Fortnite’s popularity has grown immensely over the past few years. The BR game has over 350 million global players, and there’s no stopping it. A new season is launched every two or three months which comes with its own skins, emotes, weapon cosmetics, and more. Players spend a lot of money on these items, which essentially means a lot of money for Epic. However, there is also an industry that has grown in the shadows and lives off hacked Fortnite accounts.

A hacked account is a common sight in the gaming industry. What’s shocking is that these hackers have siphoned off millions from the sale of these accounts.. According to a report by Night Lion Security, hackers can make as much as $40,000 per week! When added up, this amounts to half a million dollars a year simply through the sale of hacked accounts.

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The underground Fortnite market is organized

This underground industry works like any big ‘legal’ organization and has proper processes in place to ensure smooth delivery to the buyer. Accounts are categorized based on their value. If an account has a lot of rare skins and emotes, it is now a high-value target for hackers.

There are multiple options one can choose from while purchasing hacked accounts. Take a look at the following to understand the extent of this entire system.

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There is a judicial system in place, too

To take things a step further, hackers offer after-sales services, too. According to the report, “The Fortnite community maintains its own judicial system known as “CC”, or “Community Checkup”. This process is handled over the Telegram channel RealCommunityCheckup, which is also owned and operated by MrTayota. The purpose of CC is to keep track of scammers, sellers, buyers who are breaking the community bylaws.”

Over two billion breached accounts have gone up for sale so far, and from the looks of it, there’s no stopping this system. The profits mentioned in the above infographic are just with respect to Fortnite. Roblox, Runescape, and Minecraft sales are even more profitable with at least 33% extra earnings. Taking all the games into consideration, this is easily a billion-dollar industry.

This is an alarming statistic to come across considering game companies spend millions on security. The fact that this industry has managed to grow despite the security measures in place, clearly shows that these measures aren’t enough. The hackers are not going to stop anytime soon so it is up to the developers to ensure the security of user accounts. It’ll be interesting to see if any action is taken to stop this underground industry, with all the knowledge that has now come to light.