Java Get rid of SkyWars hackers

[Zathelas]

Hello,

Problem:
Last week we as the SkyWars community have experienced alot of hackers. Like 3 or 4 hackers are online everytime ruining players their experience. This can't go on and on. Literally embarrasing for your server. Even in the morning and in the night while it's not even peak time to play CubeCraft or SkyWars in general. Me and my friends are so sick of seeing this hackers ruining the game. They can't join a normal game anymore. I took a break because of this, you're losing players if it continues like this.

This is because the anti-cheat is so bad that it will ban players that are legit. I even have a video of it people that are playing normally getting banned for what? Playing legit?
Nah, that has to stop. This week it's actually the worst I've ever seen before. I'm pretty sure it's called LiquidBounce. People are flying everywhere, bhopping and everything you can name. It has it.
Also what I wanted to state. Reporting doens't help at all! It costs so much time to report players before they're getting accepted and if they get banned by anti-cheat they can log on, on a different account really easily and hack again. If you don't believe, do your research yourself! Play the game, ask the community or go watch it on YouTube.

I also want to note, this is happening most on SkyWars and it's basiclly the only game I play but this happens on every game too, but for most on SkyWars.

Solution:
Literally fix your own anti-cheat. You made it worse, you are the one that has to fix it. We didn't cause your problems. Reporting doesn't help and stop saying we have to do that. Just fix your anti-cheat or get more mods online to actually solve the situation. You are ruining your own game.

Spread this thread to people and especially developers that are responsible for these tasks.

Peace.

 

[Fishyy]

Ye it is sad like I reporting at least 4 fly hackers yesterday and they were definitely flying with some having even more hacks and only 1 of them were banned it’s so sad

 

[Lyriie]

I have seen a lot of feedback on this topic recently and think it's time to write a proper response. The following response is for anyone who is concerned about the state of cheaters on the server, not just OP. Keep in mind that I only speak for myself and my experiences as a moderator, not for the entire team.

Sentinel

First of all, I would like to stress that it's impossible to make a perfect anti-cheat. An anti-cheat is often used to help reduce the amount of cheaters on the server, not eradicate them entirely. It doesn't have eyes of its own - it analyses information that is sent from players and received by the server, and if it detects something suspicious and can ban for it, it will do so. Therefore, it isn't as simple as just telling it to "ban all cheaters".

This can be made even more difficult when cheat clients are developed to bypass Sentinel's detection methods. The most destructive cheats such as fly are often the first to have bypasses developed for them. Then the developers need to come up with something new to correct the problem. This becomes a cycle, or a "cat and mouse game", as it is commonly described.

False positives

All anti-cheats can sometimes ban players that did not cheat, but that does not make them bad. It is impossible to have an effective anti-cheat that does not occasionally false ban players. That being said, I understand what it's like to see players being false banned or even being banned yourself. The Sentinel appeals system gives these players a chance to explain their point of view. Appeals that seem like false positives are forwarded to other members of the team so they can take a look, and if we spot any worrying patterns in appeals then we will send a more urgent message.

You can find a development blog here, from 2020, which discusses the process of developing Sentinel in much more detail. I believe most of this information is still accurate.
https://www.cubecraft.net/threads/behind-the-cube-2-sentinel.270731/

Reports

I have also noticed a recent increase in cheaters specifically in Java SkyWars; you are not alone in that. While this is being worked on, it's up to moderators to manage the amount of cheaters, which leads into the second part of this feedback.

When we say that moderators are volunteers, we mean it. We moderate when we can and when we want to. I personally check Java in-game reports for a few hours every few days, because that's what I feel I can manage. As a result, sometimes it just happens that at certain times everyone is busy and nobody is there to check reports. Website reports are a lot more reliable, as we can view the evidence and punish the player when we get to that report, instead of only being able to see their actions while they're online.

I understand your frustration, it's certainly frustrating for me to see this happening and I'm not even someone who plays games often. But we can't just "get rid" of all cheaters; we can't do more than what is already being done. If anyone has any more questions about this topic feel free to ask.

 

[thetigerpython]

First of all, I would like to stress that it's impossible to make a perfect anti-cheat. An anti-cheat is often used to help reduce the amount of cheaters on the server, not eradicate them entirely. It doesn't have eyes of its own - it analyses information that is sent from players and received by the server, and if it detects something suspicious and can ban for it, it will do so. Therefore, it isn't as simple as just telling it to "ban all cheaters".

