We have all heard about incidents where players have complained of not being able to play Valorant due to some kind of ban, on a second-hand PC or a laptop they purchased. That happens due to the hardware being banned by Vanguard, Valorant’s anti-cheat software.
Ever wondered how the hardware ban works in Valorant and why it is implemented? Let’s take a deep dive to get a better understanding of how Hardware bans work in Valorant.
How does the Valorant Hardware Ban work
When you install Valorant for the first time on your PC, an add-on software is also installed called Vanguard. This software collects some information from the hardware like the processor, graphics card, motherboard, ram, HDD, SSD, etc.
This information collected can consist of hardware’s make and model, unique serial number, etc. or any information that can help Vanguard identify the device. This is where a HWID (Hardware ID) is generated and assigned to every piece of hardware in your system.
When you start playing Valorant, Vanguard watches all the game files like a hawk for any 3rd party software intrusion and monitors hardware activity as most cheats like aim bots, esp hack or wall hack tap into the graphical data.
In case, Vanguard finds any hacks being run on the system, Valorant shuts down your active match and bans your account as well as the HWID assigned to your PC. This causes all of your hardware to be banned from Valorant.
Pros and Cons of Hardware Ban
Valorant goes for the hardware ban hammer when they catch cheaters. It’s their way of making sure banned players can’t just hop back in with a new account on the same PC.
Also Read: Riot Games Takes Aim at Valorant Toxicity With Enhanced Voice Chat Moderation
With that being said, Hardware Ban causes issues when cheaters sell their system as a whole or sell it piece by piece. Any which way, the buyer will get an account ban if they use a hardware previously used to cheat with.
Vanguard is a pretty robust software and is successful most of the times in catching a cheater. But no software is perfect as there are cheats out there that can bypass Vanguard’s security. However, we know Riot Games is committed to ensuring the integrity of the game while preserving player experience.
