Activision is awarded $14.5 million in a Call of Duty cheating lawsuit

Activision notched a second victory in an ongoing legal case against EngineOwning, a cheat maker that the company sued in 2022. Yesterday, District Judge Michael Fitzgerald ordered several defendants, including EngineOwning itself, to pay the company $14.465,600 for their creation and distribution of Call of Duty cheats.

In addition, the judge ordered EngineOwning to turn over its website, stop making and selling cheats, and pay $292,912 in attorney fees to Activision. You can find a PDF of the ruling here. The site, engineowning.to, is apparently still operating today, offering cheats like an “Aimbot” that automatically aims and fires or the ability to see other players through walls for many games, including several in the CoD series.

Activision had previously won $3 million in a pair of settlements with two of the people — Ignacio Gayduchenko and Manuel Santiago — involved with EngineOwning, as IGN notes. But it had originally sued many more people who never responded to the lawsuit.

Yesterday’s filing named EngineOwning itself and its founders, Valentin Rick and Leon Risch, in addition to several others, including people involved in managing and marketing, site moderation, and an authorized EngineOwning reseller named Pascal Classen. Because they didn’t respond, the company finally asked the court in April to make a call, leading to yesterday’s default judgment.

The judge found EngineOwning and its many associated defendants guilty of violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. He also found them guilty of “intentionally” inducing players to buy and use cheats, despite knowing that the Call of Duty terms of use forbid it.

Gaming companies are increasingly turning to the courts to deal with cheat creators. In 2022, Bungie settled with Destiny 2 cheat makers for $13.5 million. Bungie also won a much smaller sum of $63,000, but it was also likely the first time a jury had ruled in such a case. AimJunkies, the defendant in that case, had taken the extraordinary approach of fighting the case, rather than ignoring it or settling.