Call of Duty Says It's Making It Harder to Cheat in Black Ops 7 Season 3

Activision has provided Call of Duty: black Ops 7 and Warzone players with a new update on the shooter’s anti-cheat system, known as Ricochet, for Season 3, which launched earlier today. The studio’s anti-cheat team has been working to improve Ricochet for Season 3 of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 and now says new security measures should make it harder for bad actors to reach multiplayer matches or affect other players’ accounts.

The latest season of Call of Duty launched on April 2 and brought a plethora of new content to not just Black Ops 7, but its free-to-play Battle Royale counterpart, Warzone. Multiplayer fans have plenty of new maps to check out, as well as some fan favorite remasters, such as Plaza from Black Ops 2. There’s also a fresh Battle Pass for players to check out, with the free tiers once again including some new unlockable weapons. As for Zombies fans, the wait for a new map is going to be a little longer, as Totenreich isn’t set to release until the Season 3 Reloaded update.

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Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Updates Anti-Cheat Systems for Season 3

As with any popular live-service title, cheating and hacking are a continued problem in Call of Duty. Thankfully, Activision has a proprietary anti-cheat system in place, known as Ricochet, to combat those looking to ruin the fun for others. In a new blog post on the game’s official website, Activision has revealed some important changes set in place for Black Ops 7‘s big Season 3 update. Team Ricochet says it has expanded device detections, updated attestation messaging, and added new security measures to make it harder for bad actors to reach matches or affect other players’ accounts.

With the launch of Season 2 last month, Activision went after Call of Duty players using third-party input modification devices, such as Cronus Zen and XIM Matrix. These devices are often used by players to simulate machine-perfect aim and recoil control, giving an increased advantage over other players. The studio said stopping such devices was no easy task, as they are designed to hide, adapt, and change configurations to avoid detection. Now, with the launch of Season 3 on April 2, Team Ricochet says it has expanded its device detections to continue to take action against those who are using unauthorized devices.

Alongside continued efforts to prevent players from using such devices, Activision has also introduced a new account security measure for Season 3. Starting today, any new Activision accounts created will be required to use SMS two-factor authentication if they are free-to-play users on PC. The studio says this helps to protect against account compromise, farming, and repeat offenders. “We’ll start with newly created PC accounts and expand to existing accounts over the coming weeks,” the blog post states. As of writing, this only applies to free-to-play PC players who do not own a Call of Duty title released within the last two years and will be enforced on a per-platform basis.

It isn’t just anti-cheat updates that Activision has been focused on, either, as the publisher has also been actively shutting down Call of Duty cheat providers over the last year. Back in March 2025, Activision forced one of Warzone‘s biggest cheat providers, Phantom Overlay, to shut down for good. Then, just a few weeks later, it was reported that four more cheat providers were being forced to cease operations. This isn’t something that is easy to do, as it requires a lot of resources and legal routes, but preventing players from easily accessing cheats is another effective way to stop cheaters from ruining the Call of Duty experience.