Why you cant cache grab anymore!
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I decided to write this because people keep asking "How do i do it myself"
“Why cant I rip models with cache grabbing anymore”
The main reason is content protection.
VRChat has millions of avatars and other user-created assets. Many of these models are made by creators who spend a lot of time and money working on them. Some creators also use paid assets, custom textures, animations, and other content that they are not allowed to freely redistribute.
The problem with the old system
In the past, when VRChat downloaded an avatar to your computer, parts of that avatar could end up in the local cache in a form that was easier to access.
This created a problem.
Someone could load an avatar, find the downloaded files, and potentially reconstruct the avatar outside of VRChat.
This became commonly known as avatar ripping or cache grabbing.
The important thing to understand is that the VRChat client needs the avatar's data in order to display it. However, that doesn't mean the user should automatically receive a clean copy of the creator's original files.
Why encryption helps
Encryption and other forms of asset protection make the cached data much less useful by itself.
Instead of having something like:
Download → Cache → Open the files → Get the avatar
the process can involve protected data that the client has to handle before the avatar can be displayed.
This makes it harder to take files directly from the cache and turn them back into a usable avatar.
It also helps protect things like:
- Avatar models
- Textures
- Materials
- Animations
- Other uploaded assets
It's not just about stopping people from stealing avatars
There is another important reason for this.
Creators may use assets that they have licensed or purchased.
For example, a creator might purchase a 3D model and use it as part of an avatar. Their purchase may give them permission to use the model in their avatar, but it does not necessarily give everyone who loads that avatar permission to extract and redistribute the original model.
Without protection, someone loading the avatar could potentially obtain assets that the creator themselves was only licensed to use.
So protecting downloaded content can help protect both VRChat creators and the original asset creators.
Why not just stop people from accessing the files completely?
The client still needs the data to render the avatar.
VRChat can't simply keep every part of an avatar on its servers and never send anything to the user's computer. At some point, the information needed to display the avatar has to reach the client.
Because of that, the goal is not necessarily to make the data physically impossible for the computer to access.
The goal is to make it much harder to take the downloaded data and turn it into the original creator's files.
That's an important difference.
Why did the old cache methods stop working?
Older cache-grabbing tools were designed around how VRChat handled avatar data at the time.
When VRChat changed its asset pipeline and added stronger protection, those tools could no longer rely on the same file locations, formats, or data being stored in an easily usable form.
That's why you may see people say:
“The old cache method doesn't work anymore.”
It isn't simply that VRChat deleted the cache.
The way the client handles the data changed.
What does this mean for normal users?
For most users, nothing really changes.
You can still download and use avatars normally. VRChat handles the protected data in the background so the client can load and display the avatar.
The main difference is that loading an avatar doesn't mean that you should expect to find a clean, reusable copy of the creator's original files sitting in your cache.
VRChat started using stronger protection for avatar data mainly to protect creators and their assets.
The older system made it easier for people to recover avatar data from the local cache. This could lead to avatars and paid assets being copied and redistributed without the creator's permission.
By changing how avatar data is stored, protected, and loaded, VRChat made the old cache-grabbing method much less effective.
You can still load and use an avatar in VRChat, but that doesn't mean you are being given the original avatar files.
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L Literal referenced this topic
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