‘Among Us’: Is there a way to stop game hackers?

The sad truth is that any game with mounting hype is subject to players with corrupted motives. Unfortunately, we’re not talking about the in-game impostors on board the spacecraft, we’re talking about hackers – the true impostors. Even the addictive Twitch sensation, Among Us, has attracted its slew of vicious cheaters. 

What makes Among Us hackers even worse is that there’s seemingly no reward for their maddening endeavors. Contrary to games like Fall Guys, Among Us offers no in-game profit. Winning a round of Among Us doesn’t help you attain special access to cosmetics; it doesn’t help you “level” up or gain advantages. Thus, Among Us hackers are solely in it to ruin everyone’s game. 

Despite the simplistic foundation at the core of Among Us, the social deduction game will always be complicated by malicious game hackers. The good news is that there are ways to fight back against the hackers seeking to spoil your game of Among Us. Here’s how to ward off & cut off those invasive hackers in Among Us. 

Identifying hackers

The first step in preventing hackers from tampering with a pure game of Among Us is identifying one. From what we’ve gathered, there are two main ways to cheat in Among Us. It’s important to recognize both if you’re trying to stop the hackers. 

The first way to cheat in Among Us has to do with the circulation of banned information. When you join public lobbies with your team, it’ll always be possible for people to spoil the mystery. Using a backchannel, players have the ability to share hidden information to each other. Third-party chats like Discord voice channels, make the game vulnerable to scummy cheaters inclined to swiftly end the game. 

Using this obvious cheating method, dead crewmates can straight up tell people who the killer is. This method, of course, defeats the purpose of the game entirely. The identity of the impostor is hidden for a reason. If dead crewmates blab about who killed them, there’s no point in gathering clues.   

This is the POV of an Among Us Hacker.

(yes i used the hacks, dont worry i deleted them after.) pic.twitter.com/jzPRZfJsRb

— this is poco (@Poco_BrawlStars) September 29, 2020

Implementing game mods

The second & more concerning way to cheat has to do with implementing game mods that endow game hosts & players with game-breaking powers. The mod method can rapidly deter the outcome of the match in favor of cheaters. Many mods have been made and shared online. 

In the video above, you can witness what it looks like for a hacker who’s using mods. As you can see, the mods give the killer an extreme advantage when it comes to slaying crewmates – they’re practically a super villain with OP dash attacks. A mod like this can also turn off the kill cooldown, making it way easier to take down crewmates.

Hundreds of other mods have been found and shared in video clips on Twitter. Other ways of cheating with mods include sped-up movement, mass kills, insta-kills, & shortened voting periods. If a player seems to be grabbing that win a little too quickly, that’s pretty dang sus and your game may have a hacker infestation.  

Reporting hackers? 

If you definitely think you’ve identified a hacker, you may be feeling the itch to report them so they can’t keep up their frustrating agenda. We’re sad to inform you that, at the moment, there is no way to report Among Us cheaters in the game. 

The team at InnerSloth (the Among Us developer) is currently trying to fix the cheating problem. Lead programmer & business lead Forest Willard assured players that they’re working it, saying, “We’re rushing to get an account system in place so we can have better moderation and reporting systems built around that. Also getting help with making the servers better at detecting and blocking hacks.”

InnerSloth is also producing Among Us 2. We can pray that they’ll add a functioning reporting feature in this version. That way, players inclined to cheat can be flagged so that people will know to ban them before they ruin the gameplay experience.

Into the lava they go

While reporting isn’t an option right now, it is possible for session hosts to ban players they don’t trust. If the host knows that a player may be using a cheat engine via the lobby screen, they can keep them from joining any sessions. If you’re the host, you can ban people who try to join while you’re waiting for them to join your lobby. When you read their name or chat with them in the lobby, you can immediately remove them.

Just open up the Text Chat. Underneath that icon there’s a Boot button. Press it and the cheater can say goodbye to your game. Additionally, if players identify a hacker while they’re in the middle of a game, you can simply call an emergency meeting or wait until a discussion starts and vote them off. The players will have to be on board with kicking the hacker too or you’ll be stuck with them.

After that it’s straight & simple – never invite them to a game ever again. In fact, sometimes it’s more fun to establish a consistent Among Us group filled with people you trust (out of game of course – no one can be trusted with an impostor in the bunch.) We hope this advice helps you establish a cheater-free zone so you can enjoy murdering your friends in peace.