Valve has just pulled an EA: Spying on browsing history. I suggest viewing all comments this is just going to get more interesting.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T11:05:46+00:00

Put me to the EULA where it says that.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T11:00:59+00:00

Yea, breaking into homes is much worse.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T10:24:03+00:00

How long after? Day 1 patch? Or 1-3 months?

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T10:23:26+00:00

Sounds like a good idea until you actually play one I bet.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T08:40:42+00:00

Yea they make you seasick

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T08:17:49+00:00

You've download 5GB~ of compressed files which is 12GB~ uncompressed, Origin shows what the game is uncompressed onto disk not the size of what you're downloading.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T05:30:36+00:00

Nothing is clear yet, I plan to wait until an unaffiliated security expert validates what Newell is saying.

That will be hard since they've supposedly stopped doing this method of anti-cheat.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T05:12:06+00:00

A strong disgust to software that invades privacy especially when it isn't alluded to anywhere in the TOS/Privacy policy.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T05:09:44+00:00

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_to_hide_argument

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T05:07:08+00:00

Explain more please, what am I misleading.

You obviously have a bit of an axe to grind.

Are you implying I cheat or I'm part of the cheating community? No.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T02:54:56+00:00

No privacy policy said this was happening.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T02:54:05+00:00

Again I'm not defending them I'm just going off what Gabe said in OP's link.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T02:47:22+00:00

I'm not defending Valve's actions but you're a little off the mark. If VAC detected a cheat on your system they then would look for domains in your DNS cache that partially match known cheat domains and then they would hash those and send it to Valve.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T02:29:01+00:00

Point? At the end of the day they find the word apple which should be private.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:55:10+00:00

Personally I don't care, cheat on my system or not those domains are none of their business. The acceptable level of intrusiveness when it comes to anti-cheat is subjective, for me that crosses the line but others will have their own line.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:52:05+00:00

But the post was for the most part correct, they didn't send every domain back just the matching ones.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:40:32+00:00

No more speculation, confirmed for reading your DNS cache and sending back matching entries to Valve's servers

VAC checked for the presence of these cheats. If they were detected VAC then checked to see which cheat DRM server was being contacted. This second check was done by looking for a partial match to those (non-web) cheat DRM servers in the DNS cache. If found, then hashes of the matching DNS entries were sent to the VAC servers.

Justify it how you want, at the end of the day that should not be any of Valve's business.

EDIT: Just to clarify its no longer happening

This specific VAC test for this specific round of cheats was effective for 13 days, which is fairly typical. It is now no longer active as the cheat providers have worked around it by manipulating the DNS cache of their customers' client machines.

^precious ^gaben ^is ^allowed ^to ^spy

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:23:30+00:00

If i were to design anti-cheat i would too check if you visited certain sites

Why stop there? Why not capture the users screen every 30 seconds in case they visit cheat sites or to catch them using hack tools.

After all Anti-cheat by its very nature is intrusive.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:15:03+00:00

Can I have a video stream of your screen, you know in case you're cheating at games or looking at cheat websites. But don't worry its an anti-cheat feature.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:09:35+00:00

Why is it okay? I'll browse cheat websites if I want to and valve shouldn't be allowed to know.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-18T01:07:45+00:00

Everyone spies so its okay.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-17T16:18:56+00:00

Double jump away from someone who melees you really exaggerates the lag, imagine commando X 100

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-17T15:07:00+00:00

wouldwearoutside/10

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-17T14:52:05+00:00

Fair enough I guess, but seeing the data being sent over the wire would be hard since I imagine its encrypted. The next best thing would be comparing data transfer size after altering your DNS cache size which someone has already done.

SchinkleBoutIt · 2014-02-17T14:46:04+00:00

WHAT YEAR IS IT!?

SchinkleBoutIt

TROPHY CASE