'Pokemon GO' Ban: Niantic Hunting Down Jailbroken And Rooted Devices [VIDEO]

If there's anything that Niantic has been very serious about, it is terminating cheaters of any form in its hit mobile augmented reality game, Pokemon GO. With its most recent update, the developer of the world's most downloaded game has set its eyes on another target demographic - users who use jailbroken or rooted devices.

Niantic Discontinues Support

The Pokemon GO developer has released version 0.37.0 for Android and 1.7.0 for iOS devices, and while this update does fix a number of bugs and more importantly, introduces the Buddy System to the game, the latest update also effectively kills support for rooted and jailbroken devices.

This means that if users happened to have rooted their Android phones for any reason unconnected to the game, the possibility of their Pokemon GO accounts being locked becomes very plausible.

Niantic Explains the New Ban

According to Niantic, the reasons behind the discontinuance of support for jailbroken and rooted devices are simple. Modified devices are usually used by players who utilize bots and scrapers in the game. Thus, by removing support for jailbroken and rooted devices, Niantic would be able to remove a significant number of cheaters from the game.

"We continue to focus on eliminating bots and scrapers from Pokémon GO. Rooted or jailbroken devices are not supported by Pokémon GO. Remember to download Pokémon GO from the official Google Play Store or iTunes App Store only," the developer stated.

Pokemon GO Players Disappointed

Unsurprisingly, the reception to the update from the players of Pokemon GO has been very cold, with many lamenting that the removal of support for jailbroken and rooted devices is nothing short of being unfair. In a lot of ways, the players do have a very good point.

After all, while cheating apps usually require jailbroken or rooted devices, not all Pokemon GO players who use a jailbroken or rooted device cheat. There are some who modified their smartphones for reasons completely independent of Pokemon GO.