Activision slams COD cheatmakers with racketeering charges

pcgamer.com:

Activision has gone to war on the maker of popular Call of Duty cheat software, a German-based entity called EngineOwning (hereafter EO). The videogame publisher has filed a new document in an ongoing suit in California against dozens of named individuals, and among the charges is one that does raise an eyebrow: racketeering. Activision accuses the individuals involved in EO of not just violating the software's terms of use, and wire fraud, but of a RICO violation: essentially saying that this amounts to criminal conspiracy.

I've read quite a few suits like this over the years, and usually it's about the in-game terms of service being violated, or the unfair competition element of the cheating software. But under California law, say Activision's lawyers, «Defendants have committed violations of the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (“RICO”) [...] by conducting and participating in an enterprise engaged in racketeering activity.»

These individuals knowingly conspired against Activision in order to sell cheats, the publisher claims, and ran a sophisticated operation intended to undermine the COD series. And now Activision wants all the money they've made through this, and then some.

Activision's explanation of why this is racketeering is worth a read, as it shows in outline how these cheat resellers operate at scale.

«The Enterprise is a well-coordinated multi-level marketing machine. Defendants work together to continuously sell Cheating Software licenses directly, as well as recruit reseller Defendants. A network of seller and reseller Defendants have perpetuated the same steps as across thousands of instances of marketing, sales, distribution, and support regarding the Cheating Software vis-à-vis