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Activision on Call of Duty anti-cheat system falsely banning players: “We have restored…”

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Call of Duty maker Activision has resolved an issue with its Ricochet anti-cheat system . The anti-cheat system that runs in CoD franchise titles like Modern Warfare III and Warzone resulted in the wrongful banning of legitimate players. The company attributed the problem to a "workaround to a detection system" and stated that it "impacted a small number of legitimate player accounts." In a post shared on the social media platform X (earlier Twitter), the Microsoft-owned studio confirmed that all the affected accounts have now been restored.


Take a look at the post here





In the X post, Activision wrote: “RICOCHET Anti-Cheat identified and disabled a workaround to a detection system in Modern Warfare III and Call of Duty: Warzone that impacted a small number of legitimate player accounts. We have restored all accounts that were impacted. An examination of our systems was conducted for safety and monitoring will continue.”

What a cheat seller has to say about Call of Duty’s anti-cheat system

However, a cheat seller known as zebleer, who operates the Phantom Overlay store, claims the issue was far more widespread than Activision suggests. This contradicts the company's assertion that only a small number of players were affected.


In a detailed post on X, the cheat seller exposed a vulnerability in the Ricochet anti-cheat system used in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III and Warzone that allowed malicious actors to trigger false bans on innocent players. The users also noted that he has exploited this flaw which triggers the system by simply sending a friend request or chat message containing a specific string of text. This trick can be used by any player to trigger a permanent ban on another player's account.

The exploit took advantage of how Ricochet scanned the player's computer memory for known cheat software. One of the signatures Ricochet searched for was a plaintext string reading "Trigger Bot." By including this phrase in a friend request or chat message, unethical players could cause it to appear in the targeted player's memory, triggering a false positive from Ricochet.

While Activision acknowledged the issue and stated that it "impacted a small number of legitimate player accounts," zebleer claimed that "several thousand random COD players were banned by this exploit" before it was widely known.

The cheat seller also noted that Call of Duty streamer BobbyPoff was among the players who were falsely banned by the exploit. BobbyPoff's ban, which began on October 3, sparked speculation and debate within the Call of Duty community, with some questioning his innocence while others defended him. He maintained his innocence throughout the ordeal, and his account was finally unbanned recently after Activision addressed the exploit.
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