Online gaming is more popular than ever. Millions of people are playing games on phones, computers, and consoles every day. But as gaming has grown, so has cheating. 

Cheaters use hacks, bots, and other means to try to win unfairly, so everyone else has less fun. To combat this, game companies are now using a powerful tool, AI. It allows game companies to use faster and more accurate methods to find cheaters than before. But how do they do this? How can AI “see” someone cheating? 

In this blog post, we will analyze how AI is used to detect cheats in online gaming. We will use simple examples to explain AI and the methods game companies use to think about cheating. We want every type of reader to understand this blog, even if they don’t know much about online gaming or AI.

Why Cheating Is a Big Problem

Cheating destroys games for the honest players. Imagine putting in the time to learn the game and improve yourself, then losing to someone who clicked a button that makes them invincible. That is a frustrating and unfair experience.

Cheating can also damage game companies. If the players lose hope in a game because it is riddled with cheaters, they may stop playing altogether. When the player count decreases, so do the ratings and potential money, and that is a big motivation to stop the cheats.

How AI Finds Cheaters

Let’s look at some of the ways AI can detect cheating:

1. Observations of the Movement of Players

Very often, you have to move your character easily and organically, as in most games. However, hacks, such as the notorious speed hacks or the teleport hacks, can cause the players to move in impossible directions. 

By examining thousands of honest players, AI can learn what the normal movement should look like. Hence, it can observe when a person moves too fast, too fluently, or even jumps across the map in weird directions.

The AI can pick up little differences that a human will not even notice.

2. The way players aim

Aim is quite essential in shooting games. Cheaters apply what are termed as aimbots, which assist them in having an accurate shot at the opponent.

AI would be able to monitor the movement of the player using their mouse or controller during aiming. Honest players sway slightly when they aim or even slow down. There is usually over-perfection in moving or too quick actions by aimbots.

These minute details can be noticed by AI, and it marks the accounts that seem suspicious.

3). What Players Click and Do

In most of the games, they press some buttons or do some activities in some order. Hackers may apply scripts or bots which click buttons very fast or in the same direction.

This is something that AI can compare with the actions of normal players. When a user clicks flawlessly every 0.5 seconds or does not make a mistake, it could be a bot.

4). The Analysis of Chat Messages and Reports

AI can be able to scan reports and check whether a lot of players are reporting on a single individual. Chat messages can also be examined by the use of AI.

5). Looking out for New Forms of Frauds

To avoid detection, cheaters always work to develop new hacks. New patterns can be identified with the assistance of AI. For instance, when a lot of players begin to play weirdly when a new file is downloaded, the AI may recognize this. It can advise developers about a new cheat in the game.

How AI Keeps Learning

The advantage of AI is that it never ceases to learn and become wiser in the course of time. This is aided by game companies that feed the AI with new information daily. These facts are based on a variety of sources, such as statistics of fair play of actual players. 

Data obtained using accounts that were identified as cheaters can be given to the AI. Information regarding newly developed cheat tools that are posted on the internet can also be studied to catch cheaters. 

AI systems are capable of identifying the distinction between a fair game and suspicious activity more effectively. They can do this easily, only by analyzing and contrasting user data. This implies that AI is adaptable to achieve cheat detection that was not built yet when the game was initially released. 

This makes AI a versatile and efficient weapon in making games enjoyable and fair to play by all players.

What Happens After AI Finds a Cheat?

When AI identifies a suspicious behaviour in a game, the player is not banned on the spot. Rather, what happens in most cases is a cautious step which is undertaken to ensure that no errors are committed. 

One, the AI makes an account suspicious according to strange movements, things that are impossible, such as unnatural aim or unnatural movement. Then the team of the game reviews the flagged information more closely to determine whether it really seems to be cheating. 

In case the team can conclude that cheating indeed took place because of this review, the team may take some action. Actions may include banning the account, depriving any undeserved rewards for cheating, or warning the player depending on the extent of cheating. This is a manual procedure that will safeguard the innocent gamers against getting wrongly banned, and only the actual cheaters will be penalized.

The mission of AI is not to identify all those minor errors. It is to make games fair and fun. The majority of players are simply in the business of playing and enjoying. AI ensures that even cheaters cannot afford to spoil the game for the rest of the players.

Does AI Make Mistakes?

Indeed, AI is not always right. For instance, a very talented player can be wrongfully flagged by AI as using an aimbot because he is so good at aiming. That is why AI is often used with human review. Game firms are well aware of the need to be cautious before banning a person.

AI Can’t Do It Alone

AI is strong and highly capable of detecting and punishing cheaters. However, it can’t be the only one that game organizations can employ to maintain the even field of fair play. Games also have frequent updates by developers who may either alter the code to render old cheats useless. These updates can also make new cheats difficult to make. 

Besides that, there are human teams to check a report manually and watch gameplay. This is to make sure that someone is cheating and that innocent players do not face unfair punishment. 

Players themselves can be allowed to report suspicious activity that they observe during a game. Once all these measures, AI detection, game updates, manual reviews, and player reports are put to use, cheaters will find it very difficult. Games will be fun to play and fair to honest players.

The Future: Smarter AI

AI keeps getting better daily, and it looks bright to continue to make games fair. Over the next few years, there is a possibility of AI being even quicker at detecting new cheats. It may take a few minutes to detect these rather than days. 

It would be capable of learning new hacks and tricks automatically, thus the cheaters would not have time to exploit them. Perhaps at some point, AI will be able to know which accounts are going to cheat even without it happening. It would recognize similar patterns or unusual behaviour that will lead to that. 

This will ensure that the games are safer and impartial on the part of all players.

Tips to Stay Safe and Fair

There are a few tips in case you are a player of online games:

• Do not install cheat tools. Most of these applications have viruses or capture your account information.
• Play fair. Winning is nicer when it is earned than when you cheat.
• Report cheaters.
• Whenever you are looking at a cheat, be cautious of who you trust, since people give away cheats to ban you.

Final Thoughts

Game companies are struggling with cheating. AI is transforming how they deal with the issue, with its ability to learn through data and get better with time. AI helps millions of innocent gamers in various parts of the world.

Although AI is not flawless, it really counts. Now, cheaters no longer have it easy when they want to ruin games. Good players will also be able to play their preferred games without worrying about hacking, which is less likely to take place.

It is excellent to see how such technology can be used to address the existing real problems, even in an entertaining activity such as gaming. Online games will be even fairer, safer, and more pleasant to all people as the AI continues to get better.

You can read more interesting posts about the use of AI in games on Awaretoday.com and get familiar.