Is Buying or Selling Fortnite Accounts Illegal? Here’s What You Need To Know

Fortnite is one of the most popular games at the moment, and any type of business revolving around the game can be highly lucrative. The idea behind buying and selling game accounts is nothing new. Ever since gaming embarked into online and multiplayer waters, a whole market was created on the basis of cosmetics, boosting, and various other “grey area” services. It’s not surprising then that Fortnite also has its extensive marketplace focused solely on trading accounts, so if you’re wondering whether you should cash in your old account or buy a new one, let’s see where the matters stand on the legality of the issue.

Selling Fortnite accounts is illegal and goes against the Terms of Service

Nobody reads the ToS, I’m aware, except if you’re a lawyer or you’re looking for some kind of a loophole, but even if you did not read it, it’s common sense that selling your Fortnite account is illegal. At least when Epic Games is concerned.

The illegality of selling Fortnite accounts primarily stems from the terms of service set by Epic Games, the developer and publisher of Fortnite. These terms explicitly prohibit the transfer or sale of accounts.

Epic Games maintains a strict policy to ensure that player accounts are owned and controlled by the original user who created the account. Allowing the sale of accounts could lead to a loss of control over who has access to the game and its associated content.

But it’s mostly money, like always. The only business that should be making a profit off of Fortnite is Epic Games since they are the ones that developed, created, and licensed the content. Epic Games invests considerable resources in developing and maintaining Fortnite. Prohibiting the sale of accounts helps protect their intellectual property rights by preventing unauthorized transactions and the potential misuse of in-game assets.

Besides, if account trading was to be made legal, it would considerably disrupt the in-game economy, making the real licensed content bought from the official sources worth less, thus returning much less profit to the original publisher.

There’s also the aspect of security to take into account; trading accounts is a shifty business that opens you up to several security risks. Epic Games doesn’t want to deal with and provide support for issues that you’ve created yourself, especially if someone else profited off of it.

To summarize everything, selling Minecraft accounts is illegal because only Epic Games has the license to profit from its products, and they want to maintain control over their own products. If you didn’t buy it from the official marketplace, it’s most likely illegal in the eyes of Epic Games.

Buying Fortnite accounts is also illegal

Just because you didn’t directly profit off of something, it doesn’t make it any less illegal as far as Epic Games is concerned. Besides the obvious reasons that we already clarified above, buying Fortnite accounts is also considered cheating.

The act of buying an account often involves skipping the natural progression and challenges designed by the game developers. This undermines the intended gaming experience, where players are expected to earn and unlock items through their own efforts.

The sale of accounts can create an uneven playing field, disrupting the balance and fairness of the game. Players who buy high-level accounts with rare items gain an advantage over those who progress through the game legitimately, undermining the concept of fair competition.

Risks associated with bought Fortnite accounts

If you’ve already bout a Fortnite account and you’ve just now found out that it is illegal, you should be aware of the following risks.

Your newly bought Fortnite account can be reclaimed by its previous owner anytime. This can happen if the account is stolen or if the seller decides to recover it, leaving the buyer without access to the purchased account.

There’s also the matter of personal information. Buying accounts often involves sharing personal information, including login credentials and payment details, with the seller. This poses a significant security risk, as the seller might misuse or compromise this information.

Plenty of services that offer cheap Fortnite accounts are also scams. There are plenty of fraudulent sellers who may not deliver the promised account or may provide false information about the account’s content.

The most obvious risk comes from Epic Games. Since bought accounts violate the terms of service set by Epic Games, it can lead to the suspension or banning of the account. This can result in the loss of purchased items, progress, and in-game currency.

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