Comment on Epic Games Wants Linux Gamers. It's Rebuilding EAC For Fortnite
Fubarberry@sopuli.xyz 3 weeks agoMy understanding is that there’s a systemd service that runs only when the game runs, and that uses ePBF to restrict read/write access to the game files while it’s running (to prevent tampering). The tpm/secure boot/recognized kernel part is to make sure the user doesn’t have a modified kernel that will lie to the anti-cheat.
If everything works like they say, they shouldn’t have access to the non-game files and no direct kernel access. So privacy should be maintained, and theoretically no risk of a EAC bug or exploit causing a full system crash.
Overall it sounds much better to me than windows anti-cheat, but that’s a pretty low bar.
Overall it sounds much better to me than windows anti-cheat, but that’s a pretty low bar.
I think all the things you are saying are just claims. As far as I understand it, this will be closed source software that runs as root, so basically it’s just trustmebro, same as on Windows.
The EBF module can be inspected, and EAC won’t have kernel access, so that limits it significantly. Things like crowdstrike, completely hiding it’s processes, etc shouldn’t be possible without it having kernel access.
The systemd service can easily be confirmed to only run while a game is running as well. You can even restrict the service to be masked except when specific games are running.
EAC having root access is a valid concern though, it will have full access to your entire filesystem. Normally you can restrict what files a systemd service can access, so we may be able to quarantine this to block any privacy concerns. However we’ll have to wait until it comes out to know that part.
Overall it’s not perfect, but users will have much higher ability to audit it on Linux versus the Windows version.
I’m curious how effective it will be, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with leveraging secure boot to verify the kernel is unmodified, but does this mean dkms won’t be supported?
Dkms modules would have to be on an approved list I think.
If true that does sound like a huge improvement over the Windows anticheat experience.
DacoTaco@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Agreed to your comment. Only problem i have with it is that i use mainline to get latest kernels, and that wont work (kernel is not signed). Other than that, sounds good tbh
Fubarberry@sopuli.xyz 3 weeks ago
You can have multiple kennels installed, so you could normally boot with mainline, but if you wanted to play a EAC game you could reboot with an approved kernel.
DacoTaco@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Oh i know i can. I always have latest mainline + latest supported incase i run into issues. I just dont want to reboot to play games. Might as well use windows for gaming then :)