- Epic Games has enabled new security requirements for Fortnite players who want to participate in tournaments.
- The new security measures include Secure Boot, TPM 2.0, and IOMMU.
- These security measures are compatible with most modern Windows 11-compatible systems.
It is no secret that Fortnite is an extremely competitive game, with Epic Games organizing regular tournaments, cash cups, and much more for players who want to prove that they’re the best. With such a competitive environment comes a high skill ceiling, and many players grind endlessly to reach a certain level of competitive play. However, some players end up using hacks and cheats to give themselves an advantage.
Shortly after the release of the Fortnite 39.40 update, Epic Games announced new security measures that players must complete in order to participate in any Fortnite competitive tournaments.
Epic Games Mandates Secure Boot and TPM for Fortnite Competitive
The new changes were introduced after Epic had to deal with a list of Fortnite hackers and cheaters in 2025. While Epic took legal action and won against these cheaters, the developers are looking to prevent these events from happening in the future.
According to the blog post released by Epic, starting February 19, 2026, players who want to compete in any sanctioned competitive event and climb the Fortnite ranks must have these three features enabled on their hardware:
- Secure Boot: Makes sure that the PC boots using only software trusted by the manufacturer.
- TPM (Trusted Platform Module) 2.0: Provides a safe and secure foundation to maintain platform integrity.
- IOMMU (Input-Output Memory Management Unit): Restricts external hardware from accessing the game’s memory.
Epic has made these changes to protect Fortnite’s memory from unauthorized access by players. While kernel-level anti-cheats like Easy Anti-Cheat are effective, Fortnite has seen an increase in advanced DMA (Direct Memory Access) cheats lately. DMA cheats allow hackers and cheaters to use external hardware and read game data without being detected by traditional anti-cheat.
By needing an IOMMU for gameplay, players’ operating systems can act as a hardware-level firewall and strictly control how external devices interact with the system’s RAM. To put it simply, IOMMU will prevent any hackers from using external hardware to modify their gameplay.
While the requirements listed in this article are standard for most PCs that are compatible with Windows 11, it is possible that some of these changes could sideline players on older hardware. However, these changes are extremely important, especially since many Fortnite tournaments, like the FNCS Global Championship, have prize money attached to them.
What do you think about Epic’s new security measures against cheaters in the Fortnite competitive space? Were these changes needed? Tell us in the comments below!
