A few hours ago, Resetera’s member ‘Madjoki’ discovered that Epic Launcher collecting players’ Steam friends and play history. Going into more details, Madjoki found out that Epic Games Launcher on start up searches for Steam install and proceeds to get list of files in your Steam Cloud. This also includes game saves for every user that has logged in on your PC.
“Steam Cloud is stored under userdata\[account id]\ if you wanna check
It will also create encrypted copy of config\localconfig.vdf.
This file contains your steam friends, their name history (groups you’re part of, are considered “friends”).It seems friends might be used for friends suggestions, but I don’t even use that feature and it collects more than that.
While it’s called “localhistory” it is synced from cloud
It will read, encrypt and then write copy to: C:\ProgramData\Epic\SocialBackup\RANDOM HEX CODE_STEAM ACCOUNT ID.bak
It will also keep historical entries there.”
Naturally, a lot of people were frustrated by this as they felt that Epic was spying on them, and that the Epic launcher should not have any access at their Steam friends and play history.
Epic Games has responded to these accusations, stating that it only imports your Steam friends with your explicit permission. Here is Epic’s full response.
“We use a tracking pixel (tracking.js) for our Support-A-Creator program so we can pay creators. We also track page statistics.
The launcher sends a hardware survey (CPU, GPU, and the like) at a regular interval as outlined in our privacy policy(see the “Information We Collect or Receive” section). You can find the code here.
The UDP traffic highlighted in this post is a launcher feature for communication with the Unreal Editor. The source of the underlying system is available on github.
The majority of the launcher UI is implemented using web technology that is being rendered by Chromium (which is open source). The root certificate and cookie access mentioned above is a result of normal web browser start up.
The launcher scans your active processes to prevent updating games that are currently running. This information is not sent to Epic.
We only import your Steam friends with your explicit permission. The launcher makes an encrypted local copy of your localconfig.vdf Steam file. However information from this file is only sent to Epic if you choose to import your Steam friends, and then only hashed ids of your friends are sent and no other information from the file.”
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
Contact: Email
“our store is perfect it doesnt need improvements” by the way did we mention we gonna steal every godamn game out there and bribe them to be exclusive on our store, FORCING YOU TO USE IT if you want to play any new games at all, also we are owned by a Chinese company so you can consider your personal information to be property of the communist party.
Enjoy.
Epic game you might be in your most successful situation ever financialy speaking, but you are in your lowest situation in term of respect you truly sold your souls to the greed devil
Instead of greed devil just say Tencent
Resetera…….
I would question everything that cancer claims.
lol being mad at a forum that only takes information from another source, is retarded. the information did not orignally come from resetera, and you are probably a mad neogaf member who supports the rapist owner of that site.
Considering REEEEEEEsetera is made up of the kiddy f**ker mods who left neoFAG, yeah, those in glass houses SHOULDN’T HAVE KIDDY P*RN YOU SICK F*K!
LOL wrong dump assumptions lol. Never been a NeoGAF member but whatever kid.
The investigation originated from MetaCouncil. Someone on ResetEra just posted those findings just like what DSOgaming and other places will be doing. This is still an ongoing investigation and has opened a huge can of worms for Epic Games PR machine to deal with.
Hopefully John will edit the article so to reflect that because Reeeeeesetera is little more than a hive of SJW scum who actively and openly organise to destroy the careers and livelihoods of those in the games industry who don’t march in lock-step with their poisonous extremist politics.
angry neogaf member? who supports its rapist owner. right.. you are much better.
I have no idea what it is that you just attempted to state, suggest, imply, question or accuse me or others of. Perhaps try again but this time using comprehensible grammar.
Fat bottomed girls make the rocking world go round!
Resetera is a dump for certain type of useless discussions but news is news. I mean if they claim Tim Sweeney praised the gaming patriarchy I might suspect it but not for more neutral stuff.
Edit: hopefully this is clean enough.
Epic take a facebook-like approach from the start. Ouch.
Ahhh reading comprehension…..I guess since your obviously autistic taking a break from finger painting with your poo, have your caretaker actually read the article to you instead of having them read you the headline and then flinging your poo supply……FYI I know its hard for Simple Jacks to understand but Steam actually directly collects far more information from you…But had you actually had your caregiver read you the article you would actually have a grasp on information anyway…Because FACTS are FUN….
