Activision drops the ban hammer on more than 65,000 Call of Duty cheaters

What you need to know

• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 was recently added to Xbox Game Pass, the first from the franchise to be available via the subscription service.
• The launch led to an influx of new cheaters who took advantage of PC access via the Microsoft Store to bypass previous bans.
• New detection efforts and anti-cheat mediations were enacted just before the weekend, including a ban sweep that affected 65,000 cheaters and boosters in Modern Warfare 3's Ranked multiplayer and Warzone's Ranked battle-royale modes.

If you've played Call of Duty: Warzone or Modern Warfare 3 in recent weeks, you may be wondering if your first-person shooter skills are waning or if something else entirely has led to you having a significantly worse gameplay experience. 

Turns out, it's the latter, as Activision's TeamRICOCHET anti-cheat enforcement has issued a ban sweep that has removed approximately 65,000 cheaters and boosters from Ranked lobbies in the two competitive gameplay modes.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (2023) was recently introduced into the Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass subscription catalog, allowing an influx of new players to jump into the annual blockbuster's multiplayer playlists. Players on PC Game Pass were able to access the game on their personal gaming computers, only for the in-game icon representing the player's system to show an Xbox logo. This was because they were signed in with their Xbox account on PC, but it led to frustration in the Call of Duty community among players who did not wish to utilize cross play between console and PC gameplay.

The rash of new cheats certainly did little to help assuage those concerns. However, Activision's development teams working on Warzone and Modern Warfare 3 have since remedied that issue by adding new icons to make it easier to distinguish between Xbox and PC players on the Microsoft Store edition of the game. The new icons were on a small step, with large-scale mitigation efforts rolling out across Warzone and MW3 alike.

TeamRICOCHET, the anti-cheat enforcement team put together by Activision to maintain fairness across the Call of Duty franchise, frequently rolls out a variety of cheat mitigation tactics. In the past, unique measures like cloaking, gun jamming, and the much beloved SPLAT mechanic that cuts cheaters' parachute cords have been used to trap and expose cheaters while providing useful info to the enforcement team.

Activision shared that the most recent wave of enforcement efforts has resulted in 65,000 players being issued bans for cheating or boosting. Warzone and MW3's ranked playlists were primary targets for cheaters, coinciding with past reports from Team RICOCHET that the majority of cheating occurs at the top of Ranked leaderboards. Following the ban wave, Activision reset the Season 5 leaderboards for Call of Duty: Warzone and MW3's ranked playlists.

Modern Warfare 3's summer launch into Xbox Game Pass came as a poorly kept surprise, as many anticipated this fall's Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 to be the first Call of Duty title to officially launch into the subscription service. Black Ops 6 will still be the first COD title to launch in Game Pass on Day One.