How do People Cheat in Esports: Updating 20 years of Research

Cheating and doping are not new topics to the landscape of esport. However, the methods and means to carry out these unsportsmanlike activities are ever evolving. This article highlights the evolution of cheating and doping in esports.

In traditional sports there have been many known cases of cheating and doping. These include the well-known doping and corruption scandals such as the Balco Labs[1], the East German doping program[2], the Mitchell (baseball) Report[3], and the Lance Armstrong/US Postal Service (cycling)[4] case studies. Although anti-doping agencies, legal reforms, and frameworks have emerged in response to such cases, cheating persists despite severe professional, reputational and criminal consequences. This sets the stage for examining and reviewing esports, a domain with less established governance but equally high incentives for illicit advantage.

With the context of traditional sports set, the landscape for esports is now facing similar issues. This is fueled by technological advancement, fragmented governance, and a rapidly expanding competitive environment. Seeking information from academic literature revealed only one previous article that ever tried to understand the different means of cheating in video games. This is the work by Yan and Randell[5] on the categorisation of cheating in video games.

Initially their work omitted esports and only focused on video game cheating not cheating in the context of a competitive esports event. This left out many different forms of cheating and doping methodologies.[6] In a recent article Dr. Richardson evaluated decades of new methods to cheat, a wide range of terminologies and phrases, alongside examples in competition by game, tournament and cheat classification to make it easy to follow for readers to accurately understand what these cheats are called and how they operate with real life cases.

Eventually, esports has grown into a high-profile, financially lucrative global industry marked by professional teams, sponsors, broadcast rights, and multimillion-dollar prize pools. The rise of competitive gaming has been accompanied by an equally notable rise in threats to integrity, including gambling issues, toxicity, harassment, governance weaknesses, and health concerns.[7] Among these, cheating whether through software exploits, hardware manipulation, match-fixing, or pharmacological enhancement[8] has emerged as a consistent and significant concern.

What is Cheating?

To define cheating, it is necessary to rely on key philosophical and sports ethics literature. Scholars such as Green,[9] Tamburrini,[10] and Loland,[11] have all attempted to define what cheating is. The definition by Loland is the best at encapsulating this for esports as it is,

“an attempt to gain an advantage by violating the shared interpretation of the basic rules (the ethos) of the parties engaged without being caught and held responsible for it. The goal of the cheater is that the advantage gained is not eliminated or compensated for” [12]

Cheating involves intentionally violating formal rules or the shared ethos of fair play to gain an unfair advantage while avoiding detection. Important for readers to remember, is that not all rule breaking is cheating; actions like trash-talk, gamesmanship, or strategic deception exist on a spectrum of negative behaviour but do not necessarily violate explicit rules. This distinction matters in esports, where communities often debate what counts as cheating, especially around modding, exploits, and single-player shortcuts.

The author discusses how motivations for cheating are varied and often complex as research shows that competitive stress, financial incentives, toxic in-game cultures, loss of personal significance, moral disengagement, and personality traits (such as Machiavellianism or narcissism) all influence cheating behaviour[13].

Studies also show that some players cheat out of frustration, curiosity, or for emotional regulation in single-player contexts. Others cheat because they believe opponents already are a perception that has been observed not only in sports but also in educational and professional environments. Additionally, reflecting on cheating in a broader context, Richardson shows that cheating has a key role and place in some online communities. There are forums online where they promote tutorials that actively teach cheating techniques, sometimes framing them as stepping stones toward cybersecurity or ethical hacking careers.

Cheating in Esports

Notwithstanding, the updated classification of cheating in esports[14] is the latest academic publication and attempt in the field that brings a modern classification to categorising the various ways to cheat in esports. From the original work by Yan and Randell, the initial 15 cheating categories are now devided into 11 categories and 24 sub-categories, supported by 44 distinct terms used in the literature and esports reporting.

This classification system is accompanied by real-world examples, cases, and documented sanction outcomes from 2007–2024. Overall, the dataset includes 99 identified individuals punished for cheating and 14 unnamed cases, spanning 18 esports titles and 28 major tournaments. However, this is not meant to be a complete database of every cheating instance ever recorded in esports. This is supposed to highlight, report and help to define and categorise all the currently known ways to cheat, dope and or hack across these games.

The categories include:

1. Player Trust and Morals, such as map hacks, packet sniffing, and rate analysis cheats, which allow players to view opponent locations or intercept network data.
   
   
2. Collusion, including throwing matches, kill-feeding, teaming, match-fixing, and spot-fixing—often tied to gambling or tournament manipulation.
   
   
3. Masking, including AI-driven cheating tools (e.g., the “Nexto” bot in Rocket League) and VPN-based location masking.
   
   
4. Software Modifications, ranging from wallhacks and ESP overlays to movement hacks, spin-botting, and speedrun cheating.
   
   
5. Server Attacks, such as DDoS attacks, geo-filtering, and server compromise.
   
   
6. Timing Manipulation, such as stream-sniping, ghosting, and look-ahead exploits.
   
   
7. Verification Exploits, including impersonation (spoofing), gender doping, and the use of ringers—where another player secretly competes under someone else’s identity.
   
   
8. Bug Exploitation, such as radar glitches, jump hacks, and map glitches—several of which have occurred in high-profile tournaments.
   
   
9. Performance-Enhancing Drugs, including stimulants like Adderall and, in e-cycling, anabolic steroids.
   
   
10. Equipment Modifications, such as aimbots, triggerbots, macros, unauthorized hardware, and external devices used to bypass anti-cheat systems.
    