Ego is funny. It makes people look like such arseholes. 24 people agree with me. Your opinion is alone in the wind. Thanks for the comment though Sweeny…I mean…”gamer”..
This is Illegal. This need to stop. now
Wouldn’t surprise me if these features are listed in the EULA that everyone accepts when they’re going through the install process.
It’s just China being China.
The future doesn’t look bright for this world. Hopefully a correction is on its way.
The future doesn’t look bright for this world. Hopefully a correction is on its way.
“Corrections” take the innocent, too.
there are no innocents. Our very existence makes us liable if you change to a larger frame of reference.
No, children are innocents.
Puppies are innocents too. The cow that trusted you to take care of, and not be eaten by you, is innocent too. There are many innocents, why are you limited only to the species with a more complex form of comunication and the only ones (we believe) that are self aware? If you go down that path, go all the way. Life is cruel and innocents suffer, including children. If not by a world war now, then by overpopulation, degraded quality of life, starvation etc, in the close future. Small corrections (small on the scale of Earth’s existence) like a world war or an extinction, are necessary, and healthy, no matter how painful and hard on the being that is the subject of that correction. Zoom out even farther in time and space, and all these concepts of right and wrong, innocent or guilty, dead or alive, are starting to become blurred. There are no innocents, only fireflies twinkling in the moment.
Puppies are innocents […] is innocent too. There are many innocents […] innocents suffer, including children […] There are no innocents
🙂
weak comeback, I’ll give you another try
You offered your own comeback.
aand you wasted it. take care now
You’d like to think so, wouldn’t you?
Yeah, we just taking data just in case, wont use it until you let us… Im glad I got rid of that crap
Another Epic fail.
This whole “collecting user data in the background to better understand the user’s needs” is just so wrong! But, today’s tech giants(the likes of Googles and Facebooks) all do that, and are “giants” because of it! Privacy is just an illusion in today’s world of cloud/connected technologies…almost everything is tracked in one way or another! What you say, what you do, where you go, who you talk to – its all constantly tracked and profiled.
Social media, which has done more harm than good IMHO, has literally destroyed privacy, and made the ability to “stay private” nearly impossible! An average person out there feeds everything to these media platforms in one way or another as they have become “addicts” of these platforms, and this connected worldin general. AI and machine learning algorithms are getting more intelligent by the day as there is just a constant feed of unimaginable amounts of user data helping them become more accurate. The ability of predicting the users almost every next move, makes an average person a slave of the technology and the people running these systems their “rulers”.
The people who truly understand this, or try to understand this situation know that the future is getting darker, and there is no such thing as “privacy” that exists/will exist.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/00b46d70aa4fa61ebde659250216134e479acd7bf5cd013557ab635dbd13d8f7.jpg
What’s worse is even if one chooses to not participate, they still create data (especially those trying to fully nullify themselves) because interpolation through neural networks siphoning and analyzing everything from those mass data farms will still “fill in the banks” by other means such as stealing information from those in our circles who do participate, facial recognition, data already out there about us such as job histories, the sites we search and frequent, what we fixate on when we do visit those sites, and millions of other data points.
This is machine learning we are talking about. Companies stealing our data is just ONE part of it. Data is the food for these human behavior researching AIs. Add tracked phones and other common hardware around us like smart TVs, vehicles, Alexas, Google Home, gaming systems, security cams or hell even internet connected thermostats and interested parties can get a pretty accurate picture of a person who does not participate.
Still my opinion is why make their stealing our data any easier for them?
So, basically, buying anything from Epic Store is funding Skynet!
Agree with you 100% on everything you said!
And, that is why I said privacy is “nearly impossible”. The point you made about the circle of people you know feeding your data to the AI systems/neural networks is another BIG problem.
Countries are competing to build the most advanced/intelligent AIs because they know, the one with the best AI system is going to truly rule the world!
But man, how and will the average person out there ever going to try and stay away from the connected technology of today? I don’t think so! These platforms feed and fulfill their self-gratification needs, and provide enough pleasure for them to become addicts and readily accept their role as a slave to the technology!
I’m thinking of boycotting Unreal Engine 4 games entirely now.
F*k EGS, if they keep adding more games in there that I like, I might even resort to pirating which I never do.
