Activision needs more transparency with CoD’s hacking situation

Both MW3 and Warzone are experiencing issues with cheats and hackers, and Activision can’t seem to crack down on the problem or properly explain its system for punishment. As a result, CoD players continue to suffer.

Hacking has been in CoD for a long time, but it may be at its worst right now in MW3 and Warzone. Further, Activision is compounding the issue by not communicating to the community how it plans to stop it.

The company’s shown a propensity for being picky when it comes to who gets banned and for what, leaving a lot of it to players reporting each other.

This has led to a messy situation where not everyone who is punished deserves it, and CoD players don’t understand what is going on.

The discussions about cheating and the punishment for doing so have been renewed after word about permanent bans not being appealable began to spread.

Activision is adamant that no permanent ban can be undone, and that there are no such things as a “false positive” ban, meaning that a person can’t be permanently banned unless there is irrefutable proof that they are cheating.

This is the first part of the problem, as it isn’t clear how the team can undeniably know that someone is cheating in CoD. Activision has not been clear about its process or what systems it uses to identify cheaters.

For a long time, the process has been that players can report each other when they believe the other is using a cheat, hack, or exploit of some kind. Activision could then investigate and decide what to do with the accused.

But it’s never been explained what this investigation entails or what tools get used to find proof of cheating.

As one fan asks on the MW3 subreddit: “Thing is though, if they can state that bans are justified without doubt then how can they not detect the cheating as it occurs?”

This is leading to hesitancy among players to even play the game, as they don’t know if they could be wrongfully reported by another player and receive this punishment.

Another CoD player voiced this exact concern, saying: “I’m one of the many who recently got an offensive chat warning, even though I have had voice chat off since MW3 came out. Worried I’m gonna be perma banned for no reason one day.”

The system has been wonky, as evidenced by players receiving bans even though they haven’t done anything wrong. And when they face the possibility of being permanently removed from the game, that can make a person just leave the game entirely.

It also doesn’t help that Activision doesn’t seem to want to crack down as hard as it could on this issue, with a lot of talk with no results.

The company repeatedly mentioned that its updating its anti-cheat and announced the mass numbers of bans being dealt to accounts, but then a CoD fan can hop into a game and still see cheats on full display.

This presents a conflicting picture, and makes one question whether or not there is an active crackdown on hackers being carried out. Sure, developers can say that they’re working at it but when there’s still plenty to be seen, that sends a different message.

This is leading to players just not believing what Activision is saying. One person explains their stance: “Just after the update I’ve been paired with a level 23 guy who pushed every team winning every gunfight. These bans solve the problem maybe for just 1 hour or so, then everything goes back to normal. Games full of cheaters.”

Again, it’s a lack of transparency that also paints a picture of trying to appease the players looking for bans while not upsetting others. This causes CoD players to just stop caring and walk away, which is not going to help the game at all.

If Activision wants to alleviate this hacking issue in CoD, it feels like something has to change. Either the publisher needs to have a different process to find these types of players, or needs to be more transparent on how the current process works.