Half-Life 2 developer Valve has announced that it has permanently disabled more then 30,000 player accounts for attempting to use fake registration codes or otherwise attempting to use the game without purchasing it.
To play
Half-Life 2, all users must register and use Valve’s proprietary online delivery system Steam, and it is through this that the fraudsters were identified and banned.
According to a statement from the company, “Valve takes such activities seriously and reserves the right to disable Steam accounts engaging in piracy, cheating, illegal activities, or any other activity in violation of the Steam Subscriber Agreement. The accounts that are disabled today will not be reactivated.”
The company has already
disabled the accounts of 20,000 users for pirating the title, just after
Half-Life 2 was released in November. It's believed that online cheating with a legitimate copy of the game will also lead to online banning from Steam, but in a non-permanent form.