Epic
SpywareGames Store is Cancelled. I don’t see them coming back from this. Its one thing stealing games from other platforms but stealing private data without the users consent is absolutely criminal. Its game over for Epic Games and no amount of damage control will save their already trash reputation.That is if they actually do get Cancelled. Remember when Facebook was called out for their controversial methods. Facebook should have been shut down on the spot, yet it still exists.
This is of course a major crime in my eyes what Epic has done here. Yet I doubt anything will stick enough to shut down their store and launcher.
Not trying to defend either Facebook or Epic, I equally hate both of them and believe they should both be put down in a grave for the rest of eternity.
Not literally cancelled but a mass user exodus, pun intended, will definitely happen.
Let us hope that this causes future games to avoid Epic Spyware Store.
Wishful thinking. Far, far too many simple minded sheep to be herded out there. This won’t put a dent in their user numbers. I don’t like saying it, but it’s just the truth. At best, these people shrug their shoulders at this kind of stuff.
Facebook is tumbling down harder than you think. It takes time for big trees to come down, it’s the crash at the bottom that everyone sees.
That’s fine by me. I stopped using Facebook. And deactivated and “deleted” account. Reason I wrote ” in there is because I chose deleted to my account. Whether or not Facebook actually does is another case. And most likely they backed up various content that may were on my profile.
Good thing it weren’t much content there to begin with. Nothing that were personal for me anyway.
That’s fine by me. I stopped using Facebook. And deactivated and “deleted” account. Reason I wrote ” in there is because I chose deleted to my account. Whether or not Facebook actually does is another case. And most likely they backed up various content that may were on my profile.
Good thing it weren’t much content there to begin with. Nothing that were personal for me anyway.
Hopefully you’re right and that’ll happen, i want to see Epic crash and burn, i don’t really care about unreal anymore, they had already sh*t on consumers, and they’ve been pouring gasoline over it for these last months, with this they simply lit on fire all crap they took. Hopefully Epic games / Tencent gets deleted from the page of videogames history and never to be reminded of.
Unfortunately for you, and fortunately for everyone else, most people and a ton of devs do care about Unreal 4. It’s an engine that’s allowed so many people to do so many things it’s ridiculous.
What are you talking about? I meant the game not the engine, where do you see the word “engine”?
Unreal is absolutely huge. Skipping unreal is skipping hundreds of games. Here is an incomplete list…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unreal_Engine_games
Nah, nothing is going to happen, the amount of people complaining about EPIC exclusivity and this seems huge in Reddit and websites but there is a lot of people out of the loop and they do this because that is gaming industry, is a gold mine, super lucrative, mindless customers market and that is why EA is how it is, why DLC and microtransactions exists, EPIC store works, etc… is sad but is the truth.
I mostly agree here. The average consumer doesn’t care about all of this. It really is all minor stuff that is going on everywhere else too. It is just business as usual for the industry.
The average consumer just buys the game wherever it is available and never thinks/cares about it. Steam had these same battles when it was young, and look at it now.
So we’re just ignoring the fact that Epic said the information isn’t sent to them (unless you want to import friends or whatever) ? So in other words, it doesn’t matter whether Epic does actual upload that information or not, from here on out, the r**ard gaming community will just keep parroting that they are stealing it.
You poor, poor people going to be so sad when Epic Games Store is going to be bigger than before after some time. Yes, forced exclusivity sucks, but most people still aren’t going to cry about downloading another launcher, or boycott games because of that, and lots of developers are ecstatic about the 88% cut. This isn’t going anywhere.
People only read the headlines. Reading the article to actually understand the situation is just too far beyond them.
Greedy developers can go to hell together with their dev house. Epic doesn’t offer anything better, it only offers more money, and who’s accepting that instead of actual functionalities is a fkn piece of sht and should eat a giant turd.
Edit : I’m not saying nothing fishy is going on. I’m just saying discuss the details before jumping on the bandwagon and using an accusation. Not the other way round is all. Maybe Epic are handling it badly, but it’s not like this community would know the difference imo, and I don’t think it matters what’s really going on because of the hate b*ner.
Why copy the file before asking if you can send it? Because you don’t give two s**ts about privacy, it’s easier to develop this way, and we’ll just encrypt/copy the file and lie to yourself that none of your customers will care that you promise you didn’t send it.
You know, Steam collects WAY WAY more data than this.
