A question regarding the picture with the post. Is this a person in question for cheating because he has a Palp led team at 27? How do you differentiate between someone who is cheating and someone who put a bad squad in to drop in the rankings so they could pick up wins arena wins in the GAC feats if someone is reported for having a bad squad in arena?
The picture is just an example and not a real player I reported, but to your question, just being on the leaderboard with an odd squad is not enough to trigger an investigation. The squad would have had to do something suspicious
@CG_SBCrumb so technically someone could do 7 out of 8 of their ga attacks without cheating, then god mode one round with one toon to win by a point because it wouldn’t look suspicious and is totally possible - even if reported it wouldn’t warrant an investigation.
The way things are, the only way for us to check if our GA opponents were cheating is to report every single one of them. Yet, CG is not even going to take the steps to review each report. How then are you going to be able to address those cases of cheating mentioned in my example above?
While I have seen one request handled, I have seen numerous players report on the same player without receiving a comment that the request was even received. It is so annoying it is to have a cheating player taunting you in vulgar messages. I'd really like to see a more proactive approach.
I wouldn't put it past some people to simply say they are cheating when they aren't just to stir up trouble. After all if they aren't actually cheating they won't get banned but it will **** off a bunch of people when they don't get banned.
Heres what's funny. Bulldog got banned bc he showed how inept the enforcement has been.
As an experiment, a guildmate of mine in one of our alt guilds has been using the same program, and blatantly so. FOR FOUR MONTHS. He has actually encouraged shardmates and the people who do accept his gac chat invites to report him. They have.
His account is still active. I have no doubt bulldog could have cheated to the moon and back on his alt with 0 repercussions had he not publicly made the video.
But the fact that they banned a non cheating account is pretty lame.
Bulldog wasn't expecting a medal or anything, he was trying to show CG what to look for and how to guard against it. He's been a huge help with not only tips, but identifying exploits that should be addressed to improve the game overall. And he gets banned for it? He had absolutely nothing to gain..
Heres what's funny. Bulldog got banned bc he showed how inept the enforcement has been.
As an experiment, a guildmate of mine in one of our alt guilds has been using the same program, and blatantly so. FOR FOUR MONTHS. He has actually encouraged shardmates and the people who do accept his gac chat invites to report him. They have.
His account is still active. I have no doubt bulldog could have cheated to the moon and back on his alt with 0 repercussions had he not publicly made the video.
But the fact that they banned a non cheating account is pretty lame.
Exactly why on earth would they touch his non cheating account? That account didn’t violate any terms of service.
And why CG would you react soo harsh? This is a PR nightmare.
I mean if I knew my stuff was being hacked, I would hire a hacker to help counter act that ish, not just bury my head in the sand like an ostrich.
Bulldog and McMole provided a service to the SWGOH community. I would never have know to look for something like this on my shard. It is hard to report cheaters, if you don’t know how they are doing it. McMole and Bulldog have been great contributors and have influenced more than a hand full of players to pick this game up. EA/CG you have shot the messenger.
Anyone got a link to the TOS? I'd really like to read the part that says "showing a video of someone else cheating and talking about it without endorsing cheating or giving any specific intel can still get your access suspended"...
Seriously, i want to read those TOS everyone usually just marks as "read and accepted"...
Furthermore: Why ban the main account of Bulldog that was not cheating but leave the alt account unbanned?
Is there a slight possibility you cant even find that account?
Edit: I mean, if you decide to ban him for cheating... you should at least ban the cheating account as well...
Bulldog wasn't expecting a medal or anything, he was trying to show CG what to look for and how to guard against it. He's been a huge help with not only tips, but identifying exploits that should be addressed to improve the game overall. And he gets banned for it? He had absolutely nothing to gain..
"He works with the permission of the owners of systems. An ethical Hacker must comply with the rules of the target organization or owner and the law of the land and their aim is to assess the security posture of a target organization/system."
People hack Apple and Microsoft and Google to expose security flaws without their permission are jailed IRL
There are proper safeguards in place, and bulldog never went through the correct channels to exploit the game. He never asked CG for permission to do this.
He cheated
He got caught
He got banned
He wanted fame and notoriety which is also a M.O. of some hackers -- Look up Morris Worm, the owner did the same thing that bulldog did
I like bulldog but hacking a game has consequences that can result in a ban and it was pretty dumb to do so and think he can get away with it
This is ridiculous. McMole is a whistleblower showing that cheating is happening and widespread. Penalizing him is like penalizing an employee at work for calling OSHA on violations. Shame!
They pointed out the flaws in YOUR system. Did they cheat? No. Did they cost you money because people like me won’t bet on a rigged game? Very possibly.
Fix YOUR house before you start banning people who were just warning others. Did YOU guys tell us? No.
