Activision uses AI to ban nearly 20,000 Black Ops 6 cheaters

Ranked mode has a massive cheating problem

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What just happened? Black Ops 6 debuted to widespread acclaim in October, but like many other multiplayer online shooters, it quickly became plagued by cheaters, spoiling the experience for legitimate players. In response to persistent complaints, Activision has banned thousands of accounts found guilty of cheating in Ranked Play.

Activision has banned over 19,000 accounts for cheating since the launch of Ranked Play on November 21. The company revealed it is leveraging AI to detect cheaters and performing "hourly sweeps" to remove them from the Ranked Play mode and leaderboard. Additionally, the company is enhancing its AI systems with code optimizations to improve its anti-cheating measures.

Prior to the release of Black Ops 6, Activision disclosed plans to use AI to differentiate cheaters from highly skilled "God-tier" players. The company emphasized that while cheat developers may help users improve their gameplay, they cannot alter behavioral patterns. "How people play – the legit, the phony, the good, and the bad – gives us information and we use that to build ways to pick those bad folks out of a lineup," the company had said.

The mass suspensions come in response to a community backlash after swarms of cheaters overran Ranked Play shortly after its launch. The situation escalated to the point where prominent Call of Duty content creators publicly criticized the issue, pressuring the developers to address it. In response, the team acknowledged the problem and promised updates to the Ricochet anti-cheat system to tackle the issue.

Initially, a data outage in Ricochet reduced the effectiveness of the AI systems, hampering the publisher's ability to detect and ban cheaters. However, the issue has since been resolved, and the AI systems are now reportedly performing as intended. According to Activision, these systems are more effective than ever, identifying and isolating cheaters based on player behavior and gameplay patterns.

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That said, some players claim they have been unfairly banned despite not engaging in any illegal activity. It remains unclear whether these reports are genuine or if legitimate players are indeed being mistakenly flagged by the AI.

Meanwhile, many console gamers are calling for an option to disable crossplay, arguing that PC players using a keyboard and mouse have an inherent advantage in shooting games. Whether the developers will introduce a crossplay toggle remains to be seen.