The makers of the Fortnite online multiplayer game have filed a federal lawsuit against two Dearborn residents, claiming the Michigan men used thousands of fake "bot" accounts to boost their earnings in the game. 

Epic Games of Cary, North Carolina, filed the legal action on Oct. 7 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan against Idris Nahdi and Ayob Nasser. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages, but says "tens of thousands of dollars in unearned payouts" were made to the two Wayne County men before the bot scheme was discovered. 

The legal action seeks judgment on claims of breach of contract and copyright infringement against Nasser, and claims of breach of contract, copyright infringement and fraud in the inducement against Nahdi. 

It also seeks to prohibit the two from creating Epic Games accounts, along with participation in Fortnite or other Epic content. The company said it has already ordered the two to destroy all copies of Fortnite in their possession. 

Over 500 million people have registered player accounts on Fortnite, the company said. As part of that online universe, players are invited to create spinoff games or interactive features called islands. Creators and developers of the islands are eligible to earn money based on the popularity of their designed feature. 

In its lawsuit, Epic Games claims that some developers have "abused the Island Creator Program" in hopes of earning more rewards than they would otherwise get. 

In this instance, the lawsuit claims, Nahdi and Nasser created multiple Fortnite accounts and, under those accounts, added multiple island features. In December 2024, the lawsuit said, activity from about 15,000 bot accounts fed metrics to islands owned by those two that appeared to show popularity. As a result of the initial metrics, they earned payouts. Bot accounts are artificially designed to mimic the activity of a real person, but are not actually an individual's account. 

Since the total payout money per month is limited, the lawsuit claims, any money earned under artificial manipulation takes away from what is available "to legitimate Fortnite developers." 

Payments were made to both for the December 2024 participation, Epic Games said, but company officials later became suspicious and conducted an investigation. 

"In some cases, over 99% of the engagement on Defendants' Islands was artificial," the lawsuit claims. 

The company held back payments that might have otherwise been made for January 2025 and February 2025, but said it "has been unable to recover the significant payments made to Defendants from their artificial engagement in December 2024."