In January 2020, Ubisoft filed a lawsuit against the operators of SNG.one, a website that allegedly offered to provide DDoS attacks against online games including Rainbow Six Siege. In a default judgment rendered earlier this month, the US District Court for the Central District of California found in Ubisoft's favor and awarded it more than $153,000.
Prior to the lawsuit, the SNG.one website advertised itself as a service for testing firewalls against attack. But Ubisoft alleged that its operators also offered services through other websites, including r6s.support, which specifically targeted Rainbow Six Siege for DDoS attacks. It also claimed when the lawsuit was filed, the defendants "hastily sought to conceal evidence concerning their involvement," including by posting a fake notice on one of their websites claiming that the domain had been seized by Microsoft and Ubisoft.
Now the seizure is real. Ubisoft filed for a default judgment in February after the defendants failed to respond to the suit, according to a Dot Esports report, and earlier this month that request was granted: For their troubles, Benjamin Ruesnik, Dennis Kruk, and Roland-Daniel Soos were ordered to pay a total of $153,094.04 to Ubisoft.
As an interesting side note, nearly all of that amount will go to the lawyers:
- $5,280 in investigative costs
- $4,352.04 in other costs
- $143,460 in attorneys' fees
The defendants were also ordered to shut down the DDoS services and websites they were operating (sng.one, r6.support, r6s.support, stressed-stresser-stressingstressers.com, and r6ddos.com, all of which are currently offline) and to transfer control of any relevant domain names to Ubisoft. They are also now legally forbidden from messing with people trying to play Rainbow Six Siege, including by "impairing the integrity, availability, or condition of the R6S servers and networks."
The incidence and impact of DDoS attacks on Rainbow Six Siege has improved considerably over the past couple of years, but it remains an ongoing concern. In its most recent "Top Issues and Community Concerns" update, Ubisoft said that it "will continue to look for methods of continued improvement as we seek to protect players from DDoS attacks," particularly on consoles.
