‘Pokémon Go’ Ban Wave Happening Now, Shadadowbans Confirmed Temporary

Pokémon Go’s developers at Niantic Labs are banning players again, and this has refueled concerns over its new shadowban policy.Recent tweets indicate if you’ve been shadowbanned, it won’t last forever. But there’s a catch that trainers should know about first.

After weeks of silence surrounding shadowban specifics, a support team representative finally tweeted the details fans had been suspecting. As we’ve covered many times before, the punishment mechanism is triggered by using third-party applications that “may negatively impact your gameplay” or the gameplay of others. It’s what’s said next, however, that’s truly worth knowing. When asked about the punishment duration for any account block, the rep said: “It’s temporary as long as you comply with Pokémon Go Terms Of Service And Trainer Guidelines” by discontinuing use of the application.

Read: Pokémon Go Updates Secretly Change Eggs & Pokémon Rarity

In other words, all shadowbans will be temporary as long as the user starts playing the game fairly as soon as possible. If that doesn’t happen, the results could theoretically be permanent. At this time it’s somewhat difficult to nail down the precise time windows for shadowbans. Generally they seem to last one to two weeks, depending on the severity of the offense.

While questions remain about Niantic’s methods, this news is exceptionally timely, considering another Pokémon Go ban wave is underway. In the past few hours, trainers from around the world have seen their maps grow dark with fewer Pokémon spawns and fewer trainers to interact with. The good news is, if you’ve been caught in the crossfire, your purgatory won’t last forever.

For those who missed the memo, Pokémon Go ’s shadowban policy debuted late last month, and it essentially blocks trainers from catching monsters of any significance. In some circumstances, access to the game’s item store is also blocked. These punishments are generally doled out for using any third-party applications including scanners and IV calculators. Those who’ve been using these so-called bots to find rare or strong Pokémon have been significantly impacted.

Read: Pokémon Go To Get Legendaries & PvP Battles This Summer

Where the shadowban has proved ineffective, however, is in stopping those who leverage GPS spoofing apps to warp their trainer to other parts of the world. Obviously lots of spoofers tend to take advantage of bots to level up their accounts quickly, but the shadowban has done little to stifle progress for those who use spoofers exclusively.

Over the past few months Niantic has been exceptionally aggressive when it comes to stopping cheaters and hackers who gain unfair advantages. Not only have popular Pokémon scanners been shut down, you’re now seeing this targeted, and apparently regular, assault on individual accounts too. Given the developer aims to introduce new features like legendary Pokémon and PvP battles in the next few months, it seems the intent is to clear out all remaining riffraff totally beforehand.

Pokémon Go is available now on Android and iOS.

Are you glad to hear that Pokémon Go shadowbans are temporary? Are you OK with these regular ban waves? Tell us in the comments section!