An Elegant Solution to the Botting Problem
Add in a setting, "Block Friends Requests from Low Level Accounts." It's checked by default. Riot can decide what "Low Level" means, depending on how strict they need to be to stop the botting. If you have a low level account and you send a request to someone with this box checked, you get a popup saying that you need to be a higher level, or they need to un-check that box.
https://i.imgur.com/UWgzUfK.png
If you know the person you want to add IRL or have another way to communicate with them, that's really easy to do, so this isn't a hassle. Uncheck the box, accept the request, re-check the box.
The other time that people often add friends is in the post-game screen, when you've enjoyed playing with someone. It might be possible to leave this in place. After all, bots advertising elo boosting aren't targeting the low-level players they'd be playing with, and can be banned long before they overcome the level restriction. I also suspect it wouldn't be good for an elo boosting service's reputation to advertise to right after ruining someone's game with a bot.
However, if bots do end up sending requests to low-level players in the post-game lobby, we could use the following: https://i.imgur.com/lQAiPvi.png
Panth and Nid have sent me friend requests. Their friend request icons have lit up green (fancy animation!) and there's a button at the bottom showing me how many I have from that game. I can accept the request by either clicking on the green icon OR the button at the bottom (that will open a popup with the choice to accept).
The beauty of this system is that you still get a clear notification that someone wants to add you as a friend, but you don't have to manually dismiss it if it's a bot.