This can be made even more difficult when cheat clients are developed to bypass Sentinel's detection methods. The most destructive cheats such as fly are often the first to have bypasses developed for them. Then the developers need to come up with something new to correct the problem. This becomes a cycle, or a "cat and mouse game", as it is commonly described

The problem with Sentinel, in my opinion, is that bypasses are getting patched way too slowly. There are much better anti-cheats at the moment. It might be true that an anti-cheat can not prevent all forms of cheating, but it should still be able to limit blatant cheating. @Zathelas mentioned a specific free client. This client has bypassed with fly for over a year. This is unacceptable for a server as big as Cubecraft, in my opinion.

A few years ago, anti-cheats like Intave began using predictions. This basically means that the server is simulating every possible movement by the client. If implemented correctly, this can and will detect any movement cheats without theoretically any false positives.

All anti-cheats can sometimes ban players that did not cheat, but that does not make them bad. It is impossible to have an effective anti-cheat that does not occasionally false ban players. That being said, I understand what it's like to see players being false banned or even being banned yourself. The Sentinel appeals system gives these players a chance to explain their point of view. Appeals that seem like false positives are forwarded to other members of the team so they can take a look, and if we spot any worrying patterns in appeals then we will send a more urgent message.

One of the problems of Sentinel, in my opinion, is that it bans movement cheats. Banning movement cheats is extremely difficult, as there are hundreds, if not thousands, of different factors in Minecraft that modify your movement. Opening a shulker box or walking on scaffolding, for example. Sentinel would be able to be more aggressive if it was able to setback or kick the player. If this is implemented correctly and most edge cases that usually occur while playing are covered, this will have lots of advantages over the current anti-cheat.

One other problem with creating an anti-cheat is the lag comprehension. Imagine someone with a 1000 ms ping. For an anti-cheat, it's hard to detect whether this person walked through a block or just hasn't seen the block yet. Modern anti-cheats simulate the world of the player to account for latency to prevent such false positives. If done correctly you can also detect any reach above 3.01 blocks without nearly any false positives.

I understand your frustration, it's certainly frustrating for me to see this happening and I'm not even someone who plays games often. But we can't just "get rid" of all cheaters; we can't do more than what is already being done. If anyone has any more questions about this topic feel free to ask.

You can't really prevent cheating in Minecraft. No game has fully achieved that, and Minecraft is no exception. But modern anti-cheats can pretty much limit what a cheater can do to what's possible in vanilla.

Thanks for reading! Keep in mind that this is fully my opinion. I'm also only talking about Java and wanted to give a little overview about what's possible. I understand that moderation is doing its best at preventing cheaters.
But there's always room for improvement.

 

[Zathelas]

I have seen a lot of feedback on this topic recently and think it's time to write a proper response. The following response is for anyone who is concerned about the state of cheaters on the server, not just OP. Keep in mind that I only speak for myself and my experiences as a moderator, not for the entire team.

Sentinel

First of all, I would like to stress that it's impossible to make a perfect anti-cheat. An anti-cheat is often used to help reduce the amount of cheaters on the server, not eradicate them entirely. It doesn't have eyes of its own - it analyses information that is sent from players and received by the server, and if it detects something suspicious and can ban for it, it will do so. Therefore, it isn't as simple as just telling it to "ban all cheaters".

This can be made even more difficult when cheat clients are developed to bypass Sentinel's detection methods. The most destructive cheats such as fly are often the first to have bypasses developed for them. Then the developers need to come up with something new to correct the problem. This becomes a cycle, or a "cat and mouse game", as it is commonly described.

False positives

All anti-cheats can sometimes ban players that did not cheat, but that does not make them bad. It is impossible to have an effective anti-cheat that does not occasionally false ban players. That being said, I understand what it's like to see players being false banned or even being banned yourself. The Sentinel appeals system gives these players a chance to explain their point of view. Appeals that seem like false positives are forwarded to other members of the team so they can take a look, and if we spot any worrying patterns in appeals then we will send a more urgent message.

You can find a development blog here, from 2020, which discusses the process of developing Sentinel in much more detail. I believe most of this information is still accurate.
https://www.cubecraft.net/threads/behind-the-cube-2-sentinel.270731/

Reports

I have also noticed a recent increase in cheaters specifically in Java SkyWars; you are not alone in that. While this is being worked on, it's up to moderators to manage the amount of cheaters, which leads into the second part of this feedback.

