Opinions about Hacker Shaming

[Live Bait]

Just as Gregg the Grim Reaper hates cats and undead (and catfish), I hate hackers.
ConjointGaming takes a Are-You-Fucking-Serious-Dude?!?! stance on hacking, which will result in a permanent ban if caught. I'm a fan of this.
Earlier tonight, Red and myself caught a hacker. Red's proof has an UNDENIABLE moment of him hacking.
I mentioned his name to someone else and they went "I KNEW IT!"

So, in a bold move, I checked the kid's friend list. (By the way, did I mention this proof is SOLID?) I saw ONE FRIEND still in SDK 2006 (The Hidden mod). I joined the server. It wasn't ours, but another big community.
I politely called out the friend's name and he identified himself. I brought up his friend and how we have DEFINITE proof of him hacking. ( Like I paused at the right moment when he declares to see The Hidden before  the kid has rounded the corner The Hidden is behind. It's painfully obvious. You'll see it.)

Now, it sounds as if there are a couple regulars on the server and they appear to know the name, too. They politely asked a couple questions about myself and I revealed being an Admin for ConjointGaming. I was asked if I was able to share/post the proof and I replied "With pleasure if asked." I joined ONLY to shame the hacker to his friend, but it appears another community now has the news, too and they seemed grateful for the information. There was nothing but pleasant exchanges between myself and the other players.
To me, this is how different communities should act to each other. I feel NO SHAME about what I did.

But I would like to ask you all is:
How you feel about this situation?
Do you feel I crossed a line?
Do you feel we should continue contacting other communities when we can? Our On-Site Sourcebans is GREAT for warning us about existing CG bans, but not other communities.
--Keep in mind, this WILL ONLY be done upon SOLID PROOF of hacking. It will require MORE THAN ONE ADMIN to agree "This is blatant hacking" and require the storage of said evidence. We don't need rogues running around spreading "lies" or "rumors", but as gamers, we should stand united against those who wish to cheat us out of a fair, fun match.

Right now, all I ask is your opinion on this matter. If it goes further, MAYBE discuss a way to expand it.

Thank you for your time.

[Red]

Well I approve of the idea of sharing this kind of stuff with other communities, my motto/slogan when it comes to hackers has always been the same as steam's "...no one likes playing with cheaters..." As I said to Live earlier we could create a database of players who hack by accepting .dem files/other pieces of evidence that a player was hacking and going over it to make sure the .dem is valid proof against the hacker. If we find it to be valid proof we would add it to the database.

[Kwaurtz]

I disagree with this idea completely. You are purposefully slandering someone else's name elsewhere, ban them, its that simple, but to go around and do that sort of stuff is wrong.

Also shame me, I used to hack.

[Fluffalupagus]

I'm gonna say I'm against it... It's the same as an appeal, just because they made a mistake and decided it might be fun to cheat in order to have a good time doesn't mean they won't turn around and clean up their act. If they never get a chance to do so on another server, then I feel like it's unfair. :/

While you should keep an eye on former inmates, would you say it's fair to completely ban someone from working anywhere because they had a problem at one work place and ended up with jailtime? That's basically how I'm looking at this right now...

Now that's just my honest opinion, and sometimes I feel like I am a little bit lax with bans and rules. (Maybe it's the Canadian, buahaha. >) But if it were to become a part of being an admin for CG, then I would follow said protocol.

[raddude-pancake ruler]

I think that it makes sense telling another community to look out for "that guy" but nothing more. Someone from CG posted a look out type thing on a community forum that i am admin for and i think it was quite helpful.

[Leetgrain]

For 100% proven hackers. just post their names on some kind of "hackers watchlist" post. That others can refer to. and have their demos available under their name (so as to harden the proof/etc), but don't excessively bash and don't go to their friends and poke fun. If they're active on another community/clan you frequent. Sure, you can warn the admins/owners. But don't randomly go around warning everyone ever. No point to it.

[theyankees213]

I would say be careful about this. Yes you did warn them of a hacker, but no we shouldn't do this for everyone. I know certain people do have this happen to them(WG,Snak,Cash maybe even) but that was because they did something terrible. Hackers just need to be banned. That's about it.

[AlphaWeeaboo]

The way I see it, we shouldn't be going out of our ways to tell others about bad members. For all we really know or care to know, they only hack on our servers or something. I'm sure the other community wouldn't exactly smile upon that but that is for them to find out. If they ask us however we should be glad to assist them and provide them with what information we know.

[HerpDerpMike]

I am against hackers, I don't brutally beat them with words however I just ask them why they hack and such.

But I feel that you going to his friend and his community just to "shame" him, was totally wrong.

[Live Bait]

I want to say "Thank You" for all your opinions.

While you should keep an eye on former inmates, would you say it's fair to completely ban someone from working anywhere because they had a problem at one work place and ended up with jailtime? That's basically how I'm looking at this right now...

