We have partnered with Easy Anti-Cheat to help us find and ban players who use cheat software, hacks, or custom scripts to disrupt our players’ experiences in Insurgency: Sandstorm. We take cheating very seriously, so we appreciate all of our fans who help us in combating this issue.
If you come across a player that you suspect is cheating or if you find a cheat available for Sandstorm online, please fill out a Cheat Report for Easy Anti-Cheat to investigate. If you’re reporting a cheat for sale/download, please include a link to the relevant site. Lastly, if you encounter a player who you think is using hacks or cheats, grab the replay ID of the match from the History section of the main menu and include it in your report. Be sure to watch the replay first and include the approximate time that the player can be seen using a cheat in the report as well.
What is Easy Anti-Cheat?
Easy Anti-Cheat ("EAC") provided by Epic Games, is designed to prevent, detect, and ban cheaters in multiplayer online games. It recognizes cheating software on players’ systems while Sandstorm is running and removes accounts abusing the game with those. EAC is used by a ton of other games and you can see the full list here.
Do I have to Install EAC?
To play Insurgency: Sandstorm, EAC must be installed together with the game on your computer. When you play our games, you are agreeing to New World Interactive’s Terms & Conditions to allow EAC to monitor and identify hacks and cheating software in your system while playing the game. We are committed to finding and banning players who use cheats in our game and to do this, EAC must be allowed to run.
I’m Getting EAC Error Codes when I Start Sandstorm. Help!
If you are experiencing EAC Error Codes when playing Insurgency Sandstorm, we suggest looking over EAC’s troubleshooting guide here.
If you have followed all of those steps and are still encountering EAC error codes, contact them directly here.
I’ve Been Banned! What Do I Do?
EAC has found cheat software, untrusted and/or unknown system files, debuggers, or otherwise suspicious software on your system or you may have used custom scripts that have caused you to be flagged. If you have received your ban from EAC, you can find a ton of information on how EAC handles bans here.
Please bear in mind EAC has a zero-tolerance policy against cheating.
Make sure to scan your systems regularly for viruses and suspicious files - don’t download files from untrustworthy sites. Put that anti-virus to work!
If you feel you received a ban in error, you can submit a ban appeal to EAC. General response time, according to EAC, is 3 to 14 days. While this may seem a bit long, we recommend players submitting appeals refrain from sending multiple tickets as this may increase your response time.
I Found a Cheat for Sandstorm or a Player that is Cheating.
Please fill out a Cheat Report for EAC to investigate. If you’re reporting a cheat for sale/download for Insurgency: Sandstorm, please include a link to the relevant site. If you encounter a player who you suspect is using hacks or cheats, grab the replay ID of the match from the History section of the main menu and include it in your report. Be sure to watch the replay first and include the approximate time that the player can be seen using a cheat in the report as well.
How to find a replay ID and Steam ID:
- Select “History” from the main menu
- Mouse over the replay, then click “Copy ID” and paste it in your report.
- Start the replay, go to the scoreboard, then click on the suspected player’s name and “Copy Steam ID”. Then paste it in your report.
If a player is exploiting game mechanics and does something that feels unfair but they’re not necessarily using hacks (ie spawn camping, exploiting out of bounds areas, etc.) please take a screenshot or video along with an explanation of what is happening, and send it to our team via support ticket so we can recreate and address the issue.
We have worked hard on Insurgency: Sandstorm to provide balanced gameplay for all players, and our team takes cheating very seriously. We appreciate our players out there who have been helping us crackdown on cheaters in-game, and we hope that as we continue working with EAC we can keep the amount of players using hacks to a minimum.