I think you people are severely misunderstanding the way that GTA Online works and how hackers get caught.
GTA Online is P2P but connected to a master-server; rather than have servers which players connect to, a player is selected as the host and other players connect to them, and the host/clients all submit data to the master-server for verification/persistance. This is likely for a few reasons:
- Far cheaper to implement and maintain.
- Both Xbox Live and Playstation Network matchmaking run on the same principle, and since GTAV arrived on those consoles first, the porting effort was likely minimal.
- Their servers can focus on security/integrity rather than play behaviours.
As with any online multiplayer game, GTA Online makes use of "anti-cheat". While in some cases (like APB) you might have external software such as Punkbuster, Rockstar opted to develop their own secure anticheat specific to GTAO. The way anti-cheats work is essentially verify data which is being transferred between the host (Rockstar's own master-server) and clients (including the client who is technically hosting the world); if a client exceeds/undermines certain variable limits (such as earning too much money in a very limited period of time in the open world) or initiates routines that it shouldn't (such as spawning money bags), that is considered cheating and the master-server initiates routines to "appropriately" punish the player.
A while back, I modded up both my cash and rank; I achieved this by increased the reward modifiers, which at the time were handled by the clients and not verified by the master-server. Because I still had to complete missions, it was considered a "legitimate" transaction. The one time I got banned was WELL after I stopped using the mod tool and I had ended up in a hacker's heist mission; I wasn't stripped off my cash or rank because I hadn't illegitimately earned any during that mission.
Anti-cheat can't determine
exactly who is responsible if a hacker is distributing money; it can only determine when players have exceeded the valid limits, and occasionally the master-server might determine that all parties are responsible even if you've done nothing wrong. To be quite honest, if you were to only receive a couple thousand from a hacker, under most circumstances you'll be just fine.
Now of course, Rockstar is going to want to try and outright cut out any illegally obtained cash since there's actually a microtransation system in the game (Shark Cards), but the ethics and real-life legality of modding in-game money is still out for debate, especially when a game lets you have a lot of in-game money really easily with certain missions/activities. Personally, I believe that Rockstar needs to think about finishing with Online, terminating the Shark Cards and produce some more, higher paying Heist missions and CEO activities.
