SH3 phone home?

[shegeek72]

Inside the main.cfg is this (MyDocuments\SH3\data\cfg):

[Ubi.Com]
ConnectURL=http://gsconnect.ubisoft.com/gsinit.php?user=%s&dp=%s
GameName=SILENTHUNTER3
Version=SH3PC1.0
GamePort=18000
ConfigFile=GSDownload.ini

Does this mean the game phones home when one is online while playing?
--

[Gizzmoe]

No, this is for multiplayer games.

[HundertzehnGustav]

LOL:rotfl:

yes i wondered about gthat myself...

great topic title though

[Tikigod]

If ever in doubt you can always run a port sniffer when you run an application and capture the packets leaving and entering your pc while the application is running.....

I use these two applications most to troubleshoot network issues and to make sure nothing sneaky is running on my machine.

TCPView (a UDP and TCP connectivity viewer)
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sys...g/TcpView.mspx

Ethereal Open Source Network Packet Sniffer
http://www.ethereal.com/download.html

Whenever you don't want a program to contact a certain address you can add it to your hosts file in your "...\windows\system32\drivers\etc\" directory...

the file is named "hosts" and you just drag the file into notepad to add the urls you want to block. then save it as a .txt file and rename it to hosts without the .txt extension.

The original file looks like this when you drag and drop it in notepad:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Copyright (c) 1993-1999 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each
# entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should
# be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name.
# The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one
# space.
#
# Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on individual
# lines or following the machine name denoted by a '#' symbol.
#
# For example:
#
# 102.54.94.97 rhino.acme.com # source server
# 38.25.63.10 x.acme.com # x client host

127.0.0.1 localhost

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To restrict urls from accessing your puter you just add the url after 127.0.0.1

an example is....
127.0.0.1 ads.mm.ap.org
127.0.0.1 adnet.asahi.com
127.0.0.1 q.azcentral.com
127.0.0.1 stats.bbc.co.uk
127.0.0.1 ads.bcnewsgroup.com
127.0.0.1 ads.belointeractive.com #[RealMedia][eTrust.Tracking Cookie]
127.0.0.1 te.belointeractive.com
127.0.0.1 ads.bloomberg.com

there are many host files you can download from net that block porn ads and other annoying pop ups and things that try to connect to your pc when you surf and browse the web. but, this file is the file you can use to block games from calling home if they have that sort of functionality.

Here are two hosts files you can use if you want to block most ads trojans and other crap that is out there:
http://everythingisnt.com/hosts
http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.txt

If you use spybot search and destroy and use the advanced mode you can have spybot ad its recommended blocks as well to your hosts file.

But, if you wanted to test what sh3 does...just run ethereal packet sniffer capture the packets it runs while you setup and connect to a multiplayer session or while you are just playing the game and see what network activity happends while you play. Then you will know if the game or application is "phoning home" or not. You can then take the addresses it collects and block each of them one at a time and see what the game needs and what it doesn't while it is in use.

In your example you have the url: http://gsconnect.ubisoft.com/gsinit.php?user=%s&dp=%s

If you view this php page in a webbrowser you will see all the routing addresses the different games ubisoft has that games call to for either update notifications or multiplayer sessions or cdkey checks.

gsxcdkey02.gs.mdc.ubisoft.com for example is one that checks for a valid cd key for games that require a cd key when they connect in multiplayer.

The only thing I think sh3 uses is what is needed to connect to ubi.com with username and password to see other players using your ubi.com account.