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    Read This BEFORE You Get Banned

    We would like to make everyone aware of a recent development related to Punkbuster.

    Synopsis: If you run chat programs such as IRC, Instant messaging including XFire while gaming, you need to take security measures or DO NOT RUN THEM AT ALL. People are sending or downloading files to people OVER those programs while you are playing.

    Example: The prankster sends you a file with a command to execute an Aimbot program. You don't have aimbot? IT DOESN'T MATTER whether you do or don't. Punkbuster is scanning your memory and sees aimbot files and commands and will BAN you.


    Please remember that these are PBBans bans, NOT Cain's Lair bans. If you get banned there is nothing we can do, as long as we share their banlists ans stream to their servers our banlists. You will need to appeal the ban to PBBans.com directly if you get a PBBans Hub ban.


    This is the official public announcement by Punkbuster:

    March 25, 2008

    We rarely announce anything regarding commercial cheats and hacks. However, we are aware of the numerous "You Tube" type videos and posts on various sites where hackers who sell cheats make claims that are false but sound believable about PunkBuster and hack detection status. We receive numerous emails daily by concerned honest players regarding advertisements for undetectable hacks, etc. The truth is that via recent enhancements to PunkBuster's detection capabilities, we have cracked down hard on cheaters who pay for hacks in the games we support. Some commercial cheat sites have closed down due to our new methods and others have private forums where punks routinely complain about getting caught with the "undetectable" hacks, demanding refunds, etc. We have always maintained a strict policy of not giving money to punks, but thanks to community volunteer moles who have helped us obtain access to private hacks via donations of their time, etc., PunkBuster has been catching hacks from virtually all commercial cheat sites in recent weeks and months.

    One of the recent enhancements involves our memory scanner which aggressively scans for patterns included in known cheats (public and private). A commercial hack site where we have had recent success catching their subscribers has recently staged a few demonstrations of inserting text-based patterns via certain chat-related systems such as IRC, Instant Messaging, etc. directly into the memory of computers. These are specific text patterns that we have deployed in some supported games in the recent past. It is clear that many of the demonstrators are cheat-supporters willingly participating in the demonstration, but there is evidence that some innocent players had PunkBuster violations triggered during the past few days by the hackers who sent specific text patterns into the chat programs that were open during gameplay. We are removing these text based patterns from our system and encourage admins to not ban for PB violations that occurred during the past few days.

    Online gamers who play with other programs running should always enable security features in their messaging and chat programs to deny auto-download of files and only accept downloads from people they know and trust. As always, from PunkBuster's standpoint, if a known cheat pattern is in the memory of the computer during gameplay, then a violation will be triggered. We have always suggested closing other programs while you are playing multiplayer games on PunkBuster servers and that remains the safest policy. Leagues that require chat room usage for competitive play should take steps to ensure that only league participants have access and suspicious activity should be reported to us when there are concerns about manipulating the system.

    http://www.evenbalance.com/

    ====

    PBBans is looking into this and will soon hopefully remove people falsely banned for cheating, when they were not.

    #2
    That is not good news at all. So glad i hardly use Xfire, or any other messaging software.

    Comment


      #3
      Thousands have been banned because of this. I read this too on another website which I won't mention here. This is the first time I have touched a computer in the last few days since I have been severely sick and bedridden. Hope everyone reads this and nobody here has been a victim. Hope all is well and I'll be back maybe tomorrow or somethin... until then peace out.

      ~~mike~~

      P.S. One of the people who had a hand in this exploit has been banned by cainslair for using an aimbot.
      Last edited by -IRC-MIKE; 28 Mar 2008, 07:42 AM.

      Comment


        #4
        Let this be a lesson to everyone. NEVER allow auto-accept on ANY IM program.
        A change of Pace.
        "All the fun of a clan without the BS" - Cain

        Comment


          #5
          Wow thats crazy cause I use Xfire, IRC and Messenger while gaming


          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by paceman View Post
            Let this be a lesson to everyone. NEVER allow auto-accept on ANY IM program.
            Generally, I now try to avoid any third party VOIP chat clients. I would advise others to do the same unless it is absolutely necessary. If you MUST do so, then do as I do and run your chat client on a different machine than the one you use for gaming. (As long as you don't have punkbuster installed on the machine, then you are safe.)

            See my post on the other forum here about this topic.

            http://www.cainslair.org/showthread....0954#post50954


            P.S. In fact, the machine I use as my idiot machine is a simple 200mhz Packard Bell. I use it to chat with and I choose that machine because it was one of the first few machines that runs well and will auto detect a hard drive larger than a 20 Gig. It was also my first linux webserver.

            Comment


              #7
              Thanks for this heads up, I have deleted xfire from my system
              [img]http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y56/vitopagano/CoD2/limeyfunny.jpg[/img]
              [img]http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y232/english911/admin.jpg[/img]
              [size=4][color=blue][url]http://www.cainslair.org/billspaypal.php?[/url][/color][/size]

              Comment


                #8
                Good news...
                http://www.evenbalance.com/troubleti...7f12f0867b46b9 note #5
                Update: still getting the run around from PBBans, but looks to me as if Evenbalance is lifting it.
                Last edited by Rogue7; 2 Apr 2008, 11:09 PM.

                Comment


                  #9
                  Good Deal. Glad to see it. I figured they'd be flexible.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Not sure what ya'all have done, if anything at all. But I got in, though with my luck, it'll prolly be temporary for some odd reason. I am still really unsure as to what is going on. I have been, and I have to due to PBBans power has gone to their heads, I have to be nice, and work with them as well as Evenbalance.
                    Here's the question/ deal/ whatever ya want to call it. I am going to attempt to get back in ya'alls server and see how long I stay, hopefully i dont get kicked. I am going to let ya know that I am still on the "ban list" they have. So its up to you dudes to do whatever ya want, just let me know if ya want me to leave and I will. I can give ya the tickets url's and forum url's and check out the traffic. From what it looks like to me, its just sit and wait til they come up with a solution. Evenbalance cant find anything, and the PBBans are too power hungry to look. So when EB says "false positive", ban removed. So, here goes and we'll see if i get the boot or not.


                    Nevermind, guess the server crash just had reset it and it didnt take but a few second and I was gone again. Guess I am waiting some more.
                    Last edited by Rogue7; 8 Apr 2008, 08:15 PM. Reason: Update

                    Comment


                      #11
                      i have been wondering where you were.we need to get this man back on the server.hes probably going through withdrawls.hope it gets straightened out.ready to see you on the battle field

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Oh..i am. And taking it out on new privates, Army privates. (Drill Sergeant here). Sent ya a message but will post it, nothing really personal.

                        Still in the works, like I said, i can give ya'all the links to the ticket and all..http://www.evenbalance.com/troubleti...7f12f0867b46b9

                        but until Evenbalance says the magic words, I cant do squat. they sit there and act like I shouldnt have a ban, but i still do, and havent really done crap about it. i dont get it, and to get testy with PBBans is a oneway ticket to buying a new game and having my name forever etched in the banned section.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Man that sux Rogue...I really enoyed yuo on the server wning every1 and givin them a taste of reality LOL...I hope things work out for you and I will def make an appeal on ur behalf


                          Comment


                            #14
                            there's really nothing ya'all can do. Its been going on since the 27th..roughly. Like I said, waiting on Evenbalance to figure out whatever..and being nice to PBBans.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Glad im not a private,lol.

                              Comment

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