Anticheat for a Small Whitelisted Friends SMP

What setup fits a small whitelisted SMP?

A small whitelisted SMP with a few trusted players and one or two admins usually needs alerts, not automatic punishments. Start alert-only with a short list of checks, read the alerts for about two weeks, then add mitigation for one check at a time. Skip webhooks, punishment ladders, and per-check tuning until you have a baseline you trust.

A whitelist limits who can join, but it does not stop a friend from running a cheat client on their own machine or letting someone else use their account. A small set of alerts gives you a record without turning every flagged movement into a conflict.

Think about what you are protecting. On a friends SMP that is usually the shared world, the shared economy, and the trust the group has in each other. Anticheat alerts protect those things by making odd behavior visible early, when a short conversation can fix it. They do not replace that conversation, and they should not be the first thing a friend hears about.

What should the minimal config look like?

Keep the first configuration small enough to read in one sitting. The vanilla keys below only enforce the whitelist. They do not configure any anticheat, so set the anticheat's own alert-only option separately.

• Enable the whitelist, and keep it limited to people you would call directly.
• Turn on only the combat and movement checks your group would notice first, such as reach, click speed, and movement, if your anticheat offers them.
• Set every check to alert-only. Do not enable punishments yet.
• Choose one place for alerts, such as a staff channel or the console, and check it once a day.
• Write a two-line rule for the group: how alerts are handled and who makes the decision.

# server.properties
white-list=true
enforce-whitelist=true

How do you run the review with one admin?

Use a daily routine of about ten minutes. Read the alerts, mark each one as noise, question, or repeat, and ask players only about repeats. Staff time is the real limit on a small server, so a short routine beats a complex one that nobody reads.

When should a friend's alert get a conversation instead of a punishment?

A repeat alert on a friend's connection can come from lag, a client mod, or a macro they forgot they installed. Ask before acting. Check ping and transaction timing first. The high-ping article covers those fields in detail.

Take action only after the conversation and a second review. Write down what you asked, what the player said, and what the next alert showed.

Quiet weeks are also data. If the anticheat produces no alerts for a friend who was flagged before, check the alert channel first. A silent channel can mean the alerts stopped reaching you, not that the behavior stopped, and a friend who knows they are being watched may simply change how they play for a while. Confirm delivery with a test alert before you read silence as good news.

Write the review routine down in one short note and pin it where the admin will see it. Include the time of day, the channel to check, the three labels, and the name of the person who decides on repeats. A routine that lives in one person's head disappears the first time that person is busy for a week.

What we have not verified

We have not measured how often a small whitelisted SMP produces false alerts with any anticheat, and we have not tested minimal configurations across server versions. Treat the settings above as a starting point, and confirm them on a copy of your world before you go live.