Eventually every game gets to a point where the company just stops caring about it and lets people cheat. (Starcraft and warcraft with the map hacks, diablo with god knows how many different cheats, UO now as well). EA just leaves the servers up so they can continue collecting everybody's 13 bucks a month and ride it out until they figure it isn't worth keeping the game around anymore. GM's no longer respond to anyone with problems, you get a reference to a website no matter what the issue is.
The fact is... they don't give half a crap about UO anymore, it's 11 years old and they would rather put their resources into newer games that have a bigger player base such as Warhammer. People cheat now, EA doesn't care, they sure as hell aren't going to spend time banning the 75% of UO players that cheat as that would kill the game on the spot. Adapt or quit... or cry I guess.