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Hacker says they banned ‘thousands’ of Call of Duty gamers by abusing anti-cheat flaw
- Activision's anti-cheat system flaw allowed hackers to ban 'thousands upon thousands' of Call of Duty players using hardcoded strings, according to the hacker who reported the bug.
- A cheat developer called Zebleer introduced journalists to the hacker.
- Hackers often exploit bugs in online video games to sell cheats that give players an unfair advantage, sometimes making millions.
- Video game companies have been hiring cybersecurity specialists to develop and fine-tune anti-cheat systems separate from the games themselves.
- In 2021, Activision released Ricochet, an anti-cheat system running at the kernel level.
- The flaw exploited by the hacker's 'targeted abuse' relied on Ricochet's use of hardcoded strings as 'signatures' to detect hackers, regardless of context, leading to false positives.
- Sending a message with a 'Trigger Bot' reference via the game's chat system would automatically result in the player's account being banned.
- The hacker says they could have used the flaw for years without notice, but got tired of it and quit when they spotted authorities closing in.
- Activision declined to comment on the matter.
- The company's anti-cheat teams are now reportedly working on more advanced detection techniques, moving away from signature detection.
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