League of Legends likely unplayable on Linux / Steam Deck soon due to Vanguard anti-cheat

Quoting: scaine

Quoting: BlackBloodRumDo they not realise that this software has a high enough level of access to do any number of activities on their computer, and hide it from the OS and the user? For example, hide a running process from "Task manager" on Windows, and continue running even after they close the game?

Can you really justify that level of access just for a game?

Course they can. They do. They're not techies, they just want to play games and write the odd email, maybe check their socials (although that's probably more phone-based these days). Besides, it's the norm on Windows - everything gets full control. AV software, for example. There are still hundreds of articles out there that suggest that if you're having a problem with a given piece of software, two common troubleshooting tips are a) turn off your AV and/or firewall and b) run it as root.

It's a different culture, which makes sense, because it's a different audience.

I guess so, but even so it should raise red flags even to someone who's not overly technical. But I get it.

Quoting: scaineI'll bet there are mechanics out there who walk past my car while I'm sitting at a set of lights and can critic all sorts of stuff I do with it - poor tire wear, dirty interior, crass stickers, slipping fan belt, revving too high whatever. I don't care. I'm not a car person. I don't give a single shit about the state of my car. But I care deeply about the tech I use.

You know, I used to think you was a decent fellow, but if this is how you treat your car, I'm afraid I can't think that any more.

Spoiler, click me

Just kidding!

Quoting: CatKiller

Quoting: Purple Library GuyOK, this quote annoys me:

Quote"No unfortunately not. From a security point of view supporting WINE would be like having a bank vault at the top of Nakatomi Tower then installing a doggy door in it."

Shyeah right, your anti-cheat is like a bank vault at the top of Nakatomi Tower. Also you walk on water and your shit doesn't stink. I'm sure it's been hacked six ways from Sunday, and here he is being all arrogant about it. What a douche.

Even if one were to claim that Linux were less secure - despite literally all of the high-value infrastructure everywhere using Linux... the vault at Nakatomi Plaza got breached. If he's going to go with plots from films he should have gone with Fort Knox: so radioactive that it's worthless.

Security is a wide term.
Linux is really good at allowing the owner of a device to choose who gets to do what.
It's only mediocre at letting the developer of the software on a device choose who gets to do what and Valve has made surprising little effort to achieve the latter.(I appreciate this)
Anti cheat "security" is of the second kind.
Server security is of the first kind.

Quoting: Purple Library Guy

Quoting: CybolicI've said this since the Celine Dion rootkit fiasco: rootkits should not be legal and I don't understand how they still are.

Come to that I'd be willing to bet there are laws in at least some countries that if you looked at them in that context you'd think, "Hang on, doesn't this actually break that law?" I mean, there's all these anti-hacker laws, many of them worded in a way their drafters didn't realize was so broad, or just defined weirdly, or both . . . this stuff probably falls afoul of some of them if you take the wording seriously, it's just most law enforcement pretend that's not what the law says because you can't go around putting rich corporations in jail for doing business, even if that business is crime.

A. Those laws were still being formed back then.
This is actually a very old scandal.
B. Sony has lost multiple court cases for this kind of behavior, some really really expensive. Uche OtherOs Uche.

Sony is the OpenAi of drm development. Everything for the win.

Quoting: LoudTechie

Quoting: CatKiller

Quoting: Purple Library GuyOK, this quote annoys me:

Quote"No unfortunately not. From a security point of view supporting WINE would be like having a bank vault at the top of Nakatomi Tower then installing a doggy door in it."

Shyeah right, your anti-cheat is like a bank vault at the top of Nakatomi Tower. Also you walk on water and your shit doesn't stink. I'm sure it's been hacked six ways from Sunday, and here he is being all arrogant about it. What a douche.

Even if one were to claim that Linux were less secure - despite literally all of the high-value infrastructure everywhere using Linux... the vault at Nakatomi Plaza got breached. If he's going to go with plots from films he should have gone with Fort Knox: so radioactive that it's worthless.

Security is a wide term.
Linux is really good at allowing the owner of a device to choose who gets to do what.
It's only mediocre at letting the developer of the software on a device choose who gets to do what and Valve has made surprising little effort to achieve the latter.(I appreciate this)
Anti cheat "security" is of the second kind.
Server security is of the first kind.

This is true in terms of anti-cheat (e.g, they want to control what you do). But, in my opinion the owner of a device should always have the final say on what their desktop can or cannot do.

