Rainbow Six cheater Yannox, main suspect of Ubisoft Montreal hostage threat

In November 2020, news emerged of a hostage situation at the Ubisoft Montreal offices in Canada. It would up being an elaborate hoax but one which left the company and its employees with economic and psychological damages.

After the events, an investigation was undertaken by the Montreal authorities to discover the person, or persons, behind the event and the first details have begun coming out of that case, with recent reports pointing the finger at Yanni “Yannox” Ouahioune.

(Picture: Reuters)

Yannox is an infamous name within the Rainbow Six Siege community, known for his toxic and unsportsmanlike attitude having had over 80 in-game suspensions and bans for cheating by Ubisoft's ethics committee.

Likewise, Yannox has also been responsible for several swatting cases in 2017 and has even tried to steal the passwords of other players by creating fake websites, so it would not be the first time he is in trouble with Ubisoft or dealing with legal implications.

Through the Canadian outlet Le Presse, Yannox denied he had anything to do with the Montreal hostage situation.

“I didn't do anything. I just cheated in their video games," said Yannox. "The only time I called Ubisoft was to insult them for banning me. Normally, just for the buzz, I would have said I sent the police to Ubisoft, but hey, now the buzz sucks. If my name came up, it's because I'm famous at Ubisoft."

According to a report seen by La Presse, the incident cost Ubisoft CAD$1.7 million in lost productivity, plus CAD$15,000 in psychological support services and CAD$40,000 in property damage, due to the stoppage at its workforce and the response by the SPVM Tactical Response Group.

(Picture: Rex Features)

The suspect has mentioned he stopped his malicious activity a long time ago because his name and family had already been tainted by his past actions: “I do not even have a PC anymore. I just have an old phone and I stopped all my bad activities. I don't want my mother to be disappointed anymore,”.

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Ubisoft has declined to comment for fear of interfering with the ongoing police investigation, however by the words of its VP of Communications Cedric Orvoine, “their priority remains to protect the conduct of this, hoping they will identify and convict those responsible for last fall's events."