Editing Riot Vanguard (section)

===Tencent Ownership and Chinese Government Ties===
A major concern surrounding Vanguard stems from Riot Games' ownership by Tencent Holdings, a Chinese technology conglomerate. This ownership, combined with Vanguard's kernel-level access, raises significant security and privacy implications due to Chinese legal requirements, particularly the [[wikipedia:National_Intelligence_Law_of_the_People's_Republic_of_China|National Intelligence Law of the People's Republic of China]] (2017).
The law mandates cooperation with national intelligence efforts from all organizations and citizens. Relevant articles include:<blockquote>Article 7: All organizations and citizens shall support, assist, and cooperate with national intelligence efforts in accordance with law, and shall protect national intelligence work secrets they are aware of.

Article 10: As necessary for their work, national intelligence work institutions are to use the necessary means, tactics, and channels to carry out intelligence efforts, domestically and abroad.

Article 18: As required for work, and in accordance with relevant national provisions, national intelligence work institutions may ask organs such as for customs and entry-exit border inspection to provide facilitation such as exemptions from inspection.</blockquote>These legal requirements raise several concerns:
*Tencent, as a Chinese company, could be legally compelled to provide data or access through Vanguard.
*The kernel-level access could potentially be leveraged for surveillance or data collection beyond anti-cheat purposes.
*An attack on Riot's Vanguard servers could have catastrophic consequences
*Users have no way to verify if or when such access might be utilized.
*The combination of mandatory installation, kernel-level access, and Chinese ownership creates potential security risks for:
**Government employees.
**Corporate users with sensitive data.
**Military personnel.
**Users with access to critical infrastructure.