If you’re upset about this, you should be way more upset about Steam.
And, please read the article. They’re not stealing anything.
And where’s the proof of what you’re saying?
You should update yourself on their privacy agreement…
The collect website data you view, the games you own, time/money spent, and much, much more. Everything Epic collects, Steam collects. Go through and make a checklist.
https://store.steampowered.com/privacy_agreement/
It’s ok man, Jumbo Sterling endorses the Epic Store like the shining example of consumer advocacy he is.
Stealing games? Yawn. They gave developers a HUGE leg up to get away from costly development. Credit where it’s due.
This, however, is purely unacceptable and this article even misses some of the things the app does. I for one have deleted the launcher and will never use it again. I’m all for helping devs, I’m never for spying on customers or their computers. But, in all honesty, this is likely Tencent. That social credit score stuff is probably going too far in China and Epic turned a blind eye to what they wanted to do with the app.
Privacy policies have limits .They can’t break the law, which some items that have been tracked would be considered illegal in the US, likely dependant on the state it’s in. Just because it’s a contract doesn’t make it legal.
Meanwhile, fools here such as dirthurts, ChrisB and Amith Thomas continue with their simpleton comments implying that Epic Store is just fine, pushing the false narrative that people only despise it because we have to “download an additional launcher” and reeeeing that anybody who disagrees with them must be a Steam “fanboy” or are “crying ignorant children”.
#epicfail
I’d err on the side of the simplest most likely explanation, i.e. keyboard warriors desperately craving attention.
I have no problem with it, anyone steal anyone’s data, you are just a butthurt steam fanboy that is angry about missing on all of these 3 great games, now i’m going to install another Epic launcher to get my free games.
Which one of those 3 idiots will say this ? you only have one chance to select the correct answer 😀
As there’s three of them shilling then maybe we should refer to them as the three stooges!
Strawman
More Strawman
If you’re going to call me out, atleast get my arguments right. Making jokes about gamers whining is not the same thing as saying “Anyone who disagrees about anything regarding this issue is a crybaby or must be a Steam fanboy”. Never once did I say that people were wrong for not liking exclusivity. Never once did I disagree with the fact that Epic Store lacks Steam store features. I DID, however, call out a bunch of idiots for promoting piracy because of not wanting to deal with Epic and their launcher. I do also think that people are overreacting in some cases (but that’s entirely subjective)
But you wouldn’t even know the difference between any of these, do you ? 🙂
Sorry guys, let’s promote the piracy of games in protest. That’ll show the devs, and will do great and wonderful things for the image of the online PC gaming community, amirite yarrr haha yarrr hurr durr.
Yawn
Too bad our ancestors didn’t act the same as you’re saying and did not dump that tea in the harbor, because it was.. “unlawful”
To think that we could’ve been speaking british right now… lol
When the law is unfair, you have the right NAY, the obligation to make it fair (lol). If a system doesn’t correct itself on its own, then other methods can also be employed.
They’re probably paid employees
“The launcher sends a hardware survey (CPU, GPU, and the like) …”… and the like… very informative. It is only whatever they want right there.
This is why I prefer stores such as GOG and Itch.io that allow me the option to to just download the games and stay away from clients.
I’m thinking of boycotting Unreal Engine 4 games entirely now.
FTC needs to see this.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c394eb492725b6ec52bddc1a052624501d427b1904f0402f713eb83c00a3b3ad.jpg
I bet pcgamer reports this as a plus to using epic 😀
Going by their latest article, it seems exactly that way: https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/epic-games-store-development-roadmap-includes-achievements-cloud-saves-and-more/
PCG’s refusal to say anything negative or pointing out the negative gains from Epic is so obvious it hurts.
Goddamnit Epic. You might push me into deleting my not once used account made only for free stuff. I am that mad. Maybe not, with VMs getting better and better, I will play those free games later if you still exist. After hearing this, I will never install Epic on my actual system and I will never pay for anything on that store.
no surprise from a Chinese owned company
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/4afdc7888e310d5deeb0afbaf3eb846b4b8f4f5bcdb8f06a0ade8389dac94b90.gif
Yes, because you’ve already taken data from Steam, so taking consumer data is somehow okay without their knowledge.
Sweeney really is a ratboy.
