A Karen and a cop can’t put someone in jail. It takes a prosecutor, a judge and a jury of her peers.

This is not factual. A cop can bring anyone into jail that they have just about any made up reason to.

It takes all those extra individual to put you in prison.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/jail-vs-prison-difference

Stopping processes is actually a user space action.

Now you backpedal and say

Pretty much all code is making requests to the kernel.

But I don’t know what I’m talking about? Sure. We’ll go with that if it makes you feel good. I only literally taught it at a post-grad level at an R1 institution, but what do I know.

It’s side stepping the kernel. That’s the whole point.

You’re getting it! Kind of at least. The anti-cheat actually modifies the kernel (in an extension kind of way, like drivers do). That’s the point though. Which seems to have repeatedly whooshed over your head. But I can only say it in so many ways and be ignored. Good luck. Hope I don’t run into your code.

Stopping processes is actually a user space action. You can do it without admin rights btw. Even if it popped the admin screen that’s still not a kernel level action.

Absolutely not. Task management is the job of the operating system/kernel. You can request to end a job/task. The kernel will do it on it’s own time. UAP prompts are attempts to elevate permissions so that you can access higher kernel calls.

https://linux-kernel-labs.github.io/refs/heads/master/lectures/syscalls.html#linux-system-calls-implementation

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/111625/how-does-linux-kill-a-process

You can make requests the to the kernel. If you have permission/ownership to the process the kernel will work through the sigterm/sigkill to meet your request. It is not a user space action at all to kill a process, you make requests to the kernel to do it. Hell in linux it’s even more obvious as you can instruct the kernel on HOW you would like to kill the task and even then it may not follow your direction. https://www.man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/kill.1.html with kill being a kernel tool. If you spawned the process, then you have permission/ownership to the process. But my point in the previous post was that anti-cheats can reach into the system, reading dlls and such that are absolutely NOT user space to begin with, require elevation beyond user space to install.

Yeah that it’s considered malware. I did Google it and there’s nothing saying that.

Seriously? You can’t find anything? You sure about that? Cause I can literally pull up thousands of articles and forum threads by literally typing “is vanguard anti-cheat malware?” or “is easy anti-cheat malware?”

https://forums.malwarebytes.com/topic/288793-easy-anti-cheat-launcher-detection/

Heuristics detect these things for what they are. Anti-virus software have to whitelist them because people choose to play the games anyway.

https://www.techguy.org/threads/is-valorant-vanguard-a-malicious-rootkit-or-not.1267682/

https://www.pcgamer.com/the-controversy-over-riots-vanguard-anti-cheat-software-explained/

The name is appropriate, because Vanguard doesn’t just sniff around for cheats when Valorant is running: It starts up with Windows and keeps an eye on other processes whether or not you’re playing Valorant at the time. […] Vanguard detects software with vulnerabilities which could be exploited by cheat makers, and blocks some of it.

https://www.sp-cy.com/article/is-valorants-anticheat-spyware/

Vanguard cannot be easily fully disabled since after manually quitting the process, a system reboot will be required to be able to open Valorant again.
The EULA prevents any legal recourse against Riot Games.
Valorant/Vanguard sends encrypted data to Riot. Which is Chinese owned by a giant corporation called Tencent.

Let’s attack this question from another perspective. Do you trust a games developer to properly develop kernel code? Most people BARELY trust Microsoft to do it these days. And you can’t review/evaluate it yourself at all. You have no fucking clue what they’re doing and never will. We’ve seen what happens when random companies inject shit into the kernel like crowdstrike did. You think that these anti-cheat softwares are acting in your interest when they’re being implemented and paid by a corporation? How can you look at these anti-cheats that have made backdoors on systems, cause people everywhere unstable kernels/BSODs, send data about your system without permission, interacts with software on your system that isn’t their code, etc… and say they’re not malicious?

but so far at least I’m happy with the bandwidth.