When we say that moderators are volunteers, we mean it. We moderate when we can and when we want to. I personally check Java in-game reports for a few hours every few days, because that's what I feel I can manage. As a result, sometimes it just happens that at certain times everyone is busy and nobody is there to check reports. Website reports are a lot more reliable, as we can view the evidence and punish the player when we get to that report, instead of only being able to see their actions while they're online.

I understand your frustration, it's certainly frustrating for me to see this happening and I'm not even someone who plays games often. But we can't just "get rid" of all cheaters; we can't do more than what is already being done. If anyone has any more questions about this topic feel free to ask.

Thanks for your reply. I appreciate that a lot. I understand you can't ban all hackers that are hacking but when I came back in 2024 I haven't seen any progress being really made honestly. It's still the same for a long time and we don't have an answer. Most of the time they don't get banned as they log off or don't get checked on by staff (in which I understand). For me it's concerning since it's been almost 8 months now. I have multiple recordings of people flying like literally everywhere.

Also, when a player gets falsely banned. They don't want to play the server anymore. I suppose that CubeCraft wants new players to also join and to be also active. If they get banned for 30 days they'll forget about it and leave entirely so how I see it is that you are defending the developers for making any progress. How I see it is that I want developers to fix this as soon as possible for your server and for our group of friends that are annoyed. This era of CubeCraft I've seen SkyWars people come and go quick and this might be a good reason. We want an answer when and why.

People that are liking your comment are probably not playing SkyWars as often (because I don't see them) or they know when it's fixed.

mentioned a specific free client. This client has bypassed with fly for over a year. This is unacceptable for a server as big as Cubecraft, in my opinion.

A few years ago, anti-cheats like Intave began using predictions. This basically means that the server is simulating every possible movement by the client. If implemented correctly, this can and will detect any movement cheats without theoretically any false positives.


One of the problems of Sentinel, in my opinion, is that it bans movement cheats. Banning movement cheats is extremely difficult, as there are hundreds, if not thousands, of different factors in Minecraft that modify your movement. Opening a shulker box or walking on scaffolding, for example. Sentinel would be able to be more aggressive if it was able to setback or kick the player. If this is implemented correctly and most edge cases that usually occur while playing are covered, this will have lots of advantages over the current anti-cheat.

Literally this.

Ye it is sad like I reporting at least 4 fly hackers yesterday and they were definitely flying with some having even more hacks and only 1 of them were banned it’s so sad

Yeah nah, not worth it. They have unlimited alts with VPNs so they can do whatever they want. I've seen how people did it on UHC servers that I played and it's actually so easy to do.

 

[thetigerpython]

Also, when a player gets falsely banned. They don't want to play the server anymore. I suppose that CubeCraft wants new players to also join and to be also active. If they get banned for 30 days they'll forget about it and leave entirely so how I see it is that you are defending the developers for making any progress. How I see it is that I want developers to fix this as soon as possible for your server and for our group of friends that are annoyed. This era of CubeCraft I've seen SkyWars people come and go quick and this might be a good reason. We want an answer when and why.

Due to all of the different problems I've listed above, it would probably just be better to go with an existing anti-cheat. Writing a good movement simulation and updating it can take months. Some anti-cheats have been using these things for multiple years now. They already had tons of user feedback and made improvements over time. I support the idea of a more aggressive anti-cheat. At the end, more users benefit from it. Most users don't have an extremely unstable ping or do weird stuff to intentionally false the anti-cheat. This could help get more players. If a new player is meeting fly hackers in their first games, they will probably not continue playing.

 

[Zathelas]

Due to all of the different problems I've listed above, it would probably just be better to go with an existing anti-cheat. Writing a good movement simulation and updating it can take months. Some anti-cheats have been using these things for multiple years now. They already had tons of user feedback and made improvements over time. I support the idea of a more aggressive anti-cheat. At the end, more users benefit from it. Most users don't have an extremely unstable ping or do weird stuff to intentionally false the anti-cheat. This could help get more players. If a new player is meeting fly hackers in their first games, they will probably not continue playing.

No, an anti-cheat they've developed before won't help against the hackers nowadays with the unlimited options they have. I also don't want an agressive anti-cheat that bans innocent players.