This is such an abhorrent way to deal with your problems. You guys KNOW the spenders ALL have Discord ( or Line for those primitive savages) and keeping us like mushrooms isn’t going to change that and this resolution makes the situation FAR worse.
I was sad to see that you banned McMole2 over exercising his right to free speech and sharing his opinion over the problem with some of the cheaters hacking the game.
I have been on the receiving end of cheaters that have used these hacks to knock down people who have legitimately grown their accounts and learned to play strategically. I informed CG through the forums. They promised me to look into it, but never resolved the problem.
Stop viewing McMole2 as a hindrance, and start listening to his advice and criticism. He likes this game, so he’a Not out to Heuer you. He8s out to make the fame better for both the players AND CG! Without him, and his GREAT videos, i’d still be struggling with certain parts of this game. Hurting him in turn will hurt you.
Do the right thing. Unban his account. Be ethical.
What else would you expect to get for cheating? A gold medal?
They are banning a whistleblower, there is laws and protection for people who exposes businesses, yet they went the route of banning them. EA/CG is not above the law.
That is why he used an alt account, he expected the alt account to be banned two months ago. yet it wasn't. And now they ban his real account that he did not cheat on only after they have been exposed.
Yea. This is very bad form. They only exposed the cheating. They didn’t share how nor did they profit from it. This is a huge black eye to the community
That said, I know you’ve got some egg on your face from Bulldog and McMole’s videos, and the instinct is always to punish those that embarrass you, but to be honest, they shouldn’t have to self-immolate in order for you guys to acknowledge or address this issue. Especially given Bulldog’s assertion he has made multiple efforts to bring this to your attention.
You should give players access to the combat log, so they and have the access to investigate their own Grand Arena interactions *before* reporting something, which, for my mind might save your team some time when it comes time to investigate.
“ These videos are a violation of the User Agreement (which everyone agrees to by playing the game), and we’d like to remind the community that cheating and violations of the User Agreement can result in suspension or a permanent ban.”
Are you kidding me? I’m incensed that you have the audacity to accuse those folks of violating the terms of service, when YOU (i.e. Capital Games and Electronic Arts) are willfully violating Apple Terms of Service daily. Perhaps you need a reminder....
“Customer trust is the cornerstone of the App Store’s success. Apps should never prey on users or attempt to rip-off customers, trick them into making unwanted purchases, force them to share unnecessary data, raise prices in a tricky manner, charge for features or content that are not delivered, or engage in any other manipulative practices within or outside of the app.”
I believe any reasonable person would read your post from June and conclude that cheating will soon become a thing of the past. It CLEARLY is not, and I believe one could make a pretty compelling argument that this failure is negligent at the very least, and could constitute legal fraud. It seems to clearly violate Apple terms of service.
Many of us play this game seriously, we spend a lot of money on this form of entertainment, and while I won’t speak for anyone else, I feel deceived and taken advantage of. We are WAY past “we are working really hard on this”. The community needs CG to address this issue in a way that is detailed, transparent, and specific. You are essentially asking us as a community to trust you, however that trust is gone. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
I will certainly not be spending another penny on this game until a better answer is forthcoming, and if that answer is not forthcoming I will take this issue up with Apple and other remedies available to me.
Agrivere
As far as I’m concerned this is the best post so far. I’ve run an IT department for a multi billion dollar company for over a decade. EA has the same problem as all mid to large software companies. They only understand two things.. Dollars and bad marketing. First they try to punish / silence the whistle blower then if that doesn’t work they go into damage control. That’s why cheating, exploits, vulnerabilities etc... all need to be made public. It’s the only way to get development dollars redirected to fixing the issue. If EA really wanted to put our concerns at ease they would share real numbers and not some **** percentage. They could also share end of battle stats. We all know what’s within the realm of possible for the last several meta. Having this data would allow the user community to self report cheaters with a higher degree of certainty.
What else would you expect to get for cheating? A gold medal?
He did it on an alt account to expose them, not his real one. CG and EA are just trying to make an example out of them because they are too incompetent and money hungry to ban the players who cheat as long as they spend the money. But dare not call the grand CG out in public or feel their wrath. They are pathetic and will never get another dime from me a 4mm GP player.
Shooting the messenger, but doing nothing more about the message ? Wrong way of doing it. I spent several 1000€ since I came back in April, I guess it was a bad idea.
Replies
@CG_SBCrumb so technically someone could do 7 out of 8 of their ga attacks without cheating, then god mode one round with one toon to win by a point because it wouldn’t look suspicious and is totally possible - even if reported it wouldn’t warrant an investigation.
The way things are, the only way for us to check if our GA opponents were cheating is to report every single one of them. Yet, CG is not even going to take the steps to review each report. How then are you going to be able to address those cases of cheating mentioned in my example above?
