Call of Duty: Warzone cheat providers seem to be running for the hills after publisher Activision filed a lawsuit against EngineOwning in the California District Court for statutory damages regarding the distribution of software they deem gives an unfair advantage to players.
The lawsuit has seemingly triggered a domino effect, prompting other cheat providers to close up shop. While Activision has appropriated an aggressive response to cheating with the release of its new Ricochet anti-cheat system, it did not initially spark much fear among cheat providers.
For instance, following Ricochet's release, EngineOwning boasted its ability to easily bypass Ricochet, which, at least by now, they might come to regret. However, it seems Activision's decision to "hit them where it hurts" (i.e., their wallets) might have been the correct course of action, after all.
Major Call of Duty cheat providers are shutting down
According to a source, cheat provider Cynical Software said that they are "immediately stopping sales" of Call of Duty related hacks and cheats, citing "they don't want to get sued."
Cheat provider Cynical Software announced in their public Telegram channel today that they are immediately stopping sales of CoD related hacks & cheats as they don’t want to get sued.
— CharlieIntel (@charlieINTEL) January 5, 2022
The announcement was posted on the company's official Telegram just hours after the Activision versus EngineOwning lawsuit went public.
Accordingly, the company noted the following:
- All COD related titles have been removed from the store and are no longer available to purchase.
- Any existing subscriptions will be allowed to die out over the next month as we don't wish our customers to lose any money.
- We will no longer support any COD titles in tickets, messages, websites or live chat.
- We will remove any remaining COD branding or references from our products, advertisements and website content or images.
The company also advised that Cleaner and P00fer sales will continue to be available, as will accounts on the website since they "are standalone products which do not effect (sic) any of the games directly."
Of course, this latest development sparks a sense of optimism for the future of the Call of Duty game franchise; however, some players are less impressed.
"My question is why did it take so long for Activision actually to do something about it. It's been happening since May 2020, but January 2022 is when they decide to take action. I mean, this is great news regardless. Better late than never," one Twitter user said.
Another user notes that cheat providers operating in the US undertake a lot of risks and are "probably not incorporated", meaning that "their owners could face personal liability for damages." The user adds, "since they [are] in the US, it would be easy to enforce a judgement against them."
Indeed, this could explain why providers like Cynical Software have decided to revoke their support for Call of Duty games. Given this, we can expect other cheat providers to follow suit in the near future.
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Featured image courtesy of Activision.
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