Hackers - A server Admin's viewpoint

[gtok 3]

-=Before i start can i just say, as an Admin of a DayZ server I do NOT have the ability to see through walls, over hills, spawn helicopters or gear. Neither do i want to play God. I just want to provide a safe and fun gaming experience for all players who want to call my server their home=-

So, our server has been continually targeted by hackers. We have serious problems with hackers spawning in un-official (Day-Z) gear, from skins to gunships.

The ease with which hackers are able to add scripts and get around Battlenet has made this Mod very hard to enjoy any more. We may spend 2 weeks collecting loot, setting up bases and then want to enjoy our hard fought rewards by going on peace keeper missions, city raids, charity runs etc etc. HOWEVER one hacker can ruin all of this hard work and fun within seconds, with very little ramifications. Once a server is targeted by hackers it appears then a cycle of missery and pain begins for ALL players on the server (not just us evil and mean admins).

Here are a few of the ways i believe Admins and server owners should be able to take the fight to the Hackers:

- Message showing who killed who easily available to Admins. This makes locating the source of hacker attacks faster.

- Servers should be allowed to be invite only. A Team Speak/ Mumble/ Vent server has to be joined where applicants chat to the Admins for 5 minutes. They give in their contact email, GUID, player name and IP address and in exchange they get the password. This enables the admins to monitor activity on the server much more effectively than before.

Please feel free to add more to this list and obviously I want to hear about your experiences either as an Admin who takes the fight to the hackers or as a player.

Thanks

G

Edited August 2, 2012 by gtok

[SoloMid 29]

Let some admins lock the servers, please. Just got done with I think my last game of DayZ tonight. Everytime I get a car the scripters locate me with their vehicle locator script or w.e and boom.. EVERYTIME, It's so old now.

[Buffjesus 357]

Let some admins lock the servers, please. Just got done with I think my last game of DayZ tonight. Everytime I get a car the scripters locate me with their vehicle locator script or w.e and boom.. EVERYTIME, It's so old now.

and then you have non pvp gather all the loot you want then head out servers just for you

and you can look through the item logs. just look for the illegitmiate items and gear.

or if you want to make it real easy put it on recruit find out who it is ban him, restart on vet or w/e

what we had our server admin do back on our old server

[gtok 3]

Solo Mid, If we ran a passworded server that you could apply for, you would be interested?

G

[gtok 3]

and you can look through the item logs. just look for the illegitmiate items and gear.

or if you want to make it real easy put it on recruit find out who it is ban him, restart on vet or w/e

What does that do to help, putting it on recruit?

[Sinoby 39]

If you want private server you have to switch to private hive (not sure how legitimate is that). Otherwise having private server gives it's players an unfair advantage.

[gtok 3]

If you want private server you have to switch to private hive (not sure how legitimate is that). Otherwise having private server gives it's players an unfair advantage.

This would not be a private server. It would be open to the public. Just a short interview process would be involved prior to getting the password. This would help limit the emotionally unstable individuals who usually constitute the script using community!

[Buffjesus 357]

What does that do to help, putting it on recruit?

name tags

[xarok777@gmail.com 205]

There will be no locking or passwording of servers.

[Rudson (DayZ) 61]

You have to think about so much more when you start to make private servers. I like the idea and think it could make the gameexperience even better. But think of this, one server with 40 slots, so you need at least 80 players who applied, because not everybody is playing at the same time. What leads to the next problem, if you only can play at night and the server is always dark you will stop playing on the server. What happens if the server is full, than you have to play on a different server. When signed up players on your server generally stop playing the server may become pretty empty.

Now think of the chainreaction it could cause, in the end you have hundreds of pw protected servers half empty making it difficult to play at all. Don´t forget there are over 900000 gamers at the moment.

so long Rudson.

[gtok 3]

Now think of the chainreaction it could cause, in the end you have hundreds of pw protected servers half empty making it difficult to play at all. Don´t forget there are over 900000 gamers at the moment.

Wouldn't that mean you would just need to sign up for maybe 2 servers per person?

I play daily on my server and only have issues with joining it occasionally. If i can't get in after 15 minutes I either play another game for a bit or join another server. I'm sure that switched on players would be able to manage the necessary information to log into 2 different servers.

[SoloMid 29]

No passwords? fine.what about the hackers then? let them hack?

[Tenderness 30]

-=Before i start can i just say, as an Admin of a DayZ server I do NOT have the ability to see through walls, over hills, spawn helicopters or gear. Neither do i want to play God. I just want to provide a safe and fun gaming experience for all players who want to call my server their home=-

So, our server has been continually targeted by hackers. We have serious problems with hackers spawning in un-official (Day-Z) gear, from skins to gunships.

The ease with which hackers are able to add scripts and get around Battlenet has made this Mod very hard to enjoy any more. We may spend 2 weeks collecting loot, setting up bases and then want to enjoy our hard fought rewards by going on peace keeper missions, city raids, charity runs etc etc. HOWEVER one hacker can ruin all of this hard work and fun within seconds, with very little ramifications. Once a server is targeted by hackers it appears then a cycle of missery and pain begins for ALL players on the server (not just us evil and mean admins).

Here are a few of the ways i believe Admins and server owners should be able to take the fight to the Hackers:

- Message showing who killed who easily available to Admins. This makes locating the source of hacker attacks faster.

- Servers should be allowed to be invite only. A Team Speak/ Mumble/ Vent server has to be joined where applicants chat to the Admins for 5 minutes. They give in their contact email, GUID, player name and IP address and in exchange they get the password. This enables the admins to monitor activity on the server much more effectively than before.

Please feel free to add more to this list and obviously I want to hear about your experiences either as an Admin who takes the fight to the hackers or as a player.

Thanks

G

I think it will be a lot of work to monitor it this way. I get your point, and i really like the idea though.

[scoobysnacks 32]

I agree completely with the OP and it is very refreshing to hear about the issues from an Admin's point of view, However locking servers that are still connected to the hive doesn't seem right.

I do believe the only way to help combat hacking is to introduce killfeed and detailed death information into the game (at least to the admin).

If the system cannot detect hacking maybe the admins could notice the patterns.

[Sinoby 39]

Kill feed will not help - you will be teleported 100m in the air and splash... No kill message or anything.

And about private servers - non-hive servers do exist and are working without that much issues. It is not perfect, but possible. I hope that some type of private servers are future of DayZ, since it resolves so many problems. But that is topic of other threads.

[trauma.au 14]

Agreed, this needs to go passworded to survive at this point. My group has encountered around 8 script kiddies in the last 2 night, none of us are bothering anymore. Passwords or GTFO.

[B0bbeh 0]

The op is totally right. We need some way to identify the hackers because at the moment we know someone dodgy is on but we don't know who it is. Our only option is to restart the server until the hacker gets bored and leaves.

A kill feed would definitely limit a hackers methods of screwing with you. The ability to see how long each player has been on the server for would also be very useful. Maybe this can be found in the logs but its not easily viewable at the moment.

We all know that arma2 wasn't designed for this but there needs to be more tools made available for the admins to at least try and prevent the hacking.