Dark Souls 3 players on PC will want to be on the lookout for a dangerous new exploit that can cause permanent damage to their computers.

A love letter to the first two games in From Software’s Souls series, Dark Souls 3 is still massively popular years on from its 2016 release date.

However, on January 22, 2022, it was discovered that a new exploit could potentially affect PC players who are connected to the internet while playing. Basically, it can turn DS 3 into a Trojan Horse virus vulnerable to malicious hackers.

Dark Souls 3 netcode exploit can brick PCs

like a Trojan Horse. And more nasty stuff.

It's highly suggested to NOT PLAY ONLINE DARK SOULS 3 in it's current state. Avoid any online activity from Ds3.

In addition, if you haven't already everybody and their mother can recommend the Blue Sentinel modhttps://t.co/lposZRzbr1

— SkeleMann (@SkeleMann) January 22, 2022

On Twitter Souls enthusiast SkeleMann urged players to stay away from playing Dark Souls 3 online in the game’s current state.

“On PC there is a new, very serious exploit plaguing Dark Souls 3 which can cause lasting damage to your computer,” they explained. “This could brick your PC, let your login information be shared, or execute programs in the background like a Trojan Horse.”

In addition to not playing Dark Souls 3 online until the problem is fixed, they also recommended downloading the Blue Sentinel mod for the game. This addon helps recognize hackers, however, over on the Dark Souls 3 subreddit, users reporting the mod isn’t able to detect this particular exploit just yet, which just makes it even more dangerous.

There was some good news from Reddit — that the exploit didn’t seem to be very widespread. But, they warned as well that the amount of damage this exploit could cause to a computer is “severe,” and suggested all PC users — mod or not — stay away from online play until they patched the service.

Not only that, but some players in the comments said the exploit could also affect Elden Ring as well, which would be very bad news for the highly anticipated title.

New remote code execution vulnerability discovered from darksouls3

“According to the people in discord this should be possible in Elden Ring too,” one user wrote. “Either From [the developers] fixes this or Elden Ring is doomed from the start.”

Jonientz, who made the original post drawing attention to the exploit, added they had informed From Software of the issue.

“They [From Software] don’t change their networking very much between releases, so yeah. They’ll have a very rude awakening, probably on day one [of Elden Ring] or close to it,” they explained. “They weren’t actually aware specifically of the RCE [remote code execution] and what it meant until an hour ago. I talked with them.”

Hopefully, this means a fix is on the way for Dark Souls 3 and Elden Ring. The last thing anyone wants to see happen is for one of the biggest and most-anticipated games of 2022 to be delayed because it gives hackers an unprotected back door to control and potentially destroy players’ PCs.

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