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Valve Announces Half-Life 2 Code Theft Arrests
Ant writes "GameSpot and other sources report arrests were made:
Developer of the much-anticipated and delayed shooter sequel reveals an international wave of arrests has been made.
The Half-Life 2 code theft saga entered a new chapter today when Valve Software announced a series of arrests had been made in the case. According to Valve, suspects in several countries had been taken into custody in relation to charges stemming from the theft of the Half-Life 2 code, distribution of the code, and breaking into Valve's network..."
Not too many "other sources" available. The Google News search only lists the GameSpot article.
i wonder how the punishment's will align themselves, across countries and across the different charges... surely the "code theft" charge will be handled a little different from kevin mitnick's? ;)
time to sit back and watch, i guess... should be interesting.
1. Bad that people steal code.
2. Good for Half-Life 2 cause that means the fans really like it.
3. A possible sign that Valve should hire more people so they can release it sooner.
4. What moron allows an email to install a keyboard sniffer on his computer. Anti-virus and patches take care of a lot of that. Not to mention the network guys should have caught that one quick.
5. Fire the retarded programmer that lets sniffers get installed on his PC and fire the network guys that didn't stop it.
6. Release the game already
..it or did they actually found the guilty one's?
however.. does a game developer house have any responsibility over LYING about the state of the game? to investors, to publishing partners, to customers doing pre-orders... when they had no realistical hope of meeting the deadline(a deadline that they should have set and met 2 fucking years ago anyways).
sure they might have been under pressure to do so but what the hell, they told that the game was basically ready just few weeks before the whole hacking shesbang, in which case the hacking would have been a very big deal obviously. however, pushing the delays reason on it is just.. well, it sucks. they suck. getting hacked makes them suck anyways(would make me think twice in investing).
I'm not intrested in them catching the guys who did the hacking.. I'm intrested in if VALVE can get the game out or not! so, what i'm really intrested in is that if they have or have not coded the revolutionary AI they said they had coded already a friggin year ago(must have really been a kick in the nuts to see that the whole world saw that the demos were scripted, when you said that they werent..).
oh well, I could always buy that strategy guide from amazon.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Etiquette is etiquette. He kills his mother but he can't wear grey trousers.
If I'm not mistaken, it was not a 'retarded programmer' but Gabe himself that got keylogged
If you are targetted, virus scanners and patches won't stop a keylogger, perhaps a trojan scanner would have, but we don't know what keylogger was installed. After all if I go and code up a keylogger now, and install it on your PC, your virus scanners/ trojan scanners won't detect it.
but yes they should have released the game already
I dont know... maybe I am just a little backwords in my thinking, but Valve could have used this to an advantage. Think about it. If they open source the engine but not the content, wouldn't that allow everyone to make a better engine (hence, easier patching, more features) but not have the content unless they bought it? To me, that looks like the way to go anyway. I can find a bunch of sourceforge projects that do just that. You need the content, not the engine. Valve should sell the content, not the engine. Stealing the code was wrong, and the theives should be punished, but sometimes a business needs to find an advantage to these things.
How about a Linux release?
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Just having read about the fbi raid, I can't help but think that everyone should keep a few hundred small and/or dead hard drives around. Gotta keep them busy finding your 'stash'. They'd have to use a ream of paper to document all the computer equipment I have at this location.
Of course, I didn't do anything illegal.
-Adam
After reading the Valve blurb on HL2 I panned down the page and was shocked to see DNF mentioned
:-)
Half way down on the right side
DNF to be released in 2005? Wouldn't that be a shock. Personally I would be curious to see if it's any good compared to HL2 or Doom III. I may purchase it.. then again maybe not. The excitement isn't what it used to be for DNF
Has Comcast disconnected your Internet account? Same here. You can read about it at http://comcastissue.blogspot.com
The current business model is that when the first game for the new game engine comes out, the mod tools to go with that engine ship as part of the game package. Anybody who has bought the game can create new levels or whole new game concepts.
Once you have a good mod thrown together, you can release it however you want... but in order for your mod content to be playable your users are going to need a licensed copy of the game engine and that for the most part will mean purchasing the original game.
If mods are really good, they can enter the retail channel by striking a deal with the original game writers. At that point, the original game content is replaced with the mods and sent into retail stores as its own box. Profit for all involved.
It'd be nice if there was an OSS gaming engine of record to make the commercial game engines obsolete, but let's face it... those things are not easy to come up with. Furthermore, I'm not sure a "fair" multiplayer environment can ever be done with open source code... what would there to be to block people who have hacked the engine code to give them an autopilot shooter?
Its quite simple really, people who wish to do something they're not supposed to, ie download music illegally, do not want you to think of it as stealing or theft because then they're theives
That's because they aren't thieves. They're in violation of copyright. Copyright violation and theft have nothing whatsoever to do with each other. Perhaps the people violating copyright are a bit more clued into this distinction than you are.
The theft of valve code was an actual theft, not a copyright violation. The people in question hacked the system (or rather, idiots at Valve pretty much hacked it for them), then stole the code before the owners themselves had released it for publication. Legally, this isn't any different than bashing in a window at Valve Central, sneaking in, and stealing a disk with the code on it.
