Original Post — Direct link

Hi all,

edit: this is more of an outline of events than "some thoughts". Sorry, changed the point of my post and forgot to edit the title to "An outline of events regarding the recent steam deck permabans" or something.

I just wanted to provide a write up for anyone curious and anyone in the future who is affected by Bethesda's anticheat software incorrectly flagging people for cheating (yes, this actually happens). I will focus specifically on them falsely flagging the use of the Steam Deck (SD) as cheating. I also wanted to shed some light on how Bethesda handles anticheat. In the following, I'll summarize what happened to me. In the comments, I'll eventually copy and paste the emails exchanged between me and Bethesda. Anyone else affected is welcomed to share their emails and anecdotes.

Context/Background

I played fo76 on both my PC (which is basically a vanilla install of windows--I have a mac machine and dual partition) and SD (played "out of the box" and no extra mods/apps were installed). Both my wife and I used both the same PC (with same windows profile and hence same applications downloaded) and SD (different steam profiles). Only I was banned. At the time of the ban, I had about 930 hours in the game and I was level 730. I was (and currently am at the time of writing this) subscribed to fallout 1st and have bought atoms. I have never cheated in the game (seriously, this game is too casual and easy to need to cheat).

March 30th 2023

I received an email indicating that Bethesda detected I was using third party applications to cheat (I wasn't) and gave me a permaban (not a warning nor a temp ban). I was given 4 days to respond. Confused, I scrambled to figure what the issue was. The only third party program I use is Rocket League's Bakkesmod (completely approved by Psyonix, the company behind Rocket League), Discord and the SD's proton. After hearing other people's stories on Reddit, I concluded that it must be SD's proton that caused the false positive for cheating. I submitted a ticket to Bethesda's support indicating this and waited.

April 4th 2023 (Notice this was after a weekend).

I received an email from Bethesda asking me if I was using the third party application "Steam Deck Tools" on my SD. I wasn't and told them this. They responded asking if I was using "Proton Experimental" or "Developer Mode." I wasn't using either of these and I told them this. Important: this indicates that their anticheat software doesn't actually always tell them what third party a suspected cheater is using, only that one might be cheating. Thus, they are giving permabans based on their anticheat software indicating that someone might be cheating. They are permabanning people who have spent hundreds of dollars on the game based on their faulty software flagging people for maybe cheating. If I didn't respond in 4 days, it seems my account would have been dead. If enough people were affected by this, this would of course be grounds for a class action lawsuit (not that I'd ever pursue this because it's not that serious to me).

April 5th 2023

I received an email from Bethesda indicating that my ban was lifted and that I was placed on permanent watch for displaying "suspicious activity" (I wasn't). Others asked Bethesda what suspicious activity they displayed and if SD was safe. Bethesda responded with vague statements and did not answer their questions.

Conclusion

My ban was lifted. Bethesda did not make any public statements about them accidentally falsely permabanning several players. Instead of apologizing or giving any atoms or whatever (I don't expect them to, but it would just be nice for them to give some sort of acknowledgement that they screwed up, or maybe a in-game t-shirt saying "I survived the SD ban"), Bethesda said they will permanently watch my account and give me a permaban if they find any suspicious activity. Instead of acknowledging their mistake, they basically gave us threats. I acknowledge that their "threats" are probably automated or protocol. I also note that "any suspicious activity" seems to include "using the SD."

Other remarks

u/ladydevann (the community rep) never responded to previous calls for them (I understand they are busy etc. and don't expect to them to respond to every call--they are usually very helpful and friendly and I particularly like them). No one has given us responses concerning whether it is safe to play fo76 on the SD. No one gave us confirmation that Bethesda made a mistake (even though they clearly did). The discord did not allow us to discuss this topic on the fo76 discord. People accused us of lying about our false bans (tbf, people will lie about being "falsely" banned).

It is a serious issue that Bethesda will ban paying customers based on their anticheat software indicating that someone might be cheating. Note that actual cheaters (people who dupe etc.) are rarely banned (as far as I can tell).

Anyways, hopes this info is helpful to someone. Best of luck if you get false banned. Note that (if you believe them) posts in the past have indicated that people have been falsely banned without successful appeal. Anyways, this is all not that serious. Go buy a dinosaur or something and make a wacky camp.

First post on this: https://old.reddit.com/r/fo76/comments/126r6xd/account_incorrectly_banned/

Several people had their bans lifted (personal communication).

Opinion

It is not safe to use SD to play fo76 until Bethesda (u/ladydevann, we would appreciate anything) indicates so.

I'll edit this post as comments come in. I'm also currently editing the post.

External link →
over 1 year ago - /u/Ladydevann - Direct link

Hello everyone! I apologize for the silence on my part, as you can imagine there are a lot of different moving parts that needed to be looked into to get a clear picture of the situation.

It is safe to play Fallout 76 on a Steam Deck, we have conducted a thorough investigation into the cause of the bans and can assure you that players do not need to worry about their accounts being falsely flagged. Due to our Terms of Service that protect the privacy of our players, we can’t disclose specific actions taken that raised the flags in our system, or the details of each account but we want to be very clear that this is not something that players need to be concerned about falsely triggering in their playtime. To give some context, only around 50 players raised this flag in our system. Just playing Fallout 76 on your Steam Deck alone will not cause any issues. I hope this eases any concerns you may have! <3