Riot Bans 296,416 Accounts for Boosting, Trick2g Asks Drew Levin for Help

Riot banned 296,416 accounts for boosting. On September 17 its own account posted the number: "296,416 rent-a-rank customers served and counting." Then the people it caught went to find Drew Levin on X, and he answered every one of them.

Boosting Banwave

Riot Bans 296,416 Accounts for Boosting, Trick2g Asks Drew Levin for Help

September 18, 2026

Riot banned 296,416 accounts for boosting. On September 17 its own account posted the number: "296,416 rent-a-rank customers served and counting." Then the people it caught went to find Drew Levin on X, and he answered every one of them.

Levin is League's Director of Product. He handles this himself, in public, at two in the morning. Here are the exchanges, in order, in their own words.

Trick2g and the Challenger in Gold

September 18, overnight.

Trick2g @Trick2g

Brother Drew we need help @drewlevin

Drew Levin @drewlevin, Riot Games, 1:36 AM ET, 316,100 views, 283 likes

brother you're telling me some master+ players hopped on alts amd boosted your homeboy from like gold or whatever until he hit emerald
that is basically the definition of boosting, I hate to break it to you

Trick2g @Trick2g, 1:57 AM ET, 107,900 views, 3,300 likes

The reason we had to hop accounts is because our homeboy alicopter got placed into gold, despite him being currently 2K LP challenger. We did not hop accounts to boost him, we hopped accounts to be able to play with him.

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 2:07 AM ET, 17,800 views

do you think I know anything about the details of this beyond precisely what I've been told

Trick2g's reply got 3,300 likes against Levin's 283, on a third of the reach.

The player who lost a month of climbing

September 15. MASTOS is a French streamer who had his LP reset after duoing with someone whose account turned out not to be hand-leveled.

MASTOS @Moustillon02, 3:21 PM ET, 99,000 views, 1,300 likes

So we just unbanned someone that genuinely asked Drew if she can get her BOUGHT account that was banned 5 years ago unbanned and THEY UNBANNED IT
But I duo with someone that I didnt know that his account wasnt handleveled only 30 games and we not reverting my lp reset @drewlevin

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 4:53 PM ET, 385 views

1. It's a dude you genius
2. It's his main, which we said we wouldn't ban and banned inadvertently, this is us making a correction so we are following our policy
3. We followed our policy in your situation.

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 4:59 PM ET, 20,100 views, 90 likes answering a follow-up about the 30 games

do you understand how unenforceable our boosting detections would be if "oh i didn't know the person i duoed with was on an illegitimate account" was a get out of jail free card?

MASTOS @Moustillon02, 5,439 views, 59 likes

Please Drew can we have a call ?

MASTOS @Moustillon02, 7:43 PM ET, 7,631 views, 63 likes

With this season you need 1K8 for GM and 2K3 for chall, It took me an ENTIRE month of full tryhard to handleveled the account and 200 games with 65% wr to get to 1K4 lp, I refused to go to holidays or to studentjob just for this, for my goals and carreer.

MASTOS @Moustillon02, September 16, 3:53 AM ET, 977 views

We were supposed to duo till master but then my duo and me had bad shedules togheter and so i decided to keep it solo

"If I have to polygraph for non readily available info then just remove the Que"

September 15. WeaksideWarrior's post is the one the whole ladder shared: 70,600 views, 2,000 likes, 55 reposts.

WeaksideWarrior @Slightsz, 4:18 PM ET, 70,600 views, 2,000 likes

Remove DuoQ for all ranks @drewlevin or roll back this decision making
Duoq is too risky if I have to ensure my partner is not on a purchased account, he could also lie and I get permad
If I have to polygraph for non readily available info then just fucking remove the Que atp

WeaksideWarrior @Slightsz, 5:32 PM ET, 18,700 views, 371 likes

But all the same how is this justification for any type of suspension at all? Please explain that to me because any ban for this seems unjustifiable. Simply duoqing with a purchased account, to which you can't reliably know is purchased?

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 5:47 PM ET, 4,861 views

because "i didn't know" is perhaps the simplest excuse imaginable, and if we unbanned for that then we should just stop combatting boosting altogether, which we won't do.
bad actors will always look for loopholes like this.

The couple who duo together

September 15, starting at 1:31 AM. Both players are Master. Account names are left out here.

