Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-38035207-20191106162313/@comment-24577221-20191112170046

When the game starts on your device, it connects to the game servers and tells them your game ID. The servers then tell it about the state of the game files, and if there are any changes to the files that the game knows about, it downloads the new versions. The server also updates your device about the state of your game itself: which monsters have coins to collect, which structures have things ready to collect, and so on.

Some people try to hack the game so they can collect things early, or whatever. The servers are programmed to watch for that kind of hacking. Since all of the connections between the game and the server are based on that game ID, it is then easy for BBB to set that game ID to be disabled.

I don't know if BBB bother to look for games that have been hacked to change the monster IDs, to do things like putting the "wrong" monsters on different islands. To try to watch for any hacking would cost them a lot of money, to pay their employees to work, and all that that would do would be to inspire the hackers to work harder. Basically: a "war" between the hackers and the anti-hackers. And some kinds of hacking are essentially harmless, from their point of view. They have to stop anything that would interfere in the servers running smoothly for everyone, and they very much want to stop anything that would steal game resources. (Remember that the game is free, and they get their income from people spending money in-game as well as from advertising.  People who are stealing game resources aren't likely to spend real money.)  Someone who just does something like changing the way a monster looks, or putting a monster on an island where it doesn't officially belong, doesn't do much to hurt BBB's money or reputation.