its possible, but first violation is 1 week ban 2nd violation is perm ban
as far as 3rd party equalizer, idk never tried and really not interested in messing with that

edit: i do the same as my buddy ^^ there. i focus on particular sounds more. if u learn to focus on different footstep noises (wood,concrete,dirt, snow) u can pretty much figure out where e is
example: if your on 2nd or 3rd floor in Weapons Cache and u hear a e on first floor walking and it sounds like wood, then he's probably on top of a crate at either end of hall by stairs or maybe trying to get ontop of a pallet. But if it's a concrete sound then hes walking on flooring obviously