Fortnite cheater Brandon Despotakis, also known online for his handle BlazeFN, has lost in court against Epic Games for his illegal activities.
fortnite trailer screencap
In a case filed with the Federal Court of Australia, Despotakis has been found to have violated Epic's Terms of Service and End User License Agreement (EULA) by unlawfully selling things like in-game accounts and cheats to people (mostly aimbots), reports GameSpot. The legal proceedings just concluded after they began in April of last year.
A few of the items that BlazeFN was found guilty to be selling, aside from aimbots, were so-called "Full Access V-Bucks accounts." This also includes some "inactive" Fortnite accounts which have pre-completed battle passes and even rare or popular skins which people could only get from the in-game shop by paying real world money.
Not to mention, the artwork used to promote BlazeFN's storefront seem to have been lifted from Fortnite's item shop almost to the last pixel.
Legal Ramifications
With all these violations, the court has ordered Despotakis to pay Epic Games for damages - the proceeds of which will be donated to charity. It was not mentioned how much he had to pay, but it can be safe to assume that it would be a very significant amount.
If he refuses to follow the order or for some reason wasn't able to fulfill his duties, Despotakis will be liable for imprisonment and will have his property sequestered, alongside other types of punishment. And anybody who helps him breach the agreement will also be punished the same way, as indicated in the actual court order send out by the Federal Court of Australia - New South Wales.
In light of the conviction, BlazeFN posted a link to a statement using his Twitter account, to which he mentioned the legal ramifications of his actions. He also told anyone to no longer contact him about Fortnite cheats or player accounts, and made an apology to the Fortnite community - promising to never do it again.
Fortnite's Cheating Problem - And How To Spot Hackers
Due to being free-to-play, Epic Games' battle royale title is one of the most popular games out there - but it's also among those that's most afflicted with cheating.
In fact, the cheating seems to be bad enough that so many pro Fortnite players are even claiming that everyone is hacking in the game, as reported by SportsKeeda. This statements holds far more weight than you think, and for good reason. If an extremely proficient professional player almost always gets sniped by some random player who's never even competed at the same level, you know that it is rampant cheating.
One of these pros is BBG YungCalc, who also claimed that Fortnite cheaters have been running rampant since Chapter 2:
That said, how do you go about detecting and stopping Fortnite cheaters from ruining your experience? As per DoubleXP, it's quite simple to spot these cheaters.
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Watch for unnatural movements. If they seem to be doing quickscope shots within less than a split second, you know that kind of movement is impossible to do in-game. This will often require you to be eliminated by them first before you can observe. Most of the time, hackers will tend to stay in one place for too long while aiming at something weird, like walls. Also, they seem to be always locked onto their target whatever they do - something that's impossible to do even for the most skilled players out there. This then brings us to...
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Watch out for other hacks they might be using. If they seem to be able to track enemies through walls, they might be using a wallhack in conjunction to an aimbot. Other hacks they might be using include ones that let them build structures way faster than normal, or ones that let them build multiple structures in one go.
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Story posted on GameNGuide
Written by RJ Pierce