Respawn Entertainment’s anti-cheat team banned 905 accounts on 4 November 2026 for abusing a bug that let players enter Ranked matches as Rookie IV regardless of their actual rank, the team said in a post titled “An Update from the Anti-Cheat Team” on the Apex Legends Steam store page. The bans came with a combined deduction of 15,112,554 RP, and suspension lengths ranged from 120 to 365 days depending on how much RP each account had accumulated through the exploit.
How the Exploit Worked
The bug allowed players to appear in Ranked matchmaking as Rookie IV no matter their true rank. Once in a Rookie IV lobby, exploiters paid no Ranked entry cost, received Rookie-tier kill bonuses, and had their matchmaking rating recorded as 0. Despite all of that, the RP they earned still accumulated onto their real Ranked score. The net effect was a free RP farm: no entry fee, inflated kill bonuses, and zero MMR consequence, with every point banked to the account that mattered.
The anti-cheat team stated the exploit worked “primarily on PlayStation 5,” and the platform breakdown confirms that overwhelmingly. Of the banned accounts, 848 were on PlayStation, 44 on Xbox, 12 on PC, and 2 on Nintendo Switch 2. Those figures sum to 906, one more than the stated total of 905; the post does not explain the discrepancy.
Ban Tiers and RP Deductions
Suspensions were scaled by the amount of RP an account gained through the exploit, creating three tiers:
- 731 accounts received 120-day bans for gaining up to 4,999 RP.
- 107 accounts received 240-day bans for gaining between 5,000 and 9,999 RP.
- 67 accounts received 365-day bans for gaining 10,000 RP or more.
The total RP removed across all affected accounts was 15,112,554. For context, that is roughly 16,700 RP per account on average, though the distribution was clearly skewed toward the lower tier given that 731 of the 905 accounts fell below the 5,000 RP threshold.
The tiered approach means Respawn treated this less like a blanket zero-tolerance ban wave and more like a graded penalty system. A player who triggered the exploit once or twice and walked away with a few hundred RP got four months; someone who farmed five figures got a full year. Whether that calibration satisfies players who queued against exploiters in Rookie lobbies is another question.
Unintentional Encounters Were Not Penalised
Respawn acknowledged that the bug could be triggered accidentally. The team’s post included this statement:
"We recognize that some players may have encountered this issue unintentionally. Through our investigation, we were able to precisely identify cases of unintended interaction and distinguish them from deliberate abuse. Those accounts were not actioned."
That distinction matters for anyone who saw a suspicious rank drop or an odd lobby composition during the affected period and worried about collateral enforcement. The team claims to have separated deliberate farming from accidental triggers, and only the former received bans.
This is not the first time Respawn has had to address integrity issues in Ranked. The studio’s Javelin anti-cheat system, which launched earlier in the year, focused on blocking external cheat software at the client level. This action targets a different category of problem: a game-state bug that players exploited rather than third-party tools. The enforcement mechanism here was retrospective account review rather than real-time detection.
What This Means for Players
If you played Ranked during the period this exploit was active, a few practical takeaways:
- If you were banned: The suspension length reflects the RP gained. There is no appeal process mentioned in the post. Accounts with 120-day bans will be reinstated with their RP already deducted.
- If you encountered suspicious Rookie IV players: Some of those lobbies were exploiters. Their RP has been removed, but any matches you lost to them are not being reversed or compensated.
- If you accidentally triggered the bug: Respawn says it identified and excluded unintentional cases. If your account was not actioned, no further steps are needed.
- If you are grinding Ranked now: The exploit has been patched. The Rookie IV lobbies should no longer contain high-rank players farming kill bonuses. If you still see suspicious behaviour, the standard in-game report function remains the channel.
The broader implication for Ranked integrity is that Respawn is willing to issue long suspensions for bug exploitation, not just for traditional cheating. A 365-day ban for farming 10,000 RP is functionally a season-ending penalty. Whether that deterrent holds depends on how quickly similar bugs are patched in future seasons.