Yes, I absolutely agree with this. The owner of Men's Warehouse is a former alcoholic and believes in Second Chances. Therefore, background checks are NOT part of their hiring process.

HOWEVER, people have only one life to live. Gamers, particularly on Steam, can have MANY accounts. A buddy of mine, who has hacked in the past, have about 5 accounts. There are members of this forum who have multiple accounts. We've been banning teamkilling trolls multiple times because they'll join on an alternative account to retaliate.

Also, we are NOT encouraging a "ban without evidence" policy. This is a warning to other communities that this player was caught hacking and banned. We would say "Keep an eye out".

I disagree with this idea completely. You are purposefully slandering someone else's name elsewhere, ban them, its that simple, but to go around and do that sort of stuff is wrong.

Also shame me, I used to hack.

Slander. Yes. I suppose this could fall under this definition, but then are Wanted posters slander? Is the Sex Offender Registry List slander (although I admit the laws governing who registers are outrageous in some places)?
This is about shaming a player. Kwaurtz, I used to "hack" too. Delta Force 4. I was just a 12 year old that liked to play games. My neighbor gave me a pirated copy of his video game ( didn't realize that at the time), and showed me a program to use to get infinite ammo, so many weapons, etc. "Is that cheating?" "Bleh. EVERYONE is using it. It's part of the game." I didn't even know because I was dumb and naive. I'm still ashamed I did that to a group of people. I'm ashamed of being that dumb.

Kwaurtz, I don't know if you feel guilty of your past hacking, but I certainly do. Are you still hacking? Do you need us to kick your online ass and shame the shit out of you to make you clean up? No? Then your tongue-in-cheek remark about shaming you is useless. This isn't about punish those who have hacked, it's shaming those who STILL ARE.

For 100% proven hackers. just post their names on some kind of "hackers watchlist" post. That others can refer to. and have their demos available under their name (so as to harden the proof/etc), but don't excessively bash and don't go to their friends and poke fun. If they're active on another community/clan you frequent. Sure, you can warn the admins/owners. But don't randomly go around warning everyone ever. No point to it.

Leet, Red mentioned putting up their demos on YouTube or something. The thing about a passive watchlist is that the other communities are probably not actively trying to interact with each other.
The last time communities got in touch was when He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named burned us and HuntersGaming.

I think that it makes sense telling another community to look out for "that guy" but nothing more. Someone from CG posted a look out type thing on a community forum that i am admin for and i think it was quite helpful.

This. This is it. Said much simpler and in two sentences. My story starts with me just wanting to tell his friend and evolved into warning another community. That's something I think can be good.

[Christovski]

Hackers/cheaters are scum.  Fuck them, they fucked others over, they deserve to be shamed.

[HerpDerpMike]

Hackers/cheaters are scum.  Fuck them, they fucked others over, they deserve to be shamed.

Calm down.

No they don't, they cheat who the fuck cares. If they want to cheat then get the fuck off our servers, however following them around and shaming them is no way to take care of one.

[Leninade]

Calm down.

No they don't, they cheat who the fuck cares. If they want to cheat then get the fuck off our servers, however following them around and shaming them is no way to take care of one.

Well, we do is the point. We insta-permaban if we catch people cheating like that.

That said, I don't think it's necessary. Our sourcebans are made public, and I'm sure that just like we have for other people who have had previous bans, ours are fairly easily searchable on the internets. So not really any need to go around and spread the news. If anything, something like this just antagonizes people needlessly, which isn't something a gaming community really needs to do. If we catch them doing it, and can support it with a demo file, then perma-banning them is all that really needs to be done, imo.

[crovv]

Your wording in your original post caught me off guard a little bit.

I joined ONLY to shame the hacker to his friend, but it appears another community now has the news, too and they seemed grateful for the information.

If you went there with the intention of shaming the hacker rather than deliver the information to another community, that's a little...backhanded, in my opinion. Then there's the conversation we could have "do the ends justify the means" or "does motive matter."

But let's say you didn't share that little tidbit. You went to another community, talked to the people on it, shared that he was hacking, and warned them to watch out for him. What they do with that information is up to them. If you went on the community and said "permaban this hacker, we just caught him hacking on our server!" that's another story, indeed, but if you just warned them and then they permabanned him, okay, fine.

That being said, I do agree with this.

Spoiler for rant:

Sometimes admins miss things. Sometimes on TTT I suspect people of ghosting and cannot find a connection, or have someone RDMing and don't realize they've been going server to server getting themselves banned for mass rdm. Sometimes a suspected hacker doesn't have any proof against him, so we cannot act on it, yet another community could have demos from earlier that day. While we could dig for previous bans for every ban we do like we do for accepted admins, having a list of SteamIDs or names could be helpful - not that we would ban them immediately, but in case we did suspect them of something, we could be ready to get proof.

[Spadie]

Video games. That is all.