Activision explained why it uses shadow bans in Call of Duty

Players are not always immediately banned.

Activision prefers not to permanently ban players suspected of using cheats in Call of Duty, but instead places them in separate pools with limited matchmaking. David Andrews, Senior Director of Call of Duty Security, explained the reasons behind this approach.

According to him, the Ricochet system can send a suspicious account to so-called restricted matchmaking — a mode often referred to as a “shadow ban.” In such a case, the player is effectively isolated from the main audience while developers conduct additional checks and gather necessary information.

According to him, this allows Activision to assess the user's overall behavior and understand whether they actually violated the rules.

At the same time, temporary isolation helps avoid irreversible consequences in situations where the system made a mistake. If further investigation shows that the suspicions were false, the account can be returned to the regular player pool. Thus, a shadow ban acts as an intermediate measure between detecting suspicious activity and final punishment.

Andrews also noted that Activision has a whole set of tools to combat cheaters. In addition to restricted matchmaking, the company can issue bans in ranked mode, block remote play, apply temporary or permanent account bans, and hardware bans.