Infinity Ward wields MW2 Steam-powered banhammer

Infinity Ward and Steam have completed the first wave of bans for players using cheats for the PC version of Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 claims Infinity Ward's Rob Bowling, with 2500 accounts now blocked from connecting to the game's multiplayer service. Posting on Twitter, Bowling claimed "the Steam ban hammer is coming down" and it certainly doesn't look like it was an an empty threat - we've found plenty of accounts now serving Modern Warfare 2 bans.

This is the first public statement regarding cheating in Modern Warfare 2 from Infinity Ward since the game's release and its controversial switch away from dedicated servers. New anti-cheat abilities were touted as a major benefit for the game with the move from Punkbuster to Valve's inhouse anti-cheat system VAC, promising a hack free experience for gamers.

It's likely more hackers will face the wrath of Steam's banhammer before long, although this will come as little consolation to those who've had their games ruined by cheaters, especially as VAC's automated banning procedure is typically slower than manual methods - it's taken over two weeks for this first round of bans to emerge, for instance.

Infinity Ward and Steam have also been working to make things difficult for those trying to get online with pirated copies of the game, releasing regular small updates to the game's executable via Steam that invalidate pirated copies from the IWnet matchmaking service.

Have you experienced cheating in Modern Warfare 2? Think VAC is too sluggish to be an effective anti-cheat? Tell us your thoughts in the forums