System security
- Not to be confused with player individual security status
System security (system sec, security rating, sec rating, security level, sec level) is a rough measure of how hazardous a particular system is. This guide details how system security affects the player's actions in that system.
Overview
In general, as system security decreases the hazards a player can face in that system increases but the reward for overcoming those hazards increases. To find the security of the system you are in, look in the upper-left hand corner of the EVE client. System security should be displayed along with other system-specific information. You can also use the map to browse system security of different systems (select security status under the Stars tab).
In general named systems (Yulai and Jita, for example) have >0.0 security status while number-letter systems (HED-GP and EC-P8R, for example) have 0.0 security status or lower. There are however a few exceptions, as they are some named systems that have a 0.0 security status.
However, if a system has a security status higher then 0.0, that doesn't mean it is perfectly safe! In systems with security lower then 0.5 - the so-called low security (low-sec) systems, there is no CONCORD NPC police, which means that human pirates attack other players; in other words, PvP combat is possible. On a map, those systems are colored in shades of red - the darker, the lower the system security.
In systems with security 0.5 or higher (high security or high-sec), CONCORD will reply to PvP combat and destroy the attacker. Thus those systems are reasonably safe. Reasonably, as there exist "suicide pirates" - see suicide ganking), who are willing to sacrifice their ship (which will inevitably be destroyed by CONCORD) to give their allies a chance to loot the wreckage (stealing does not provoke a reply from CONCORD, which only allows players to attack the thieves for a limited period of time (see Criminal Flagging) - but if your ship was just destroyed, you are unable to hunt the thieves quickly). That said, "suicide pirates" are rare, and will only go after ships with very expensive items (dozens of millions of isks or more), so new players should consider high-sec space safe.
It should be noted that PvP in high-sec can also occur after a war declaration between player corporations, or as a result of factional warfare. Those type of activities, however, also involve only experienced players, so again, new players should not worry too much about those issues.
0.0 Space
In general, 0.0 systems are lawless. Committing an act of aggression in 0.0 space does not cause the aggressor to be criminally flagged and does not cause the aggressor to lose security status.
Police Drones
- 0.5 - 1.0: Police drones and sentry guns respond to players that are criminally flagged.
- 0.1 - 0.4: Sentry guns respond to players that are criminally flagged.
- 0.0: No police presence at jumpgates, only sentry guns at NPC-owned stations (non-conquerable)
Pirate Drones
In general, as system security decreases the bounties of the pirate drones (rats) that spawn there increases. Also, systems with a lower security have a higher chance of having officer spawns.(This is especially important with regard to PvE in 0.0 space, as pirate drone spawns in -1.0 space are better than spawns in -0.1 space.)
- 0.7 - 1.0: Frigate-class pirate drones spawn in asteroid belts and at gates.
- 0.4 - 0.6: Small cruiser-class pirate drones in addition to frigate-class spawn.
- 0.1 - 0.3: Battlecruiser-class, cruiser-class, frigate-class drones spawn in asteroid belts and at gates.
- 0.0: Drones of all size (including battleship-class) can spawn in belts and at gates.
Anchoring
- 0.9 - 1.0: No structures may be anchored. (Some early patches allowed anchoring here and some early anchorings can still be found.)
- 0.4 - 0.8: Containers may be anchored, Starbases may be anchored with decent standing with the sovereignty, requires starbase charters
- 0.0 - 0.3: Player Owned Starbases and Containers may be freely anchored, starbases may contain moon-mining equipment
True Security
The EVE client displays system security as a range of values from 0.0 to 1.0 with increments in tenths (i.e. 0.1, 0.2, etc.). In actuality, system security is a value from -1.0 to 1.0, with values being rounded to the nearest tenth and values lower than 0.0 being shown as 0.0 in the client. The rounding up of vales can sometimes lead to some confusion, for example if system true security status is 0.89, structures may be anchored there, even through it system security is displayed as 0.9.
Restricted Systems
Players that have low security status provoke a police drone response when going into systems with a high security status. The thresholds for provoking a police drone response are follows:
- 1.0: -2.0 and lower.
- 0.9: -2.5 and lower.
- 0.8: -3.0 and lower.
- 0.7: -3.5 and lower.
- 0.6: -4.0 and lower.
- 0.5: -4.5 and lower.
- 0.0-0.4: No restrictions.
Please note that the systems in the Sanctum constellation in Genesis are claimed by Interbus and CONCORD, thus the faction police are CONCORD. Entering any system in this constellation, while having a security status below the level stated above, will provoke a CONCORD response, similar to the response. Gates will be locked down to prevent you from escaping the system and you will be webbed, scrammed and your ship destroyed.
Also, this does not mean that the player can be attacked by other players! A player can only justifiably be attacked by others, without provoking CONCORD response, if his security status is below -5.0.
Security level as a difficulty rating
Security level also governs:
- the varieties of ore that can be found asteroid belts within in a system.
- the presence and variety of Ice Fields or Gas Clouds.
- the frequency and difficulty of random rat spawns.
- the average difficulty level of Deadspace Complexes.
- the average difficulty class of Wormhole links.