cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/10958052
Vanguard, the controversial anti-cheat software initially attached to Valorant, is now also coming to League of Legends.
Summary:
The article discusses Riot Games’ requirement for players to install their Vanguard anti-cheat software, which runs at the kernel level, in order to play their games such as League of Legends and Valorant. The software aims to combat cheating by scanning for known vulnerabilities and blocking them, as well as monitoring for suspicious activity while the game is being played. However, the use of kernel-level software raises concerns about privacy and security, as it grants the company complete access to users’ devices.
The article highlights that Riot Games is owned by Tencent, a Chinese tech giant that has been involved in censorship and surveillance activities in China. This raises concerns that Vanguard could potentially be used for similar purposes, such as monitoring players’ activity and restricting free speech in-game.
Ultimately, the decision to install Vanguard rests with players, but the article urges caution and encourages players to consider the potential risks and implications before doing so.
One more reason to switch to Linux! (It can’t run Valorant)
Correct me if I’m wrong but if it can’t run Valorant then it can’t run the game in general, so you’d be just as well off by not playing Riot games on a Windoze or Mac machine as well.
I’m ok with running a VM to run software if I absolutely have to but this won’t even let you do that.
Not supporting a game is not a reason to switch to linux, and the more games aren’t supported, the less people are gonna switch. The Linux zeal on this site is comical.
“Haha my OS cant play games that have millions of concurrent daily users each!”
How the year of the Linux gaming PC coming?
It’s the other way around: no game is worth sacrificing security and privacy by giving it kernel level access.
The argument is: more and more games are running on Linux and there’s a damn good reason not to play the ones that don’t at all.
That’s a great argument for the extremely small percentage of gamers who give a damn about that, but just about all of them are already on linux, so if that’s the way forward for linux gaming, congrats it’s at full saturation. This site is wild. Downvotes for pointing out thay not running games thay millions play a day is bad for gaming on the OS. I may as well be talking to Republicans about Biden. You’re zealots.
Go on the legaue and valorant forums see how many of the millions you can convince that Linux security is more important than being able to play with their friends.
Hey bud. The original comment was a joke.
Lol bold opinion on this site when people are already responding that its good for Linux gaming that it won’t play games that has intrusive anticheat. I’ll admit sure it’s better for security, but to think that’s a good thing for gaming on Linux is hilarious.
No, it’s obviously better to have the choice (run the game or not). And losing a game that previously worked on Linux is obviously a bad thing, hence the joke about it being good.
Of course you could argue that taking a stance against this kind of intrusive anticheat is good in the long run. If Microsoft had a backbone they’d do the same.
But yeah losing games because of anticheat is obviously a bad thing lol. No need to take it so seriously.
The comment was about valorant, did that one ever work on Linux, if so I wasn’t aware that they figured it out. Didnt seem like a joke, and people are unironocally agreeing with it soooo
I don’t give a shit if a billion people suddenly decide that shooting their own brains is a great idea, shooting yourself is still a bad idea.
Just so you understand, you aren’t downvoted because you have a different opinion. You are downvoted because the conversation is basically this:
Post: Company does evil and shit things!
You: Well the majority lets them so I will too and so should you.
Others: We should not let company do evil.
You: Haha but majority lets them so I will too and you should too!
See how stupid it is?
Im literally just asking for people to not act like that’s a good thing. Also your example is exactly how ALL companies work, tell me do you avoid every product Nestle makes? If by some miracle you do, there’s at least a dozen other mega companies I imagine you can’t. I don’t understand how you call that stupid considering I’d wager a lot of money you participate in systems EXACTLY like that.
tell me do you avoid every product Nestle makes?
Yes, actually. If you don’t buy processed foods it’s very easy.
there’s at least a dozen other mega companies I imagine you can’t.
Try me.
So, requiring to puncture the security and privacy of your PC for a game is ok, as long as millions of players are affected. Did I understand you correctly, here?
The same people would let Sony install a rootkit so they can listen to music on their PC.
