Call of Duty’s Ricochet Anti-Cheat Boss Dispels the Myths and Explains How It Actually Works

More than 293,000 Call of Duty accounts have been banned in 2026 alone, and when Ricochet detects a cheater mid-match, it takes an average of six minutes — less than a single game — to act. Behind those numbers is a team led by David Andrews, the Senior Director of Game Security at Activision, who sat down with IGN to dispel some of the most common myths about cheating in Call of Duty and explain exactly how the ban process works from the inside.

The Real Scale of Cheating: Myth Versus Reality

One of the most persistent perceptions around Call of Duty is that the game is overrun with cheaters — a belief fuelled largely by viral clips circulating on social media. Andrews argues the reality is considerably better. “The numbers that we see internally remain really, really positive,” he told IGN. “If you’re an average player in ranked or Warzone, you’re not encountering a lot of cheaters.” That said, Andrews was careful not to declare victory. The match infection rate — the proportion of games that contain a confirmed cheater — is “incredibly low” for most of the player population. But at the very top of Ricochet’s ranked play ladder, particularly among content creators and professional players, cheating encounters are more frequent. Andrews described these as “hotspots” the team is actively focused on. Social media clips, he noted, are a far smaller driver of enforcement than the community might assume. Publicly reported cases account for just 0.11 per cent of all enforcement actions. The remaining 99.89 per cent come from automated detection systems, in-game reports, and internal monitoring.

How Ricochet Actually Catches Cheaters

The detection pipeline is more layered than most players realise. When Ricochet identifies a new cheat tool, the team deploys a signature — essentially a unique string that only that cheat produces in running memory. Accounts triggering that signature are flagged, reviewed in bulk and individually, and, once validated, permanently banned. For cases flagged by player reports or social media, a more manual process begins. Investigators access full match replays, review kill/death ratios over time, analyse win/loss trends, and examine whether performance spikes in suspicious circumstances. The system also flags accounts for “limited matchmaking” — a quarantine pool where suspicious players are isolated while a fuller investigation runs. It’s a holding area that prevents irrevocable action until the team is certain.

What Happens After You’re Caught

Ricochet’s enforcement is graduated. A first strike — for using a disallowed device or cheat — brings a seven-day temporary suspension and a clear warning: stop, or face permanent action. “We’re letting you know you can’t use that thing,” Andrews explained. “If you use it again, you’re gone forever.” A second strike triggers a permanent account suspension and potential hardware bans, which can affect the console or PC itself. Ricochet has a full range of tools available: ranked play bans, remote play restrictions, temporary and permanent account suspensions, and hardware-level bans. Not all investigations end in a ban. Andrews cited a case from a Black Ops 7 beta where approximately 200 players were incorrectly flagged. The issue was identified, the signature corrected, and all affected accounts were restored.

The Technology Closing the Gaps

Black Ops 7 marked a significant step forward with the introduction of TPM 2.0 and Secure Boot requirements — hardware-level security features that make it considerably harder for cheats to bypass detection. The team also uses Microsoft Azure Attestation, a cloud-based verification layer that checks PC integrity before a match begins. Andrews has also brought former cheat developers into the team — a practice that gives Ricochet direct insight into how cheats are built and where detection gaps exist. Combined with a kernel-level PC driver that monitors software interacting with Call of Duty in real time, the system is more comprehensive than the community’s surface-level frustration suggests. Whether it’s enough to satisfy players who regularly encounter cheaters at the top of ranked play is another question. Andrews acknowledges the hotspots exist — and that solving them is exactly what the team is working on.