[h2]Hey Legends, [/h2]We’re sharing today that Linux (and Steam Deck using Linux) will no longer be able to access Apex Legends. Our dev team wanted to provide a bit more context into this and share some of the decision-making process that happened along the way. As mentioned in our prior [url=https://www.ea.com/en-gb/games/apex-legends/news/anti-cheat-update-082124]anti-cheat dev blog[/url], competitive integrity is a top priority for our team and there are many ways in which we’re battling cheaters—this is one to add to the list. We remain committed to more regular updates on topics like this and appreciate your continued reports. Read on to hear from our Anti-Cheat Team. --- [h1]What’s happening? [/h1] In our efforts to combat cheating in Apex, we've identified Linux OS as being a path for a variety of impactful exploits and cheats. As a result, we've decided to block Linux OS access to the game. While this will impact a small number of Apex players, we believe the decision will meaningfully reduce instances of cheating in our game. Linux is used by default on the Steam Deck. There is currently no reliable way for us to differentiate a legitimate Steam Deck from a malicious cheat claiming to be a Steam Deck (via Linux). Decision making process The openness of the Linux operating systems makes it an attractive one for cheaters and cheat developers. Linux cheats are indeed harder to detect and the data shows that they are growing at a rate that requires an outsized level of focus and attention from the team for a relatively small platform. There are also cases in which cheats for the Windows OS get emulated as if it’s on Linux in order to increase the difficulty of detection and prevention. We had to weigh the decision on the number of players who were legitimately playing on Linux/the Steam Deck versus the greater health of the population of players for Apex. While the population of Linux users is small, their impact infected a fair amount of players’ games. This ultimately brought us to our decision today. [h1]Next steps [/h1] To eliminate this cheat vector, we have made the decision to prevent access to the game for Linux users. This means that Apex Legends will be unplayable immediately for those running this operating system. Playing on handhelds, such as the Steam Deck, is still possible if the user opts to install Windows. To clarify, this will not impact users who play Apex via Steam on Windows (or other supported platforms). Thanks for everyone’s continual support and we look forward to sharing future anti-cheat updates! --- This is only a part of our ongoing efforts towards Apex’s anti-cheat. We are continually expanding and refining our detection and banning capabilities globally. Keep an eye out for more news to come in the future. Please continue to report cheaters using the designated tools and channels. Your reports are helpful and matter to us and anti-cheat continues to be a top priority for us. For future updates and the latest info, continue to follow us here or check out the Apex [url=https://trello.com/b/ZVrHV38P/apex-tracker]Tracker Trello[/url] for bugs or concerns we’re investigating.