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Blizzard is asking a court to award it $8.5 million in damages for the over 42,000 game hacks sold by Bossland that Blizzard says infringe on its copyrights.

Alissa McAloon, Publisher

March 15, 2017

1 Min Read

Blizzard is asking a California court to award it $8.5 million in damages in a default judgment against game hack distributor Bossland GMBH, who Blizzard sued for copyright infringement last summer. 

The earlier lawsuit accused Bossland of “creating, distributing, maintaining, and updating malicious software products” designed to give players an unfair advantage in many of Blizzard’s multiplayer titles, which the company says have ultimately resulted in millions of dollars in lost sales.

TorrentFreak reports that, after failing to have the case dismissed over a lack of jurisdiction, Bossland has gone radio silent, causing Blizzard to seek a default judgment.

The developer is asking for only the minimum statutory damages of $200 per infringement, putting the total amount sought at just over $8.5 million dollars given the estimated 42,818 Blizzard-related hacks sold by Bossland in the U.S.

In the full complaint shared by TorrentFreak, Blizzard alleges that the default action was sought deliberately by Bossland, who hoped such a ruling would both excuse the company from further probing and be difficult to enforce given Bossland’s German origin.

More and more game developers have been trying to fight game altering hacks by going after the companies that profit from them; notably, League of Legends creator Riot Games was awarded $10 million following a lawsuit against the hacking service LeagueSharp just weeks ago. 

About the Author(s)

Alissa McAloon

Publisher, GameDeveloper.com

As the Publisher of Game Developer, Alissa McAloon brings a decade of experience in the video game industry and media. When not working in the world of B2B game journalism, Alissa enjoys spending her time in the worlds of immersive sandbox games or dabbling in the occasional TTRPG.

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