Frequently Asked Questions

CSWatch is a community-driven anti-cheat platform for Counter-Strike 2. We combine rule-based signal analysis (account age, ban history, playtime anomalies, rank-vs-hours mismatches) with human Overwatch-style demo review to produce a public, transparent record of players the community has flagged as cheaters or smurfs. To check a specific player, use the CS2 cheater checker.

No. CSWatch is an independent project. We use Valve's public Steam and CS2 APIs in accordance with their terms, but we are not endorsed by, sponsored by, or otherwise affiliated with Valve Corporation.

Yes, the lookup, leaderboard, and blog are free for everyone, and reporting uses 1 credit, which everyone can claim free each day. CSWatch Pro (from €5/month) supports the project and unlocks ad-free browsing, unlimited lookups and watchlist, ban-alert notifications for watched players, monthly credits, and priority render queue on higher tiers. See the pricing page for the full breakdown.

A 0-100 score built from seven categories: ban record (28%), community reports (18%), account legitimacy (17%), skill consistency (14%), rank trajectory (10%), friend network (8%, currently neutral because friend-ban data is unavailable) and profile signals (5%). Higher means a cleaner record. A conviction on CSWatch sets the score to 0. The profile shows how each category scored.

Several factors can drag a score down: a VAC ban on any of their Steam games (driving the ban-record sub-score to floor), a young account with low CS2 hours but high rank, a bare or private profile, or accumulated community reports. Click through to the full profile to see exactly which signals are firing.

Yes. Email support@cswatch.gg with your Steam ID and the basis for the appeal. We review appeals individually. Verifiable evidence (e.g., your account was hijacked, a report was submitted in bad faith) leads to manual adjustments. Appeals against actual VAC bans are out of scope; those are Valve's.

Partially. Community reports weigh less as they age, and the skill sub-scores update as new match stats arrive. Ban-record sub-score does not recover, since Valve's VAC bans are permanent. The composite score therefore has a soft ceiling determined by ban history.

Sign in, open the player's profile, click "Report", and add the match share code or a clip link as evidence. A report costs 1 credit, refunded if the player is convicted. The case enters the review queue for approved Overwatch reviewers, and the team renders demos into video on demand.

The match share code of a game where the player showed suspect behaviour (the match must include that player), or a link to a clip. A share code is strongest, because we save the match demo as evidence. You can also add timestamps pointing reviewers to a specific round or moment.

1. The case enters the Overwatch review queue.
2. Approved reviewers watch the evidence and vote: cheater or insufficient evidence.
3. With 3+ votes and more than 66% of the accuracy-weighted vote for cheater, the player is convicted. The conviction is public once the match demo is saved.
4. The CSWatch team can also convict directly, and those decisions are logged.
5. Otherwise the case is closed as insufficient evidence and does not count as a conviction.

Apply via the Overwatch page. You need 500+ CS2 hours plus FACEIT level 5+ or a Premier rating of 8,000+, and the team approves each application. Votes are weighted from 0.5x to 2x by your accuracy on resolved cases, and the team can remove careless reviewers.

Email us with the case ID and your basis for appeal. Falsely-decided cases can be reopened or overturned. Our reviewer accuracy tracking exists precisely so we can identify and correct verdict patterns that don't match reality.

Public data only: the same fields anyone visiting your profile page can see. Steam ID, persona name, avatar, Steam level, game library and hours, and ban indicators, plus public Leetify and FACEIT stats. We do not access private profiles or friends-only data. If you link your own match history, we use the match authentication code you give us for that.

Reach out via email with your Steam ID. Removal of a clean profile is straightforward. Removal of a profile with confirmed convictions or VAC ban evidence is not; that information is part of the public record and serves the community oversight function CSWatch was built for.

EU residents can request access, correction, or erasure of their data via support@cswatch.gg. See our Privacy Policy for the full data-handling and retention details.

Not directly: no software anti-cheat reliably detects DMA hardware cheats. CSWatch flags them indirectly through behavioural signals (impossible reaction times, statistical aim outliers) and community demo review. See our blog post The Anatomy of a Modern CS2 Cheat for the full technical breakdown.

Yes, see the developers page. The public endpoints are free and need no auth. A keyed data API is available on request.

Profiles are fetched live from Steam on each view, and FACEIT data is cached for about 5 minutes. Verdicts update as reviewers vote. Ban alerts for watched players are checked daily.