Apex Legends players concerned as data shows Warzone streamers are bringing hackers

With drama surrounding Call of Duty’s Warzone battle royale, Apex Legends has been getting a lot more love from major Twitch streamers. Unfortunately, players have dug up data which suggests that hackers are switching over as well.

The most prominent problem with Warzone over the past few months has been the overwhelming amount of hackers found in higher-skilled lobbies. Apex, a game less-known for hacking issues, has therefore become a refuge of sorts for frustrated Warzone players.

With huge names like NICKMERCS (whose viewership is regularly above the 50,000 mark) swapping over to grind the Respawn Entertainment battle royale, Apex Legends has surged past Warzone in Twitch popularity. The added attention is great, but some of it is coming from the wrong people.

As Reddit’s ‘Mayor-of-Apex’ has pointed out, some of the major Warzone streamer’s seem to be bringing over hackers. According to search data on google, queries like “Apex Legends aimbot” are surging.

Looking at options like Apex Legends “aimbot, hacks, cheats,” Mayor uses Google’s Keyword Planner to find out that there has been a 658% increase in such searches. While this doesn’t mean there’s 658% more hackers in Apex now than before, it does show that the cheaters are looking.

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And this type of research can be replicated even without Keyword Planner, as a simple check on Google Trends shows that searches for “Apex Legends hack” hit new peaks in July 2021 (right around the Warzone exodus).

Of course, the increase in hack searches can’t be blamed on Warzone streamers since they don’t control their viewers. And you can’t assume that more searches will mean more hackers in-game, especially since Apex has had a better history preventing cheaters than Warzone has.

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But, nonetheless, more interested hackers is a worrying sign. Considering Apex’s former issues with DDoS attacks and calls for a stricter anti-cheat, one has to wonder if some of these new searchers will successfully slip through the cracks.

Only time will tell if more hackers are coming to Apex Legends, but, for now, Respawn Entertainment should keep an eye out — because the cheaters most certainly are.