14 DAY TRIAL // Niantic has filed a lawsuit against a group called Global++, which the company claims not only that used to cheat in a bunch of games, but also helped others do the same with hacked versions of these titles.
The games in question are Pokemon Go, Ingress, and Harry Potter: Wizard Unite, the last of which is still in beta testing stage.
Niantic says the members of the group offered what it called “unauthorized derivative” versions of these games, violating its intellectual property rights and ruining the gaming experience. Additionally, the company says, the hackers sold subscriptions to players that could help them cheat.
The lawsuit mentions several Global++ members, including leader Ryan Hunt and YouTube promoter Alen Hundur, but as per engadget, 20 other anonymous members are included in the legal action as well.
“Among other things, defendants’ schemes undermine the integrity of the gaming experience for legitimate players, diminishing enthusiasm for Niantic’s games and, in some cases, driving players away from Niantic’s games altogether. Defendants’ schemes therefore damage Niantic’s reputation and goodwill and interfere with Niantic’s business,” the lawsuit reads according to PokemonGoHub.
Global++ site already taken offline
The group has already removed its website and Discover servers in order to comply with “legal obligations.”
“It is will [sic] great sadness that we will be shutting down indefinitely incompliance [sic] with our legal obligations. It has been a fun ride with the entire community and we have made some unbelievable memories,” the group said on Discord.
Niantic wants the hackers to stop distributing the modified versions of the games and abandon all their work that involves making modifications to the original code owned by the company. By the looks of things, however, Global++ is already stopping the work on everything related to Niantic’s games, as the official website and Discord serves are already offline.