VALORANT AI cheat providers arrested after month-long co-operation between Chinese Police and Tencent – In a recent crackdown by Yijiang Public Security Bureau, the authorities were able to catch 10 individuals who were illegally manufacturing and providing VALORANT AI cheats. Let us look at the situation in detail.
VALORANT AI cheat providers arrested after month-long co-operation between Chinese Police and Tencent
Accoriding to a VALO2ASIA report, The Yijiang Public Security Bureau and Tencent cooperated for a month before arresting 10 individuals who were developing and distributing AI cheat tools for VALORANT. The investigation disclosed transactions involving over RMB 30 million (nearly $4.1 million USD) related to this illegal activity till Sept. 22.
🇨🇳 BREAKING – Ten individuals have been arrested in China for developing and distributing VALORANT AI cheat software, as disclosed by the Yijiang Public Security Bureau via Weibo.
This arrest came after a month of investigation by local police and Tencent, uncovering… pic.twitter.com/6NUdfC3YHK
— VALO2ASIA (@VALO2ASIA) September 22, 2023
The 10 suspects apprehended by the Chinese police confessed to their illegal activities. This is the first time Chinese officials have taken a hard step towards stopping AI cheats that have become an issue in the gaming community.
The operation was executed on Sept. 15 in which more than 20 law enforcement officers conducted coordinated raids across multiple locations across Zhejiang, Chongqing, and other provinces. Apart from capturing 10 suspects, the police also confiscated 17 computers, 11 mobile phones, source codes, and other hardware components. Out of the 10 people, 2 of them were responsible for developing cheats while the other 8 acted as agents and distributed them to user.
Riot Games, the developer of VALORANT, has included various anti-cheat measures in the game to tackle the rising cheating situations. Known as Vanguard, this anti-cheat system is designed to end games the moment a cheater is detected. But this is not full proof as hackers often bypass this system by using AI cheats. This type of cheats function outside the operating system and are undetectable by Vanguard’s kernel-level anti-cheat.
Tencent’s VALORANT team in China also released an official statement on Weibo addressing this incident:
Fairness is the bottom line of competitive games. VALORANT will continue to uphold the concept of “pursuing fairness to the end,” maintaining a “zero tolerance” stance towards any cheating behaviors involving “plugins”. We are willing to maintain closer communication with players and work together to maintain a positive gaming environment in China.
In the past decade, the gaming industry has grown tremendously. Unfortunately, many have tried to take advantage of this situation via illegal cheats and hacking. Especially in competitive games, players sometimes use cheats to overcome their own skill disadvantages. This not only reduces the player experience of the other players but also threatens the integrity of the game.
Stay tuned with us to get more such updates regarding VALORANT and its esports scene.
