How to efficiently detect cheats is the key to ensuring the healthy and stable operation of games. We will analyse the implementation principles of common cheats through actual cases and share online game anti-cheat solutions.
Game cheats refer to cheating programs or software that are used to play games abnormally. Generally, they implant themselves into the game program in some way, intercept and modify local data, or deceive the data sent by the server to achieve the cheating effect.
Memory modification cheats case
Memory modification cheats are the most common type of cheats. The principle of implementation is to search and locate the game memory through a memory modifier, and then modify the value module.Depending on the type of game and how it is played, memory modification cheats can cause varying degrees of harm, such as modifying the attack power of characters in the game, modifying the amount of currency in the game to an infinite amount, modifying the number of key items in the game, etc. These types of cheats can seriously undermine the fairness of the game and cause dissatisfaction among normal players.
Achieving free purchases of items by modifying item prices
Data packet intercept cheats case
During game operation, when we click a button or perform a specific game action, the client sends the game action request and parameters to the server via data packets according to predefined rules. The server parses the request, processes the information, and sends the response back to the client, which then parses and displays the response to the player.
Normal client-server interaction
Hackers usually use packet capture tools to obtain game data packets. Once the hacker has captured and hacked the data, they can freely tamper with the game's uplink and downlink data, such as the attack power and health of game characters, the game's win/loss logic, and the surrender/loss logic, thereby achieving a series of cheat features.
Client-server interaction after packet interception
Injection cheats case
Injection cheats, as the name suggests, is the injection of a cheat module into the game process space, while executing the entry function of the feature module, which often involves memory operations and rich features.In terms of the injection process, Android systems generally use SO injection, ptrace injection, Zygote injection, and ELF file infection. After jailbreaking, iOS systems can use the Cydia framework to inject dylib to achieve this.
After turning on the cheats and successfully injecting them into the game, the cheat interface guides players to use the features, and then calls the interface function to hook the corresponding function, rewrite the parameters, or call the logic to achieve the cheat features.
Android hook process
Compared with other types of cheats, the injection cheats method of modifying game code logic is more flexible and diverse, and hackers will use a variety of means to hide the injection module, making it more difficult and time-consuming to detect the injection cheats, and causing more serious negative impact on the game.
Auto-click cheats case
Common auto-click cheats can construct click logic by setting parameters such as key position, key sequence, and key interval time, and then use a script analyser to parse the parameters and pass them to the corresponding function interface to create an automated auto-click script.
Auto-click script
In a specific game environment, select the auto-click solution to achieve automatic tasks, automatic keeping online to get rewards, and other features. This type of auto-click cheat has a huge impact on game balance and destroys the normal gaming experience.
JikGuard has developed a number of industry-exclusive technologies and built a protection matrix for different game scenarios to provide a comprehensive anti-cheat solution for online games.