Finkypop @Finkypopp, 1:31 AM ET, 7,274 views

Drew, I just want to clarify everything in one reply because I think I made it confusing with multiple responses. [My husband's account] is my husband's account. He did not buy it. He has owned and played on it for years. He's a Master-level player, and I'm normally Master as well. When we duo, we're two similarly ranked players playing together on our respective accounts. [The other account] is completely separate. I purchased that account myself and used it as my own, mostly playing solo. But my husband did not purchase that account to duo with or boost me.

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 2:18 AM ET, 211 views

You reached out to me claiming that you played only on your own account. That was false. You and your husband both purchased accounts and used them to duo with each other. They've both been banned and you've both been issued suspensions correctly. Please don't buy accounts.

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 2:19 AM ET, 176 views

The account you've admitted to having purchased and [a third account] (not mentioned but also purchased) are illegitimate transfers. Your main account bans are meant to dissuade you from continuing this behavior.

Finkypop @Finkypopp, 2:39 AM ET, 7,468 views

I bought that account, I understand now that I shouldn't have, and I won't buy accounts again. I'm not asking you to restore that account. I think what threw me off is that the suspension on my main came through as ranked manipulation/boosting. I've played this game since Season 3 and I've never paid someone to boost me or intentionally manipulated my rank. My husband and I have played League together basically since we met and have duoed for years. We just love playing together. I've had my main for over a decade and it means a lot to me.

Drew Levin @drewlevin, 2:45 AM ET

Totally understand. To clarify, the contention is that - as the system - you and your husband were boosting the accounts you acquired, not that your main accounts are boosted. To the best of my knowledge, your main account rank has not been altered. The penalty is there as a first strike, and I have every confidence that it won't be consequential in any way beyond the next two days.

Finkypop @Finkypopp, 2:52 AM ET, 1,749 views

Thanks for clarifying, Drew. I misunderstood the notice as saying our mains were boosted. I understand now it concerns the acquired accounts. I shouldn't have bought [that account] and won't buy or use transferred accounts again. I appreciate you taking the time.

The rest of the night

Levin said the same thing to players with no audience at all.

Drew Levin September 17, 5:04 PM ET to a player who said the account was only leveled by different people

you boosted Omar's account, it's not your account

Drew Levin September 17, 10:25 PM ET to a Master player who said he felt awful for getting his friends permabanned

They got boosted three times. A permaban is what happens the third time that happens.

Drew Levin September 17, 10:30 PM ET

Did you not think to question why you both kept getting banned and rank reset?

Drew Levin September 17, 4:09 AM ET to a player asking for one last look at an old ban

We don't reopen old bans as a matter of policy. That would open the door to an overwhelming amount of work that would be impossible to allocate limited resources against fairly, while depriving current players of that same player support resourcing.

Drew Levin September 16, 11:32 AM ET, 467 views asked whether only the boosted games get wiped

that is exactly how it works - we reset ranked state to where it was at the start of the boost

Trainwrecks got clipped for his friends list

He said his rank was rolled back the day after the announcement, after queuing with Tyler1, Trick2g and Yassuo.

Trainwrecks on stream

I just don't understand how this is possible. We're playing on Stream, we're just playing to play.

Trainwrecks on stream

It's not my fault they're all pro League players.

Riot calls that hitchhiking: riding in a party with someone whose rank is being built for them. It gets penalized like boosting does.

Matt Leung-Harrison @RiotPhroxzon, lead gameplay designer, September 18, 12:23 AM ET, 2,553 views

The war on boosters, cheaters, hitchhikers and derankers is and will continue to be one of the major focuses for League.

What the bans do

A permaban isn't the only outcome here. Riot rolls rank back, strips rewards, suspends, or removes the account outright.

Outcome	Who gets it
Rank reset	Ranked state reverted to where it sat before the boost began
Rewards stripped	Season rewards pulled for the affected account
Suspension	Starts at three days, scales up for repeats
Permanent ban	Purchased accounts, accounts with no legitimate owner, repeat boostees

Riot says the system isn't running at full capacity yet, so 296,416 is not the final number.

RiotZac summarized it best

Drew Levin may not have said it directly, but he definitely implied it.

"If you don't perform a background check on your friend's account before playing league together, you will both be permanently banned."

@RiotZac, parody account