Activision Allows Ranked Console Players to Disable Crossplay with PC Amid Cheating

In response to mounting complaints about cheating in Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 and Warzone Ranked Play, Activision has announced that starting with the launch of Season 2, console players will have the option to disable crossplay with PC.

The decision comes after criticism from the Call of Duty community regarding the impact of cheating on Ranked Play, which launched alongside Season 1 last year. Activision’s Team Ricochet, the division behind the game’s anti-cheat technology, admitted in December that its measures at the launch of Season 1 had fallen short.

Since the launch of the first season on Nov. 14, 2024, Activision has issued over 136,000 account bans in Ranked Play as part of its anti-cheat efforts. The company outlined additional measures to combat cheating, including improvements to its Ricochet Anti-Cheat system, a kernel-level driver update, and enhanced client- and server-side detections. These changes are part of a broader initiative to safeguard the integrity of the game’s ecosystem, with new technologies planned for future seasons.

“We’ll be monitoring closely and will consider further changes to prioritize the integrity of the ecosystem,” Activision said in a recent blog post, emphasizing its commitment to staying ahead of cheat developers.

The change aims to provide a level playing field for console players who want to compete without the risk of encountering PC-based exploits. Activision plans to monitor the impact of this feature and consider additional adjustments as necessary.

Cheating has been a persistent issue for Call of Duty since the rise of Warzone in 2020. Activision has invested millions into anti-cheat technology and legal action against cheat developers. “The people behind cheats are organized, illegal groups that pick apart every piece of data within our games to make cheating possible,” Activision stated. The company’s proactive measures have included machine-learning behavioral systems to detect and ban cheaters faster, with the goal of removing them from the game within one hour of their first match.