Valve has banned over 90k smurf accounts

Valve released the news that it has banned more than 90,000 players who used smurf accounts. Such accounts are created to hide the player's real ranking and usually play against weak opponents, ruining the game for others. 

Valve puts the exact number of permanently banned accounts at 90,000. Just as importantly, they were able to find the owners of smurf profiles, meaning these accounts can be connected and punished:

"Today we permanently blocked 90,000 smurf accounts that have been active for the past few months. These are alternate accounts that some players use to hide their real rankings - so they can leave the game, use cheats, commit sabotage or otherwise engage in toxic behavior without repercussions."

On top of that, we've also discovered the main accounts of all these smurfs. From now on, discovering a main account's connection to a smurf account can result in a range of penalties, from a temporary change in decency level to permanent lockouts.

Valve is emphasizing that it's better to play Dota 2 fairly. The company is trying to make games in matchmaking as competitive and interesting as possible:

"Dota 2 is a game best enjoyed in an honest environment. The quality of a matchmaking game is directly related to the behavior of the players. We do everything we can to ensure your matches are of the highest quality, and smurfs diminish the enjoyment of the game."

A reminder that with the appearance of the Summer Client Update, which was released on August 31st, gamers can now file reports against toxic players in real time. 

"As always, if you suspect a smurf has been playing with you, you can complain about it after playing through the appropriate marker after the game. This will help us continue to weed out abusers and collect more data to make our tools to combat smurf accounts work better." 

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