$30 million is a lot of money. If you’re a professional Fortnite player competing in the game’s World Cup, the promise of all that cash can be awfully tempting. One Fortnite pro has already succumbed to that temptation, as he tried to use cheating software to give himself an advantage. Unfortunately for the cheater, he was caught – and in a bizarre turn of events, it was the cheat maker himself who turned the pro in.
Johnathan Kosmala is the now-former Fortnite professional player in question, and was representing Team Kaliber during the first week of qualifiers for the Fortnite World Cup in July. He was caught cheating during those games – but only after the maker of the cheat himself, known as CBV, snitched on him.
According to CBV (via Polygon), while he obviously doesn’t have any problems with Fortnite players using his software generally – or as he puts in, to “have fun, looking for a stream, stomp pubs” – he draws the line at anyone cheating “to win money and scam other players who are playing legitimately”.
Kosmala has now been dropped by Team Kaliber, and presumably will not be allowed to compete further in the Fortnite World Cup qualifiers. Kaliber posted an official statement on the team’s Twitter feed, which you can see below.
We have released Johnathan Kosmala from our Fortnite team.
We are shocked to learn that he was cheating during the World Cup Qualifiers.
This violation is serious and we have ended our relationship with him. We apologize to our supporters for his lapse in judgement.
— Team Kaliber (@TeamKaliber) April 14, 2019
Apparently CBV worked with YouTube user The Fortnite Guy to expose Kosmala, known in the game as JonnyK. The two videos detail the entire process of how Kosmala bought, set up, used, and eventually got banned for using Fortnite cheats during the qualifiers.
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Polygon also reached out to Epic, who also released a statement on the events. “The integrity of Fortnite competition is important to us,” a spokesperson said. “We actively monitor all official competitions across a wide range of metrics and all winners are subjected to additional monitoring for various forms of cheating, with thorough investigations taking place for any World Cup Qualifying players. We’ll be releasing a game integrity blog later this week detailing our ongoing and future efforts.”
Let this be a lesson to everyone: if you’re going to cheat in Fortnite, don’t do it in a $30 million event. The cheat makers still have some morals too, you know.