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VALORANT Mobile Multi-Factor Authentication: Riot Games' Counter to Smurfing
Earlier this year, Riot Games announced their intention to become more active in combating the widespread smurfing issue in their FPS title VALORANT. In the 5 years since the game’s initial launch, the number of smurf accounts has grown exponentially and the frustration especially among the lower rank brackets continues to expand.
Smurfing: Any account that has a pattern of deliberate deception of our matchmaker to be placed into matches below a players’ true skill level. – as per Riot’s definition
Yesterday evening, Riot Games finally unveiled a detailed outline of the timeline they intend to take to combat this issue – at least in part. The key is to it is a gradual targeted rollout of the new Riot Mobile MFA (Multi-Factor Authentication). Smurfing is an issue that can never really be squashed, but the hope is this will go someways towards reducing it.
Account Sharing the Main Target of Riot’s Efforts
According to Riot, a “sizable amount” of the smurfing issue stems from shared accounts. Hence, their opening approach in this campaign aims to better enforce punishment against exactly that – an act that is already against Riot Games’ Terms of Service.
Shared Account: Any account in which the owner deliberately shared its account credentials to be played by someone who is not the owner of the account. – as per Riot’s definition
Fret not, however. Not all accounts will have to activate Riot Mobile MFA. Riot has issued a detailed timeline of its gradual rollout as well as a checklist of all the factors that would qualify an account to require Riot Mobile MFA activation.
Will My Account Require Riot Mobile MFA Activation?
Whether your account will require MFA activation will depend on a number of factors:
- If your account is detected as a shared account.
- Detection looks at a few different signals to determine if different humans are playing on the same account.
- As of Patch 11.10, accounts ranked in Ascendant, Immortal and Radiant will require MFA activation.
The reasoning given behind why Ascendant and above is being targeted especially for MFA activation is that those 3 are the highest rank brackets in VALORANT and are “capable of inflicting the greatest harm when smurfing.” Moreover, those skill brackets are considered the most “at risk” of competitive integrity violations, i.e. win trading through shared accounts.
To note, only the accounts flagged will require MFA activation, but any account can choose to activate it regardless to better protect the account’s security.
How Can I Activate Riot Mobile MFA?
If your account becomes flagged as a shared account, you’ll be required to install Riot Mobile and complete a one-time verification process – thereby linking your mobile device to your Riot account. Here’s a full breakdown for the process of setting it up, as per Riot’s official documentation.
Accounts that activate MFA will be provided with game-specific in-game rewards as well.
- League of Legends: Taliyah “Very Cool” Emote
- VALORANT: “Keep it Safer” Gun Buddy
- Legends of Runeterra: Rare Prismatic Chest
- Teamfight Tactics: 100 Treasure Tokens
When Will The New Riot Mobile MFA Activation Roll Out?
The rollout will begin as of Patch 11.08 and extend into 2026. Here’s the full timeline as we’ve been given so far.
- Patch 11.08 (Oct 14th)
- Report option of “Rank Manipulation” will be added to in-game reporting system list.
- Patch 11.09 (~Oct 28th)
- Riot Mobile MFA will be required for flagged shared accounts in the following regions: NA, LATAM, BR, and KR.
- Bans will begin to be issued for accounts Riot are confident in that have been purchased and are detected for boosting.
- Patch 11.10 (~Nov 11th)
- Riot Mobile MFA required for Ascendant+ accounts in the following regions: NA, LATAM, BR, and KR.
- Patch ? (2026)
- Riot Mobile MFA required for shared accounts and Ascendant+ in AP (Asia-Pacific) and EU.
As more information presents itself, we'll keep you updated with an even more comprehensive timeline.
Boosting: A type of smurfing in which a player uses an account that is lower ranked than their own account (booster) to inflate the rank of the account used and the accounts in the player’s party. – as per Riot’s definition
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Featured Image Credit: Riot Games
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