Oh for sure, it’s boatloads and I love it… but I’m in the market for a /28. I want to hand them like $40 extra a month. LET ME PAY YOU QUANTUM/LUMEN/CENTURYLINK/LEVEL3. It’s effectively free money as once it’s setup there’s nothing that changes or goes down. There’s so little maintenance/upkeep cost to it that I just don’t understand why they don’t want to print free money.

Source for what in specific?

That stopping processes is a kernel action? Go ahead. Open powershell and ask it to close some other system process… The UAP prompt (if you’re on windows, linux will just fail silently most of the time unless you sudo or are root) that shows up is the kernel validating that you even have permissions to do that. The kernel handles ALL task scheduling/management. When you close something you’re asking the kernel to do it. The kernel also handles ALL file management and driver management (drivers being extensions of the kernel). So the fact that it can read other active DLLs and such hooked into other processes (say your graphics drivers) is literally proof.

That industry agrees that it’s malware? Depends on which part of industry I suppose. But if it’s able to do all these actions at the kernel level, and attached itself it to other software to install, often doesn’t uninstall when you remove the game it was attached to, AND gets flagged by anti-viruses that don’t have it whitelisted yet… It’s definitionally malware. Go search for “Is <insert anticheat> malware”. Very few people will argue that they’re not.

Hell it’s possible for anti-cheats to write to UEFI if they really wanted to. There’s no legitimate reason for that level of access, 0, none.

They have kernel access… They can control anything since they’re in the kernel. And yes, I’ve seen it.

If you remember back in the late 2000’s early 2010’s there were a boatload of apps that would hook into games to do things like display overlays for chats (Teamspeak for example, overwolf as another.) some kernel anti-cheats would stop those processes from starting up.

But don’t take my word for it.

https://www.pcgamer.com/according-to-experts-on-kernel-level-anticheat-two-things-are-abundantly-clear-1-its-not-perfect-and-2-its-not-going-anywhere/

I’m less worried about developers abusing kernel access, and more concerned with potential vulnerabilities introduced for third-party actors to exploit. Rigney cited two examples: the infamous Extended Copy Protection (XCP) from Sony, which bad actors used to compromise affected systems, as well as a backdoor vulnerability introduced by Street Fighter 5’s kernel level anticheat. In 2022, a ransomware developer also took advantage of Genshin Impact’s kernel level anticheat to disable antivirus processes.

Introduces backdoors to be used by malicious actors.

https://www.pcgamer.com/the-controversy-over-riots-vanguard-anti-cheat-software-explained/

Vanguard detects software with vulnerabilities which could be exploited by cheat makers, and blocks some of it.

Blocks external softwares that it deems “vulnerable”

https://old.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/xf1cwr/the_insanity_of_eas_anticheat_system_by_a_kernel/

This is far from the first time that boot level firmware or kernel mode code inserted via patches or drivers have been used to install spyware, but every time I see it happen I want to warn users about the consequences, and provide some information about the danger.

Kernel devs beg users to not allow this shit.

Just look it up. All sorts of articles and experts have spoken on it.

Taking kernel level actions to stop processes on YOUR machine is absolutely taking control of the system.

Kernel level anti-cheats meet every requirement. Just because you think there’s gymnastics going on doesn’t make it so. It’s actually well established in the security field that they count.

Malware isn’t defined by its privileges but what it does.

Correct… and anything that intercepts all system calls and forces closed applications that it deems “not safe” even if I the user specifically run it is malware. You bet your ass they feed back information to the mothership too.

And btw, if you’re accepting the “Spyware” moniker from the other comment chain. Spyware is a form/category of malware.

Definition from Malwarebytes:

Hostile, intrusive, and intentionally nasty, malware seeks to invade, damage, or disable computers, computer systems, networks, tablets, and mobile devices, often by taking partial control over a device’s operations.

