After recently seeing that the ESEA has come back into the spotlight with the main focus being on their illegal bitcoin operation, I will try to bring more focus on why we need to renew/continue our push for open source software. Some may remember the ESEA secretly used machines with their game launcher on it to mine bitcoin with out user knowledge. This isn't the first time I have read about someone adding malicious content with their installer.
This is a big issue as a major company in the gaming industry has now betrayed our trust. Who knows how many more in their type of position are doing something similar. We just haven't discovered how many backdoors they have left open in our system to get what information they want from us. Whether it is mining or grabbing browser information unknowingly, it is something we shouldn't want on our system. At what point does it become overstepping their bounds and trust for their services. Not to keep my tinfoil hat out and say I don't use services that record my information. I use things like Google quite often. I go in knowing that their services monitor certain activities while using their services. I never once have thought Google wasn't this kind of company. It is more about a violation of trust as I don't know what Companies are starting to record and pass on. When you give someone that much access to your system this starts to become a privacy issue. Certain programs may start listening to your microphone every so often to gather information. I know Microsoft was battling this issue with their latest console. It is absurd that this has become more and more acceptable today. Okay, I am now putting my tinfoil hat away.
Not to say that Open Source will solve these issues completely, but having the source for something as simple as a game launcher available to the public would greatly increase the transparency and the trust. I don't go around downloading third party launchers at will mostly because I don't trust everyone with access to my personal computer. I wouldn't expect a company such as Valve to load a bitcoin miner on my computer. There is far more risk in being an established company to try something like that. Companies such as ESEA have not been established as long and require trust but in a quickly adapting environment could easily allow for something like this to be added in. Sneaking it into your terms of service or trying to see how much they can get away with before being caught.
Well, how do we trust the compiled version of these open source launchers? The big thing with this is being able compile your own software and understanding what packages are needed for the install. This can help you control what is installed. If you aren't that savvy with computers you can still use the companies compiled version but the source will help those who want to compare and check that the company has properly compiled and hasn't added any new products unknown to you.
This may not be perfect. This won't be perfect, but it would definitely be a huge step in the correct direction to allow others to help scrutinize especially with these kinds of actions coming to light. I would look forward to more of a push from the community to look at and inspect these launchers more closely. Gamers as a whole have a tremendous amount of power behind them. Just recently when Valve and Bethesda tried to monetize mods it backfired and outraged the community. Gamers as a whole could push for this kind of open launcher and push us further into an open software community.
No comments:
Post a Comment