Battlefield 2042 will, after a few weeks delay, open its doors to fans this week for its open beta. With EA Play members and those that pre-ordered the game getting first dibs tomorrow, October 6, we’ll be able to finally see through our own eyes the guns, maps, and of course, the tornados.
However, alarm bells are already ringing as a number of leakers and insiders are reporting that the anti-cheat system used for Battlefield 2042, the well-established and relatively effective Easy Anti-Cheat, has already been breached by cheaters. It appears that with preloads for the Battlefield 2042 beta going live earlier today, cheat providers have been quick to dive into the game files and figure out workarounds. The likes of ModernWarzone and Tom Henderson are reporting that this is the case, with the latter claiming to have received convincing evidence.
It’s not clear whether it’s the PC or console versions of the game that have been “bypassed” by the cheaters (it’s most likely the former), but it could affect all players regardless with Battlefield 2042 cross-play matching players on all platforms together.
Easy Anti-Cheat is used by EA across a number of its titles, with the most notable being Apex Legends. It’s also used by Epic Games to police Fortnite.
These two extremely popular, free-to-play games manage to remain relatively cheater-free thanks to EAC, with the system being extremely effective at detecting widely-used, off-the-shelf cheats, according to a recent article by Henderson. It’s not 100% perfect, but you see far fewer cheaters roaming about in Apex and Fortnite than you do in Call of Duty: Warzone, for example.
Dataminers and Hackers have already bypassed Easy Anti-Cheat for #Battlefield2042
Evidence has been provided. pic.twitter.com/WbRXeRaezB
— Tom Henderson (@_Tom_Henderson_) October 5, 2021
However, Henderson says that when it comes to catching custom-made or more complex cheats, Easy Anti-Cheat can struggle to do so automatically, and requires manual bans. It appears to be this weakness that has already been exploited by cheaters.
The Loadout has reached out to EA to comment on Henderson’s claims that Battlefield 2042’s anti-cheat has already been bypassed.
With less than 24 hours until showtime, we won’t have long to wait to discover if these reports will translate into lots of encounters with cheaters in the Battlefield 2042 beta.