Riot Games will start recording Valorant voice chats from July 13

[midian182]

A hot potato: Riot Games' previously announced policy of recording Valorant's in-game player voice chats as a way of combating toxicity will begin on July 13 in the US. This initial phase won't see the recordings used as evidence when a player's behavior is reported but for training Riot's language models.

It's been just over a year since Riot Games revealed plans to record and temporarily store voice chat in Valorant (download here). The company plans to use the recordings whenever someone's disruptive/toxic behavior is reported to check if any rules were broken. Once the logs have been examined for violations, the recordings are removed. Riot said it won't be actively monitor live chat; it will only check voice logs after a report has been submitted.

Riot emphasizes in its announcement post that these initial recordings from English-speaking US players won't be used to assess behavior but to help train its language models, thereby helping "get the tech in a good enough place for a beta launch later this year."

We're committed to making our games better for everyone who plays them. This is another step toward tackling disruptive behavior across the board, starting with @PlayVALORANT. Stay tuned for more from our Central Player Dynamics team! https://t.co/wD6vErtlzo

— Riot Games (@riotgames) April 30, 2021

"We know that before we can even think of expanding this tool, we'll have to be confident it's effective, and if mistakes happen, we have systems in place to make sure we can correct any false positives (or negatives for that matter)," Riot added.

Having your voice comms recorded, even when it's for the purpose of identifying and banning players who can make the experience miserable for others, is always going to prove controversial. Riot says those who don't want to be part of the recordings will have to ensure voice chat is turned off.

Earlier this year, Valorant gave players the option of selectively censoring specific words in the chat settings.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/95085-riot-games-start-recording-valorant-player-voice-chats.html

 

[ZedRM]

Simple solution, figure out what folder/files the recordings are being stored in, delete them, create a dummy/dummies and use the security tab to lockout access to it in the Security tab of the Properties window. TADA! No more recordings.

 

[yRaz]

Simple solution, figure out what folder/files the recordings are being stored in, delete them, create a dummy/dummies and use the security tab to lockout access to it in the Security tab of the Properties window. TADA! No more recordings.

They aren't stored locally, it goes through their VoIP servers

 

[SoloCamo]

Simple solution, figure out what folder/files the recordings are being stored in, delete them, create a dummy/dummies and use the security tab to lockout access to it in the Security tab of the Properties window. TADA! No more recordings.

Thats not how that works at all...

 

[MaitieS]

Also Valorant has very aggressive anti-cheat which is starting with BIOS so gl changing stuff without getting banned

 

[psycros]

LOL, as if everyone isn't already using Discord.

 

[Skjorn]

Could anyone provide a list of some other games that do this?

 

[ZedRM]

They aren't stored locally, it goes through their VoIP servers

They aren't stored locally, it goes through their VoIP servers

That depends on how the VoIP is configured and used. Some providers store data on user machines for later retrieval.

 

[yRaz]

That depends on how the VoIP is configured and used. Some providers store data on user machines for later retrieval.

You lack a fundamental understanding of VoIP

 

[ZedRM]

You lack a fundamental understanding of VoIP

You keep thinking that Mr Zippy.

 

[yRaz]

You keep thinking that Mr Zippy.

I will until proven otherwise

 

[bandit8623]

It is made by china....

 

[bandit8623]

That depends on how the VoIP is configured and used. Some providers store data on user machines for later retrieval.

the latency would be too great to store then send. sure for some sevices it may be stored locally, but its also first sent out before its stored locally. so deleting the locally stored data makes zero sense.

 

[Milest]

You keep thinking that Mr Zippy.

In order for the voice chat to be of use during game play, the data needs to be sent to the other players.
Why would it need to be stored locally when it's already been sent out into the wild?

 

[ZedRM]

Why would it need to be stored locally when it's already been sent out into the wild?

Simple: Storing the recordings on the servers takes up huge amounts of space, even when compressed, but on a per user basis, storing those same recordings locally within the install/user folder would be trivial. Retrieval would be equally trivial as it would be done on login. So why store all recordings for all users on the game server when you can easily store and pull them on an individual basis? Lot's of companies do this to save on server storage space. So you all can argue till cows come home, but all of you failing to understand how some things work.

 

[ZedRM]

the latency would be too great to store then send.

Not really. Even low end PC's can do both at the same time.

 

[zamroni111]

Also Valorant has very aggressive anti-cheat which is starting with BIOS so gl changing stuff without getting banned

Kernel driver, not bios

 

[zamroni111]

Simple: Storing the recordings on the servers takes up huge amounts of space, even when compressed, but on a per user basis, storing those same recordings locally within the install/user folder would be trivial. Retrieval would be equally trivial as it would be done on login. So why store all recordings for all users on the game server when you can easily store and pull them on an individual basis? Lot's of companies do this to save on server storage space. So you all can argue till cows come home, but all of you failing to understand how some things work.

Voip bit rate is only 32 kbps.

G.729.1 - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[bandit8623]

Not really. Even low end PC's can do both at the same time.

Yeah but the argument is it's stored only locally.its not

 

[ZedRM]

Yeah but the argument is it's stored only locally.its not

I didn't say "only". Don't think in such narrow terms. I simply presented it as a valid, and as it happens, well used option.

Voip bit rate is only 32 kbps.

G.729.1 - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

That is for one protocol. There are many. VoIP services are NOT limited to any particular standard.