Does LoL use Vanguard? This is everything you need to know about Riot’s anti-cheat system and whether it’s implemented in the MOBA.

Image Credits | Riot Games

What is Riot Games’ Vanguard?

If you play VALORANT, you probably know what Vanguard is. It’s one of the toughest anti-cheat systems in the gaming world. With the rise of online games throughout the last decade, anti-cheat systems have played a vital role in maintaining competitive integrity. By removing all the cheaters from the game, Riot guarantees a fair and enjoyable gaming experience.

Riot Vanguard is a software program that aims to prevent cheating and hacking. It runs in the background while you’re playing an online game and it monitors your computer’s memory and checks for any unauthorized modifications to the game files or software.

How Does Riot Vanguard Work?

Whenever Riot Vanguard detects a possible cheating activity, it will immediately shut down the game, flagging the user’s account.

By utilizing low-level software like kernel-level drivers, Riot Vanguard allows the program to access your computer’s hardware directly so it can detect suspicious behavior in real-time and minor the game in real time. Moreover, Vanguard employs machine learning algorithms so that it can learn from past cheating activity to improve the program’s accuracy in the future.

The need to run kernel-level drivers is necessary to catch cheats that would otherwise run at a higher privilege level. Vanguard, instead, is able to detect even the most advanced cheats.

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What kind of information does Vanguard get access to?

Vanguard will have access to your system information, personal information that you provided upon signup, and gameplay information. Even though it’s technically a more “invasive” anti-cheat software, Vanguard will not upload personal files to their servers or spy on your web browser.

Other esports titles also use similar anti-cheats to ensure their competitive integrity so the only things you will be giving to Riot are the three aforementioned information.

Is Vanguard safe to use?

When Vanguard was initially announced, there were some controversies regarding the program’s “invasive” nature in using kernel-level drivers. Riot Games has taken several measures to ensure that the program is safe and secure for players to use, claiming that it does not collect or process any personal information beyond what the current League of Legends anti-cheat solution does.

In other words, the devs don’t want to know anything about you or the machine you’re using, as long as it can maintain integrity in your game. In an official blog post by the Security and Privacy teams, Riot mentioned they would never “ship something we couldn’t stand behind from a player-trust perspective. Players have every right to question and challenge us, but let’s be clear—we wouldn’t work here if we didn’t deeply care about player trust and privacy and believe that Riot feels the same way. We’re players just like you, and we wouldn’t install programs on our computer that we didn’t have the utmost confidence in.”

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How to Check if the Vanguard is Working?

If you want to know whether Riot Vanguard is running, you can check it by opening the Task Manager and seeing if the program is running through the process tab. If Vanguard currently runs, it will be listed as “vgc.exe.”

Another quicker way to check if Vanguard is working is to look at the system tray and see if there is a Riot Vanguard software icon. Whenever the icon is present, it means that Vanguard is running correctly.

Riot Vanguard should only run whenever you’re playing a game, and it should close once the game is also closed. In case it still runs, make sure to deactivate it manually from the Task Manager section.

Does LoL use Vanguard?

Even though Riot Vanguard is a strong anti-cheat system, it’s currently only implemented in the company’s FPS title, VALORANT.

League of Legends doesn’t use Vanguard to spot cheaters. There are a couple of reasons behind this, the first being that hacking is done differently in a shooter and a MOBA. There is another anti-cheat system called Packman but it doesn’t have the same level of access as Vanguard.

Vanguard is not implemented in League because the hacks used in League don’t have the same level of impact on games as much as in VALORANT. That said, Riot mentioned in an update to their Privacy Notice and ToS (Terms of Service) that they are planning to use it in some of Riot’s future game titles.

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