As predicted, the Call of Duty Black Ops 7 beta launch has attracted unwanted attention: cheaters. Days prior, Activision hinted at this inevitability. Now, with the beta live, reports of cheating are surfacing rapidly.
Social media is filling with posts from players encountering cheaters. Activision’s anti-cheat team, responding to these concerns, has confirmed that accounts found cheating are being swiftly banned. One such response read: “This clip was from earlier today. The account was already banned.” demonstrating a rapid response.
The anti-cheat team is actively addressing reports of wallhacks and aimbots, often replying with the hammer emoji to show action is being taken. Many of these player-submitted examples of cheating quickly gained traction on social media platforms. Interestingly, the Reddit community appears less focused on cheating than other platforms, which some might consider an unusual development.
Activision anticipates such activity. In a recent blog post, they stated that the beta would be a testing ground for cheaters. Their anti-cheat system, #TeamRICOCHET, is actively monitoring, identifying, and banning offenders. Crucially, accounts permanently banned for cheating during the beta will face bans across all Call of Duty titles, encompassing everything from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare onward.
Cheating is a common issue in online gaming. As previously noted with Battlefield 6’s beta, developers are struggling to combat cheating, despite measures like requiring secure boot for PC players. The question is whether these increasingly stringent anti-cheat measures, and the inconveniences they may cause to legitimate players, are worth the effort in combating persistent cheating.
Finding the correct balance is tricky. The tolerance for such inconveniences often depends on individual experiences with cheaters. Adding a layer of complexity to the Black Ops 7 situation, the game contains killstreaks which temporarily allow players to see and shoot through walls, actually simulating the effect of some cheats.
The full release of Black Ops 7 arrives on November 14th. It’s likely that cheating concerns will resurface then, especially if the cheating controversy surrounding Battlefield 6’s October 10th launch hasn’t fully subsided.