Counteracting The Counter-Strike Issue

Did you know that they have now opened up rehabilitation centers for gaming addicts? Yes that is correct people can become addicted to computer games in the same manner that a person becomes addicted to a drug. After all, an addiction is an addiction and with the fantastic graphics and wonderful game play that modern technology has to offer, it is not the least bit surprising that many people all over the world become gaming addicts. One of the best games that most definitely can become addictive is Counter-Strike. Unexpectedly, it has recently been discovered that a vulnerability exists in this superior game.

For those of you, who haven't had the privilege of experiencing Counter-Strike, let me give you a brief overview of it, before I jump into the deep end and tell you about the vulnerability. Counter-Strike is an extremely popular action game. It involves terrorists and counter-terrorists taking on each other in a high powered graphical combat game, which is set all over the world. It has been remade from the original old game except the levels and graphics have been upgraded to a vast degree.

This vulnerability affects the Windows platforms, as the game has been geared for Windows operating systems. This vulnerability has unfortunately been detected in build 3698 and users need to be consciously aware of the factor that other versions may also be affected by this issue. The system requirements for the game include Windows operating systems, such as Windows Vista, and Windows XP. Some of the files of Windows XP include: acspecfc.dll, apimon.exe, cipher.exe as well as comaddin.dll.

This vulnerability runs the risk of being exploited by malicious online attackers in order to create Denial of Service attacks. This in turn runs the risks of malicious attackers being actively able to compromise targeted systems with relatively little effort. This vulnerability exists due to a specific format string error, with regard to the showing of console messages. This relates to players that either have or are disconnecting.

Unfortunately this issue has been rated as highly critical and affects the Source Engine. The bad news is that no fix is available at this current point in time, although this does not mean that there is nothing you can do. If you would like to stay safe and not become the next victim of this vulnerability then it has been suggested that you only host games in a network environment that you fully trust.