"Interception Driver Prohibited" appears when logging into PTS

Aelthwyn

I can play ESO just fine, but for some reason when I try to log into the Test Server it's been giving me this error for the last couple of days and I have no idea what to do about it. When I click play the screen will go black like it's about to show the Bethesda logo, but then an error message pops up saying "Interception driver prohibited. Application terminated" and it just goes back to the launcher. Has anyone else experienced this? I don't know what an interception driver is. I've restarted the computer but that made no difference. The PTS should be up to date and it was working a few days ago, it's just this week that it's giving me this error. I can log into the test server from my laptop, but not my gaming PC, so it must be something specific to that computer, I just don't have a clue where to begin troubleshooting.

etchedpixels

The one I am familiar with is a driver library used to provide accessibility, work around game flaws with accessibility, let the disabled use systems they otherwise couldn't. Long ago people used it to write bots, but nobody does that any more because it's detectable and the smart ones all use USB based plugin botting tools or Hyper-V bypass tricks. It's also used by a wide range of other apps from older versions of customcurve to home threater equipment to some third party fancy keyboard/mouse setups.

If you don't know what is using it on your machine then there are a bunch of apps and tools that install and use it, that includes some home theatre software that uses it for remote control of apps. Some emulators install it, some fancy user input tools use it and a few keyboard/mice sets - if you have those you may have a real problem.

Sounds like something @ZOS_GinaBruno needs to explain and or provide a FAQ on because whilst I can see why someone who isn't thinking it through might want to block interception it's not a very smart idea to just block disabled accessibility tools. Detect it and look for it combined with other botting evidence yes but they clearly don't do that very well - or they'd be detecting the 12 characters who move identically between the same spots continually. That's not rocket science on the server side and the difference between a botter and even the most awesomely co-ordinated ball group is kinda noticable.

robpr

Interception Driver captures the input (usually mouse) and modifies it before sending it to the system. It's most likely used to smooth mouse movements, but many anticheats view it as botting software because it can also change the keyboard keys.

oblita.com/interception.html

Aelthwyn

Hrmmmm.... given this information I'm wondering.... We do have the desktop PC set up with multiple joysticks and extra buttons and switches and custom keyboard etc. for space flight games, although haven't actually used all that in almost a year so I'm not actually sure if it's even still plugged in, but perhaps that would have something to do with this error????

In any case this is extremely worrying that come the next update I will only be able to play from my laptop I hope I can get this sorted out.

etchedpixels

It may well do.

Make sure you file a PTS bug - perhaps it'll help them separate interception from actual cheats.

Because interception is a kernel driver you also need to be careful how you remove it. There should be an interception.exe somewhere which can be used to uninstall/reinstall it safely (although it may break anything that relied upon it).

etchedpixels

Gina is apparently away having a much deserved break according to twitter so I should have done @ZOS_Kevin I guess ?

Elsonso

etchedpixels wrote: »

Gina is apparently away having a much deserved break according to twitter so I should have done ZOS_Kevin I guess ?

As this looks to be related to anti-cheat, my guess it does not matter who you ping. I can't really think of a time they went into any detail, or discussion, on such matters. I see nothing helpful in the support knowledge base, either.

All they can do is write a bug report. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

etchedpixels

I don't expect them to discuss their anti-cheat internals, just want them to be knowingly breaking disabled access tools not accidentally. There are some important ramifications about knowingly doing such things versus accidentally

Hopefully they can figure out how to manage to deal with the cheat aspect alone, especially given that nowdays the botters and cheat people use separate physical devices and software because anti-cheat got better and so it also works on console.

Aelthwyn

Well, my husband went through and removed a lot of the software related to his flight sim equipment, and I did a search for anything with Interception in the name and it came up with nothing. Yet I'm still getting the same error and cannot load the PTS.

Elsonso

Aelthwyn wrote: »

Well, my husband went through and removed a lot of the software related to his flight sim equipment, and I did a search for anything with Interception in the name and it came up with nothing. Yet I'm still getting the same error and cannot load the PTS.

Virus and malware scans done and clean?

Aelthwyn

Elsonso wrote: »

Virus and malware scans done and clean?

good suggestion, I did a scan, but it did come up clean.