Hostile - it’s not meant to help you at all. If you’re doing something deemed “unsafe” in their eyes. They will take action up to and including stealing your money that you paid for the game. intrusive - embeds itself in the kernel Intentionally nasty - Well it’s not accidentally nasty.

invade - attached to games with little to no input on what you’re installing. disable computer systems - specifically the software you paid for Taking partial control over a device’s operations - the whole fucking kernel.

I’d say meeting the VAST majority of the definition and at least one portion of each category is sufficient to call them all malware.

I’ve been repeatedly told by everyone I talk to over there that it’s not ready yet… still… even though it was supposed to be ready by end of Q2 this year.

Calling them today still yielded the same answer for me.

I’m forced to use DDNS and a service to route my emails for me. But email and PBX servers really don’t do well on DDNS type stuff.

I have basically a full rack of equipment. Here’s the network side of it all. My desktop is 2 SPF+ fiber connections back to the core switch. Tons of stuff in my rack is all 10gbps or 40gbps.

Dual opnsense firewalls (top 2 slots, dual 40gbps connecting to core switches), though one is inactive until they let me buy static addresses. I run some business stuff on this. Boatloads of homelabbing and self-learning.

If you want to do full IPS/IDS, then yes you need some horsepower. But just connection with basic rules there’s plenty out there that’s not super expensive. Ubiquiti has their dream machine line which even the “cheap” $400 one can do 10gbps (2gbps with ips, or something like that. I dunno, I don’t keep tabs on them).

I didn’t stop any active connections/downloads happening on the network. I very likely had a gig of other stuff going elsewhere on the network.

Their “smart-nid” is also a router… so that works too, but I don’t trust it and in my setup it’s in transparent mode.

Edit: Formatting sucked

My personal best so far is 7TB in a month 😂

This is just my past month… I have no idea what my record is… but would likely be significantly higher as I slowed down on some stuff recently. I need more harddrive bays/harddrives… Stupid ebay doesn’t have what I want.

Edit: here’s past 90 days as well

Harris did not out perform Biden in ANY category.

The only downside is it’s still IPv6 Rapid Deployment.

And no static IP addresses yet… Even though it was supposed to be rolled out Q2.

And yet here I am in the USA with 8/8 Gbps fiber with no caps. Though I do pay $185 a month. I live in a Red state, and in a metro area, but not near the metro core, in unincorporated county land.

last 30 days stats to prove no caps:

But… That could be what it adds on. Gotta use the right tool to capture the ghost. That way identification is still relevant.

Rabies kills animals in about 10 days. We have years of videos… It didn’t have rabies. Since lived indoors you can also reasonably prove that it couldn’t get rabies either.

I’m not… Building a private road on your 10 acre plot is also simply cheaper than maintaining a DOT Approved road that can handle a full semi+trailer.

The same thing exists virtually everywhere. When government is involved, there is some standard written somewhere on what standards need to be met. In order to guarantee to meet those standards/tests there’s costs associated with that.

It’s common knowledge you can easily ask 300% of your default price if it’s the government.

primarily because government requirements are often way more strict than standard commercial or consumer… If someone sets up a contract with you that requires you do 100 things you normally don’t do… you’re going to charge more. 3x is likely fair in most cases where compliance becomes a thing just for the cost of talking to counsel about meeting those requirements.

If your vehicle isn’t disabled, what’s the big deal about stopping?

If you’re just careening down the highway at 80, you’re not really giving your car a fair chance to let you know that it’s really in a disabled state now are you?

It’s just common sense that after a major impact you should evaluate the safety of continuing in your current state. Stopping and doing the bare minimum of just looking at your car would be the first step of that process.

Real Autopilot also needs constant attention

Newer “real” autopilot systems absolutely do not need constant attention. Many of them can do full landing sequences now. The definition would match what people commonly use it for, not what it was “originally”. Most people believe autopilot to be that it pilots itself automatically. There is 0 intuition about what a pilot actually does in the cockpit for most normal people. And technology bares out that thought process as autopilot in it’s modern form can actually do 99% of flying, where take-off and landing isn’t exempted anymore.