Thousands of cheaters are getting permanent Hardware bans in Valorant

"No second chances for cheaters," says Riot CEO.

It has only been a few days since the official launch of VALORANT on June 2, and cheaters have already started revealing their frustration after effectively receiving permanent bans from the game.

Long before the closed beta of Riot’s competitive shooter started on April 7th, they had promised fans that keeping the game free from cheaters would be their top priority. It looks like they’re delivering their promise to the community, as more and more cheaters are reportedly getting permanent bans from the game with each passing day.

On June 3rd, just a day after the official VALORANT launch, Riot CEO Nicolo Laurent had shared a screenshot of the messages of a frustrated cheater through his official Twitter handle. He confirmed that players who used cheats in the closed beta of VALORANT would not be unbanned after launch. “Sorry, no second chance for cheaters,” Laurent said.

While the news was certain to sadden the cheaters, the community greatly appreciated this move taken by Riot. However, some innocent gamers who use cloud PCs for playing may have been caught in the crossfire.

However, the biggest cause of concern for the cheaters might be the fact that these delivered bans are all HWID bans. To put it simply, if a banned user wants to be able to play the game again, creating a new account won’t be of any use. The only way to bypass a hardware ban is to buy a new computer, which is a huge pinch in the pocket to pay as a price for cheating.

The Twitter handle of Anti-Cheat Police Department has shared screenshots of some cheaters who were caught in the ban-wave. The attached link claims 200+ users being banned from a pixelbot in VALORANT and shows the conversation between the cheaters.

Early in the closed beta, we had reported instances of cheaters blatantly using hacks in the game without giving a care for Vanguard. It appears that this huge ban-wave might just be enough to scare them off from continuing to cheat, and that too only if they didn’t already get banned.