The European ESL Head Admin Manuel "Pesticide" Hoedemakers has defended Aequitas saying that the accusations of it not working properly are far fetched. The accusations were made by Virtus.Pro captain, Alexey "LeX" Kolesnikov who said, "I think it is someone's desire to harm the Russian skills and by using sneaky tricks, some people hacked Viktor's Aequitas file."

According to Hoedemakers' statement, Aequitas is completley secure and said, "There is no way to hack Aequitas data. It is directly uploaded from the player's PC to the ESL servers. No one can alter Aequitas files." He continues to defend the program and the way that the data is stored.

"All data is kept safe and secure on file servers in one of the largest and best dedicated hosting facilities in Europe."

It appears that the ESL are still deliberating over Viktor "Sally" Filimonchenko's ban and access to the rehabilitation program. We will of course keep you upto date on the situation.

Manuel "Pesticide" Hoedemakers Statement: Regarding the cheating incident involving ViktorF aka Sally from Virtus.pro some things need to be clearly stated. ESL Aequitas is an anti cheat tool detecting cheats and system modifications. Besides creating a file containing data like config settings that the player has to upload after a match, Aequitas also communicates directly with ESL servers during games. Every player using the program has to agree to that via the terms of use. In its 18 month history we caught several hundred cheaters thanks to Aequitas. Its results and effectivity are beyond question. Our cheating decisions are based on hard facts. ViktorF used an Aequitas blocker with built-in wallhack during a cup match of the European section of ESL. This hack was said to be Aequitas-proof, but with recently implemented detections, gathering data over the last weeks no doubt remains about ViktorF's guilt. Besides the Virtus.pro player we caught 58 cheaters, mainly German players, all using a certain variety of Counter-Strike cheats. There is no way to hack Aequitas data. It is directly uploaded from the player's PC to the ESL servers. No one can alter Aequitas files. All data is kept safe and secure on file servers in one of the largest and best dedicated hosting facilities in Europe. Accusing ESL of running a campaign against Russian players is absolutely illogical. We have seen Virtus.pro compete exceptionally well on a number of offline tournaments and respect its performances and team spirit. Banning a reknowned player or team from one of our pro leagues is certainly no action any of us enjoys. It diminishes the importance and attractiveness of our tournaments. On the other hand, our rules about cheating are strict. We can and will not tolerate cheating and move against any perpetrator with all due force, regardless of his previous merits to the eSports community. Enforcing strict cheating rules is of utmost importance to anyone involved with eSports. Just look at what doping does to certain kinds of sports right now. ViktorF made a grave mistake. He should have heeded the warning that in the long run Aequitas will detect any cheat available, whether it is claimed to be Aequitas-proof or not. There is no discussion whatsoever about the fact, that he used this cheat in an ESL match and no statement can reverse this fact. This reality may be unpopular, but it is the only way to handle cheating incidents like this.