Every year, Activision releases one of the biggest multiplayer experiences in the form of a Call of Duty entry. This year was no different, with Black Ops 6 arriving and taking the crown of being the most popular game in the entire franchise so far. However, one thing the company has been having trouble tackling is the issue of cheaters.
The kernel mode anti-cheat solution of Activision, RICOCHET, has been touting state-of-the-art detection techniques and the use of AI to ban cheaters. However, while it had proven effective at launch, by the time Black Ops 6 season 1 rolled in with ranked play, plenty of cheaters were back in action.
"We understand the promise of glory and notoriety from Ranked Play leaderboards makes Ranked Play an attractive target for cheaters," says the anti-cheat team in a blog post. "For this reason, our teams have been especially focused on turning the tide to deliver the competitive arena our players seek."
Here are the changes to the system it has done so far:
- Upgrades & Accounts: Account bans are now happening hourly due to increased velocity from several RICOCHET Anti-Cheat systems, this in addition to the over 19,000 accounts we’ve removed recently. These updates to our systems mean enforcement response times are now quicker than they have ever been.
- Leaderboards: The cleanup process has been updated for faster synchronization of leaderboard changes.
- Investigations: We have significantly expanded our Replay Investigation render farm – the machines used to generate clips for examination. We've also ramped up the group dedicated to manually review clips (based on a priority order that favors detections). In the last several weeks, the Replay tool updates have been highly effective at validating detections and reports, providing further training for AI systems for the anti-cheat team, and removing cheaters.
In future seasons, the Black Ops 6 anti-cheat team intends to launch a major overhaul to RICOCHET's kernel-mode driver, server-side detections, and other aspects of its protections.
"The RICOCHET Anti-Cheat team will be continuing its work to fight cheaters throughout the remainder of the month," adds the message. "While we have made progress, we know more needs to be done and we’re eager to share details of our planned major updates coming in the new year."
The team also recommended the use of two-factor authentication, which can thwart most phishing attempts to gather used accounts for cheating.
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