Summary
Steamusers have been receiving surprising notifications from Steam where they’ve been informed of permanent bans from certain games that they haven’t played for quite some time. The notifications appeared out of the blue, asSteamplayers are sharing their messages online to help spread awareness of the issue.
Updates for the Steam clientdo happen on a somewhat regular basis, with the most recent big update dropping this past June. Visual and usability improvements were administered throughout the Desktop experience Steam, complete with adjustments to the in-game overlay, giving the client an updated look. Moreover, one of the other changes involved the client’s notifications, which allowed users to see which messages they could see.
As reported by several Reddit users online, the Steam client has been sending its users permanent ban notifications for specific games. Namely, the reported bans involve games that the players haven’t picked up for years, adding an element of confusion to the mix as to what caused the messages to appear. One such report comes from Reddit user ItzMatt415, who shared a message from Steam that read, “You’ve been permanently banned in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2009) - Multiplayer by Valve Anit-Cheat.” The post’s caption mentions that ItzMatt415 received the message nearly 14 years after last playing theCall of Dutygame on Steam.
ItzMatt415 confirmed that the notification came years too late. He noted, “i was banned back then, this is just a weird notification,” as a response to a user’s comment about the massive time jump. In short, it’s a ban that happened years ago. The confusion and mystery revolves around the notification’s appearance, regardless of the player’scheating habits on Valve’s Steam platform.
As it might turn out, a recent Steam maintenance may be the cause of the notifications. SteamDB noted the issue on their Twitter account in a tweet where they shared a similar message. While there are moments whereSteam has been a problem for usersin recent memory, the ban messages are new to the mix.
While it may have been a few months since the last major Steam client update, problems such as the one in question could be fixed with a smaller patch. The latest small update was administered on June 29, 2025, with a few fixes. If users continue to share and report the notifications, the problem could quickly become a worry of the past.
