Nintendo Switch Hackers Face Suspension From Gaming Access and Online Services

Nintendo Switch is undeniably a successfully launched portable gaming console. However, like many things in the world, it was not built (and released) perfect. In the previous months, there were several exploitable vulnerabilities found on Switch that were naturally taken advantage of by many gamers.

Despite issuing fixes through firmware updates to stop the use of these exploits, the growth of the homebrew gaming community appears unaffected while the video game company is still finding a way to discourage gamers from hacking their Switch consoles. And one likely effective way to do so is scaring them with a possible ban of their accounts.

The first case of Nintendo Switch ban was reported this week as shared by known Nintendo homebrew community member Shiny Quagsire. Earlier this week, Quagsire shared a photo of a Nintendo Switch screen that reflects the Error Code 2124-4007 which states online services on the device in question “is currently restricted by Nintendo.”

After contacting customer support, the gamer was informed that the error was caused by a ban which cannot be lifted at the time of the agent’s response sent to Quagsire on Monday.

Meanwhile, Quagsire maintained that the Switch pictured in the earlier Twitter post was never hacked. This led reports to believe that Nintendo is imposing bans on user accounts and not the actual hacked Switch console.

This means that if a gamer used his account while executing an exploit at a certain Switch console and gets slapped with a ban, the suspension may still be in effect on other "unhacked" consoles associated with the penalized user account.

Last year, one of the major Switch exploits was discovered on the console's custom Nvidia Tegra chip but the exploit can only be used with firmware 3.0.0. Then, earlier this year, persistent hackers found a couple of similar vulnerabilities — which reports called “unpatchable” — that can let users install homebrew games more effectively.