A used Ryzen 7 5800X3D kept a buyer out of Valorant over someone else’s ban

A German buyer purchased a used AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D processor on the classifieds platform Kleinanzeigen. According to him, the deal took place on September 21, the hardware turned out to be in working order, and the computer behaved normally after the upgrade. The problem surfaced later, when the owner launched Valorant: the game would immediately kick him out, even though everything had worked with the previous processor. He described what happened on Reddit, from where the story was picked up by tech outlets.

Riot Games support told him that the processor had been blacklisted by the Vanguard anti-cheat back on August 12. The reason given was cheating by the previous owner: the mark landed on the hardware itself, not on the account, so the restriction passed to the new owner along with the processor. According to the buyer, he only learned about the ban after contacting support.

A hardware ban isn't permanent

Phillip Koskinas, head of Riot's anti-cheat division, clarified the details. Hardware bans are not indefinite: they last a maximum of four months and apply only to the game where the violation was recorded. He also disagreed that Vanguard automatically bans all the other components in a computer because of a single blocked part. Judging by the dates given, the restriction should be lifted around mid-December, and Riot support can tell you how much time is left.

How Vanguard tells one processor from another

The company doesn't publicly explain exactly how Vanguard tells one Ryzen 7 5800X3D from another. The anti-cheat requires TPM 2.0 and Secure Boot, but Riot doesn't disclose the exact method for identifying individual components.

The story shows a non-obvious risk when buying used components. You can inspect a processor for damage, check temperatures, and run benchmarks, but a buyer has no simple way to find out in advance whether a hardware ban is attached to a part.

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Translation editors: Соловьев В., Пеков А.