How do you firewall OpenIV?
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Recently, OpenIV auto-updated, right through my firewall! Whilst I love the Russian hacker magic which is OpenIV, still, I don't like it trying to bypass my own firewall rules (I blocked %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\New Technology Studio\Apps\OpenIV\OpenIV.exe, btw).
They're probably using something else which needs to be blocked too. But what? Last time, during the Take2 debacle, OpenIV tried to uninstall itself (also, without my permission). And yesterday, it upgraded the ASI loader, to accommodate for 'changes in the code' for a game upgrade I haven't even installed yet (still waiting for the February Menyoo upgrade).
So, long story short, I'd like to take some control back, please.
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well, its made by russians, and I'm pretty sure everybody is aware that the russians and the internet don't have a history of playing well with other. what I find amazeballs is, EVERYBODY who GTA 5's HATES the auto update feature. so, why would the one tool that everyone needs be one that auto updates, and snakes past firewalls ?
here's what I did to avoid it. I got bored one day in the shop and decided to make a "desktop internet kill-switch" all it is a a little toggle switch in a box that interrupts the the signal. I just hit it before I open OpenIV.
or you could just unplug the internet from the back of the pc.
I asked @GooD-NTS why it was like this, but he chose to ignore the question. seems sketchy af to me, which is why it's now blocked permanent like. after this last update to 2.9.2. I'm done messing with it. unless there's a huge update ( think liberty city, which we all know isn't going to happen ) I'll never update it again. absolute fail.
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@meimeiriver Seems it bypasses the Windows Firewall somehow... not sure how. I tried blocking it in Inbound and Outbound rules, and also blocked the ports it's connecting from, but to no avail.
What did work is blocking it in the hosts file. OpenIV REALLY wants to be online so you have to block a few domains. Add this to your hosts file:
127.0.0.1 ntscorp.ru
127.0.0.1 openiv.com
127.0.0.1 api.openiv.com
127.0.0.1 sannybuilder.com
127.0.0.1 openiv.sannybuilder.comIf you want to visit any of the above websites again you'll have to remove these from your hosts file.
Also in case you don't know already, the hosts file is located in C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc. Run any text editor as administrator then open/edit the file.
Note: Doing this violates the End User License of OpenIV.
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@Jitnaught pretty sure we already covered the fact open IV bypasses the firewall. not even the real question. the real question is WHY. but thanks for repeating the obvious.
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@Jitnaught said in How do you firewall OpenIV?:
@meimeiriver Seems it bypasses the Windows Firewall somehow... not sure how. I tried blocking it in Inbound and Outbound rules, and also blocked the ports it's connecting from, but to no avail.
Thanks for confirming this. I must admit I find this quite disconcerting. Not to sound too paranoia, but could they have installed some sort of rootkit?!
I'm going to try and firewall off any other OpenIV components I can find, and hope it's in one of those, as 'just' bypassing the Windows firewall otherwise requires some very low-level system access that I hope OpenIV doesn't have.
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@meimeiriver
I doubt it due to the fact that it's so popular that if it was malicious then there would bound to be at least one person who noticed it doing something malicious by now.I checked processes using Process Monitor to see what was connecting to the internet and once I blocked the mentioned domains OpenIV didn't connect to the internet, and I didn't see any suspicious programs trying to connect to the internet. I also used Process Monitor to see if OpenIV was starting another program to access the internet for it and didn't find any.
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I have Norton and I block that fucker.
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@Jitnaught I was just searching the openiv Core.xml and found this line
UseWindowsProxy>True</UseWindowsProxy
Now i'm a bit rusty when it comes to proxy settings and firewalls lol but wouldn't this allow the program to update regardless of firewall settings? Please feel free to correct me if i'm completely wrong
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@krissboo My guess is that setting has to do with the program detecting any proxy settings you have set on your computer, so that it can connect to the internet through the proxy.
I set the value to False and it does not affect the bypassing of Windows Firewall.
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@Jitnaught I did wonder if it was related but wasn't 100% (as I said my proxy knowledge is rusty af)
thanks for trying it out tho
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OpenIV does not bypass Windows Firewall (or any other firewall actually) in any way. We don't have any special code for this, and for connection to internet we use standard methods, nothing unusual.
@racer-x You should stop distribute misinformation of the facts which based on your racist beliefs.And btw, blocking updates is violating our End User licence which you agreed with when you installed OpenIV. (You can't install it unless you agreed.)
@krissboo said in How do you firewall OpenIV?:
UseWindowsProxy>True</UseWindowsProxy
This parameter is not used since OpenIV 2.9
@racer-x this might be a little ironic but OpenIV have auto-updates, to make sure all user will receive importance fixes of critical issues (which for example can corrupt your files).
Also, without auto-update majority of users will not update by they own will, even when we have new features (which might help them for example). And if users are not update there is absolutly no reason for us to make new features/updates.
So, if you want OpenIV dead, continue to block updates.
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@GooD-NTS Hey dude, thanks for stopping by and clarifying. As I said in my comment I am rusty af when it comes to proxy's and if they affect firewalls and was just throwing something out there in case it helped somebody!!
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@GooD-NTS said in How do you firewall OpenIV?:
**OpenIV does not bypass Windows Firewall (or any other firewall actually) in any way. We don't have any special code for this, and for connection to internet we use [standard]
Nevetheless, OpenIV, demonstrably, bypasses the Windows firewall.EDIT: After some googling, I found that the Windows firewall does not recognize user variables like %userprofile% or %appdata% (see my start post). Pretty silly, as that's how it adds the path itself.
At any rate, @GooD-NTS, looks like I owe you an apology: it wasnt't OpenIV at all.
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@Jitnaught said in How do you firewall OpenIV?:
Note: Doing this violates the End User License of OpenIV.
Such stipulations are null and void to begin with.
Seriously, even though MS pushes the envelope in that regard, still, even they can't legally bind you to not block a Windows process.Just want to leave here, that I wish OpenIV laxed its update policy a bit. Often I just want to wait a few days, to watch the forums, and see whether any egregious breakage is occuring with a new update. That is entirely reasonable, IMHO.
Anyways, as it turns out, OpenIV wasn't doing anything wrong here: it was the Windows firewall all along, adding user variables to a path it can then not use (!). So, I marked this thread as 'Solved.'
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@GooD-NTS said in How do you firewall OpenIV?:
And btw, blocking updates is violating our End User licence which you agreed with when you installed OpenIV. (You can't install it unless you agreed.)
are you even being serious ?