That level of control isn't just for servers, it's for desktops too. Your computer can potentially hold your most personal information, as such you should have full control over it[1].

The desktop user (device owner) should be fully able to control and limit what an application can do, anti-cheat or not.

Personally, I significantly limit what steam and my games can or cannot access on my computer. They get bare minimum permissions, they don't need more and will certainly never get any kernel-level control.

[1] I believe the same for smartphones where used. But I don't use mine a lot, so it doesn't hold much data for me.

It's time to say goodbye!

Don't played this game for 1 year, feels good, i recomend for all

In case some folks may have forgotten:
"The Sony BMG CD copy protection scandal concerns the copy protection measures included by Sony BMG on compact discs in 2005. When inserted into a computer, the CDs installed one of two pieces of software that provided a form of digital rights management (DRM) by modifying the operating system to interfere with CD copying. Neither program could easily be uninstalled, and they created vulnerabilities that were exploited by unrelated malware. One of the programs would install and "phone home" with reports on the user's private listening habits, even if the user refused its end-user license agreement (EULA), while the other was not mentioned in the EULA at all. Both programs contained code from several pieces of copylefted free software in an apparent infringement of copyright, and configured the operating system to hide the software's existence, leading to both programs being classified as rootkits.

Sony BMG initially denied that the rootkits were harmful. It then released an uninstaller for one of the programs that merely made the program's files visible while also installing additional software that could not be easily removed, collected an email address from the user and introduced further security vulnerabilities.

Following public outcry, government investigations and class-action lawsuits in 2005 and 2006, Sony BMG partially addressed the scandal with consumer settlements, a recall of about 10% of the affected CDs and the suspension of CD copy-protection efforts in early 2007."
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal

This was an absolutely nasty piece of work. I worked in Computer Repair for a small neighnorhood shop back in those days. Removal of this rootkit was nigh impossible. Caused BSoDs. The only real way to deal with it was to remove the drive, recover any data from it from a different system, and the do a compl;ete reinstall of the OS, along with a warning and a printout of info concerning the Sony rootkit, and letting them know that latest hot CD burning up the charts was the cause of their woes.

I won't use any recreational software that needs kernel-level access.

Quoting: BlackBloodRumDo they not realise that this software has a high enough level of access to do any number of activities on their computer, and hide it from the OS and the user? For example, hide a running process from "Task manager" on Windows, and continue running even after they close the game?

Can you really justify that level of access just for a game?

Maybe a bit pessimistic, but i'm not really surprised by it. Have you heard techbros or (in earlier times) PC magazines talk abot free software or software freedom? I sure haven't. The only time you (rarely) see this stuff is to maybe to compare it to something else to see how slow/fast it is. And it's been going like that for ages. It also reminds me how parents refuse to do parental controls on devices.

Quoting: dubigrasuHow good is Vanguard compared with other AC software out there? Is that efficient on Valorant?

If you're talking about performance, Valorant runs fine with it on.

If you're talking about security, you can circumvent the anti-virus (and most other kernel-level software) with a Windows VM.

Quoting: Pyretic

Quoting: dubigrasuHow good is Vanguard compared with other AC software out there? Is that efficient on Valorant?

If you're talking about performance, Valorant runs fine with it on.

If you're talking about security, you can circumvent the anti-virus (and most other kernel-level software) with a Windows VM.

I was asking how efficient is in terms of combating cheating in whatever form. Is Valorant cheaters free, or at least is cheating significantly reduced compared with other AC software, so much so that is worth (for Riot) the public backlash?
And as a side note, what other game (if any) is using it?

Quoting: dubigrasu

Quoting: Pyretic

Quoting: dubigrasuHow good is Vanguard compared with other AC software out there? Is that efficient on Valorant?

If you're talking about performance, Valorant runs fine with it on.

If you're talking about security, you can circumvent the anti-virus (and most other kernel-level software) with a Windows VM.

I was asking how efficient is in terms of combating cheating in whatever form. Is Valorant cheaters free, or at least is cheating significantly reduced compared with other AC software, so much so that is worth (for Riot) the public backlash?
And as a side note, what other game (if any) is using it?

Security is hard to measure(especially for security through obscurity products maybe protected by the "effective measures" clause)
There are free and openly accessible cheats of Valorant.
Cheats have existed, since the beta.
There appear to be no other games using it.
Vanguard appears to have decent VM detection(circumventable, but requiring at least some research).


Last edited by LoudTechie on 12 January 2024 at 12:23 pm UTC