350,000+ Call of Duty Accounts Have Been Banned for Toxicity or Racism
Like many other major online multiplayer games, Call of Duty is locked in a seemingly constant struggle to curb toxicity among its player-base. Now, in their latest progress report, the Call of Duty anti-toxicity team have revealed that more than 350,000 Call of Duty accounts have been banned in the last year for either racist account names or toxic behaviour.
Call of Duty Shares New Anti-Toxicity Update
“We are committed to delivering a fun gameplay experience for all our players,” reads the latest update from the Call of Duty anti-toxicity team; “There’s no place for toxic behaviour, hate speech or harassment of any kind in our games or our society.”
However, despite these strong words, the team goes on to state that addressing toxicity is requiring “sustained effort”. In the last twelve months, across Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, Warzone, Mobile, and Modern Warfare, the team have banned more than 350,000 accounts for toxic behaviour or racist names. Reviews of the games’ player-name database were able to eliminate most of the latter. Meanwhile, most of the bans for the former were thanks to player reporting. The team has also reportedly set up new filters designed to catch offensive words in other areas; clan tags, profiles, and other such names associated with player accounts, for example, as well as text chat.
Despite these efforts, however, the team acknowledges that there is; “much more to be done”. They go on to single out voice chat as being an area of concern, for example. They also list six areas where the team will be focusing their efforts and resources in the near future. These include, among other things, “increased communication with the community”. Public updates like these are rare; something which has often led players to feel that the studio isn’t doing enough to combat toxic behaviour. The update ends with a renewal of the studio’s commitment to tackling these issues, and the statement that this is; “just the start,” although the team also acknowledges that they have a “long way to go”.