Valve Anti-Cheat System (VAC)
Question
What is VAC?
VAC Bans versus Server Bans
VAC enabled games
Answer
Important:
All VAC bans are permanent - Valve has a zero-tolerance policy for cheating and will not lift VAC bans under any circumstances.
What is VAC?
If a user connects to a VAC-Secured server from a computer with identifiable cheats installed, the VAC system will ban the user from playing on VAC-Secured servers in the future.
While server admins may choose to ban specific players, server admins cannot VAC ban players. The VAC system is automated - contacting Steam Support to report cheaters is not necessary, nor will Steam Support act on any information provided.
The VAC system reliably detects cheats using their cheat signatures. Any third-party modification to a game designed to give one player an advantage over another is classified as a cheat or hack and will trigger a VAC ban. This includes modifications to a game's core executable files and dynamic link libraries.
The following will not trigger a VAC ban:
Using chat programs like X-Fire
System hardware configurations
Updated system drivers, such as video card drivers
Use only trusted machines to play on VAC-Secured servers - if you are not sure whether or not the machine you are using to connect to Steam may have cheats installed, do not play on VAC-Secured servers.
Use caution when installing any game modifications, such as scripts or custom skins. Only download custom content from trusted sources. Hackers sometimes maliciously disguise their cheats to cause others to get banned.
VAC Enabled Games
Please see the Steam Store Valve Anti Cheat Enabled search term.
Valve games
The Valve Anti-Cheat system is enabled for servers displaying the Secured shield logo. Using custom skins, sounds or maps and playing multi-player mods which do not modify core .EXE and .DLL files will not result in a VAC ban
Cheating in a Source Engine game that was released prior to Left 4 Dead will result in a VAC ban from Counter-Strike: Source, Half-Life 2: Deathmatch, Day of Defeat: Source, and Team Fortress 2.
Cheating in a Gold Source engine game will result in a VAC ban from Counter-Strike, Condition Zero, Ricochet, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress Classic, Half-Life: Deathmatch, and Deathmatch Classic
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
VAC is enabled on all multiplayer servers, public and private. Any modifications to the game other than editing config files can result in a VAC ban. Examples of such modifications include but are not limited to console enablers, VAC disablers, and server hosting mods.
A VAC ban in Modern Warfare 2 only affects Modern Warfare 2.
VAC Bans versus Server Bans
The best indicator that your account has been banned by VAC is if you receive this message when attempting to access a VAC-secure server:
"Your connection to this secure server has been rejected. Because of past cheating violations, you have been banned from playing on all secure servers"
If you receive an error message stating "STEAMID IS BANNED" (or other similar messages) when attempting to connect to a server, your account is not banned by VAC - server administrators may ban you from a particular server (we cannot prevent this - whoever runs the server can ban players for any reason they desire).
If you find that you are banned from a large number of servers but your VAC status is in good standing, you have likely been banned by a third-party ban tool, such as Steambans or Punkbuster. These third-party tools are used by a large number of servers sharing a common database of banned ID's. These tools are unrelated to Steam and we cannot assist you in resolving this issue.
You will not be banned by the VAC system unless you login to a VAC-secure server with a cheat installed on your computer.
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