Nowhere did I say that, what I said is most gamers do not care. So what I’m implying is if you want Linux desktop OS to overtake the next highest competitor (which is ‘OS unknown’ btw) you’re going to need to do better. For at least the past 20 years gaming has been a social phenomena more than anything else, and not being able to play games that millions play daily isn’t a brag for linux gaming just because you’re more secure than they are. Unknown OS is ahead of linux on desktop share, not just gaming desktop, all desktop. Linux ranks just below a statistical anomaly and just above chrome os. If that’s fine with you than fine, but if you’re one of the people for whom gaming is a very social thing, then you’re probably never moving to linux at this rate, or at least hope things get better. But apparently I’m the only one unsatisfied with what gaming on linux looks like, and everyone else loves it as is. Welp, if that’s how it is and this is what linux gaming is supposed to be, then it’s defiantly not for me either.
Name checks out.
It was a joke, chill your beans.
How the year of the Linux gaming PC coming?
very well, thank you.
How the year of the Linux gaming PC coming?
Pretty damn good! I can play all of my games that I want!
It may sound silly, but for a lot of people being unable to play games like Valorant, Warzone or League of Legends it’s actually a feature and not a bug or a problem.
Pro tip, you can not install those games on literally every OS, so even if that’s a feature for you, its one you absolutely do not need linux for.
“Thats the best part of my ti 89 calculator. It doesn’t play Lol Cod or Valorant!”
What a brilliant feature, that calculator was ahead of its time.
OP was saying something along the lines of ‘if Valorant can’t run on Linux, it’s a sign your privacy is much less compromised.’ After all this community is specifically about privacy.
Ima tell you right now 90% probably more of the val community wouldnt play the game on linux or switch regardless of if it ran or not so it so it doesnt really matter
How the year of the Linux gaming PC coming?
You’re right, it’s been absolutely devastating not being able to play games on my computer. I’ll go cry over my video game consoles.
League of Legends doesn’t run on console . . .
You’re right, it’s been absolutely devastating not being able to play a 14-year old game that I have no interest in playing on my computer. I’ll go cry over my video game consoles.
Meh just another crappy rootkit game that doesn’t even fully prevent cheating at the cost of undermining system security. But for worse or worse, the entire playerbase doesn’t care about their data being bought and sold for immense profits they get 0% of.
Oh. Now I remember why I have never played League of Legends.
You’ve never played League of Legends because they just now introduced kernal level anti cheat? That doesn’t even make sense.
Don’t play at first, because the game fosters toxicity like hell. Keep not playing due to the kernel-level anticheat.
More like Anti-Linux Software since the cheat works great.
since the cheat works great.
I’ve heard that cheaters are very rampent in Valorant, so not really effective anti cheat software.
But as anti-linux is amazing. 👌
yeah… and I’m a bit sad, since I really think that Valorant is fun (with friends), but it’s a price I’m willing to pay.
You know, Valve once considered making an entire OS to prevent cheating. I’d assume something like SteamOS, but incredibly locked down and designed for playing Valve games. Obviously that never got past the idea stage, but disregarding the truckload of issues with that idea, one big one is that you could use either physical cheating tools, by messing with the direct hardware inputs, or run it in a VM. Basically, unless you have a player in a locked-off room, with a pc, keyboard, and mouse provided by you, and the pc running your own locked-down OS… well, someone’s gonna figure out a way to cheat.
That’s not to say that anticheat can be ignored entirely, but since there is no remotely reasonable state which could eradicate cheating entirely, you need to find a happy medium of not “infecting” the player’s pc with a new backdoor, because even if you’re not malicious, someone else will be, and nothing at all. Something that has a minimum level of invasiveness with a maximum level of cheating prevention, at least filtering out basic script kiddies.
The problem with that is, nobody cares. Basically nobody even knows what a “Kernel” is and what “Kernel-level” means and implies, so it’s just some weird anticheat for them. Also, as long as DRM doesn’t interfere with their playing experience, they don’t care either. Barely anyone will even notice if a few frames are missing, because Denuvo is chilling in the background, keeping the game “safe”.
