Content creator Kirill "Cake" Zabrodin has reported encountering inflated viewer numbers among previously unknown streamers. In posts on his personal Telegram channel, Zabrodin said the situation convinced him that some streamers on Twitch are using dishonest means to boost their apparent audience, echoing earlier claims made by fellow creator Ilya "Maddyson" Davydov.
According to Cake, toward the end of 2025 he was approached twice by advertising managers about participating in campaigns. On both occasions, he concluded that the campaigns involved a so-called "nakrutchik" — services or techniques used to artificially pump up viewership. Initially he admitted he was skeptical of Maddyson’s warnings about unreal viewer figures, thinking that Maddyson’s statements might simply attract attention to himself.
Cake said he now accepts that isolated incidents of manipulated metrics can and do occur. He recalled other notable anomalies in streaming history, for example the so‑called "streamhat" incident involving Andrey "Dread" Golubev, when a broadcast reportedly reached more than 50,000 viewers under unusual circumstances.
What surprised Zabrodin most was a recent advertising campaign that included a person whom none of his regular viewers had ever heard of. Cake determined that this individual was likely dishonest based on clear inconsistencies in follower counts, live viewer numbers, and recorded view metrics. He also noted that the streamer’s Telegram channel carried many promotional posts whose views and reactions appeared to be similarly inflated.
Zabrodin raised a broader question: how can someone with a fabricated audience secure so much advertising? He suggested that such streamers must be promoted by others or by networks behind the scenes. He specifically dismissed one rumored promoter — a person he referred to as Diana — saying he had discussed the matter with her and she did not know the streamer in question. Cake warned that there truly are many no‑name streamers who nonetheless receive a flood of advertising and begin to displace legitimate creators in attractive brand campaigns.
Cake added that if there is sufficient interest from his audience, he could present evidence for this particular case. He reiterated that Maddyson’s claims about dishonest streamers appear to have merit and praised Maddyson for being on the mark. This was, he said, the first time he had seen a "nonexistent streamer" included in an advertising buyout.
He did not disclose the streamer’s identity, but offered a striking data point: a channel that had about 60 concurrent viewers suddenly recorded roughly 2,000 new followers in a single day, while Cake himself has about 300,000 followers in total. Zabrodin emphasized that artificial view inflation on Twitch is not a new problem, recalling a past Twitch PUBG event in which organizers reportedly excluded a participant due to suspected fake viewers; some commenters speculated the incident involved a streamer known as off_kuka358.