Someone bought a second-hand CPU owned by a Valorant cheater, and it got them banned too

Published Oct 2, 2026, 7:19 PM EDT Simon is a Computer Science BSc graduate who has been writing about technology since 2014, and using Windows machines since 3.1. After working for an indie game studio and acting as the family's go-to technician for all computer issues, he found his passion for writing and decided to use his skill set to write about all things tech. Since beginning his writing career, he has written for many different publications such as WorldStart, Listverse, and MakeTechEasier. However, after finding his home at MakeUseOf in February 2019, he would eventually move on to its sister site, XDA, to bring the latest and greatest in Windows, Linux, and DIY electronics. Sign in to your XDA account Summary Buying a used CPU led to an instant Valorant hardware ban via Vanguard. Riot blacklisted the CPU serial, then flagged the rest of the PC—motherboard and drive included. Second-hand parts can inherit cheater bans; you might need to replace major components to play. Buying second-hand hardware is smart if you want to keep the costs down, but it turns out that anti-cheat mechanisms in video games are getting so advanced that they can blacklist specific components from confirmed cheaters. Someone discovered this the hard way when they purchased a second-hand CPU, put it into their PC, and then got immediately banned from Valorant when they booted it up. A used CPU got a Valorant player banned from the game The rest of their PC's hardware has also been blacklisted VideoCardz spotted a post by user After-Cartoonist-196 on the German PCBaumeister subreddit about their experience. In the original post, they describe how they purchased a used CPU, but it came with a nasty surprise when they tried to play Riot's hit FPS game Valorant (machine-translated from German): I recently bought a used Ryzen 7 5800x3d from classifieds. The CPU works perfectly and hasn't caused any problems so far. Yesterday I started playing Valorant and was immediately kicked out, which I found strange because Valorant played perfectly fine with my previous CPU. When I contacted Riot, they informed me that my CPU ID/serial number is blacklisted in the Vanguard system because it was banned on August 12th due to a hardware ban, apparently because the previous owner used it to cheat in Valorant. Unfortunately, After-Cartoonist-196 spoke to Riot and learned that, because they used a confirmed CPU that a cheater used, the rest of their hardware had also been blacklisted, including the motherboard and hard drive. This one second-hand CPU has seemingly blacklisted their entire PC, and they'll likely need to replace a lot of hardware just to get back into Valorant. So, if you're a competitive player considering saving a few bucks, be careful with who you buy from.