CNET are reporting that Microsoft have banned some one million plus gamertags from their Xbox Live service, purportedly for modding their console and playing illegally pirated games, in clearly a sting operation designed to thwart piracy (and probably drum up some more console sales given the timing).

The news of the mass bannings comes on the tail-end of the release (and pre-release) of Modern Warfare 2 which had ISOs hitting pirate sites before the game was due to officially launch, prompting many to believe Activision or Infinity Ward likely nudged Microsoft to throw down their almighty wrath.

"Commitment to combat piracy and support safer and more secure gameplay for the more than 20 million members of the Xbox Live community remains a top priority," a Microsoft spokesperson said. "All consumers should know that piracy is illegal and modifying their Xbox 360 console violates the Xbox Live terms of use, will void their warranty and result in a ban from Xbox Live. We can assure you that if an Xbox Live member follows the Xbox Live terms of use, purchased a retail copy of Modern Warfare 2 and played the game on an unmodified Xbox 360, no action will be taken."

It's a pretty hardcore figure, and it's not known if the bans are permanent or if those unlucky enough to have been caught will be allowed to come back to the service at another point.

but i modded my xbox to make backup of games i own and continue to own and havent traded into eb because my 4 year old daughter likes to rub my advanced review copies of games with sandpaper and i can do what i want with hardware ive purchased that's the law

Pfth rubbish you didn't even come up with a couriermail-esque witty topic line

your face is a couriermail-esque witty topic line

Screw it, Ausgamers needs to get on this bandwagon. Lets report that 2 million people have been banned from xbox live. We can then link to the same article that has sod all source.

Change title to "One million console owners realise PC gaming is better."

you know what someone should do...

open another thread about this.... read before posting FFS

discussion thread FYI QGLers there are people who peruse AusGamers news and don't look at the forums

last edited by Steve Farrelly at 16:06:29 12/Nov/09

you know what someone should do...

open another thread about this.... read before posting FFS

Uhm...isn't this a news item?

Well looks like microsoft skipped my console...not that it would matter because my gold subscription just expired and never planning to re-subscribe.

100% support! I wonder how many false positives were banned also, considering this is Microsoft and all...

I generally don't read the forums, just the odd thread. So this news item is the 1st I saw of this.

Well looks like microsoft skipped my console...not that it would matter because my gold subscription just expired and never planning to re-subscribe.

I thought when they banned your account they also banned your Xbox hardware ID? Don't you need you Xbox to get updates from live to play new titles sometimes?

From my experience the new games that need those updates come with them. Would be a bit hard for people who don't have live to play those games if the updates weren't included..

I dunno. When I got GOW2. It wouldn't let me play until I connected to Live and downloaded an update.

No, you dont' need live or patches to play games. Xbox Live won't let you be on live, with an out of date version of a game how ever. So it does force you to update the game, but only if you wish to remain logged into xbox live.