Activision bans over 60,000 Warzone accounts for cheating amid Community uproar

Earlier this week, several prominent professional Call Of Duty Warzone players called Activision out for their inability to upkeep the game’s authenticity with hackers running rampant across the game. 

Several high-profile players have already called it quits over rampant cheating and those that still remain are upset. Just last week YouTuber Vikkstar, whose real name is Vikram Singh Barn decided to quit and released a video saying Warzone was in “the worst state it has ever been”.

Vikkstar has over seven million subscribers on YouTube and his video about his decision to quit quickly went viral and has been viewed over 1.2 Millon times already. 

Following his video, the community started pressuring Activision to take strict steps and quell the rampant cheating. Joining in with the demands of the community several other professional players like Summit1G, NICKMERCS, and Drift0r also questioned Activision’s inability to add anti-cheat measures and maintain authentic Warzone tournaments. 

Yesterday in a blog post, Activision finally responded to the community’s demand and banned more than 60,000 accounts for cheating in Call of Duty Warzone. “There’s no place for cheating,” Raven Software said. “We’re committed to this cause. We are listening and will not stop in our efforts.”

Since Warzone launched in March 2020, Activision had issued more than 300,000 permabans worldwide and ensured the community of increased efforts “to identify and address cheat providers at the source”.

As per a report by Vice, yesterday’s ban wave hit EngineOwning customers the most forcing EngineOwning to update its official site with a developer’s message indicating that they are “updating” the cheat. Sources with knowledge of the bans said that “Anyone that used EngineOwning since the last banwave was wiped out.” 

This is the second-largest wave of bans that Activision issued against Warzone cheaters since the game was released in 2020. In April last year, the company banned more than 70,000 accounts followed by another 20,000 accounts in September.

Activision is now working on adding more detection measures, adding new resources dedicated to monitoring and enforcement, and regular communication updates on progress, with more of a two-way dialogue between Warzone developer Raven Software and players.