I wouldn't put it past some people to simply say they are cheating when they aren't just to stir up trouble. After all if they aren't actually cheating they won't get banned but it will **** off a bunch of people when they don't get banned.
As an experiment, a guildmate of mine in one of our alt guilds has been using the same program, and blatantly so. FOR FOUR MONTHS. He has actually encouraged shardmates and the people who do accept his gac chat invites to report him. They have.
His account is still active. I have no doubt bulldog could have cheated to the moon and back on his alt with 0 repercussions had he not publicly made the video.
But the fact that they banned a non cheating account is pretty lame.
Exactly why on earth would they touch his non cheating account? That account didn’t violate any terms of service.
And why CG would you react soo harsh? This is a PR nightmare.
I mean if I knew my stuff was being hacked, I would hire a hacker to help counter act that ish, not just bury my head in the sand like an ostrich.
Seriously, i want to read those TOS everyone usually just marks as "read and accepted"...
Furthermore: Why ban the main account of Bulldog that was not cheating but leave the alt account unbanned?
Is there a slight possibility you cant even find that account?
Edit: I mean, if you decide to ban him for cheating... you should at least ban the cheating account as well...
"He works with the permission of the owners of systems. An ethical Hacker must comply with the rules of the target organization or owner and the law of the land and their aim is to assess the security posture of a target organization/system."
People hack Apple and Microsoft and Google to expose security flaws without their permission are jailed IRL
There are proper safeguards in place, and bulldog never went through the correct channels to exploit the game. He never asked CG for permission to do this.
He cheated
He got caught
He got banned
He wanted fame and notoriety which is also a M.O. of some hackers -- Look up Morris Worm, the owner did the same thing that bulldog did
I like bulldog but hacking a game has consequences that can result in a ban and it was pretty dumb to do so and think he can get away with it
It is really easy to see that no one at the controls at CG has an MBA..... (mail order diploma's dont count)
Fix YOUR house before you start banning people who were just warning others. Did YOU guys tell us? No.
This is such an abhorrent way to deal with your problems. You guys KNOW the spenders ALL have Discord ( or Line for those primitive savages) and keeping us like mushrooms isn’t going to change that and this resolution makes the situation FAR worse.
I was sad to see that you banned McMole2 over exercising his right to free speech and sharing his opinion over the problem with some of the cheaters hacking the game.
I have been on the receiving end of cheaters that have used these hacks to knock down people who have legitimately grown their accounts and learned to play strategically. I informed CG through the forums. They promised me to look into it, but never resolved the problem.
Stop viewing McMole2 as a hindrance, and start listening to his advice and criticism. He likes this game, so he’a Not out to Heuer you. He8s out to make the fame better for both the players AND CG! Without him, and his GREAT videos, i’d still be struggling with certain parts of this game. Hurting him in turn will hurt you.
Do the right thing. Unban his account. Be ethical.
They are banning a whistleblower, there is laws and protection for people who exposes businesses, yet they went the route of banning them. EA/CG is not above the law.
That is why he used an alt account, he expected the alt account to be banned two months ago. yet it wasn't. And now they ban his real account that he did not cheat on only after they have been exposed.
That said, I know you’ve got some egg on your face from Bulldog and McMole’s videos, and the instinct is always to punish those that embarrass you, but to be honest, they shouldn’t have to self-immolate in order for you guys to acknowledge or address this issue. Especially given Bulldog’s assertion he has made multiple efforts to bring this to your attention.
You should give players access to the combat log, so they and have the access to investigate their own Grand Arena interactions *before* reporting something, which, for my mind might save your team some time when it comes time to investigate.
As far as I’m concerned this is the best post so far. I’ve run an IT department for a multi billion dollar company for over a decade. EA has the same problem as all mid to large software companies. They only understand two things.. Dollars and bad marketing. First they try to punish / silence the whistle blower then if that doesn’t work they go into damage control. That’s why cheating, exploits, vulnerabilities etc... all need to be made public. It’s the only way to get development dollars redirected to fixing the issue. If EA really wanted to put our concerns at ease they would share real numbers and not some **** percentage. They could also share end of battle stats. We all know what’s within the realm of possible for the last several meta. Having this data would allow the user community to self report cheaters with a higher degree of certainty.
He did it on an alt account to expose them, not his real one. CG and EA are just trying to make an example out of them because they are too incompetent and money hungry to ban the players who cheat as long as they spend the money. But dare not call the grand CG out in public or feel their wrath. They are pathetic and will never get another dime from me a 4mm GP player.
Honestly, Bulldog bought the cheat app, used it repeatedly, then told everyone about it. I'm not surprised he's perma-banned.
McMole, on the other hand, should not have a month break for commenting on Bulldog's video. That's ridiculous.