefore the first 8 bits are all identical, and you really only have 40 bits of unique address.
Somebody's parents only threw him one birthday party, and he can't even remember it.
Guy's been bitter since.
--Dan
If he's running OS X, he can use ifconfig to set his MAC (as mentioned by numerous people).
Gameranger may also have been blocking a parent IP or domain.
It is a source of constant amazement for what passes as news at /.
/. I stopped talking about 1995 technology in 1996.
Don't get me wrong. I love the dot but come on. Show a little integrity and don't insult your own audience's intelligence.
Oh wait. Every one fell for it! All these arguements over nic selling and mac changing and this and that. All pointless.
This issue was blown out of the water over SIX YEARS ago. When I was a fresh geek trying to get into networking everyone was going to manage on NICs. They learned quickly what a waste of time it was. This SP will learn that lesson as well. Geez look at TFC. It gives you a CD assigned ID. A little tougher to forge. But if they are gonna make you install software why not just use a GUID to generate a private key to identify the machine.
Get with it
If that happens at the Game maker/developer level for example EPIC or ID, they better be prepared for me to sue their ass's. That or you better make dam sure your refund department changes its stance. If I pay $50 to play a Online game and then you ban my entire ISP, which in all likelyhood is the only broadband I can even get, you can be sure I'm going to sue you in small claims court. There is no way a company could get away with that.
Now if some individual running a game server wants to ban someone, thats up to them. But the game maker better stay well away from the issue.
BTW most gamers do NOT have static IP's.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
If you include the manufacturer code, you no longer have a random system -- most likely, they're serializing each card from a very large address space, and (barring unfortunate accidents by far eastern card manufacturers) never using that number again. No collisions -- ever.
:-) It's a use of LFSR's.
But if you have two hosts randomly pick an address, they can twiddle all 48 bits. Odds of a collision hit 2^48 unless all nodes ever activated are simultaneously active, in which case the odds of an eventual collision hit 50% once 2^24 nodes are live.
Thassa lot of nodes, but it's a nonzero chance of collision.
Incidentally, this is why direct sequence spread spectrum occasionally beats the pants off of frequency hopping. The former increments freq's along a linear progression; the latter uses PRNGs to choose which subband to hop onto next. It takes some synchronization, but the former can be guarantee to never collide -- while the latter is has to!
It is actually possible to design functions that are nonlinear and never collide, though. I'm trying to track one down right now, actually
Incidentally, it'll be interesting when they overflow the manufacturer byte(why haven't they already?).
--Dan
If you use a NIC it probably means you have Broadband, Some carriers require you to register your NIC, and I'm pretty sure most of these are in Australia, so it isn't a simple matter of just changine your MAC because if you change it your Broadband will go down.
As the software runs on the client machine, I don't think it matters if you have a hub that returns a different MAC, the software will still record the MAC of the machine you were on.
Of course, what will happen is a cracked version will be released that lets you specifiy the MAC you want to report in a config file.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
the first 8 bits of address specify the manufacturer. Not all the possible 8-bit codes are assigned.
And you believe that every NIC has a database of which codes have been assigned? What happens when new manufacturers are added - does every card in existence download the new database?
Secondly (just FYI), the manufacturer code is 24 bits, not 8 - for a list of codes, see http://www.tigress.com/info/mac
It's a game server. It's for playing a bloody game. If you don't like their rules, go and play on your own server. Personally I don't object to this, because if I want to play online games I want to be reasonably sure that the other players aren't cheating. This at least shows an attempt to stop the average wallhack Joe Lamer from fucking it up for everyone else.
Am I the only one that was wondering what the heck this story had to do with Macs and Apple? Damm, I feel so un1337.
I stole this Sig
Cheating as an art form
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
ifconfig dc0 lladdr 00:03:AF:42:C1:6E
You should cycle the interface or else you'll probably lose any existing connection. Here's a shell script I use for that purpose:Alias that to a command (say, `newmac`) and all you have to do is type `newmac 00:03:AF:42:C1:6E` to change the MAC. If you're not using a variation of the FreeBSD "simple" firewall be sure to edit or remove the last line in the script.
Shaun
Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
You can ban CD keys. Basically the only way around that is to buy a new copy of the game, which I doubt many people are willing to do.
Teh CD keys are also an effective anti-piracy measrure, and one that isn't bothersome to legit users. When you are using the game for local play, the CD key doesn't matter, it's never checked. When you play on the Internet, however, the CD key is authenticated.