Yikes, you do realize people that their client is malware. I will never install it on my machine, hell no.
lol, Gabe paid postingpeople, cant call them bloggers if they are paid. 😉
Totally unexpected from China. Everyone is really surprised and shocked
And Epic’s list of anti-consumer practices grows by the day. For those wondering, here’s everything that’s wrong with Epic and their store and all the anti-consumer practices they’re trying to pull on us.
-Forced third party exclusive deals and robbing us customers the options to to buy from other stores like Steam / GOG
-Restricting / preventing other official stores from competing and selling those games on their stores and any third party sites for cheaper
-Implementing all kinds of anti-consumer policies on their stores and strong-arming them on customers.
-Lack of many features of other storefronts / launchers, chiefly Steam
-No forum support
-Review system is opt-in by developers / publishers who has full control over it
-Epic’s disdain of PC gamers calling them toxic, pirates and blaming PC gamers for lack of sales
-Limited and convoluted refund system
-Epic owned 48 percent by the Chinese company Tencent who is infamous for spying and censoring people
-Epic collaborating with the Chinese company Tencent to sell user information to them or with any others in the world as stated in their EULA
-Epic’s lack of security on their store / launcher with numerous hacking successful attempts
-Epic does not comply with the GDPR laws set by the EU and have seemingly broken a few
-Epic’s CEO, Tim Sweeney expressing his desire for an open free PC platform where stores and customers can freely compete and buy games from without restriction while doing the exact opposite with forced third party exclusives and strong-arming customers with anti-consumer policies. He has recently stated on Twitter that Epic wants to compete by creating “store wars” and forced third party exclusives on their store instead of improving their stores with better features and services to appeal to customers
-Bad or lack of regional pricing
-Bad customer service
do you guys smell that https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/71321b2f6b4155a94a0522ac6b3deb39ba3bfc564a8f260d5289937fade4db8c.gif
This is what happens when companies get to the top of the pile. They try to act like the “good guys” but really have the same miser intentions like EA, and pull the same anti-consumer crimes. This is just the beginning for Epic and once they got a taste of all that money, the “good guy” business models ended.
If they get away with this their anti-consumerism will get worse, just like EA. And like I always say, they have mass collected data to figure out precisely how to pull us by our chains however they choose. They know exactly what the masses will tolerate for a fix (not enjoy). Just like a drug dealer knowing your weaknesses. Tired of hearing “that’s business.” No it’s theft and not with my money.
They already are. greedy devs and publishers are welcomed with open arms, both being defended by complete and utter retarded morons, people who would willingly give up their data and defend the company doing it.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f941b6f90a9c59bf718aae9c00919e30db0c65ac4f2c1b71c5ad68ac1215cb86.jpg
Before I read the article I will guess what Epic’s response to this accusation is:
“We aren’t doing what we have been caught doing. Honest guys, we wouldn’t do that.”
Now I will go read the article and see if I am right or close to right.
I don’t care if epic spaying or not I will support epic because of regional pricing i bought metro exodus for 19$
hope steam will do the same in the future
What you mean Steam will do in the future ? Steam already had that same if not better regional price before it was pulled over by Epic and Deep Silver. On top of that, you don’t have to pay tax on payment with Steam but Epic charges you tax on top of the payment on their store. The following chart compares Metro Exodus Steam vs Epic regional pricing
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10quwatz4VhQZKshZFDAMW78eLi7C99DPbJcl_J2z-ZQ/edit#gid=0
On steam the game cost 60 but on epic only 19$ that huge difference for me and steam there is no regional pricing everything that cost 60$ is 60$ or 30$ is 30$
Epic Fail
F*ck EPIC.
WOOW … just WOW…
That is straight Tencent mentallity…
well steam collects it,windows 10 spyware collects it and goggle collects it.whats the big deal?every launcher collects you data more or less.
stop being salty about epic and talk to steam about its 35% on all sales.its no wonder devs are going to go to other launchers soon.
the problem is steams 35% of sales talk to steam.
Oh no! Epic Games knows your Steam games and friends! Are you people serious? You really care? No. You don’t. Cuz if you did you’d be a freakin moron.
“The launcher scans your active processes to prevent updating games that are currently running. This information is not sent to Epic.”
It’s ridiculous what idiots will cry over.
is steam data PUBLIC knowledge any way?why are they getting up set?you can already see what games are most played on steam.