The Apex Legends Global Series’ organisers postponed the world event due to hacking incidents in the ongoing series.
Two competitive esports players encountered these hacking attempts in the highly anticipated Apex Legends Global Series, which boasts a substantial $5 million prize pool, Techcrunch reported.
The players were confronted with cheats seemingly injected into their matches. One player, Genburten, expressed his disbelief during the game, exclaiming, “Wait, what the heck? I’m getting hacked, bro, I’m getting hacked!” This moment was captured in a video posted on X and circulated on various YouTube channels.
The video footage shows Genburten experiencing a sudden enhancement in his gameplay, with other players being highlighted on the map, even if they were behind obstacles.
This manipulation, commonly known as ‘wallhack,’ allows hackers to gain an unfair advantage by seeing opponents through in-game barriers.
Further adding to the intrigue, a screenshot from the video displays a moment where a window appears on Genburten’s screen, seemingly offering a menu for a cheating tool titled ‘TSM HALAL HOOK.’
Simultaneously, a message purportedly from the hackers appeared in the game’s chatbot, reading, “Apex hacking global series, by Destroyer2009 and R4andom.”
In another match, a similar incident unfolded with competitive player ImperialHal, who also documented the sequence on their X account. He claimed to have gained access to aimbot, a cheating technique that automatically aims at enemies, granting players an unfair advantage in hitting opponents without aiming.
In response to these egregious hacks, the tournament organisers took decisive action, announcing the suspension and postponement of the tournament.
“Due to the competitive integrity of this series being compromised, we have decided to postpone the NA finals at this time. We will share more information soon,” announced Apex Legends on their X account.
Despite the uproar caused by these incidents, details regarding the exact nature of the hacks remain mysterious. Electronic Arts, the publisher of Apex Legends, is still silent on the issue. Likewise, the two hacked players, Genburten and ImperialHal refrained from issuing statements. However, ImperialHal said on X that he is still banned on Apex Legends while EA/Respawn investigated the matter.
On the following day, Easy Anti-Cheat, the developers of the anti-cheat system used in Apex Legends and other games, addressed the concerns about a potential security vulnerability known as remote code execution (RCE) bug within their system. They dismissed the possibility of such an exploit being utilised in these incidents.
“We have investigated recent reports of a potential RCE issue within Easy Anti-Cheat. At this time – we are confident that there is no RCE vulnerability within EAC being exploited. We will continue to work closely with our partners for any follow-up support needed,” said Easy Anti-Cheat on X.
Interestingly, this was the company’s first tweet in five years, whose last tweet was in 2019, prompting the users to ask whether they have updated EAC at all in these five years.
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