Activision said the market around video game cheats generates about $8.5 billion a year, in a blog post from Team Ricochet, the group that runs Call of Duty's anti-cheat efforts. The post was published ahead of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4's October 23 release.
The figure draws on research from threat intelligence platform Intorqa, which estimated earlier this year that cheat subscriptions across 15 analyzed games bring in roughly $3.5 billion annually. Including adjacent services such as account sales, boosting and spoofing tools raises that estimate to $8.5 billion, GamesIndustry.biz and IGN reported.
Cheat sellers have built a sprawling, multi-billion-dollar marketplace of resellers, subscription services, cheat reskins, illicit accounts, spoofing tools, and organized distribution networks.
Enforcement figures
Activision said it has paired technical detection with sustained legal action, disrupting more than 375 reseller operations, issuing more than 80 cease-and-desist demands and helping shut down 31 primary cheat vendors. GamesIndustry.biz reported that the team issued more than 70,000 new hardware bans last month. In August, Call of Duty posted footage of a representative serving a cease-and-desist order at the Ohio home of a cheat seller during the Modern Warfare 4 closed beta.
The publisher said cheat sellers often explain detection-related downtime with excuses such as the flu, surgery or a car accident to reassure customers. It also said its pressure is raising costs for cheaters: some subscriptions cost upwards of $100, spoofing tools add recurring fees, and some players spend more than $1,000 a year. Dexerto noted that Activision previously won a judgment against cheat provider EngineOwning, which in 2024 was ordered to pay the publisher more than $14 million.
Developer survey
GamesIndustry.biz also reported on a survey commissioned by anti-cheat provider Anybrain, which cited the same Intorqa data. Conducted by Atomik Research among 250 US and UK developers of online competitive multiplayer games, it found that 69% of studios consider cheating a significant or very significant problem, and more than half reported measurable drops in player retention or revenue. According to the survey, 76% of respondents have implemented anti-cheat measures, and 88% plan to increase anti-cheat investment over the next 12 months.