You might want to check to see if you know shit about the laws in question before spouting off on the topic.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Theft is taking without permission. Colloquially, the words theft and stealing mean the taking of anything, whether an object or ideas and has done for a very long time, therefore in informal speech it is quite correct to refer to it as stealing. If on the other hand, I was speaking as a lawyer, then the terms 'Copyright Infringement' or 'Larceny' or who knows how many other terms for a very specific set of circumstances, depending upon what and the value of what was 'inappropriately taken.' would be used. In either case, whether 'Copyright infringement' or 'Larceny' and its many degrees, something was taken that you had no rights to. That act of taking that which is not yours, and you have no right or permission to is encompassed in the word Theft.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
I find it funny that they had "all of a sudden" their source code stolen a bit after the date when they were suppose to release it (late september IIRC). I thought back then "ok this is just an excuse so they can finish the game".
In winter time, the news about half life 2 ceased completely (nothing on planethalflife, etc.) and then we heard about the X800 & GF6800 cards. BOOM all ofa sudden, for the E3 (perfect moment), Half life 2 appears in full strenght! Now, in the month where half life 2 is suppose to come out, they say they finall caught those guys.
I'm not sure what I should believe anymore but all I know is, they better not postpone the game again cause they're killing us!
Anybody else here who thinks or thought like me on some points?
Walking in someone's door and stealing their TV is legally different from breaking down someone's door (or otherwise bypassing their lock) and stealing their TV, at least here in the USA. Why should so-called piracy be any different?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
If arrests were made outside of the US then it makes you wonder if some sort of terrorist type approach was used. I sympathize with Valve because someone hacked into their network and created problems for their product however at the same time it's uncomfortable to see the US's arm of the law go overseas, especially if the US turned this issue into an act of terrorism.
actually steam is their 'auto update', server browser, master server, and license key authentication system.
;}
if this was leaked, yes it would take a long time to rework, but it wasn't THAT broken, they decided to release counterstrike:conditionzero via it and no one seems to have said anything.
flat out they are simply behind on their game - BUT they are paying the bill for it, not their publisher remember. valve pays 100% of development costs out of their pocket and gets really good royalty rates from their publishers as a result. This is the trick.
by looking at their E3 2004 video, it is pretty easy to see how the game could be behind schedule - it could be called 'biting off more than you can chew'
Gekido's Lair
IANAL, but actually it is different. If they broke in and stole a disk, then Valve has one less disk and a broken window. Many anti-RIAA slashdotters have repeatedly claimed that music copying isn't stealing because they didn't actually take or deprive someone of anything, they just copied it, which to me seems like what happened here.
I'd have to say that copying (and subsequently distributing) the source code was a copyright violation just like downloading an unlicensed mp3. The network intrusion is also a crime. There are probably also laws which might consider unreleased source code to have "trade secrets", which would be yet another crime. Therefore the entire operation is far more serious than sharing a copied music file, but the root event is probably similar.
This is not the greatest sig in the world, this is just a tribute.
So what you're saying is that there was a private key in the HL2 source which was compromised by the code release? And somehow, someone is expected to not have pulled this from memory? Your example doesn't make any sense, and certainly doesn't justify calling my comment "fucking stupid". But, I guess you know it all.
If their goal is just to prevent wallhacks and aimbots before the game goes gold, and not to prevent them in general, then there is already no point whatsoever in buying HL2 unless you plan to play only on LAN or single player, because that means it will likely be hacked up just as much as half-life. Their goal should be to devise technologies that proactively prevent wallhacks and aimbots.
Thinking that there is no such thing as inherently secure is absolutely ignorant. There are ways to do things which are inherently insecure, and there are ways to do things which are inherently secure. Another way to put it is secure by design. We see endless security updates for microsoft products because they are legacy code bases and they need constant band-aids because they are doing something inherently insecure. The same is true of buffer overflows on Unix systems, if you don't use/create functions which are vulnerable to buffer overflows, you won't have buffer overflows. Yet, people keep doing it. I am at a loss to explain it, but I can at least explain the results of their failure to take security into account.
A secure cryptosystem is secure even when the source is released. A game should be the same way, and it is; if having the uncompiled source code makes the game insecure, it doesn't - the game was already insecure.
True, the need for security means moving more processing to the server. It may even mean the end of games which can use a non-dedicated server. Further, the server may need to be as CPU-intensive as the game itself, and maybe even moreso. But, that is a price which I (and millions of others) will be willing to pay if it actually brings a game resistant to cheating. You can rent time on professional gaming servers, and people all over the world have enough money to run full time servers. A game with no cheating will itself likely have allure enough to draw in business to replace any lost through people not willing to pay for the anti-cheating features.
There is no such thing as entirely secure. There are, however, right and wrong ways to do things.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
It's not the missing the release date that gets to me. It's that they didn't announce it was going to be late until a matter of days before the original release date. On top of that, for a game that was meant to be finished 4 months after announcing, we're now at 11 months, which makes me wonder if they ever really believed they'd make that date, or were just winding up the gamers to get them interested.
