In its newest efforts to combat the seemingly insurmountable problem of video game toxicity, developer Riot Games has announced plans to record and/or listen in on voice chatter during games of its online hero shooter Valorant.
Revealed this weekend in a statement to the Valorant community, Riot stated that it will be recording online voice chat going forward, though the League of Legends developer insists that it will only listen to specific recordings once they are flagged as containing racist, threatening, or otherwise toxic behavior. This policy is only rolling out in Valorant, and is not, at this time, extending to Riot's other releases such as League of Legends or Teamfight Tactics.
Riot addressed understandable player concerns that Big Brother might be listening.
"We believe we should collect the absolute minimum data to effectively run our games and continuously improve your experience," reads the statement. "When we collect data, we’ll be transparent, we’ll keep it for only as long as necessary, and we’ll protect it as if it were our own. We know collecting voice data is a concern for many of you, but be assured that we would never ship anything if we weren’t comfortable having our own data treated the same way."
Riot suggests that anyone who does not wish to be recorded cease immediate use of voice chat.
