Bungie Obtains $4.3 Million in Arbitral Proceedings Against Developer of Unauthorized Modifications for Destiny 2
Bungie, the creators of Marathon, Halo, and Destiny, have finally achieved a major legal victory in a lawsuit against a well-known Destiny 2 cheat maker and have been rewarded with $4.3 million. This is a result of their long-standing battle against cheats used to gain high-end rewards in their endgame-tier competitive multiplayer modes.
In the past, some have taken part in Destiny 2 Raid race events to gain fame, but their attempts to cheat have been unsuccessful. Bungie’s reaction to these rumors of cheating has been to declare a war on the cheaters in court.
Destiny Bulletin, a prominent Twitter account devoted to tracking Destiny 2 news, has reported that Bungie was recently awarded a $4.3 million sum following its litigation against AimJunkies, a popular cheat maker. After a complex legal battle, AimJunkies was eventually slapped with a penalty of $3.6 million plus an additional $738K in fees. Bungie was among the first companies to take legal action against AimJunkies and it appears that their effort has finally been rewarded.
At first, the court dismissed Bungie’s case against AimJunkies, as the cheat maker’s attorney asserted that the application was not a violation of copyright or trademark. The lawyer argued that Bungie had no opposing evidence, as the hacks used by players were completely original and did not require any of the official Destiny 2 code to operate.
AimJunkies’ saga unfolded further in the same year when it requested subpoenas from Valve, PayPal, and Google to demonstrate that its cheats had not violated Bungie’s copyright and were instead similar to Valve’s Steam Overlay interface. Ultimately, the judge decided that this argument had no merit and threw out the appeal.
Last year, Don McGowan, Bungie’s General Counsel, explained why the company was taking legal action against cheaters. He stated that Bungie wanted to protect its gaming community by getting rid of any malicious and unfair elements. After sustained litigation, Bungie seems to have achieved this goal with AimJunkies no longer a factor. As a result, Bungie’s legal team is likely to be even more vigilant about this issue.
Destiny 2 is available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Stadia, Xbox One, and the Xbox Series X/S.