A trainer in Pokémon GO just wanted to help the game. However, the help backfired and resulted in a ban for the player.
What did the trainer do? A friend of the trainer reported on Reddit that his friend had just reached Level 37. From this level onwards, trainers can access Niantic Wayfarer and submit their own PokéStops.
These are then checked by other trainers and can be approved by Niantic for the game.
The trainer did exactly this to submit his first own PokéStop. The next day, he received an email from Niantic. However, he was not informed that his PokéStop was approved, but that his account would be banned for 7 days.
Not the first case
Why was the trainer banned? In the Reddit post, a screenshot of the email from Niantic was attached. However, there is unfortunately no exact explanation for the ban.
It only states that the PokéStop violates the rules and that the account will be banned from Wayfarer and Pokémon GO for 7 days.
Additionally, the email mentions that further violations of the rules can result in a permanent ban.
Is this the first case of such a ban? No. There have been cases in the past where trainers were banned for submitting PokéStops. In many of these cases, multiple PokéStops were submitted by the trainers.
So the number of PokéStops could possibly also be a criterion for the temporary ban. In this current case, however, according to the creator of the Reddit post, this is the first PokéStop submitted by the trainer.
What does the community say about this? The trainer s-mores points out in the post on Reddit that there have been networks of bots in the past that automatically submitted PokéStops.
Through these activities, trainers who legitimately submitted a PokéStop coincidentally similar to the automated ones were also banned.
He writes: There have been cases where a network of bots conspired to approve nonsensical stops, and people who submitted similar stops were also temporarily banned. It could be a similar situation unless you submitted about 200 stops at once
What should I pay attention to when submitting PokéStops? If you have already reached Level 37 and want to submit PokéStops, you should first pay attention to the tips in the Help Center of Niantic.
Also, you can check the tips from an expert on applying for PokéStops to get more helpful hints on the topic.
What do you think about this? Have you had similar experiences? Have you submitted any PokéStops so far? Feel free to share your experiences in the comments. If you want to know which events await you in July 2024 in Pokémon GO, we have the right overview for you.
