Over 40.000 Steam Accounts Banned By Valve Anti-Cheat System
Valve doled out more than 40.000 bans on Steam, via Valve Anti-Cheat. The ban wave happened on July 6th, one day after the Steam Summer Sale wrapped up. This is the single biggest ban-hammer strike in the history of Steam; the largest before this was on October 12th, 2016, when a total of 15.000 accounts were banned.
The morning after the Steam Summer Sale wrapped up, on July 6th, Valve made a huge crack-down on cheaters. The Valve Anti-Cheat (or VAC, if you will), got rid of a grand total of 40.411 Steam accounts. If the number seems incredible, well, that’s because it is. The Steam Database ban chart shows an unprecedented spike. This is, by far, the most radical ban wave on Steam ever. On a normal day, an average of 5.000 accounts get banned daily, and the biggest previous wave got rid of “only” 15.000 accounts.
The timing of the ban-hammer smashing down is probably very intentional, as Dot Esports pointed out. Losing an account is not necessarily the end of the world for your average cheater, since they can just make another. However, this ban hit them where it might actually hurt – the wallet. According to Vac Ban, over $9.000 dollars in inventory value went down the VAC drain. You see, the VAC ban blocks you from accessing Valve’s servers, Rendering cosmetic items worthless, which is what makes up the most of the lost inventory. Best of all, considering the timing, there was no real way for them to get these items on the cheap again.
The VAC wasn’t the only thing working overtime on July 6th. Almost 5.000 accounts got banned in CS:GO, particularly griefers and those that the Anti-Cheat somehow missed. Of course, the cheaters will be back pretty soon. However, this precise strike of the ban-hammer is still pretty satisfying.
