Valorant's First Ban Wave Eliminates Over 8,000 Cheaters

While Valorant is still in closed beta, Riot is cracking down hard on cheaters already. Exactly 8,873 cheaters have been struck by the ban hammer from Riot in a first wave of bans.

The news came from Phillip Koskinas, one of the designers of the anticheat pipelines for Valorant. While we don’t know how many players are currently in the closed beta, 8,873 may just be a drop in the ocean.

The very first players banned from Valorant was over a month ago, with hackers being banned just three days into the closed beta. Riot is pulling out all the stops to put a halt to cheaters and hackers before the game releases in Summer.

The primary system behind these player bans is Riot’s Vanguard system, a kernel mode driver that loads during the boot system. This means that those who have downloaded Valorant will have the Vanguard system running in the background, even when not playing the game. It is possible to disable the Vanguard, but it will have to be turned back on in order to play.

Cheating isn’t the only thing Riot wants to stamp out in Valorant, with player harassment in the company’s reticle. The development team behind Valorant are hoping to cut down on the issue of player harassment within the game, with the intent of creating a fair and non-hostile environment for players to enjoy.