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Will kernel-level anti-cheat ever work on linux?
(lemmy.zip)
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this post was submitted on 08 Jun 2025
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I'm not a programmer or cheater or anything, but I think the answer is yes and no. Yes it could technically be done and even work as intended as long as the device is locked down to prevent the user from replacing the shipped kernel (which would be a bad thing for users). However, savvy people could (in theory) make custom kernels that lie to the kernel module, causing the module to report there is no cheating when there is. It's my understanding that it's close to the current situation with Windows and virtual machines and anticheat: you can cheat by running your game in a VM and then have that virtual hardware extract secret information or flip bits in the right spots. Most competitive games will refuse to run in a VM for this reason.
This is where TPMs, measured boot, and remote attestation come in.
You can run whatever kernel you want, but if it is not an approved kernel, you wouldn't be able to attest to running an approved kernel; allowing whatever DRM scheme the developer put in to active.
I believe this is how the higher levels of Android's Play Integrity system work.
When Microsoft first proposed something like that a couple decades ago, it was widely seen as the nightmarish corporate power grab it was. Even mainstream, non-techy publications were critical.
It is.
How the fuck did this become acceptable?