“Status Update (requested by our loved Discord users) I know, the downtime sucks. But I don't want to bring it back online again to let you run into bans. Account security is one of the most important things for us and you know - the last ban wave did not hurt Pokefarmer accounts at all. Because our API Emulation is safe. However the new encryption is the only missing thing right now to get it updated and back online again and it's still a "find the needle in the haystack game" and we're building tools that automates the process and helps us because for a human this is absolutly not possible to find. Building these tools cannot be done in a day, or two days. This just takes time. EDIT: I cannot say an ETA. It's just done when it's done and the tools are working properly. I really wish I could provide an ETA but you'll see it magically works again when it's done then. Please be patient we're back very soon.” Not really the great news that we are waiting for, but any update such as this is a good news. Now, the clients, as stake holders, are also aware of what is going on. From the business point of view, this is very ethical and the right thing to do. Letting the clients know that your intent is for them to get the highest quality product is a selling point. But the danger of losing clients caused by long delay though is high. Most botters and gamers are like drug addicts or smokers. They can’t seem to stop using it, even when it is not really needed. When you abruptly cut off their supply, they will react in so many different ways. But eventually, long delay will force clients to adjust to the change. Some will wait and hold on, but some will move on. Some smokers will quit when there is no more cigarette to buy. People will not stop eating just because their favorite restaurant closed. Some of them will find a new place to eat, bringing their stories about the previous restaurant, some of them will bring their own food, and they will continue checking if the restaurant opened from time to time. But long closure will bring a new norm, until the customers realized that they can survive without their favorite restaurant and will stop checking, and some of them will not even care that the restaurant is back up again. I will not worry about those people complaining. As annoying as they are, they are also a good sign. It means that PF is still relevant to them. It’s when they stop complaining that you need to worry about. It means that they finally gave up and learned to move on without PF, or maybe they found a new restaurant where they can eat. With Niantic easing up on banning, customers will test the water, and if they don’t get burned, they may take the plunge. Without active banning from Niantic, customers will have difficulty distinguishing which product is safe and which is not. You may be developing a quality and safe product, but for some, if they used the same account using a different bot, it may be too late due to no fault of yours. Most smokers will not simply quit, they will find cigarette from other manufacturer, regardless of the brand. As for the "defenders of the universe", they seem to have higher tolerance. But for most of them, their interest is high and fueled by complainers. Without the complainers, they will have no one to defend against, and may soon find themselves fidgeting with their fingers as well. I also hope that the tools that you are developing is reusable. Niantic is many steps ahead of you. All they need to do is increase the frequency of their update and you will spend all your time catching up. There are two updates within a month, and with long delay, new update could be already on its way, while you are still *****ing this one. As I see it, Niantic’s new tactic is not to target the botters and users, they are targeting the source. Good Luck!
Customers who do not want to wait can use competing products. When they get banned, they will be back. Reality does not change because someone is butthurt. These devs are doing the right thing. If the cry baby asshats do not see that, it is their problem.
I was about to reply, but it's basically useless now. There is no more competing products. All bots stopped working now because of the new captcha. Pictures are randomly selected, and need to be physically selected by a human. They have to find a way to get around it and implement it in the program to access individual accounts and for the bot to work. Bot will not work if it cannot log in. Not sure if they can do it, but hopefully they can.
Pokefarmer could work too. It's not the captcha that is the issue there. It's about the new encryption with 0.39. I could activate Pokefarmer using the old encryption (that's what other bots are doing) but you will get banned using this method. So we take it offline until we figure out the new encryption.
i don't mind waiting as long as it's safe, you guys do your best, don't hurry, if you decrypt it you have what other bot companies don't - a banproof bot ;]
That's actually a relief. As a client, I am not worried about the encryption, it is breakable and I know you are guys are on it. Niantic has announced before that they will implement captcha to prevent bots from logging in and that was many months ago, but this is the first time that I saw it being implemented. So it is really good to know that this will not be a serious problem at all. Thanks
The captcha could be a problem if say, Niantic decides you have to answer the captcha question after every login or after capturing say more than 20 pokemons in 20 minutes or every 20 pokestops. I don't think their ban waves gave them the results they were expecting. They scared a lot of people and made them aware there were several cheats available and not only pokevision. So far what Niantic appears to be doing is identifying those bot sessions and instead of banning the account for incurring in suspicious session they give them the Captcha prompt which only a human can solve. This way they ensure that the client is a human and not a bot. I think this will affect any automated process that has been implemented so far.
