Valorant Making Anti-Cheat Changes Following Major Ban Wave

Summary

• Valorant is combating cheaters with a new ranked rollback system. This reverses rank progression if a match is compromised by hackers.
• This aims to punish cheaters and ensure fair play for all Valorant players.
• Players teaming with cheaters will retain their rank, preventing unfair penalties.

Valorant is tackling its recent surge in hackers with a powerful new weapon: ranked rollbacks. The head of Valorant's anti-cheat team recently addressed the issue, warning cheaters that Riot's capabilities have significantly increased and outlining the new system.

Online games constantly battle the persistent problem of cheaters seeking unfair advantages. While many developers employ various anti-cheat strategies, determined cheaters often find ways to circumvent them. Despite boasting one of the most effective anti-cheat systems, Valorant has recently experienced a rise in disruptive hacking activity. This prompted Riot Games to implement stricter penalties.

Riot Games' anti-cheat lead, Phillip Koskinas, publicly acknowledged Valorant's cheating problem on Twitter, assuring players of the studio's commitment to a solution. A key element of this solution is the upcoming implementation of ranked rollbacks. This means players will have their rank adjusted if their match was negatively impacted by cheaters. Koskinas even shared a graph illustrating the number of cheaters banned by Riot's Vanguard system in January alone, highlighting a peak on January 13th.

Riot Games' Future Valorant Bans Will Include Ranked Rollbacks

Addressing concerns about players winning matches with cheaters on their team—a situation unfair to both the opposing team and those playing alongside the hacker—Koskinas clarified that players on the same team as a cheater will retain their rank rating. The opposing team, however, will have their rank adjusted to compensate for the unfair loss. Koskinas acknowledged the potential for this to slightly inflate rankings but expressed confidence in the strategy's overall effectiveness.

Valorant's Vanguard system, utilizing kernel-level security access on PCs, has proven highly effective at detecting and banning cheaters. Its success has even inspired similar anti-cheat implementations in other popular games like Call of Duty. However, despite developers' best efforts, cheaters persistently find new ways to infiltrate games.

Valorant has already banned thousands of players, offering hope to those frustrated by persistent hacking in ranked matches. Riot Games' clear dedication to resolving this issue and mitigating the recent wave of cheating activity is evident. The long-term effectiveness of the new ranked rollback technique remains to be seen.