AutoRune

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Introduction

A screenshot of the AutoRune program.

AutoRune was a RuneScape cheat that acted as a proxy between the game client and server. It was able to analyse the packets sent in both directions, and modify these packets and inject its own. This allowed it to perform a series of actions such as mining, smelting and banking. It used its own scripting language for scripts that would perform these actions.

History

Creation

The first version of AutoRune was created around September 2002, by Kaitnieks. The included sample script mined iron in Varrock, smithed it in Lumbridge, smelted it in Varrock and then finally banked it.

New owner

In November 2002, Coran purchased AutoRune for $500, including the source code and copyrights. Kaitnieks continued developing the software.

Mass ban, the first death

On Friday the 13th of December 2002, Jagex changed the game protocol slightly. After every 45 actions, the official client would send an additional packet. If the server did not receive this packet, then it would ban the account as it was likely that it was using AutoRune or another proxy-style cheat. Almost every AutoRune user was banned, as well as users of other, private bots.

Return

After several months of no activity, AutoRune was fixed in April 2003. It sent the additional packets just like the official RuneScape client.

The second death

Jagex changed the RuneScape communication protocol and added encryption, effectively rendering AutoRune useless. No accounts were banned, like in the initial mass ban.

Secret return

After the death of AutoRune, another program named SCAR was created by Kaitnieks which was a colour-clicking bot. Additionally, AutoRune was fixed but this was kept secret. Only a small group of users, nicknamed the 'AutoRune Crew', had access to this fixed version. As it was developed in secret, it lasted a significant amount of time without detection.

Dupes

After a while, AutoRune was released to the public again. It had autotrading support, and a user named SixFeetUnder discovered the server did not validate all the packets which allowed duping. In fact, items were not needed, so new items could be created!

Thousands of items were created worth billions of coins. It only took Jagex a few hours to find and fix the bug, however, by then many of the AutoRuners had made fortunes. There was no rollback and none of the duped items were deleted.

After the first dupe, other bugs were found in the RuneScape server allowing players to cast spells without runes and without a target, creating women with beards, attacking and killing yourself in the wilderness and creating a character without a visible body (just a minimap icon).

Next owner and mass ban

Coran sold the AutoRune code and rights to Josh. On the 2nd of January 2004, AutoRune users were banned in a second mass ban. There was no fix and future development of AutoRune has stopped.

Future

Due to the new cryptography measures put in place, pure standalone proxy bots are now impossible. A degree of client modification must be done to grab the ISAAC keys. Additionally, the packet structures change every release making it difficult to keep up to date.

Links