Twitch CEO Dan Clancy speaks out on making changes to site's viewbotting system

Twitch has been making headlines for concerning artificially increased viewcounts. CEO Dan Clancy responded to the significant challenge and shared updates while acknowledging the issue for many streamers. 

To stand against the fake numbers, the platform is in the process of making notable changes to its bot detection systems, according to a report by Game Rant. Clancy recently addressed the challenge of staying ahead in a "cat and mouse game" against constantly evolving bot services.

The method of artificially surging viewership is not a new occurrence. Interestingly, it has been in the news for a while now. As Dexerto reported, news on this strange practice is gaining a lot of attention online presently. 

Amid several remarks and reactions on viewbotting, the Twitch platform and its CEO released statements to reflect on the issue and speak about making changes to understand the viewbots flooding online.

Twitch & Dan Clancy reacted to viewbotting reports

In the simplest terms, viewbotting is the process of artificially inflating viewer counts of a live stream or any video with the help of automated scripts or bots. This much-talked-about deceiving procedure is often followed by creators to mirror a fake picture of engagement and popularity.

The platform announced taking action to combat the issues right after renowned streamer 'shroud' spoke about using bots in one of his recent broadcasts. Apart from suggesting others to follow viewbotting, he also claimed that Twitch does not take any steps about it. Amid the surprising revelation, the platform set things straight by sharing "a quick update on viewcounts."

On July 28, Twitch Support confirmed,

"We have teams and tech dedicated to ensuring that the views that show up on channels reflect actual viewership, and aren’t artificially inflated in any way. Ultimately, metrics on Twitch should represent the real and growing communities that show up and participate on channels, so we regularly update detection tools and methods."

A quick update on viewcounts. We have teams and tech dedicated to ensuring that the views that show up on channels reflect actual viewership, and aren’t artificially inflated in any way. Ultimately, metrics on Twitch should represent the real and growing communities that show up… pic.twitter.com/Pr6XaoSCfP

— Twitch Support (@TwitchSupport) July 28, 2025

Detailing some recently conducted steps that "meaningfully improved" the platform's "ability to identify viewbots, inauthentic viewership, and other potentially fake engagement," the support team reiterated,

"These changes will roll out over the next few weeks."

Leaving a message for streamers who used viewbotting to raise their view counts, the platform also explained,

"So, if your channel was viewbotted, or if some of your viewers are artificial or inflated, you will see an impact to your channel’s viewcount. This also means that third party sites that publish unverified Twitch viewcounts are going to see changes to that data over time. We recognize that viewbotting can be out of the streamer’s control. In making these changes, our goal is to improve the experiences for both streamers and viewers."

Twitch CEO Dan Clancy re-tweeted the official statement and shared further information about the changes to identify bots. Announcing the newer steps conducted behind the scenes for a transparent ecosystem on the platform, he noted,

"As highlighted in this recent Twitch Support tweet, we just updated some of the code that we use to detect and eliminate viewbots.  I wanted to quickly follow up on a few key points regarding the recent update to our viewbot detection."

Calling the process of detecting bots and eliminating them without affecting real viewers "tricky," he pointed out,

"First, I want to be very clear that we always try to detect and eliminate viewbots. However, doing this in a manner that does not eliminate real viewers can be tricky."

Acknowledging the frustration of many streamers, Clancy assured that the Twitch team took enough time to ensure that they were not "inadvertently filtering out real users." Listing his comments on viewbotting and how users have been using it to present fake numbers, he next emphasized that "bots come in all shapes and sizes."

As highlighted in this recent Twitch Support tweet, we just updated some of the code that we use to detect and eliminate viewbots. I wanted to quickly follow up on a few key points regarding the recent update to our viewbot detection.

First, I want to be very clear that we… https://t.co/wKZllhYf1h

— Daniel Clancy (@djclancy999) July 28, 2025

Dan later approached the matter, sharing different instances. Based on his views, streamers might be "actively working with third parties to inflate their numbers" at times. On the other hand, "the bots may be used to harass streamers" at other times. Reacting to both situations, he clarified,

"We don’t want either type, because Average Concurrent Viewers (ACCV) is intended to be a measure of the people that are watching the streamer at any given point in time."

Calling the procedure for detecting fake view counts and viewbots "a cat and mouse game," he concluded his post, expressing,

"As is always the case, detecting viewbots is a bit of a cat and mouse game as third parties work to avoid our detection.  We will continue monitoring and make updates over time to improve our viewbot detection system."

Last year, Kick also shared its two cents on viewbotting. Discussing how the streaming platform was navigating the obstacle, its official page posted on X,

"Viewbotting unfortunately is an issue that all streaming platforms face. We’re actively learning how to best navigate with such roadblocks by tweaking KCIP.  Doing our best with the tools we currently have. Trust me it makes our jobs harder too 💚"

Follow Primetimer for more such updates.