Joe, if your account is a throw away like mine, and I would suspect that we are using at least one common bot, see if this will happen to you. I also raised mine to level 21 without any problem. But today, after they enabled the new captcha, I finally received this warning. there is no immediate ban, but this is one step closer to getting ban and higher than soft ban. The bot will work even with the new captcha, but the next time that you logged in to your phone, you will receive this message. Now is it because of the encrypted API or the new implemented captcha. I don't know, but I have been seeing new things today. And something that we might need to be concerned about.
I wished I had taken a screenshot. I was able to use that software and capture some pokemon, but on my fourth attempt. the bot stopped working. when I went to the phone and logged in, I got the captcha screen. After answering I got a warning saying something about a cheating alert.
I don't think Pokémon was able to recognize the third party log in, but they recognized the speed at which the bot was moving or the patterns. idk.
Niantic Enables Captcha Aimed at Blocking 3rd Party Pokemon Go Scanners, Bots and Apps I guess this was news 5 hours ago. Might be a potential problem, even for the newest PF
Recently I read there are some bigger new features coming in the game coming up, at least some found traces in the game code, for example the pokemon exchange between users its expected in this month or so. It will be interesting to prevent us to exchange the rare pokemons in our main account with the bots, I wonder how niantic will try to block that. Some our latest bot accounts managed to remain under the radar, how it will be detected or traced if we simply pass it to our legit accounts...
I really have to thank the PF Team for the heads up a week ago. My main account could have been compromised right now if you guys didn't pull the plug last week. I am looking forward to wait for a fix. I really don't mind waiting as long as necessary.
Ditto! If PF staff continued to sell unsafe product, all my accounts could have been flagged or banned right now, including those accounts that I have established long before PF. So to my fellow clients who think that PF is robbing you of something, be thankful, as you can see the result of our experiments using competitor bots. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to continue with my experiments. The accounts that I used for this experiment are all unverified, and they stopped working before I was completely perma-banned. I used imaginary email addresses to create my PTC account. But I think you see my point. ALL of the bots that I tried gave me soft ban and eventually triggered the captcha and the succeeding cheating message that wont disappear. Like you, I hate waiting but it's better to wait than regret later.
I still have one experimental account that is still active, and I want to try one more thing before it too stop working. It seems that the warning sign is permanent, no matter how many times I log in/log out, but it didn't permanently ban me either. Because it requires human interaction to click on it before I can proceed, I wonder if it will also prevent a user from using the bot. Is this a countermeasure to stop a known cheater from further botting? Or is this account about to get banned in the future, but then again, why not just ban it completely, why continue wasting time on an account that will be gone soon anyway. Maybe not an issue, because bot can level up, transfer or evolve pokemon by itself, and the mod even gave an assurance that captcha is not a serious problem at all, but still worth a try. This unverified account will soon disappear by itself anyway. I will let everyone know!
Actually the warning message is just client side. There is a simple flag in the network protocol message that tells the client to display the popup. There is no response sent back to the server to confirm you've clicked it or something like that. It seems to be a permanent message but it's on Niantic's side if they're turn that flag off again for your a specific account. So probably it's time based, permanent or whatever but it's still just a warning message and an indicator that they've detected the account and they probably ban it if you continue using some of the detected services.
Dangit. I hate it when you have the right answer and especially with one that makes sense. I am learning a lot here. So it probably explains why the bots were able to continue, it was triggered when I was using my phone, but not when I was using a bot? Is this also the same for captcha, that's why you said it is not a major issue? Capctha also did not appear on my regular account, only for those that were flagged. So my suspicion is that it only appears after you receive the first soft ban. (inconclusive) Warning came out after the second soft ban. Unfortunately, I will not be able to find out if it is time-based or permanent, unless I use one of my regular accounts. As for others, I always believed that two things can get you banned: 1. Use of an unreliable bot 2. Your botting attitude. For this experiment, I sniped, I teleported, and when I get soft ban, my suspicion was that my action caused it. But when I also used a conservative human-like method, I still got soft ban, so I knew it could also be the bot that I used. Things that I verified: 1. Niantic is still banning. It's not true that they relaxed on it. 2. You cannot use any other bot and risk of not getting banned 3. Your botting attitude matters, sniping, teleporting, catching too fast, farming too fast, running too fast, could also cause you to get flagged, or banned 4. Bot matters, the safer the better, or risk the potential loss of your valued high level accounts. For this, I used name+number gmail accounts (fake mail generators don't seem to work anymore for Pogo) Some of the bots I used are g**d ****t bot by p*** ***o (trial) ; p*** ****y(free); h*** **t(free) None of them are worth it!