We are a subset of privacy-minded people in a subset of somewhat knowledgeable gamers. Losing us as customers doesn’t matter in the slightest to the devs/publishers, and nobody else will make a fuss, or at least they’ll not stop spending money.
The problem with that is, nobody cares. Basically nobody even knows what a “Kernel” is and what “Kernel-level” means and implies, so it’s just some weird anticheat for them. Also, as long as DRM doesn’t interfere with their playing experience, they don’t care either. Barely anyone will even notice if a few frames are missing, because Denuvo is chilling in the background, keeping the game “safe”.
We are a subset of privacy-minded people in a subset of somewhat knowledgeable gamers. Losing us as customers doesn’t matter in the slightest to the devs/publishers, and nobody else will make a fuss, or at least they’ll not stop spending money.
Yeah, computer illiteracy is pretty bad. Those who don’t care make the most money to companies, and they don’t even care how the companies invade their privacy and or security.
The first crack took around 4 days.
The only difference us that cheats now cost more money than before.
Riot Games Now Requires Kernel-Level Anti-Cheat Software
In other words, a Chinese rootkit. Wouldn’t want a Chinese backdoor in my kernel, but that’s just my personal opinion. If you want one, go ahead, install this garbage.
You already have NSA backdoors in your device.
Well, if you install this Riot Games rootkit, you now also have a Chinese backdoor.
What is your point exactly ?
I don’t support this existing, but does the nsa collect and sell all your data to third parties and make a shitload of money doing so? Because everyone else definitely does. I don’t know how difficult it is now, but some number of years ago you could request a copy of all the data some of the social media sites have on you and it’s fucking scary especially with how much is deduced, presumably from piecing together info from your entire social network.
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I’d much rather have the USA as a world leader, but considering that neither if them are anywhere near that level of control, giving my data to China is the better option.
If the US has my data and the worst case happens, i.e. anything in my data labels me as a terrorist (let’s be honest, nothing else matters to the NSA, they don’t care about your day to day life), then the possibility is high that my own government gets a hint and I’m locked up pretty quickly.
If China has my data the worst case is that I can’t set foot into China, that’s it.
Both options are shit, but having their data in China means less possible harm for anyone that isn’t a Chinese or Russian citizen.
Well, the world today kind of sucks and continues to decline and the US plays global police force which no one asked for.
Dude, I’m from Latin America, I prefer ANYONE but USA.
Just don’t buy it. It’s very simple.
Lol is free to play
Don’t play it, then
My biggest issue wouldn’t even be the kernel level access, but the fact that the stuff is written and tested by no one in particular. The possible bugs are the issue for me.
If that thing would be bullet-proof, hackers trying for years to break it without success, yeah. Ok. I could be convinced. If it is cracked after two days already… Then nope.
Will their future MMO have this trash?
It’s likely, but I do really hope it’s not put into the MMO as I would love to play a Riot MMO. I won’t be installing it if it uses Vanguard.
Same. I miss the IP (especially Arcane) & the friends I made playing LoL—and I think I could have a good time living in the world, but not at the cost of compromising device permissions. Same reason I refuse to use my shitty banking app if they try to tell me what software I can & can’t run/install or how to operate the device I own.
Fail
Kernel level? Hahaha. No thanks.
This has been known for years and it’s not different from the behavior of EAC, whether it’s good or bad.
Except that EAC doesn’t have to run from startup and can be started on demand. Vanguard has to run all the time.
But yeah, Vanguards shitty behavior is known since its inception.
This. An always-on rootkit is worlds different in terms of privacy and security than most conventional ones like EAC.
(Not like conventional ACs are good for these things either, of course. But it is many degrees less invasive.)Technically you can also start it on demand, you just need to reboot before and after 😅
While you are technically correct, this is a massive PITA to turn off manually every single boot and rebooting just to play a game isn’t very fun, ha. (It also breaks linux, where I play.)
Yea, I agree it’s not worth it…
Take my angry upvote 😄
Fair point!