When you first go to play multiplayer games, you client talks to the master server and lets it know what it's key is, the server chekcs and authenticates this against its list. Then, when you connect to a server the server checks your key, and asks the master if this is a legit key and if that key has authenticated. If not, the server refuses the connection.
Hence, you can ban a CD key, and be very certian that the person it belongs to has been completely banned. Things like key generators aren't effective because while they can know the algortihm used to make legit keys, the keyspace is huge and they have no way of knowing which are actually legit and which aren't.
So it ends up working out pretty nice for both parties. Bioware gets some copyprotection that there is actually a reason for srever owners to want to use.
Banning isn't the only reason they are implementing this. According to the FAQ,
"A major issue with [people finding/connecting through other gamebrowsers such as GameSpy, in-game-browsers, etc] is that users would frequently be playing on the GameArena servers whilst being almost totally unaware of the other services offered by GameArena, for example the files library, the ladders, GameCreate, the messageboards, and the statistics. "
I have a feeling that the real intention behind this is to make sure that their other services are promoted to people playing on their servers. I'm not going to argue if this is a good or bad thing, but I believe that it is the real reason behind the requirement.
Price, Quality, Time. Pick none. What, you thought you had a choice?
Q. How can I change my media access control (MAC) address under Windows NT 4.0?
c es\\Parameters.
A. Each network adapter card has a MAC address, which machines on local subnets use to talk to each other. MAC addresses are usually burned into the adapters during the manufacturing process. To overwrite a network adapter card's default MAC address, perform the following steps:
1. Start the registry editor (e.g., regedit.exe).
2. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servi
3. From the Edit menu, select New - String Value.
4. Type a name of NetworkAddress, and press Enter.
5. Double-click the new value, and enter the adapter's new MAC value.
6. Click OK.
7. Close the registry editor.
8. Reboot the machine.
This makes me very happy- One should be able to deliver their cutting remarks and wage psychiological warfare upon the weak with one liners like "Yeah thats what your mom did last night, cock jocky."
That is the essence of multiplayer gaming, and any attempt to deprive us of that should be fought bitterly.
You wouldn't even need to do it that randomly. A huge chunk of the MAC space is assigned to vendors who no longer exist or who produce non-consumer systems. You could just grab MAC addresses assigned to mainframe and minicomputer vendors, for example.
Ah, but the average cheater does know how to change the MAC address: visit their favorite warez/cheats site, download the application or instructions for changing the address, and change the address.
The smart cheater who writes the utility is central to the argument after all, since historically the smart cheaters have published tools for the ignorant ones not "eventually" but almost immediately. The smart cheaters have already published a workaround, and the rest of them already know where to find it.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
Hmmm. Total set of possibilities is 365*365, or 133225 different combinations of two people with two birthdays. Of those 133225 possibilities, 365 of them involve the two people having the exact same birthday. So:
/365
133225
======
365 (unsurprisingly)
1/365 times, two people have the same birthday. I think the two person case is special because if x equals y, y must also equal x. The -1 is really familiar, but the brute forcing above just doesn't flesh it out.
--Dan
"This is known as the birthday paradox, so named because this precise logic means that given 23 people in a room, there's a +50% chance that two people have the same birthday."
The same Month and Day, right? What are the odds of two people having the same Birtdate (Month, Day, and Year?) Much lower, and depends on the distribution of your domain, right?
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
1 - (d! / ((d-n)!d^n)) > 50%
where d is the number of possible options (i.e. 365 for birthdays), and n is the number of selected values (i.e. people).
So for the MAC address case if MAC addresses where randomly allocated (which they're not) you be looking for the smallest n where:
1 - ((2^48)! / ((2^48-n)! (2^48)^n)) > 50%
n will be considerably less than 2^24.
However, all of this is irrelevant as MAC addresses are not randomly picked by manufacturers and won't be randomly picked by people changing them.
That's the tragedy of the commons. All it takes is one asshole to ruin it for everyone. The only solution is to regulate it, and the only way to regulate it online is to block ISPs of bad users, because ISPs are slightly harder to change than MAC addresses.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
So long as you don't change things that break your local segment (ie: duplicate MACs), then you're fine - go for your life.
I find your ideas intriguing and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Not really a valid comparision, since the power company and other utilities tend to be regulated.
Perhaps it was a bad comparison, but unregulated monopolies do exist. Look at the owner of any subsisting copyright or patent.
