Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose and no one likes to play with cheaters, but there are times when the solution to the latter is even more complicated to justify. With the arrival of May, the Vanguard anti-cheat system arrived in League of Legends and that, more than security among the community, has generated reasonable uncertainty among players given that by installing it we are giving Riot Games a VIP pass to the protection ring of our PC. What can happen from there?
The implementation of Vanguard It is not something new or something that has caught us by surprise. In April of this same year, a date was set for its implementation, although Riot Games itself already spoke at length about its own anti-cheat system. no less than four years ago. What’s more, in April 2020 the creators of LOL and Valorant already dropped two concepts that began to stir the waters:
- Your anti-cheat software would require more permits than usual. The reason given is that if the advantageous software was on top it would be of no use, so the last hierarchical protection domain had to be reached.
- Of course, accessing those privileges on our PC through a video game is something that cannot be said without waiting for a reply, so right after Riot Games stated that Vanguard would not collect user information.
With that ahead of us, and Vanguard officially implemented in Riot Games games, it’s time to answer three more reasonable questions. How it works, what is promised and to what extent it has room to maneuver when maneuvering from the Kernel, which is where access to our PC hardware is granted. Let’s go by parts.
What is Vanguard, LOL’s anti-cheat system
In January 2024, Riot Games decided to speak even more clearly about Vanguard. At the end of the day, it’s your own custom security software. According to the company, Vanguard consists of a client that remains active while playing its games, and also has a kernel mode driver.
To put it simply, all operating systems have different degrees or rings of concessions that allow access to certain functions of our PC. In the most superficial one are the applications and programs, while the hardware and software Drivers cover the next two inner layers. The highest of all privileges, ring 0, is el KerneL. Y from there Vanguard operates.
Is it really necessary to delve so deeply into a PC’s operating system to be able to play LOL? Without justifying the methods on our part, four years ago Riot Games shared the statistics of detection and actions against cheaters in its games from time to time since 2020especially with its successful MOBA, and the amount is beyond worrying.
Given the playable nature of LOL, as well as its monetization system and the depth of its competitive division, either cheating is nipped in the bud, or it will become a growing problem. In fact, Riot ensures that Vanguard must be active during the gaming experience, although it does not rule out that “unexpected interactions may arise between the program.”
What’s more, already in 2020 was anticipated the possibility that the Vanguard client or controller could prevent play in any way. Which, according to several users on social networks, has ended up happening.
How Riot Games says Vanguard works and why it was implemented
If Vanguard has been announced for so long, why has it been implemented this way and now? The thing comes from 2023, when Riot they leaked both the source code itself League of Legends like that of its previous Packman anti-cheat software, so, as a result of that disaster and its consequences, it decided to implement this new, much stronger system with its flagship.
With the theory stated, at least in essence, it is time to move on to practice. According to Riot Games, Vanguard Drivers load during PC startup, but it is neither active all the time nor connected to the network until a Riot game is launched.
Chart with the escalation of cheaters in Valorant until February 2024 (Source: Riot Games)
In fact, the exact words used by Riot is that Vanguard is “quiet and with a menacing air” so that nothing corrupts the operating system between Windows boot and starting LOL. What’s more, only by passing that initial check is it possible to connect to the game servers. And after that?
“The client’s instructions then begin to activate controller functions to monitor for elements that may interfere with and terminate official League processes.”
So, Is Vanguard here to stay on our team? According to Riot Games, it is possible to deactivate the controller at any time under one condition: after doing so, it is necessary to restart the PC to “recertify the integrity” before entering the game.
Can Riot Games take screenshots of my PC while playing?
There is an additional layer of uncertainty regarding Vanguard: Tencent, the Chinese video game colossus to which Riot Games belongs, is subject to the jurisdiction and laws of its country, of course. So if necessary for the security of the nation, China can force them to transfer data regardless of the country they come from, relying on the National Intelligence Law.
The question from here is whether Vanguard collects our data and, as you might expect, Riot Games categorically states that it does not. In fact, the day before deploying Vanguard in LOL were last modified company policies regarding the data obtained by the players. The summary, and according to Riot, is precisely to have to “reduce the amount of information” that they are forced to collect to combat cheating and remember that there is a guide
“The goal of our controller is not to gather more information, as we can already see everything we need from user mode. Instead, Vanguard’s main goal is to confirm that the game is running in an environment where that we can trust.
This serves to reduce the number of detections we need to create and the amount of information we are forced to collect, but above all, it makes it more difficult for cheaters to access the game.”
However, on the same day that Vanguard arrived at LOL a capture taken from unknowncheats set off all the alarms: according to the user JustAReverser With the new anti-cheat system installed, Riot could take screenshots and upload them to their servers.
“Surely this isn’t legal. Valorant now takes screenshots of your PC. In fact, they can take screenshots of Discord chats and make any window full screen without you knowing and upload it to their servers.”
Riot’s updated terms state that users choose what information they provide, but that they also automatically collect information about how they interact with and navigate through Riot’s servers, as well as the device and software they use.
Does that mean you can technically take screenshots of my PC when playing LOL? As specified by JustAReverser itself, video games can sometimes take screenshots, but most of the time “those screenshots are related to the game engine” so this does not imply that the windows that we have open can be captured. Although, logically, not all systems function like a Vanguard that has all privileges.
What happens from this point? Although Riot Games has been clear and transparent in its policies for four years, since the installation of Vanguard It all comes down to the trust that the players have in the company itself and the way in which it monitors and controls cheaters. Because LOL It is still free and it doesn’t look like that is going to change, but to play starting today we will have to grant privileges on our PC.
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