    
11. Purchasing Cheats, ranging from buying cheat software to paying others to play on one’s behalf.
    
    

Wider Implications for the Esports Landscape

The author stresses that esports governance is fragmented and inconsistent, largely because esports titles are privately owned intellectual properties. In contrast with traditional sports, where rules and governance are shared and international federations operate across the sport, esports publishers control not only gameplay but also event organisation, participant eligibility, and integrity standards. This leads to inconsistent enforcement across games and regions. For example, the Esports Integrity Commission (ESIC) is a major regulator but does not cover esports giants like Riot Games’ League of Legends, leaving major gaps in oversight.

For matters concerning cheating and or doping to be addressed effectively, regulatory bodies such as the ESIC need to work with game producers, events organisers, national and international federations to codify a set of rules that all parities sign up to and uphold. That way, everyone is in agreement and plays by the same rules and punishments which are enforceable by all parties at all levels of esports. This will not only help to clean up the sport and dissuade those who are wanting to subvert the rules. More importantly it will help professionalise the sport and help improve the image of esports and those specific esports titles where cheating and doping have become associated with.

The author argues that this decentralised governance structure of esports creates a permissive environment for cheating to flourish. Wider esport research conducting player surveys show widespread confusion about which organisations govern esports and who enforces sanctions. Many esports athletes are unaware that governing bodies exist at all.

Research suggests strong support among players for a single global governing body, which could unify standards and sanctions across titles similar to frameworks in traditional sport but need to be bespoke to esport communities, systems, cultures and the games themselves. As da Silva Candeo et al.[15] reported governance frameworks are lacking in esports but taking on a traditional sports model will not solve these issues, esports needs to create their own models that work for them.

The author also highlights the emerging integrity threats, including boosted accounts, paid cheating services, financial fraud, illegal gambling corruption, and politically motivated cyberattacks, all of which may target esports ecosystems as they grow in cultural and economic importance. Finally, the author stresses the urgent need for unified, consistent governance.[16]

Without strong, coordinated action by publishers, federations, anti-cheat developers, and tournament organisers, esports risks losing credibility among fans, sponsors, and media partners. Harsh and consistent sanctions including permanent bans, fines, and potentially criminal penalties are necessary to deter cheating and protect the long-term integrity of the industry. As esports moves toward greater global recognition such as the growing potential for future Olympic involvement — the stakes for clean competition are higher than ever.

Disclaimer

This article is a shortened version of the most comprehensive and updated classification of cheating in esports to date by Dr Andrew Richardson at Newcastle University. Published in the International Journal of Esports, the work addresses a major gap in the current academic and industry literature.

[1] Athey, N. C., & Bouchard, M. (2016). The BALCO scandal: the social structure of a steroid distribution network. In Advances in Research on Illicit Networks (pp. 98-119). Routledge.

[2] Dimeo, P., Hunt, T. M., & Horbury, R. (2011). The individual and the state: A social historical analysis of the East German ‘doping system’. Sport in History, 31(2), 218-237.

[3] Mitchell, G. J. (2007). Report to the commissioner of baseball of an independent investigation into the illegal use of steroids and other performance enhancing substances by players in major league baseball (Vol. 13). New York: Office of the Commissioner of Baseball.

[4] Dimeo, P. (2014). Why Lance Armstrong? Historical context and key turning points in the ‘cleaning up’of professional cycling. The International Journal of the History of Sport, 31(8), 951-968.

[5] Yan, J., & Randell, B. (2005, October). A systematic classification of cheating in online games. In Proceedings of 4th ACM SIGCOMM workshop on Network and system support for games (pp. 1-9).

[6] Richardson, A. (2025). An Updated Classification of Cheating in Esports. International Journal of Esports, 1(1).

[7] Richardson, A., Tjønndal, A., Demetrovics, Z., & Bates, G. (2024). Issues and Threats to the Integrity of Esports. Performance Enhancement & Health, 12(3), 100297.

[8] Richardson, A. (2024). Entering Cheat Codes or to Play True: Where is Anti-Doping going within Esports?. International Journal of Esports, 3(3).

[9] Green, S.P., 2006. Lying, cheating, and stealing: A moral theory of white-collar crime. Oxford University Press. p. 57.

[10] Tamburrini, C.M., 2001. The’Hand of God’. Essays in the Philosophy of Sports. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 4(3). pp. 13-14.

[11] Loland, S., 2013. Fair play in sport: A moral norm system. Routledge. Page 96

[12] Idem.

[13] Chirico, A., Lucidi, F., Pica, G., Di Santo, D., Galli, F., Alivernini, F., Mallia, L., Zelli, A., Kruglanski, A.W. and Pierro, A., 2021. The motivational underpinnings of intentions to use doping in sport: a sample of young non-professional athletes. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(10), p.5411; Sipavičiūtė, B. and Šukys, S., 2019. Understanding factors related with cheating in sport: What we know and what is worth future consideration. Baltic Journal of Sport and Health Sciences, 4(115); Kavussanu, M., 2019. Toward an understanding of transgressive behavior in sport: Progress and prospects. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 42, pp.33-39.

[14] Richardson, A. (2025). An Updated Classification of Cheating in Esports. International Journal of Esports, 1(1).

[15] da Silva Candeo, A. L., Haller, N., Richardson, A., Preuss, H., Souvignet, T., Könecke, T., & Schubert, M. (2025). Governance and integrity challenges in esports: A scoping review. Performance Enhancement & Health, 13(4), 100352.

[16] da Silva Candeo, A. L., Haller, N., Richardson, A., Preuss, H., Souvignet, T., Könecke, T., & Schubert, M. (2025). Governance and integrity challenges in esports: A scoping review. Performance Enhancement & Health, 13(4), 100352.