The short answer is NO. Riot Games doesn’t have a surefire way to detect accounts purchased from legitimate sellers. However, they aren’t totally helpless in this aspect because there are numerous ways they can detect if an account has been illegally transferred from one party to another. It is against Riot Games’ terms of service to trade accounts, whether it’s through buying and selling or harmless swapping between friends. It’s important to be careful when you buy an account.
Despite so many players trading accounts daily, only a really small number of accounts get banned. These are from players who are careless with their purchase or usage of the traded account that Riot Games actually detects their suspicious activity. However, it doesn’t really take a lot of effort to hide the fact that you bought an account to actually avoid getting detected by the system. There are many reasons to buy smurf accounts and even more reasons why you don’t want to lose it.
How Does Riot Games Know if I Buy an Account?
Riot Games detects players through a number of ways that you might not know was relevant. People buy an account without thinking about how Riot Games might see through massive changes within the profile of the original owner and recipient that they think there’s some fancy system that tracks complicated data that exposes a traded account. Here are some examples on how Riot Games’ system detects if you buy an account online:
- Drastic and instant change in IP Address. It’s better to wait 12-24 hours before opening a newly purchased account.
- Major changes in keybinds. Keybinds are like personality traits within an account. It’s better to make gradual changes to your keybinds over a controlled period to prevent arousing suspicion.
- Massive change in champion pool and role preference. A person who usually plays enchanters in the support role suddenly wants to play champs like Viego and Xin Zhao? Looks suspicious.
- Replacing Friend List. This is probably the biggest red flag. Don’t do this.
These are the easiest ways for Riot Games to detect traded accounts. Fortunately, they don’t have the capacity to detect all accounts instantly. As long as you make gradual changes to your account that make sense, you’ll find yourself getting away with buying a smurf account. Don’t be afraid to change your password, email, and IGN so that you’ll feel safer with your account and prevent scammers from simply retrieving the product they just sold to you.
What Happens When Riot Games Detects That I Bought My Account?
The worst possible offense that you can get is an IP ban if they detect that you’ve bought several accounts and have been using them for malicious purposes. However, you might only get your current account banned if they detect that it’s the first time you buy an account without following the proper steps to make sure that you don’t easily get detected. Most people get away with buying an account online. As we’ve mentioned, it’s hard for Riot Games to do everything at once.
If you ever experience your account getting banned, you can still submit a ticket to the main website to refute the claim that you purchased an account (even if you did). Just make sure to coordinate with your seller to come up with a reasonable story that Riot Games will believe. However, it’s better if you just get a replacement account or a refund from the seller if the fault lies on their side of the deal. If you did something to get your account banned, you’ll just need to own your mistake.
How Do I Know I Got Banned For Buying an Account?
Riot Games usually gives players a notice when they try to log into their account that they got banned. This will also include the reason why that account got banned. Some accounts also get suspended in the middle of their matches, which is the worst possible outcome since that will also affect your ELO even if you successfully dispute your claim. In these instances, make sure to remain calm and start mapping out what you need to do next.
If you can’t log into your account because it says your password, email, or other credentials have been changed, it might be because you just got scammed. In this instance, try to calmly discuss with the person you bought the account from to see if it was a misunderstanding. If not, go to the website you bought the account from to settle any disputes and hopefully recover the account or at least get a refund.