And that's what bugs me.
Normally when the FBI or other agency busts a piracy ring, they're proud as hell about it. They talk about how many people they arrested, in however many countries they made the arrests, how many dollars in stolen software the pirates were responsible for, and so on, and so forth. Even when the FBI went after Skylarov at Adobe's request, the FBI was very proud of what they did, bringing such an eeeeeevul pirate to justice.
In this case, it's Valve, the company that did something very stupid that allowed their code to get stolen, and not an actual law-enforcement agency, that's releasing all the vague details of the arrests, whereas all the FBI has to say is that "Yes, we made some arrests." No details on who, or where.
That's very unusual. What's up with that?
Obscurity is the only option in this case.
Well, no. There is one other option: strong hardware DRM, with severe criminal penalties for anyone producing a DRM circumvention device...
And actually, that's the way online gameplay is going. Half-Life2 would NOT have obscurity anyway, regardless of the code leak. The hackers would just need a few extra days to reverse-engineer the machine code before writing the cheat-modules.
Instead, most shooting games today are moving towards a solution like PunkBuster, which requires the player to allow a "trusted" 3rd party to remotely inspect your computer's memory to hunt for cheats. (In fact, Punkbuster now requires you to log in as the Windows "administrator" account before playing online!).
But, Punkbuster is doomed to eventual failure. Someone will manage to run it within a completely emulated environment that looks legit, but still allows wallhacking or aimbotting. The only way to prevent that will be strong hardware DRM. (Which is already happening with X-Box and similar)
Thanks for clearing that up Gabe. Quite a few people (including myself) felt that the break-in was a bad excuse for delaying the game. I post to hopefully get more attention to your post
/.ers are going to be flaming soon me thinks
anyway if I were you I would still buckle down b/c the linux
well actually, This "intelectual property argument" would depend on your definition and the use. you can't own an idea, you can however put the idea to works and own the works. Intelectual property is either the idea, or the works made from the idea. Technicaly it is the idea and not both.
To ilistrate this, think of putting icing on a doughnut, then try and pattent or take owner ship of this idea. You can't. Now think of making a pice of software that does a specific thing,in a specific way. You can own the device it created but not the idea of making the device.
In this case the device is a specific game that plays a certain way. You can own the game (a device or copy writen work) but not the idea of making a game. Once the game is made into a device or a work, it is physical and not intelectual hence the argument that always ensues trying to colorfully state the differences and as always, someone will goto the extream in one direction or the other.
If you noticed, the parent made the conection of it not being intelectual property and refered it to a physical object like copy right instead. Now the oposite extream has been made were someone can't figure out that copyright or physical property has value and then claims to make an argument about those that don't believe in the way they do live in some alternate reality. In short,the reality is when looking at the way it is being used, both are the same thing and aren't intelectual at all but physical instead.
It depends. If they are writing an aimbot that works entirely off of the I/O drivers, then you are correct - there's no answer to aimbots on general purpose computers.
On the other hand, the aimbots actually work by reading and manipulating the program's memory state, and therefore have more information to work with than the user would have. Given that, there are a number of ways to secure games from that class of attacks, the simplest with current technology being PunkBuster.
An example of another technique that can be used is having server-controlled constantly moving enviornments. If there is grass everywhere blowing in the wind, and insects flying around, and birds, etc, and there is no difference in the in-memory data structures between a bird and a player, then anyone who kills every bird in thier LOS in twitch-time is obviously using an aimbot.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
Someone either broke physically into their building, broke electronically into their servers, or illegally duplicated a legal copy (which is defined by law as theft)
1) There was never any legal copy. There was one original held by Valve, and lots of illegal copies made.
2) Even though the result of stealing a CD and pirating a CD is pretty much the same (less the cost of packaging), they go under different laws.
Pirating is illegal. Stealing is illegal. That does not imply that pirating is stealing. This reminds me of a play by Ludvig Holberg (1684-1754): "A stone can not fly. 'Mor Nille' can not fly. Thus, 'Mor Nille' is a stone."
IP is a nonsense concept, because it doesn't say if it's copyright, patent, trademark or otherwise. Likewise IP theft has no meaning in any legal sense, it's a buzzword for the media. It's trying to ascribe attributes to copyright violations that simply aren't real.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Well, again, for the slow readers...
Of course there is a problem with breaking into someone's property, stealing stuff and breaking even electronic stuff. What I tried to say is that the fact that matters _in_this_case_ is not theft itself, (a small damage for the company, and maybe a big crime, punished with years in jail in most places) but copyright infringement (a big damage for the company, in this case) , which is not a form of theft, because no one is deprived of their property. You could say thet they are deprived of potential profits, and be right, but that is not intellectual property theft.
Intellectual property has no specific meaning itself, because it is usually applied to many concepts that have little to do with each other (patents, trade marks, trade secrets, copyright, property). Although it is actually used in many places, that term is confusing, because leads to the incorrect assumption that they are all the same, and that they are property, while they share little with each other, and with the concept of property. That leads to the general public to make assumptions about copyight by analogy to property, or to patents, while that would be wrong. Copyright infringement has its own laws everywhere.