A server-side anti-cheat never sees a player's screen. It only sees what the player's game sends to the server, and when. Most of the time that's enough to spot a cheat. But plenty of ordinary things change what the server receives, and an anti-cheat that doesn't allow for them will flag people who did nothing wrong. Here are the common culprits, and what you can do about each.
High ping and unstable connections
This is the most common cause by far. On a slow or unstable connection, a player's game is always showing them a slightly out-of-date picture of the world, and their actions reach the server late, or in bunches after a hiccup. From the server's side, that can look like hitting something from too far away, moving too far in one step, or reacting impossibly fast. Players on Wi-Fi, on mobile data, or far from your server's location are hit hardest.
What to do: check whether your anti-cheat accounts for each player's connection, and look at a flagged player's ping before acting. If the same check keeps flagging players with high ping, treat that as a tuning problem, not a wave of cheaters.
Server lag
When your server falls behind (low TPS, or MSPT above 50 milliseconds), it processes movement in uneven bursts. A player who walked normally can appear to have covered too much ground at once. If your anti-cheat flags lots of different players at the same moment, look at your server's performance before looking at the players. Our guide to finding what's causing lag covers how to check.
Crossplay and version translators
Geyser lets Bedrock players join a Java server by translating what their game sends, and ViaVersion, ViaBackwards and ViaRewind do the same for other Java versions. Translation isn't perfect: Bedrock movement, combat and inventory actions differ from Java's, and translated clients can send things in a slightly different order or rhythm. An anti-cheat built only with modern Java clients in mind can misread them. If you support crossplay or older versions, test with those clients before trusting automatic punishments. Our Geyser guide goes into Bedrock players specifically.
Your own plugins
Anything that moves a player in a way vanilla Minecraft wouldn't can look like cheating: custom knockback, launch pads, grappling hooks, custom enchantments, abilities in RPG and minigame plugins, and teleports. Some anti-cheats handle common cases automatically; others need you to add exemptions. When you add a plugin that moves players, check your anti-cheat's alerts for the next few days.
Fast but legitimate players
Some players really are unusually fast. Techniques like jitter and butterfly clicking produce high click rates, and practised PvP players aim and move in ways that can look inhuman to a loosely tuned check. Decide what your server allows (for example, whether macros or double-click mice are permitted), write it in your rules, and make sure your anti-cheat's limits match those rules rather than a guess.
How to keep false bans down
- Start with alerts only. Run any new anti-cheat, or any new check, in alert mode for at least a week before letting it punish anyone.
- Review the evidence before acting. A single flag is rarely enough. Look for repeated, consistent behaviour, and check ping and server performance at the time.
- Escalate gradually. A warning or kick before a ban, and temporary bans before permanent ones, limits the damage of a mistake.
- Tune the check, not everything. If one check misfires, adjust or disable that check rather than loosening the whole anti-cheat.
- Have an appeal process, and keep enough of a record to answer appeals fairly.
- Re-test after updates to Minecraft, your server software, Geyser, or the anti-cheat itself.
How we think about it at Argus
These are the problems Argus is designed around. Every finding comes with the evidence behind it, so your staff can see what happened before deciding anything, and automatic action is something each check has to earn over time rather than a switch you flip on day one. Argus is still in development and hasn't been tested with real players yet. Until then, the steps above will do more for your regulars than any single setting.