Activision bans 60,000 Call of Duty Warzone accounts for cheating amid hacking furore
Dishonourable discharge.
Activision last night banned 60,000 accounts for cheating in Call of Duty Warzone amid an ongoing furore over hacking.
In a blog post, Activision said it had issued more than 300,000 permabans worldwide to accounts since Warzone launched in March 2020.
The news follows increasing pressure from the Call of Duty community, and comes after two high-profile Call of Duty streamers announced they had quit the game over cheating.
Warzone's anti-cheat has come under intense scrutiny from players, particularly on PC, with the issue exacerbated by radio silence from its publisher and developer. Some console players disable crossplay in a bid to avoid PC hackers.
One of the problems has to do with the free-to-download nature of Warzone. The perception at least is that cheaters do not feel threatened by the prospect of being banned because they can simply create a new account to cheat again. Even with a two-factor authentication system, which Activision said has invalidated over 180,000 suspect accounts since launch, there are simple workarounds available to determined cheaters.
Looking to the future, Activision said it was "increasing our efforts and capabilities" in a number of key areas, including its internal anti-cheat software. The company is working on additional detection technology, adding new resources dedicated to monitoring and enforcement, and promised regular communication updates on progress, with more of a two-way dialogue between Warzone developer Raven Software and players.
"The security and enforcement teams have additional measures coming - both preventative and enforcement - throughout this year to root out both cheaters and cheat providers," Activision said.
"We know cheaters are constantly looking for vulnerabilities, and we continue to dedicate resources 24/7 to identify and combat cheats, including aimbots, wallhacks, trainers, stat hacks, texture hacks, leaderboard hacks, injectors, hex editors and any third party software that is used to manipulate game data or memory.
"There's no place for cheating. We're committed to this cause. We are listening and will not stop in our efforts."
Activision faces an uphill battle against Warzone cheaters - and it is a war that spans many games. It's anti-cheat effort is ongoing with Warzone, Black Ops Cold War and Modern Warfare, and will no doubt continue with the release of subsequent games in the Call of Duty series.