You're talking about two different things - what a game server admin can do legally, and what conduct the user community is going to accept.
They're not entirely different. If a game flops because of the behavior of the publisher's exclusive server provider, the publisher loses the money it invested in developing and marketing the game and creating the server infrastructure. If the publisher loses too much money, it has its hands tied legally (bankruptcy law).
It is legal for the admin to decide who gets to play, but you have to be careful not to alienate the userbase.
Really? If you're a big company, you reserve the exclusive right to run servers for a game that you publish, and running a server for a given game is no longer profitable, you shut down the game's server. You don't care about alienating a particular game's userbase because alienating the userbase boosts your bottom line, that is, unless the game's userbase decides not to buy your next game.
(oh, and any scheme which is built on trusted clients will be crackable)
Except in the USA, one of the world's largest markets for PC video games.
Will I retire or break 10K?
> n will be considerably less than 2^24.
:-) Though I admit to dropping a null byte at the beginning -- some hardware just gets confused for strange reasons. Also it keeps me out of the multicast range except when I choose to be there.
How much less? Factorial math is pretty ugly, but the "half the entropy"(aka square root) rule is pretty widespread when designing cryptographic hashes against birthday attacks.
However, all of this is irrelevant as MAC addresses are not randomly picked by manufacturers and won't be randomly picked by people changing them.
Ummm, I use Yarrow to generate spoofed MACs
Anyway, random keygenerators are older than I am, Red. We're talking about a randomizer to get you around a MAC ban -- one-click unbans don't particularly ask you to type *anything*. And as I found out earlier, you can actually burn a new MAC into the hardware without a trace (though I suspect you might want to keep the manufacturer ID bytes the same).
--Dan
Great, I can now win by getting all my opponents banned from the game server:
/usr/sbin/getmacuserbanned.sh
for i in $opponent_mac
do
ifconfig eth0 down
ifconfig eth0 hw ether $i
ifconfig eth0 up
done
Xix.
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
Not that I expect [the release of a video game server daemon independently developed through reverse engineering] to ever happen for a sufficiently complex game
Then what's bnetd? It's a program licensed under GNU GPL that lets anybody set up a competitor to Battle.net service. However, assuming enforceability of shrinkwrap EULAs, the Blizzard EULA specifically prohibits users from running or connecting to bnetd-type services.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Many of them based on id software's engines, there are many games nowadays that use CD keys to prevent piracy. One of the first was Half Life, and unfortunately Half Life sold very well and used too simple a key... so it is relatively easy to 'generate' a valid Half Life key.
However, Quake 3 and related games have a CD Key system as well, and their keys are much more cryptographically secure. They have a legal keyspace in the trillions, making it very difficult to generate valid keys.
The system works. You can crack the game to make the key unnecessary, but you cannot crack all the Internet servers you could connect to. So a warez monkey can only play the game in single player or on a LAN, not on random Internet servers.
"I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
Almost every game makes this same "mistake" but usually it's because there is too much processing going on to handle it all at the server. How many cheaterstrike servers do you think there would be if they decided at the server side what you can and cannot see, which would make the cheater drivers useless? A game whose server requires a quad xeon isn't going to go far.
Games trust the client (to a certain degree) because some of the processing must be offloaded.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
A law that cannot be enforced because too many people refuse to observe it is probably a bad law, and should be amended.
Most dashslotters know that you can easily change the MAC address of a computer (PC, Macintosh, Sun ...) quite easily. If the "third party software" in question gets round the changes that something like ifconfig can make, well somebody will "reverse engineer" the software and distribute a patch.
The "MAC-based ban" mechanism will fail.
IANAOGP, but I think that the game server needs to be changed, to make it harder to break the rules, rather than trying to punish those who break them.
If you want to stop people from driving their cars too fast in a residential area, what do you do?
Modify the environment sufficiently, and people won't tryto cheat, because the extra effort won't be worth the marginal gain.
Interesting question.
Lets assume we had a random distribution of people between 0 and 60 years old, and we were interested in the same birthdate. So, that's 60*365 possibilities...21900 dates. Since the birthday paradox effectively approximates down to a square root of the number of possibilities(would you believe I never noticed this?) that's about 147 randomly picked people are required before you'll find two with the exact same birthdate.
Of course, US POPULATION DISTRIBUTIONS AREN'T RANDOM, there's this big ol' spike referred to as the Baby Boom, which is really accentuated by the Twentysomething Massacre that came right before -- so YMMV.
--Dan