Alex

Working on FACEIT/ESEA

[FACEIT CS2 @FACEITcs]

After winning the UEFA Champions League, Illia Zabarnyi has been grinding FACEIT, winning 71% of his matches and averaging 1.26 FACEIT rating.

[FACEIT CS2 @FACEITcs]

97.3% of FACEIT players now have IOMMU/VBS enabled, which helps disrupt DMA cheats.

We began rolling this out in April 2025, expanding coverage as we worked with hardware vendors to resolve driver compatibility issues and support more players without requiring upgrades.

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

Every time I see @tabseNcs, I remember this.

ESEA Premier LAN, peak ESEA vs FACEIT era.
Warming up, he spots me and says to his team loudly with a big smile: "Guys, let's all play Rank S!"
Watches me walk past.
Shouts after me: "NOT! Let's queue FPL."

[ESL Counter-Strike @ESLCS]

73% of pick'ems had @THUNDERdUNDERcs going 0-3.

THUNDER dOWNUNDER didn't.

Data from the @cs2stats Pick'Em leaderboard.

[ESL Counter-Strike @ESLCS]

Make your move.

#IEM Cologne Major 2026 Official Trailer.

[ESL Counter-Strike @ESLCS]

Who's first to a Diamond coin at the #IEM Cologne Major 2026? 💎

The global pick 'ems leaderboard is live on @cs2stats!

Every correct pick climbs you up the ladder. Link your auth code, check your position and share your picks!

[FACEIT CS2 @FACEITcs]

Ahead of his IEM Cologne 2026 debut, @JBafps has been grinding FACEIT, playing 49 matches in the last week.

He has played 69% more matches than the next most active participant, averaging 7 matches per day.

[infocsarg @infocsarg]

🏆😳 EL CAMPEÓN DE LA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE LEVEL 10 EN FACEIT.

El jugador ucraniano Illya Zabarnyi 🇺🇦 se consagró con el PSG en la final vs Arsenal y además es jugador de Counter-Strike.

Actualmente es Level 10 en FACEIT con 2256 de ELO y tiene más de 60 mapas jugados en el mes.

[Ozzny @Ozzny_CS2]

JUST IN: FACEIT's Anti-Cheat team spent two days at the Google office collaborating with them on detecting AI Cheats for Counter Strike 2 ‼️

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

@CalculatedNtry @Ozzny_CS2 AI cheats are the fastest-growing cheating ban category on FACEIT, and we anticipate them being the biggest for the industry over the next few years as AI continues to scale. We talked about this more in our Season 7 Integrity Report:

https://t.co/OyHJuceu3t

[FACEIT CS2 @FACEITcs]

AI cheats are the most-banned cheat category, with detections up 272% in Season 7 (372 total bans).

Meanwhile, DMA-related bans dropped by 4%. IOMMU/VBS hardware enforcement now covers 88% of players, helping block how DMA cheats read game files.

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

@anonimo1is @Ozzny_CS2 Our director of integrity posted about the trip: https://t.co/KdyFlMmdCZ

[Amir Arshad @TheAmirArshad]

Detecting AI cheats has been one of FACEIT's biggest focuses in 2026.

Recently, several of our anti-cheat developers, data scientists, and staff spent two days at the @Google London office, building on that work alongside their engineers.

We collaborated with Google's team to evolve two of our current approaches:

1. Training models on past matches where our anti-cheat confirmed players cheated, learning to recognize similar patterns elsewhere.
2. Modelling what normal play looks like to flag behavior that sits outside it.

FACEIT processes millions of CS2 matches a month, with years of high-level gameplay on record. That scale creates a foundation our detection models can learn from.

Before these techniques can be applied to the full FACEIT player base, there is still more work to do. We're running new behavioral analysis in the next months, building an automated pipeline of confirmed-cheating data for our models to learn from, and improving how we capture more supporting data for the context of kills.

We will continue to collaborate with Google’s engineers and share more information as these detection methods are rolled out across the platform.

[Amir Arshad @TheAmirArshad]

Detecting AI cheats has been one of FACEIT's biggest focuses in 2026.

Recently, several of our anti-cheat developers, data scientists, and staff spent two days at the @Google London office, building on that work alongside their engineers.

We collaborated with Google's team to evolve two of our current approaches:

1. Training models on past matches where our anti-cheat confirmed players cheated, learning to recognize similar patterns elsewhere.
2. Modelling what normal play looks like to flag behavior that sits outside it.

FACEIT processes millions of CS2 matches a month, with years of high-level gameplay on record. That scale creates a foundation our detection models can learn from.

Before these techniques can be applied to the full FACEIT player base, there is still more work to do. We're running new behavioral analysis in the next months, building an automated pipeline of confirmed-cheating data for our models to learn from, and improving how we capture more supporting data for the context of kills.

We will continue to collaborate with Google’s engineers and share more information as these detection methods are rolled out across the platform.

[FACEIT CS2 @FACEITcs]

Season 8 Matchmaking data shows that A site is the most common plant location on five of eight maps. Overpass, Ancient and Anubis are the only maps where B site plants lead.

What do you think drives the difference between these maps?

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

My favorite thing about Match Insights is calling out my friends on their comms.

"They're coming fast B"

[Team Spirit CS2 @Team__Spirit]

‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌‌@donk1337 has been grinding @FACEITcs for the last 2 weeks 👊

🔥 15W / 4L
📊 1.51 K/D
🎯 23.4 AVG
💥 112.6 ADR
📈 +258 ELO

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

Congratulations to Legacy on being back-to-back CAC champions.

At 15, @lattofps grinded to FACEIT level 10 in under 100 matches in two weeks. Now he's MVP and taking home his share of $150,000, again.

Exciting to see the next wave of Brazilian talent coming through.

[FACEIT CS2 @FACEITcs]

Check your corners.

Since Cache returned in Season 8, FACEIT kill/death data shows the highest concentration of engagements at the B site entrance and forklift/NBK on A.

Which spot do you hold?

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

@DamDamas33 @FACEITcs Hello, do you mind helping me understand what the lie is in this post, please.

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

@huwkayyy @FACEITcs More information about selfie re-checks as a method to disrupt smurfs and account sales is available here: https://t.co/ExbNu3P95A

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

@kingsblend4 Make a ticket please and we can work through it with you.

[Alex @Aluminaticsgo]

I remember working in ESEA prizes back then.
Emailed a younger winner asking if they wanted their winnings via PayPal or a check.
Their reply: "check what?"

[Hunter Mims @SicK_cs]

Found this check from 2016, from winning CS:GO ESEA premier. This was the step up to pro league actual ancient relic.